EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     159 
coin  had  the  reputation  of  being  inspired  by  an  almost 
unbounded  ambition,"  says  Mr.  Selby,  "it  was  of  that 
generous  quality  which  characterized  his  other  attributes, 
and  often  led  him  voluntarily  to  restrain  its  gratification 
in  deference  to  the  conflicting  aspirations  of  his  friends. 
All  remember  his  magnanimity  towards  Col.  Edward  D. 
Baker,  when  the  latter  was  elected  to  Congress  from  the 
Springfield  District  in  1844,  and  the  frankness  with  which 
he  informed  Baker  of  his  own  desire  to  be  a  candidate  in 
1846  —  when  for  the  only  time  in  his  life,  he  was  elected 
to  that  body.  In  1852,  Richard  Yates  of  Jacksonville, 
then  recognized  as  one  of  the  rising  young  orators  and 
statesmen  of  the  West,  was  elected  to  Congress  for  the 
second  time  from  the  Springfield  District.  It  was  during 
the  term  following  this  election  that  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
issue  was  precipitated  upon  the  country  by  Senator 
Douglas,  in  the  introduction  of  his  bill  for  the  repeal  of 
the  Missouri  Compromise.  Yates,  in  obedience  to  his 
impulses,  which  were  always  on  the  side  of  freedom,  took 
strong  ground  against  the  measure  —  notwithstanding 
the  fact  that  a  majority  of  his  constituents,  though 
originally  Whigs,  were  strongly  conservative,  as  was 
generally  the  case  with  people  who  were  largely  of  Ken 
tucky  and  Tennessee  origin.  In  1854  the  Whig  party, 
which  had  been  divided  on  the  Kansas-Nebraska  question, 
began  to  manifest  symptoms  of  disintegration;  while  the 
Republican  party,  though  not  yet  known  by  that  name, 
began  to  take  form.  At  this  time  I  was  publishing  a 
paper  at  Jacksonville,  Yates's  home;  and  although  from 
the  date  of  my  connection  with  it,  in  1852,  it  had  not 
been  a  political  paper,  the  introduction  of  a  new  issue 
soon  led  me  to  take  decided  ground  on  the  side  of  free 
territory.  Lincoln  at  once  sprang  into  prominence  as 
one  of  the  boldest,  most  vigorous  and  eloquent  oppo 
nents  of  Mr.  Douglas's  measure,  which  was  construed  as  a 
scheme  to  secure  the  admission  of  slavery  into  all  the  new
160     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
territories  of  the  United  States.  At  that  time  Lincoln's 
election  to  a  seat  in  Congress  would  probably  have  been 
very  grateful  to  his  ambition,  as  well  as  acceptable  in  a 
pecuniary  point  of  view;  and  his  prominence  and  ability 
had  already  attracted  the  eyes  of  the  whole  State  toward 
him  in  a  special  degree.  Having  occasion  to  visit  Spring 
field  one  day  while  the  subject  of  the  selection  of  a  candi 
date  was  under  consideration  among  the  opponents  of 
the  Kansas-Nebraska  Bill,  I  encountered  Mr.  Lincoln  on 
the  street.  As  we  walked  along,  the  subject  of  the  choice 
of  a  candidate  for  Congress  to  succeed  Yates  came  up, 
when  I  stated  that  many  of  the  old-line  Whigs  and  anti- 
Nebraska  men  in  the  western  part  of  the  district  were 
looking  to  him  as  an  available  leader.  While  he  seemed 
gratified  by  the  compliment,  he  said:  'No;  Yates  has  been 
a  true  and  faithful  Representative,  and  should  be  re 
turned/  Yates  was  re-nominated;  and  although  he  ran 
ahead  of  his  ticket,  yet  so  far  had  the  disorganization  of 
the  Whig  party  then  progressed,  and  so  strong  a  foothold 
had  the  pro-slavery  sentiment  obtained  in  the  district, 
that  he  was  defeated  by  Major  Thomas  L.  Harris,  of 
Petersburg,  whom  he  had  defeated  when  he  first  entered 
the  field  as  a  candidate  four  years  before.  While  it  is 
scarcely  probable  that  Lincoln,  if  he  had  been  a  candidate, 
could  have  changed  the  result,  yet  the  prize  was  one 
which  he  would  then  have  considered  worth  contending 
for;  and  if  the  nomination  could  have  been  tendered  him 
without  doing  injustice  to  his  friend,  he  would  undoubtedly 
have  accepted  it  gladly  and  thrown  all  the  earnestness  and 
ability  which  he  possessed  into  the  contest.  This  in 
stance  only  illustrates  a  feature  of  his  character  which 
has  so  often  been  recognized  and  commented  upon  — 
his  generosity  toward  those  among  his  political  friends 
who  might  be  regarded  as  occupying  the  position  of 
rivals." 
