973.7L63 E4K53b lKTCKLEY, BETSEY^ pseud Behind the seams; woman who took in Mrs. Lincoln and by a nigger work from Irs . Davis . . LINCOLN ROOM UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY MEMORIAL the Class of 1901 founded by HARLAN HOYT HORNER and HENRIETTA CALHOUN HORNER BEHIND THE SEAMS; BY A NIC? ( J EU "WOMAN WHO TOOK IN WORK FROM Mrs. Lincoln and, Mrs. Davis. PHICE TEN CENTS. NEW YORK : The National News Company, 21 & 23 Ann Street. 1868. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2012 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://archive.org/details/behindseamsbynigOOotto Edition limited to 200 numbered copies. This is No.±_L_ PREFATORY NOTE In 1868 G. W. Carleton and Company of New York, N. Y., pub- lished a book called Behind The Scenes or Thirty Years A Slave , And Four Years In The White House . The supposed author was Elizabeth Keckley or Kickley, a negro seamstress who was "for- merly a slave, but more recently modiste, and friend to Mrs. Abraham Lincoln. " The reading public was somewhat surprised that a negro dress- maker could write (not sew) in such an easy-flowing style, and at the same time they were greatly shocked at what had occurred "behind the scenes" in the White House. The incredulous said that there was no such person as Lizzie (sometimes called Betsey) Keckley. Some readers claimed that the abolitionist sob-sister Jane Swisshelm invented her purely for literary purposes. At the same time Hamilton Busbey was said to be the ghost-writer of the Carleton publication, however, inquiring literary investigators laid the blame on one Jim Redpath. Even Mr. D. Ottolengul, a gentleman in New York State litera- ry circles questioned the authorship of the sensational book. A few months after the so-called Keckley study appeared Mr. Ottolengul published an odd little tract called Behind The Seams by Betsey Kickley (sometimes called Keckley). Immediate- ly emotional and sentimental literary critics branded the mod- est essay to be a satirical parady a lampoon edition of the more comprehensive work. Poor Lizzie (sometimes called Betsey) who was actually a real person had her name Kickley (sometimes called Keckley) on the title pages of both publications, and she had to take the credit for everything contained between the "lids" (sic). Un- fortunately these theses did not help Mrs. Lincoln to be better understood by the public, which was the original intention of the author (anonymous). The text of Behind the Scenes was not so obnoxious to Republicans and friends of the former White House mistress, but the appendix of the book pertaining large- ly to the sale of old clothes most certainly should have been removed. Its publication caused young Mr. Robert Lincoln to go on a book suppressing spree, which proved good practice for a similar task in 1889. Behind The Scenes is to be found on the shelves of practi- cally every Lincoln library, however, Mr. Ottolengul' s pamph- let Behind The Seams is a much sought after i-t-e-m. I can recall only one having been offered for sale in the last sev- eral decades. Even degreed scholars, who record the glories of Lincoln in general and their own glories in particular, have been deprived of this unique dissertation. Advanced collectors who boast of the selected works in their li- braries (they do not have the patience to get everything on the subject) would give their upper dentures for an original copy. How gleefully they would display the item in the ori- ginal (if they had one) to their collector f iends. How the ownership of such a rarity would stimulate their possessive instincts. Likewise they would read Mr. Ottolengul' s copy- righted essay (author unknown) with more than usual interest, because, Behind the Seams has a certain literary quality not found in the average mine run of printed tracts. Naturally, all conservative scholars might be expected to condemn the author (anonymous), but they would carefully preserve the fas- cinating little literary gem in their fire-proof vaults. I do not feel that any apologies should be offered for the publication of this reprint. I truly believe that I have made a contribution as well as being one to follow a trend which at the present time seems to have been taken up by the literary- historical field - namely: bringing forth in a new format belle-lettres that were long ago printed and published, but at this late date practically obliterated. Within the last few years, since William Abbott's excesses (The Magazine of His- tory) such fine items as Peek' s