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Show LINCOLN'S PLUG HAT. A VERITABLE "JOINT OF STOVEPIPE" WITH ROMANTIC BRIM. It Served aa s Tile Back and at One Time Wa the Postofllco of New Salem Iti Liveliest Experience Was Whea It Serrad m a Football For Ladle. There are enough of funny incidents reported of Mr. Lincoln's hat to make it "fabled in song and illumined In story." For example, it served as a football on the night of his election tc the presidency, when the ladles at the old homestead testified their glee ovei his good fortune. The scene would hava done credit to the great game between Yale and Princeton on Manhattan field. This is the story as told by an eyewit- "A few of us ladies went over and helped Mrs. Lincoln prepare a little supper sup-per for the friends of Mr. Lincoln, who had been invited in to hear the returns. Every half hour or so we would pass ! around coffee and cakes. About I o'clock in the morning enough had been learned to warrant the beliefthat the rail splitter split-ter had been elected. I think it wa when we heard the news from New York. The men rushed on Mr. Lincoln and shook his bands, while some of the women actually hugged him, and I might as well admit it I kissed him. "Then some one went into the hall and took from the rack the old silk hat that he wore, and which was as long aa a joint of stovepipe and about as shapely shape-ly to my mind, and it was thrown up to the ceiling. As it came down some one gave it a kick, and then the women joined in the fun, and we played football foot-ball with that hat until it was an indistinguishable indis-tinguishable mass. We were simply beyond be-yond control. What a ridiculous scene it would have been to one looking :d without knowing what prompted it! "It was all the more so, so far as I was concerned, for originally I had been a Seward woman. While the convention conven-tion was in session in Chicago we were waiting to hear the news. It had been arranged in case Lincoln received the nomination to fire a cannon. My nearest near-est neighbor was a Mrs. Dubois, with whom I had several friendly spats dur-ir.g dur-ir.g the campaign preceding the nomination. nomi-nation. I heard the cannon shot, and the next moment I saw Mrs. Dubois running across the street. She had been making a shirt for her husband, who was about the size of the late Judge David Da-vid Davis, so you may have some idea of the size of the garment Bhe was waving. wav-ing. She rushed into the house and flaunted it in my face. It made me mad, and I sat down and began crying. The good woman put her arms around me, begged my pardon and kissed me, and from that time we were Lincoln women. She took part in the football match." . . As if not contenjfith his 6 feet 4 or 5 inches cf gaunt sUture, Lincoln bad his now bi8toriii-lijVmade fnlly a foot high, wth a iliialrlioot-ob big as a southern sombTero." It seemed to have been a combination of all styles then in existence, and in this respect it reflected his own early experience in having been a storekeeper, soldier, surveyor and finally a solicitor. It was a veritable "joint of stovepipe," and its remarkable remarka-ble and romantic brim made it alike serviceable in rain or shine. It might have been called with propriety a "plug ugly," after the name cf the mob in Baltimore that threatened him in his journey to the capital. During Lincoln's great debate with Douglas the hat fairly looned into Bpace, The Bmallness of the latter's stature caused him to be nicknamed "The Little Giant," and when Lincoln stood beside him with his hat on the difference between the two seemed all but immeasurable. Curiously enough, when Mr.. Lincoln came to be inaugurated inaugu-rated at Washington and took off his hat on the stand preparatory to making his inaugural address Douglas held the high hat so that no careless person might put his foot in it. Representative Springer, who hails from Lincoln's old home, knew the hat well, and in Bpeakingof it recently said: "Mr. Lincoln's high hat was the most indispensable thing of his whole outfit. In it he carried all his valuable papers. In fact, it was a sort of file rack. Here weie all the briefs of his various law cases, Curiouely enough, he carried the accounts in his bead, and that is why he lost so much money. Had here-versed here-versed the process and kept his accounts in his hat and the cases in his head, he would have been better off. His hat served for his satchel on a journey, and all that was needed besides this were his saddlebags and his horse. It was large and capacious, and a great many documents an4 data could be crowded into it without seriously discommoding the wearer." But Mr. Lincoln had still a better use for his valuable tile, which seem3 to have had more virtues thrn those rehearsed re-hearsed in the nursery tale of "Jack and the Beanstalk." When he was postmaster post-master at New Salem, his hat became a most important part of his office equipment. equip-ment. As soon as the mail was received each day the young postmaster would put the letters in his hat and take a stroll through the village. The villagers villa-gers knew that he was a peripatetic postoffice, and of course everybody was anxious to know the contents of the hat, which seemed to promise as much to them as a hat in the hands of a sleight of hand performer. Washington Cor. St. Louis Republic. m |