In  1854,  during  Lincoln's  absence  from  Springfield,  he
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     161 
was  nominated  as  a  candidate  for  the  State  Legislature. 
It  was  in  one  of  Lincoln's  periods  of  profound  depression, 
and  it  was  with  the  greatest  difficulty  that  he  could  be 
persuaded  to  accept  the  nomination.  "I  went  to  see 
him,"  says  one  of  his  close  political  friends,  Mr.  William 
Jayne,  "in  order  to  get  his  consent  to  run.  This  was  at 
his  house.  He  was  then  the  saddest  man  I  ever  saw  — 
the  gloomiest.  He  walked  up  and  down  the  floor,  almost 
crying;  and  to  all  my  persuasions  to  let  his  name  stand  in 
the  paper,  he  said,  'No,  I  can't.  You  don't  know  all. 
I  say  you  don't  begin  to  know  one-half;  and  that's 
enough.'  '  His  name,  however,  was  allowed  to  stand, 
and  he  was  elected  by  about  600  majority.  But  Lincoln 
was  then  extremely  desirous  of  succeeding  General  James 
Shields,  whose  term  in  the  United  States  Senate  was  to 
expire  the  following  March.  The  Senate  Chamber  had 
long  been  the  goal  of  his  ambition.  He  summed  up  his 
feelings  in  a  letter  to  Hon.  N.  B.  Judd,  some  years  after, 
saying,  "I  would  rather  have  a  full  term  in  the  United 
States  Senate  than  the  Presidency."  He  therefore  re 
signed  his  seat  in  the  Legislature  —  the  fact  that  a  major 
ity  in  both  houses  was  opposed  to  the  Nebraska  Bill 
allowing  him  to  do  so  without  injury  to  his  party  —  and 
became  a  candidate  for  the  Senate.  But  the  act  was 
futile.  When  the  Legislature  met,  in  February,  1855,  to 
make  choice  of  a  Senator,  a  clique  of  anti-Nebraska 
Democrats  held  out  so  firmly  against  the  nomination  of 
Lincoln  that  there  was  danger  of  the  Whigs  leaving  their 
candidate  altogether.  In  this  dilemma  Lincoln  was  con 
sulted.  Mr.  Lamon  thus  describes  the  incident:  "Lin 
coln  said,  unhesitatingly,  'You  ought  to  drop  me  and  go 
for  Trumbull;  that  is  the  only  way  you  can  defeat  Matte- 
son.'  Judge  Logan  came  up  about  that  time,  and  in 
sisted  on  running  Lincoln  still;  but  the  latter  said,  'If 
you  do,  you  will  lose  both  Trumbull  and  myself;  and  I 
think  the  cause  in  this  case  is  to  be  preferred  to  men.'
162     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
We  adopted  his  suggestion,  and  took  up  Trumbull  and 
elected  him,  although  it  grieved  us  to  the  heart  to  give 
up  Lincoln."  Mr.  Parks,  a  member  of  the  Legislature 
at  this  time,  and  one  of  Lincoln's  intimate  friends,  said: 
"Mr.  Lincoln  was  very  much  disappointed,  for  I  think  it 
was  the  height  of  his  ambition  to  get  into  the  United 
States  Senate.  Yet  he  manifested  no  bitterness  toward 
Mr.  Judd  or  the  other  anti-Nebraska  Democrats  by 
whom  politically  he  was  beaten,  but  evidently  thought 
their  motives  were  right.  He  told  me  several  times 
afterwards  that  the  election  of  Trumbull  was  the  best 
thing  that  could  have  happened." 
Hon.  Elijah  M.  Haines,  ex-Speaker  of  the  Illinois 
Legislature,  a  resident  of  the  State  for  over  half  a  century, 
and  one  of  Lincoln's  early  friends,  was  a  member  of  the 
Legislature  during  the  Senatorial  struggle  just  referred 
to.  His  familiarity  with  all  its  incidents  lends  value  to 
his  distinct  and  vivid  recollections.  "Abraham  Lincoln 
had  been  elected  a  member  of  the  House  on  the  Fusion 
ticket,  with  Judge  Stephen  T.  Logan,  for  the  district 
composed  of  Sangamon  County,"  writes  Mr.  Haines. 
