He had not finished presenting the case in a light in which he felt sure it would touch the character of the man before him.
"Are your small personal needs paramount to those of your country? Have you no patriotism? Have you no _mercy_ upon our soldiers? Must more hundreds of them suffer defeat and death for the lack of what _you_ can give them? Are you willing to receive the benefits of a free country which you are not willing to help in her hour of greatest need? Can you--do you--want to leave your young sons and the sons of your neighbors on the far side of the dead line marked by that bridge?" The allusion was a chance one, but it struck home.
"What do you want me to do?" he gasped, hoarsely.
The President grasped his hand and held it in a vice-like grip. "What--do--I--want--you--to--do?" he asked, with a deliberation strangely at variance with the passion of his words a moment ago. He looked down searchingly, kindly, pityingly into the troubled eyes before him. "What do I want you to do? I--want--you--to--follow-- your--conscience----for--the--benefit--of--your--country--instead--of-- for--your--own--personal--comfort,--until--that--conscience--tells--you-- your--country--needs--you--no--longer; that you have, in deed and in truth, done your share fully! I want you to go with an advance guard down through that very country"--his long finger pointed to the disfigured map on the table--"and show our commander the _real_ topography of that land. I want you to make him as familiar with it as you are yourself. I want you to show him where the passes and fords are, where supplies can be carried across, where water is plenty, and where both advance and retreat are possible without useless and horrible slaughter. I want you--" He was still holding Griffith's right hand. He placed his left on his shoulder, again. "No man has done his duty in a crisis like this until he has done _all_ that he can to hasten the dawn of peace;" he lowered his voice, "and he that is not with us is against us," he said solemnly, the scriptural language falling from his lips as if their professions were reversed.
"How far do you want me to go?" asked Griffith, looking up with an appeal in every tense muscle of his miserable face. "It is my native State! They are my people! I love every foot of ground--I love those--" He was breathing so hard he stopped for a moment. "That we do not think alike--that they are what you call rebels to our common country--does not change my love. I--Mr. Lincoln----"