Lincoln Catechism and the "reasonably priced" preprint of Heartman' s Defense of a Lincoln Conspirator (Sam Arnold) have made their appearance. Just recently The Diary Of A Public Man (Only $10.00 a copy) has been reprinted with a scholarly "foreword" and "prefatory' notes" by such worthies as C. Sandberg and L. Bullard. The reader will immediately note a similarity between the Diary and' the Seams, because, in both cases the author is anonymous (unknown) . It is my belief that Lincoln collectors will welcome this publication as a significant addition (they will never get the original) to their libraries and will be grateful for this labor of love which has prompted me to bring this long sought for study to the attention of the licerari, to say nothing of the task of writing this "prefatory note". A. Lincoln Fann April 1, 1945 BEHIND THE SEAMS; ■BY 1 i> V Nr("J(JEU*BOMAN WHO TOOK IN WORK FROM Mrs. Lincoln and, Mrs. Davis. .PItlCE TEN CENTS. NEW YORK : The National News Company, 21 & 23 Ann Street. 1868. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the Year 1808, by D. Ottolengul, in the Clerk'a Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Southern ** District of New York. m 7i £3 V P R E F A O E Stop V name is Betsey Kickley, and I am a most extraordinary nigger. Vs this is the case, ami as a large number of people who know me pMiave often requested me to write my life for the benefit of a larger @^numlier ol' jwople who do not know me, and also lor my own ben- efit in a iH'euniary point of view, as I am hard tip, and the pension oi' eight dollars per month allowed me by ungrateful Unelc Sam, does not sufliee to pay my board, even. in the plain little room (m the fourth floor of No. 14 Carroll Flair, I am going to try an experiment and see if I can't make' more money by writing a hook than by taking in sewing. I had proposed to call my work — I don't mean my sewing work— 1 mean my book — "The Confes- sions of a Nigger," but, on second thoughts, I infilled it/'IJelund the Seams," asl not only intend to speak of the dresses I made for my " bosom friend,' Mrs. Lincoln, and my not. quite so nosom friends, Mrs. Davis, Mrs. Douglas, and so forth, but of what took place behind the seams of those dresses, that is to say, of all they said and did together with a great deal that they did not say and did not do. I am a romantic nigger, and, although I was a slave for thirty years, I do not blame the Southern people, nor hold them responsible. I only blame the God of nature and the fathers who framed the Constitution for the United States. I forgive them, too, however, as I am all right now, having been transformed from a nigger slave who took in sewing in the South, into a free mgger writing a book in the North that is destined to set on fire all of the big rivers and little streams in the United" States. People may blame me for going it rather strong in writing about the pri- vate affairs of my bosom friend, Mrs. Lincoln, but it is not my fault, she invited public criticism, and why shall not her bosom friend, though a nig- ger, criticise her actions and defend them at the same time? If I have betrayed confidence in anything I have published, I do it for Mrs. Lincoln's sake as well as my own. I desire it to be distinctly understood that. I wish to defend my own character as well as that of my bosom friend. I am an independent nigger and its no body's business what I write, so I made up my mind that if I could find a publisher who would' engineer my book, I'd try the thing on as I used to do with Mrs. Lincoln's dresses. As a modiste, I liave always succeeded in dressing my bosom friend to her satisfaction, and now I modestly assert that in this work she is " dressed up" better than ever. It is a kind of low neck and short sleeve affair, like the dresses Mrs. Lincoln pre- fers, and if it shows a little too much I cannot help it. her BETSEY x KICKLEY, (nigger.) mark. 14 Carroll Place, New York, March 14. 1868. BEHIND THE SEAMS. V life, has been an eyonfiiil one for anigger, and an ex- G -l\ r C s * ilV( '- * was norn Jl M ^ff cr im( t slave. My parents "T^^were slaves ami niggers, and I came upon earth done up brown, that is to say a dark mulatto. 