Patrick Kurp remarks on the careful prose of Abraham Lincoln, whom he calls one of the greatest prose writers among U.S. presidents. And occasionally quite funny.

“In a letter he wrote from Springfield, Ill., to Mrs. Orville H. Browning on Jan. 27, 1838, Abraham Lincoln, then a member of the Illinois General Assembly, tells a tall-tale, purportedly true, worthy of Mark Twain. It involves the matchmaking efforts of another friend on behalf of her sister.” Read on.