I will try his wife. I will try Emma.
No, I won't give it up yet. I will go there this evening, and see what
can be done. But if I find that--'
The rest of the sentence was inaudible.
HOW MR. LINCOLN BECAME AN ABOLITIONIST.
Perhaps, Messrs. Editors, you may recall
A story you published some time in the fall,--
I think 'twas October--your files will declare,--
Bearing the title of 'Tom Johnson's Bear.'
* * * * *
Well, the story since that time has grown somewhat bigger,
And has something to say about holding the 'nigger;'
And something, likewise, about letting him go,
The which I've no purpose at present to show:
To wit, how a woodman, a kind-hearted neighbor,
Returning at night from his rail-splitting labor,
Found poor Mistress Johnson forlorn and distressed,
In that perilous posture still holding the beast;
And how she besought the kind gentleman's help,
And how he'd have nothing to do with the whelp;
And how he and Johnson soon got by the ears,
And fought on the question of 'freedom for bears;'
And how, _inter alia_, the beast got away
And took himself off in the midst of the fray;
And how Tommy Johnson at last came to grief:
All which I omit, as I wish to be brief.
The story's too lengthy--it must not be sent all
To cumber your pages, my dear CONTINENTAL.
At present my purpose, my object, my mission is
To show how the woodman became 'Abolitionist.
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