Humorous Anecdotes from Original Sources by and about Abraham Lincoln (review)

BOOK REVIEWS157 buried in the disappointingly brief bibliography. (A bibliographical essay would have been far more useful.) Finally, there is no discussion as to the selection process for the material included. Medical memoirs are plentiful and, like other wartime recollections, must be used with a good deal of caution. Despite these concerns, Denny has compiled a useful work. While of greater value to the casual reader and the amateur historian than to the scholar, it contributes to a fuller understanding of the too-long-understudied "terrible" side of the Civil War. James O. Breeden Southern Methodist University Humorous Anecdotesfrom Original Sources by and about Abraham Lincoln. Edited by P. M. ZaIl. (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1995. Pp. xii, 193. $14.00.) This is a welcome and much-needed reprint, in paper, of the definitive edition of anecdotes Lincoln used—over three-hundred of them. While there have been many other books about Lincoln's humor, this is the first to substantiate the stories as those used by Lincoln. In chronological order, they appear with notes to put them in context, adjudge their credibility, and identify, when known, the source. There are two useful indexes, one for specific subjects and one for general topics. It is true that humor was a major part of Lincoln's persona: he used stories to make a point, convince his listeners, facilitate understanding, and relieve stress. It was James G. Randall who said, "Humor was no mere technique but a habit of [Lincoln's] mind." Lincoln was a "retail dealer" who did not create the anecdotes but heard them from others or picked them up from his voracious reading of newspapers and journals, filed them in his extensive repertoire, embellished them with his personal imprint, and then skillfully applied them for whatever need was at hand. His use ofmetaphors was based on Aesop's fables, the Bible, and his own Western upbringing. So, it is no surprise that the subjects ranged from barnyard humor to politicians to the very people who made up the immediate postfrontier period in which he grew to manhood while practicing the dual professions of politics and law. Coming from another time, many anecdotes do not now appear amusing. No. 176, for example, has a clergyman at the beginning of the Civil War saying to President Lincoln that he "hoped the Lord was on our side." "I am not at all concerned about that," replied Mr. Lincoln, "for I know that the Lord is always on the side of the right, but it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this nation should be on the Lord's side." Some are dubious, like No. 268, where a speaker (Richard Price Morgan), on February 12, 1909, avows that he stood next to Mr. Lincoln in 1856 and heard him say, "You can fool some of I58CIVIL WAR HISTORY the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time." This was important because John G. Nicolay and John Hay in their Complete Works ofAbraham Lincoln reported that no one could discover whether Lincoln had, in effect, uttered this oftquoted remark. In fact, the authentic Respectfully Quoted, a Dictionary of Quotations Requestedfrom the Congressional Research Service by the Library of Congress also cannot verify whether Lincoln said this. Some are still funny, like No. 10, in which the self-effacing Lincoln thought he was like the ugly man riding through a forest who came upon a woman who commented, "Well, for land's sake, you are the homeliest man I ever saw." "Yes, madam, but I can't help it." he replied. "No, I suppose not," she observed, "but you might stay at home." Lincoln's attempts at ribald humor are also included (No. 324). He said he was riding bass-ackwards on ajass-ack, through a patton-cotch, on a pair of baddle-sags, stuffed full of binger-gred, when the animal steered at a scump, and the lirrup-steather broke, and throwed him in theforner of the kence and broke his pishing-fole. He said he would not have minded it...