1 am a Virginia nig- ger and was born in Dinwiddie Court House. I distinctly re- member the time when I was a baby, though I am now on the wrong side of forty. I live, as 1 have said in the preface, iu a plain little room ou the fourth lloor of No. 14 Carroll Place, and as 1 have no money to pay for going to places of amusement, I have a panorama in my room, and whilst my brain is busy and I have no sewing nor book writing to do, 1 look at the pano- rama. It is a line picture, drawn in my mind's eye, Horatio, painted from memory by a nigger artist. The nigger artist is myself, signed and sworn to by Betsey Kick ley, her mark. 1 used to belong to Col. Bruneil, who had a wife and baby; the baby was named Betsey, after me, and I used to wash and dress it and dry nurse it. I was a stupid nigger when young, though I have since turned out to be a great authoress, and one day when I had upset the baby on the floor, I picked it up with the fire-shovel, for which piece of stupidity I received my first lambasting, which made quite an impression on me in more senses than one. I was told when I was fourteen years old that I would never be worth my salt, and the thing did look rather probable at the time. My mother belonged to the Colonel who owned me. My father was some one else's nigger, and came to see us twice a year. The Colonel borrowed or hired my old man, however, and he came to live with us, but all of a sudden he was sent back to his master and shipped off to the West. My father kissed us all round several times, and then packed up his traps and vamoused. We never saw him any more, but entertain confident expectations of meeting *< the old un" sooner or later on the other side of Jawdam. My mother cried a great deal when the ll old un " (I'm quoting my bosom friend Dickens) cried a great deal, I say, when the "old un" left, whereupon my mistress told her not to make a fool of herself, quoted the song u a nigger is a nigger," added that one nigger man was as good as another if not better, and advised her to look out for a substitute. My father and mother >vrote letters Behind the Seams. 7 to each other : the old man's letters particularly were very fine specimens of epistolary literature, except that there was a spell upon him and the spells were horrible. My father scorned to follow the book, but had a system of orthography of his own invention. When I was seven years old L attended the fust nigger sale I have ever seen. A little nigger boy, whose mother was a cook, was put up and then knocked down to the highest bidder, and the cook got a warming up because she cried when her child was taken from her. My uncle, as line a looking nig- ger man as was ever seen, hanged himself one day rather than run the risk of getting a paddling he had reason to expect. When I was eighteen years old and was a tine looking nig- ger girl and well developed, a school master named Maugham, -came up to me one day and for no reason in the world remarked that he wanted to polish me off a little. »< Polish me off, Mr. Bangham ! What for T "Xo matter , v he replied, u just for a little exercise. " He then told me to take down my dress, which I blushingly refused to do, for you must remember that I was no chicken, i and was uncommonly well developed. L also remarked, that should he try to polish me off, L would show tight. As he was not my master, 1 would not let him whip me, and as I was not his mistress, I would not appear before him in low neck and short sleeves costume. I added that should he attempt force L would show light. We fought, lie was very strong and gained the victory. lie bound my hands with a stout cord, tore my dress from my back, and tore my back with a cow-hide, lie beat me most unmercifully, and 1 hero pronounce him a cowardly good for nothing, mean, cruel villain. 1 appealed to my master, and showed him how l>angham had peeled the skin off my back. 1 asked him what I had done to be so pun- ished, and he told me to go away and not bother him. I did "bother him, however, and asked for satisfaction, which I got in a cheerful style, for his only reply was by knocking me down with a chair. I desire to be distinctly understood that this inci- dent did really take place exactly as I have- related it. Mr. Bangham,who was not my master, beat me thus cruelly, simply for exercise, or what is worse, for fun. These things happen often in the South. I am telling the truth and not drawing the long bow by any manner of means. I'm not lying at all. Bang- ham was not satisfied with this polishing off that he adminis- tered to me on Saturday ; but, was so pleased with the per- formance, that on the Friday following he sent for me to come to his study and take another lesson . I went like a fool and found him ready with a cowhide and rope. We fought again,. 