"But  it  being  settled  that  the  Fusion  party  —  which  was 
an  anti-Douglas  combination,  including  Whigs,  Free- 
Soilers,  Know-Nothings,  etc.  —  would  have  a  majority 
of  the  two  houses  on  ballot,  Mr.  Lincoln  was  induced  to 
become  a  candidate  for  United  States  Senator,  for  the 
support  of  that  party.  He  therefore  did  not  qualify  as  a 
member.  Although  Mr.  Lincoln  never  acquired  the 
reputation  of  being  an  office-seeker,  yet  it  happened  fre 
quently  that  his  name  would  be  mentioned  in  connection 
with  some  important  position.  He  became  quite  early 
in  life  one  of  the  prominent  leaders  of  the  Whig  party  of 
the  State,  and  for  a  long  time,  in  connection  with  a  few 
devoted  associates,  led  the  forlorn  hope  of  that  party. 
During  a  period  of  about  twenty  years  there  was  seldom 
more  than  one  Whig  member  in  the  Illinois  delegation  of
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     163 
Congressmen.  The  Sangamon  district,  in  which  Mr. 
Lincoln  lived,  was  always  sure  to  elect  a  Whig  member 
when  the  party  was  united;  but  it  contained  quite  a 
number  of  aspiring  Whig  orators,  and  there  was  a  kind  of 
understanding  between  them  that  no  one  who  attained 
the  position  of  Representative  in  Congress  should  hold  it 
longer  than  one  term;  that  he  would  then  give  way  for 
the  next  favorite.  Mr.  Lincoln  had  held  the  position 
once,  and  its  return  to  him  was  far  in  the  future.  The 
Fusion  triumph  in  the  Legislature  was  considered  by  the 
Whig  element  as  a  success,  in  which  they  acknowledged 
great  obligation  to  Mr.  Lincoln.  That  element  in  the 
Fusion  party  therefore  urged  his  claims  as  the  successor 
of  General  Shields.  His  old  associate  and  tried  friend 
in  the  Whig  cause,  Judge  Logan,  became  the  champion 
of  his  interests  in  the  House  of  Representatives.  I  was 
present  and  saw  something  of  Mr.  Lincoln  during  the 
early  part  of  the  session,  before  the  vote  for  Senator  was 
taken.  He  was  around  among  the  members  much  of  the 
time.  His  manner  was  agreeable  and  unassuming;  he 
was  not  forward  in  pressing  his  case  upon  the  attention 
of  members,  yet  before  the  interview  would  come  to  a 
close  some  allusion  to  the  Senatorship  would  generally 
occur,  when  he  would  respond  in  some  such  way  as  this: 
*  Gentlemen,  that  is  rather  a  delicate  subject  for  me  to 
talk  upon;  but  I  must  confess  that  I  would  be  glad  of 
your  support  for  the  office,  if  you  shall  conclude  that  I 
am  the  proper  person  for  it.'  When  he  had  finished,  he 
would  generally  take  occasion  to  withdraw  before  any 
discussion  on  the  subject  arose.  W7hen  the  election  of 
Senator  occurred,  in  February,  Lincoln  received  45  votes 
—  the  highest  number  of  any  of  the  candidates,  and 
within  six  votes  of  enough  to  secure  his  election.  This 
was  on  the  first  ballot,  after  which  Lincoln's  votes  de 
clined.  After  the  ninth  ballot,  Mr.  Lincoln  stepped 
forward  —  or,  as  Mr.  Richmond  expresses  it,  leaned  for-
164     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
ward  from  his  position  in  the  lobby  —  and  requested  the 
committee  to  withdraw  his  name.  On  the  tenth  ballot 
Judge  Trumbull  received  fifty-one  votes  and  was  de 
clared  elected."  Thus  were  Lincoln's  political  ambitions 
again  frustrated.  But  their  realization  was  only  delayed 
for  the  far  grander  triumph  that  was  so  soon  to  come, 
although  no  man  then  foresaw  its  coming.
CHAPTER  X 
Birth  of  the  Republican  Party  —  Lincoln  One  of  Its  Fathers — Takes 
His  Stand  with  the  Abolitionists  —  The  Bloomington  Convention 
—  Lincoln's  Great  Anti-Slavery  Speech  —  A  Ratification  Meeting 
of  Three  —  The  First  National  Republican  Convention  —  Lincoln's 
Name  Presented  for  the  Vice-Presidency  —  Nomination  of  Fremont 
and  Dayton  —  Lincoln  in  the  Campaign  of  1856  —  His  Appear 
ance  and  Influence  on  the  Stump  —  Regarded  as  a  Dangerous 
Man  —  His  Views  on  the  Politics  of  the  Future — First  Visit  to 
Cincinnati — Meeting  with  Edwin  M.  Stanton — Stanton's  First 
Impressions  of  Lincoln  —  Regards  Him  as  a  "  Giraffe  "  —  A  Visit 
to  Cincinnati. 
