The senator laughed over this figure of a “carcass” carried off by birds of prey; and the President went on,—

“I have made up my mind to make very few changes in the offices in my gift for my second term. I think now that I will not remove a single man, except for delinquency. To remove a man is very easy, but when I go to fill his place, there are twenty applicants, and of these I must make nineteen enemies.”

Senator Clark endorsed these sentiments as belonging to true statesmanship, and hoped that the President would be able to reduce his theory to practice. The latter closed the interview with the following rather sharp remark,—

“Sitting here, where all the avenues to public patronage seem to come together in a knot, it does seem to me that our people are fast approaching the point where it can be said that seven-eighths of them are trying to find how to live at the expense of the other eighth.”

Three weeks after Mr. Lincoln entered upon his second term of office, he went to City Point, partly to recruit his wasted energies, and partly to be near the base of military operations now hastening to a crisis. The “boys in blue” greeted him with an enthusiasm that showed their strong love for the man.

A grand review had been arranged for the twenty-fifth of March, in honour of the President; but General Lee attacked and captured Fort Stedman, on that morning, requiring a hard-fought battle, instead of a review, to drive out his forces—a feat that was triumphantly accomplished within a few hours. President Lincoln visited the field of carnage soon after the battle, and, on hearing regrets expressed that the grand review did not occur, he said,—

“This victory is better than any review.”

Immediately a council of war was held at City Point, attended by the President and Generals Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, Meade, and Ord; and it was followed by those three memorable days of battle, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, sealing the doom of Richmond.

Mr. Lincoln remained at City Point, receiving dispatches from the front and forwarding them to Washington. His first dispatch to the Secretary of War on Saturday was—

“Hard fighting this morning, and our forces repulsed.”

A few hours later, he telegraphed—

“The ground lost has been retaken.”

On Sunday morning his dispatch was—

“The triumphant success of our armies, after two days of hard fighting, during which the forces on both sides displayed unsurpassed valour.”

In the afternoon he telegraphed—

“General Grant has taken twelve thousand prisoners and fifty pieces of artillery.”

On Monday morning he telegraphed—

“Richmond has fallen!”

Later, his dispatch to Secretary Stanton read—

“I am about to enter Richmond!”