exceptional fairness with which the young lawyer presented not only his
own case but that of his opponent. He had great tact in holding his
friends, in convincing those who did not agree with him, and in winning
over opponents; but he gave no futile effort to tasks which his judgment
convinced him would prove impossible. He never, says Horace Porter,
citing Lincoln's words, "wasted any time in trying to massage the back
of a political porcupine." "A man might as well," says Lincoln,
"undertake to throw fleas across the barnyard with a shovel."

He had as a youngster won repute as a teller of dramatic stories, and
those who listened to his arguments in court were expecting to have his
words to the jury brightened and rendered for the moment more effective
by such stories. The hearers were often disappointed in such
expectation. Neither at the Bar, nor, it may be said here, in his later
work as a political leader, did Lincoln indulge himself in the telling a
story for the sake of the story, nor for the sake of the laugh to be
raised by the story, nor for the momentary pleasure or possible
temporary advantage of the discomfiture of the opponent. The story was
used, whether in law or in politics, only when it happened to be the
shortest and most effective method of making clear an issue or of
illustrating a statement. In later years, when he had upon him the
terrible burdens of the great struggle, Lincoln used stories from time
to time as a vent to his feelings. The impression given was that by an
effort of will and in order to keep his mind from dwelling too
continuously upon the tremendous problems upon which he was engaged, he
would, by the use of some humorous reminiscence, set his thoughts in a
direction as different as possible from that of his cares. A third and
very valuable use of the story which grew up in his Washington days was
to turn aside some persistent but impossible application; and to give to
the applicant, with the least risk of unnecessary annoyance to his