8 Behind the Seams. and I boat him worse than David Coppcrlield beat Mr. Murd- stone, but 1 caught it though, and went home bleeding and much cut up. On the fallowing Thursday the third whipping matinee came oil', and Mr. Ihiugham thrashed me again, and then, felt sorry, burst into tears, asked my forgiveness, declared that he regretted the last unkindest cut of all, and at once be- came my bosom friend. Bangham having thus withdrawn from the matinee performances, my master, who was a parson, was prevailed upon by my mistress, who was a tartar, to enact the nigger whipping role himself, and he made his debut armed with an oak broom handle. I fought him, but came out second best, and lie performed on me with the broom handle ill such an artistic style, that my mistress, herself, was moved to tears and very handsomely interceded in my behalf. I come now to a little transaction that, had I been a white woman, I might have blushed to chronicle, but being a nigger, 1 can not get up a blush to suit, and so shall relate it without any mauvaise honte. I was, as J have before remarked, a hand- some nigger, and well developed. My beauty and my develop- ments attracted the attention of a white man, who fell in love with me at first sight and asked me — that is to say, did not ask me to marry him. lie vowed that he adored me, and would marry me without ceremony were I not a nigger, but as I teas a nigger, though a fascinating one, he proposed still to marry me without any ceremony, or in other words without any mar- riage ceremony being performed. T was virtuous and modest, like C;osar\s wile, and refused him, but he bothered me with his attentions for lour years, when 1 struck my colors, and capitulated. The result of the capitulation was that I — I — I — I — I — I — became a mother. A tine mulatto baby was the result of my surrender at indiscretion. I have never had any other child but this mulatto boy. The years passed and brought me many changes, but not many changes of clothes, and I went to St. Louis with Mr. Gar- land and his wife, "Miss Ann," oneof my old master's daughters. Mr. Garland was so poor that there was a letter advertised for him once and he could not raise three cents to pay the postage with. It was proposed to put my old mother out to work and make her pay wages. I said, "No! no! no! a thousand million times no P and agreed to do sewing enough to support the family. I began to sew, and I did more than so-su, for with my needle I kept bread and biscuits in the mouths of seven- teen persons, for two years and five months. Thus it was that I became a modiste, though I could hardly be called modest any longer, on account of that sans ceremonie marriage, and Behind the Scams. 9 e little nigger baby wlro was not acquainted with its paternal progenitor. Whilst I was feeding those seventeen white people, I thought of the remark about the salt making, and laughed. My lips curled with a bitter sneer, ami 1 showed my teeth and gums, and snickered in a sardine ie — 1 mean sardonic manner. Whilst 1 was snickering, a nigger man, named Kickley, came into the room and fell in love with me immediately. lie asked me to marry him, did not mind the tfanx'crmHonle all'air, nor the baby, and was ready to give me his hand and heart. 1 refused him at first, on the ground that when people get married there is a possibility of there being some result of the manuMivre, as my bosom friend, Tony Weller-says, and 1 did not care to have nigger children who would not be burn free and equal, consti- tutionally speaking. It was bad enough to have one son already who was a half nigger and whole slave, lint 1 married Kickley, nevertheless, after a while, and determined to take the chances. Having lived in the South so long, and becoming imbued with the idea that nigger property would pay handsomely, 1 pro- posed to become a slave owner and so wanted to buy a couple of niggers from Mr. Garland. I ottered him twelve hundred dollars for my son and myself, and felt that I then would have a legal right to call the former my own. My master, Mr. Gar- land, who afterwards sold me to myself, gave me away to Kick- ley — so I was given away and Kickley was sold. .My nigger husband, finding himself badly sold in his second-hand wife, took to drinking liquor and playing seven-up, and turned out to be a humbug, and a good for nothing. He was a liar besides, for he had told me he was a free nigger, and I found out, in short order, that he was a slave to a white man, besides being a slave to forty-yard whiskey.. I lived with him eight years, and then became so horribly disgusted with the nigger, that