Lincoln Story Book, The

<h3>"I RECKON I TOOK MORE THAN MY SHARE."</h3> <p>Lincoln confessed at the outset of life that he was going to avoid society, as its frequentation was incompatible with study. He avowed at the same time that he liked it, which enhanced the sacrifice. No doubt so, since his Washington sojourn and his legal and legislative company earned him the title of the prince of good fellows. To be coupled with the genial Martin van Buren with the same epithet was, indeed, a compliment.</p> <p>At Washington he had, in 1848, made acquaintance with the fashionable world. He preferred the livelier and less strait ways of the Congressional boarding-house table, the Saturday parties at Daniel Webster's, and the motley crowd at the bowling-alley, as well as the chatterers' corner in the Congressional post-office. Still, as chairman of a committee, and by reason of his being a wonder from the hirsute West, he was invited to the receptions and feasts of the first families. Green to the niceties of the table, he committed errors--so frankly apologized for and humorously treated that he lost no standing.</p> <p>At one dinner the experience was new to him of the dish of currant jelly being passed around for each guest to transfer a little to his plate. So he took it as a sweet, oddly accompanying the venison, and left but little on the general plate. But after tasting it, he perceived that the compote-dish was going the rounds, and suddenly looking pointedly at his plate and then at the hostess, with a troubled air, he said, with convincing simplicity:</p> <p>"It looks as though I took more than my share."--(Supplied by the hostess, and collected by J. R. Speed.) <br/> <br/> <br/></p> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />