Lincoln began, but to save his life he could not speak one hour, and the laboring oar fell into Linder's hands.

"But," said Lincoln, "he was equal to the occasion.
He spoke most interestingly three mortal hours, about everything in the world.

He discussed Benedict from head to foot, and put in about three-quarters of an hour on the subject of Benedict's whiskers." Lincoln said he never envied a man so much as he did Linder on that occasion.

He thought he was inimitable in his capacity to talk interestingly about everything and nothing, by the hour.
But if Lincoln had not General Linder's art of "talking against time," his wit often suggested some readier method of gaining advantage in a case.

On one occasion, a suit was on trial in the Circuit Court of Sangamon County, in which Lincoln was attorney for the plaintiff, and Mr.James C.Conkling, then a young man just entering practice, was attorney for the defendant.