I— but ■" a wink is as good as a horse to a blind nod," so let charity wrap him up warm in an overcoat of silence. When I separated from Kickley, after putting the overcoat upon him, I planked up the twelve hundred for my boy and self and became a nig- ger owner. I did not have the spondulix myself, and proposed to go on to New York to raise it ; but Mrs. Le Bourgois, a nice, good lady, for whom I used to sew, told me that I'd get it in New York in four extra sized brass French horns, and very kindly forked over a large amount herself, and made up the balance among the ladies in St. Louis, from whom I took in work. It was all light, I was A FREE NIGGER ! ! My son and myself were free. 10 Ilehhul the Scams. A IKLE XKilJKIM!! What a big thing on a skating pond. A FUKK NUJC.EK! The earth wove a blighter look, and the stars sang Yankee Doodle. A VllKK NIGGK1M!! Itnlly for mo, and bully for you, and thrice bully for the dear good lady who made me so. Heaven bless this good Southern lady. I love her, and I love the, South for her sake ; ami so I shall not be ungrateful, and I never shall write a book full of no-sneh-things about the Southern people, and how they used to whin us poor slaves only for exercise, like Bangham did, as I have before related. 1 took in work from the best ladies in St. Louis, and they were all pleased with the dresses that I put upon them, though some objected to the airs I put upon myself. .I'll take the overcoat oil' my husband, for a moment, just to state that he used to spree so much on some of the money I made in St. Louis, that I determined to leave the drunken nigger and St. Louis at the .same time, and I carried out my resolution and carried oil* myself. I went to Baltimore in a nigger ear, and then on to "\\ ashing- ton. In Washington I was at once called on by Mrs. Jefferson Davis, who hid heard that L was a dress-maker, and modest. Old Jeff was a senator at the time, but he and his wife could appreciate genius and intellect, even in a nigger woman, and so 1 not only did Mrs. Davis' sewing, but took tea with herself and tie If, and tiiey told me in advance all about secession and the coming war, and so forth. Mrs. Davis wanted to give J eft" a night gown as a Christmas present, and got me to make it for hei' and for him. .Air. Davis toand me sitting up late one night, hard at work on tin 4 night-shirt, ami very kindly told me to turn in and go to bed. lint I finished the night-shirt exactly as the clock struck twelve, and consequently there is not the slightest shadow of a doubt that the President of the Confederate States wore this night-gown many a time- at the same hour. Mrs. Davis told me, behind the seams, that she would rather be kicked about in Washington than go South to be Mi s. President. Was it not curious that she should make this remark so long before the war, and don't it look very much like lying on my part when 1 say that she did ? Bat I am not draw- ing it strong at all ; it's all the blessed truth. Mrs. Davis told me. behind the seams, that a war was corning, and asked m? to ^o South with her, forgetting, it seems, the remark about tli.' kicking. I refused to go with Mrs. Davis, so bade her good-bye ; first making her a chintz wrapper, which I afterwards saw done in Behind the Seams. 11 wax on n figure of .leff that I saw in ISO,"), at a nigger lair in Chicago. I believe it now is pretty well established that Mr. Davis had on a wnter-jflroof cloak instead of a dress, as at first reported, when he was captured ; yet, on the honor of a nigger, I assure yon 1 don't lie about that wrapper, which I suppose somebody must have bagged out of Sirs. Davis 1 trunk. This will do for the Davis family. 1 come now to my first introduc- tion to my bosom friend^ Sirs. Abraham Lincoln, wife of the President of the United States, and the dearest friend of Bet- sey Kickley, y, her mark. I became acquainted with Mrs. Lincoln as follows : One day she had upset a cup of coffee on her dress, and so had nothing to wear on the evening of the reception after her husband's inauguration. Mrs. MeOlcnn, for whom \ worked, was asked the name of her dress-maker, and, of course, replied, II Betsey Kickley.*' " Betsey Kickley ?" said Mrs. L., "Betsey who used to hang out in St. Louis V " The same,*' said Mrs. MeC. " Enough said," replied Mrs. L., ''send her to me, I think I shall engage her.'' So T went to the White House and became acquainted with the distinguished lady, who, when all the world and its wife abandoned her, found a true and only friend in Betsey Kickley, nigger, x her mark. It was on Tuesday morning, alter breakfast, that four mantua-makers crossed the threshold of the White House, and were shown into a waiting room, where they awaited the sum- mons of Mrs. Lincoln. I, Betsey Kickley, nigger, was one of those four. The three other applicants were sent for, one by one, and each one was dismissed with a flea in her ear. I was then sent for, and went. Mrs. Lincoln at once took a fancy to me, embraced me, and kissed me affectionately. " Mrs. Kickley, who have you worked for in the city," said Mrs. L. in bad grammar. " I have done work for Mrs. Jeff Davis," said I. %t Good egg, then," replied Mrs. Lincoln, u I engage you, pro- vided, however, you don't charge too much." '• I work for nigger pay," said I. " Enough said," rejoined Mrs. Lincoln, " I engage you to make up my moire-antique for the reception, but be sure you have it done in time." I had it done in plenty time, but Mrs. Lincoln, when I took the dress to her, kicked up a big fuss, and declared she would not have time to fix herself up, I told her that a nigger could 12 Behind the Seams. do it, and that I would dress her, which I did at once. Mr. Lincoln then came in and complimented both myself and his wile, who then took his arm and walked down stairs like a queen of trumps. From this time I became a regularly modest nigger, and did all Mrs. Lincoln's sewing. I also worked for Mrs. Senator Douglas, one of the loveliest ladies that I ever met, not even excepting myself. I soon became, a bosom friend of Mrs. Lincoln, and every- _ body knew that I was her confidante. One day a woman, who was not a lady, came to me to order a dress, and the following conversation took place: — Woman who was not a lady, — Mrs. Kickley, do you know Mrs. Lincoln ? Xhjyvr who was. — 1 do. Woman. — Are you modest ? Xifigev, — You may bet your pile. Woman. — Are you intimate with Mrs. L.I Xigger. — I'm with her all the time. Woman. — Have you any influence with her? Xiffficr. — That's none of your business. The woman, who was not a lady, then proposed that I should smuggle her into the White House, which 1 indignantly refused tt> do. She was a theatre actress, and wanted to get a look behind the seams, for the purpose of learning the secrets of the White House and publishing a scandal to the world. This, however, being a game that J wanted to play myself should I ever be hard up for board money, 1 euchred her on a lone hand, and the queen of spades was the highest trump. It was at this eventful period of my life that Mrs. Lincoln began to call me Jietsey. "Betsey," said she, " these are war times, and we must cut down our house-keeping expenses. State dinners cost too much money; how would it do to give tea light* instead V I replied that 1 was in favor of the tea fights, as being less expensive and more fashionable. Mr. Lincoln then came in and spoke in favor of the dinners. 44 Mother," said he, u I don't think the tea fights will work." " Father," said she, " yes they will." We all argued the point, and Mrs. Lincoln and myself carried the day. At the first tea fight, Mrs. Lincoln, who had a great partiality for low neck and short sleeves, had on a dress that was very low in- deed, which Mr. Lincoln observing and noticing her long trail at the same time, he playfully compared her to a long-tailed Behind Ihc Scams. 18 cat, and remarked that if sonic of the cat's tail was nearer to the cat's head the dress would not be quite so low. Ill the summer of 1802 a largo number of runaway niters came to Washington in search of liberty, and money or work— ami found rather too much of the first commodity and too little of the others. Where they received one kind word they were '•cussed" a dozen times. They soon became so hard up, that 1 got some nigger societies to raise the wind for them. \Ye raised the wind a little, but it did not blow a regular greenback gale. Mr. Lincoln got bad news once from the army and read the book of Job, and very properly did not see the necessity of letting his son Robert enter the ser\ iceand perhaps lose his lite. Mrs. Lincoln, who was rather a poor Job's comforter, suggested that other people had lost their sons, and in short it was agreed upon that I iobert should go to the front and take his chances. When General Tom Thumb was entertained at the While House, Robert t 'nought it a nonsensical affair, and so went oat and played billiards. Mrs, Lincoln was jealous of Mrs. 1>. and Miss C. and did not wish good honest old Abe io pay them any attentions. So Mr. Lincoln, who was a man of sense as well as a good husband, obeyed her directions, rather than subject himself to the mi pleasant ordeal of a curtain lecture. Mrs. Lincoln was down on Mr. Salmon P. Chase and was jeal- ous of his daughter, who was a belle in Washington. The President and his wife knew that 1 was an extraordinary nigger, and so did not mind talking secrets in my presence. " Father," said Mrs. L., "drat Chase, 1 don't like him, you had better keep your eye upon him.'' " Mother," said good old Abe, " you don't know what you are saying. Chase is a patriot, and one of my best friends, so chase that sorrow from your brow." "•He is your best friend in a horn," said Mrs. L., " he's a hum- bug, and only looks out for number one." " You are prejudiced, Mother," said good old Abe. "You are bliud, Father," rejoined his wife. Mrs. Lincoln was also down on Seward, and remarked that she would not trust him with three cents' worth of peanuts. " Honest old Abe replied that should he take her advice, he would be without a Cabinet. " No matter," said Mrs. L., " make a new cabinet— be a cabi- net maker; or, even do without any, rather than have Chase and Seward— drat them both ! ! " The President's wife liked McClellan, and pronounced nim a 14 Behind the Scams. patriot and an able soldier, but she was by no means a Grant man. " Grant is a butcher," she used to remark to myself and Mr. Lincoln, " and ought to keep a meat stall — he is not fit to head an army/' 1 remarked that he was fit, and had fit well in the field. Mrs Lincoln requested me to dry up. "Grant has been very successful in the field," said good old Abe. ; Tm very much obliged to him/' said Mrs. L., "he wins a victory by giving two men for one, as we do in the losing game of draughts; if he goes on long in this style, there Will be no men left. lie is an obstinate fool, a butcher and a humbug ! ! There, now!!!" Honest Old Abe laughed, and suggested that Mrs. Lincoln should take Grant's place, try the thing on for a while, and see if it was such an easy matter to checkmate old Bob Le without swapping the pieces down a little. This put a stop to Mrs. Lincoln's argument. Old Abe came out ahead, and so did Grant. When Mrs. Lincoln's brother, Captain Alexander Todd, who was in the Confederate Army, was killed, she did not mourn his death at all, which was very patriotic in her, and proves that she was loyal and all right on the goose. She was, tooth and nail and llat-footedly, down on the South, and always ob- jected to being thought Southern in feeling. Good Old Abe admired Lee and Stonewall Jackson, and Joe Johnson. lie called Jackson " a brave, honest Presbyterian soldier," and said, " what a pity that we should have to fight such a gallant fellow." He also remarked, one day, to his son Robert, whilst they were looking at a portrait of Lee, "It is a good face ; it is the face of a noble, noble, brave man, lam glad the war is over at last." Mr. Lincoln was, truly, a great and good man, and I almost feel ashamed of myself when I think of what I have still before me to write in th'is book, in relation to his widow ; especially when I reflect that in order to make my book pay, both myself and the publisher, I shall be compelled, at times, to draw the long bow a little, even in speaking of my dear, bosom friend, Mrs. Lincoln. When Andrew Johnson was proposed as military governor of Tennessee, Mrs. Lincoln raised the greatest kind of a row, insisting that he was a demagogue and that should he ever be placed in power, he would stand up for his rights and stick to them like death to a dead nigger. When the runaway niggern came to Washington in search of Behind the Seams. 15 liberty, which they found too much of, and money, which they did not find too much of, I met an old maumer, who assured me that she had coine to Washington entertaining confident ex- pectations of inheriting at least a couple of Mrs. Lincoln's chemises, but not having received them, had found to her sor- row, that she had to make shift for herself. The old nigger's idea of freedom was two shifts per year, and she found that even this was too high an estimate. As a slave, she used to get the shifts from her old missus; as a freed nigger she had, as I have before remarked, to find the material an I make shift for herself as best she could. In 1804, Mrs. Lincoln being rather uoubtfiL is to the chances in favor of her husband's re-election, told me that she intended to shinney around for him, as Old Abe was too honest a man to stock the cards, even in such a big gams. She proposed to boot-lick all the politicians, promise them all sorts of fat places, and fool them all in the end. 9 When 1 asked if Mr. Lincoln knew, of this little turn-up-a- jjK'k-froin-the -bottom arrangement, she said, "God.; no," which was a favorite expression of hers. She added, again, that Old Abe was too honest, and implied that she was not. The reason that Mrs. Lincoln was so anxious as to the result of the elec- tion, was that she had been buying goods " on tick v at Stew- art's and elsewhere, and owed out the snug little amount of twenty seven thousand dollars. " Betsey," said she, " my dear triend, although 3*011 are a nigger, you know how much money it takes to buy a wardrobe with in these war times, but Mr. Lincoln don't, and he thinks that one! or two hundred dollars will do, but they will not do. and so I must shop on credit." I asked her if Mr. Lincoln knew that she was running up such tall bills, and she replied, "God, no!!" I understood her to say " God knows," but she had only said " God, no ! ! " the favorite style in which she used to smash the third com- mandment. One day when Mrs. L. was in a passion, she re- marked that she hoped she might be rammed in to a shot-gun, and shot off at a nigger riot, if she would not work things so that the Black Bepublican politicians should settle up her debts, She said that they all made piles of greenbacks by boot-licking good Old Abe, and she would make them come down with the needful or break several traces in the attempt, A few days after this, Mrs. L. came to my room to try on a dress, which I think was rather undignified on her part, and I should have gone to her room, for though I was her bosom frieud, 'tis true, yet I am only a nigger woman after all. It was on this occa- sion that I asked her to give me one of Mr. Lincoln's dirty 1* Behind the Seams. gloves, provided it should get filthy in the shakings it would get on the occasion of the first public reception after his second inaugural. She promised me the dirty glove, gave it to me when the time came, and I have it now. The glove was even dirtier than I had hoped it would be, for it had the honor of be- ing grasped by the paw of Frederick Douglass, nigger. When LMchmond foil, I gave allot* my sewing girls a holiday, nid they all got highly elevated, not to say gloriously drunk. All of the clerks in the various departments got drunk like- wise, even to the nigger waiters, and there was a gay old time, generally speaking. Mrs. Lin coin. and myself went to Lichmond, and by a curious coincidence, when I got into the Capitol, I picked up a paper containing a resolution prohibiting free niggers from entering the State of Virginia. I thought this a capital joke, and sat in JoJt' Davis 1 chair, also in Alexander 11. Stevens' chair, and laughed long and feelingly. Whilst Ave were on board the River Queen, a Yankee Officer joked with Mrs. Lincoln about the manner in which the ladies had kissed their hands to good Old Abe, but she dried him up in a minute and he felt small to be so shut up in the presence of a nigger. On this trip I learned some Latin. A little nigger proposed to " tote" Mr. Lincoln's carpet bag, and Senator Sumner explained that the word is derived from the Latin word totum or tote-em. After the assassination of Mr. Lincoln, the first words uttered by Mrs. L., when she recovered from her swoon, were u Send for Betsey Kickley immediately/' There were a couple of Wil- liam goats that Mrs. L. was very fond of— she gave them to Mrs. Bhiir. Mrs. Lincoln has aty ays thought, and still thinks, that Andy Johnson had a hand in the assassination of President Lincoln. I don't say whether I agree with her or not. It is true, how- ever, on the honor of a nigger, that Andy did not call on Mrs. L , nor even write her a line of condolence. If this is a lie, it don't matter. Mr. Johnson can deny it iu the Herald, should he choose to do so. When Mrs. Lincoln left the White House, a great deal of furniture was missing — she did not take it, however — it was stolen by the niggers. Mrs. Liucolu wanted me to go West vvitii ner, but I told her it would break Mrs. Senator Douglas' heart. Mrs. Douglas, however, said no it wouldn't, and so I went with Mrs. Lincoln, who remarked that Congress ought to provide for me. Little Tad Lincoln wasn't very smart in his books, though a bright child out of them. Behind the Scams. * 7 One day ho was spoiling in a picture book and came to A : pc " What docs A-p-e spoil ?'' said his ma, u Monkey," said Tad, looking at the picture. t% Nonsense," sai