THE  year  1856  saw  the  dissolution  of  the  old  Whig 
party.  It  had  become  too  narrow  and  restricted 
to  answer  the  needs  of  the  hour.  A  new  platform  was 
demanded,  one  that  would  admit  the  great  principles  and 
issues  growing  out  of  the  slavery  agitation.  A  conven 
tion  of  the  Whig  leaders  throughout  the  country  met  at 
Pittsburgh,  Pennsylvania,  on  the  22d  of  February  of  that 
year,  to  consider  the  necessity  of  a  new  organization.  A 
little  later,  Mr.  Herndon,  in  the  office  of  Lincoln,  pre 
pared  a  call  for  a  convention  at  Bloomington,  Illinois, 
"summoning  together  all  those  who  wished  to  see  the  gov 
ernment  conducted  on  the  principles  of  Washington  and 
Jefferson."  This  call  was  signed  by  the  most  prominent 
Abolitionists  of  Illinois,  with  the  name  of  A.  LINCOLN  at 
the  head.  The  morning  after  its  publication,  Major 
Stuart  entered  Mr.  Herndon's  office  in  a  state  of  extreme 
excitement,  and,  as  the  latter  relates,  demanded:  ':  'Sir, 
did  Mr.  Lincoln  sign  that  Abolition  call  which  is  pub 
lished  this  morning?'  I  answered,  'Mr.  Lincoln  did  not 
sign  that  call.'  'Did  Lincoln  authorize  you  to  sign  it?'
166     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
'No,  he  never  authorized  me  to  sign  it.'  <rThen  do  you 
know  that  you  have  ruined  Mr.  Lincoln?'  'I  did  not 
know  that  I  had  ruined  Mr.  Lincoln;  did  not  intend  to 
do  so;  thought  he  was  a  made  man  by  it;  that  the  time 
had  come  when  conservatism  was  a  crime  and  a  blunder.' 
'You,  then,  take  the  responsibility  of  your  acts,  do  you?' 
*I  do,  most  emphatically.'  However,  I  instantly  sat 
down  and  wrote  to  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  was  then  in  Pekin 
or  Tremont  —  possibly  at  court.  He  received  my  letter, 
and  instantly  replied,  either  by  letter  or  telegraph  —  most 
likely  by  letter  —  that  he  adopted  in  toto  what  I  had 
done,  and  promised  to  meet  the  radicals  —  Lovejoy  and 
such  like  men  —  among  us."  Mr.  Herndon  adds :  "Never 
did  a  man  change  as  Lincoln  did  from  that  hour.  No 
sooner  had  he  planted  himself  right  on  the  slavery  question 
than  his  whole  soul  seemed  burning.  He  blossomed  right 
out.  Then,  too,  other  spiritual  things  grew  more  real  to 
him." 
Mr.  Herndon  had  been  an  Abolitionist  from  birth.  It 
was  an  inheritance  with  him;  but  Lincoln's  conversion 
was  a  gradual  process,  stimulated  and  confirmed  by  the 
influence  of  his  companion.  "From  1854  to  1860,"  says 
Mr.  Herndon,  "I  kept  putting  into  Lincoln's  hands  the 
speeches  and  sermons  of  Theodore  Parker,  Wendell 
Phillips,  and  Henry  Ward  Beecher.  I  took  'The  Anti- 
Slavery  Standard'  for  years  before  1856,  'The  Chicago 
Tribune,'  and  'The  New  York  Tribune';  kept  them  in 
my  office,  kept  them  purposely  on  my  table,  and  would 
read  to  Lincoln  the  good,  sharp,  solid  things,  well  put. 
Lincoln  was  a  natural  anti-slavery  man,  as  I  think,  and 
yet  he  needed  watching,  —  needed  hope,  faith,  energy; 
and  I  think  I  warmed  him." 
It  is  stated  that  "when  Herndon  was  very  young  — 
probably  before  Mr.  Lincoln  made  his  first  protest  in  the 
Legislature  of  the  State  in  behalf  of  liberty  —  Lincoln 
once  said  to  him:  'I  cannot  see  what  makes  your  con-
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     167 
victions  so  decided  as  regards  the  future  of  slavery.  What 
tells  you  the  thing  must  be  rooted  out?'  'I  feel  it  in  my 
bones,'  was  Herndon's  emphatic  answer.  'This  conti 
nent  is  not  broad  enough  to  endure  the  contest  between 
freedom  and  slavery ! '  It  was  almost  in  these  very  words 
that  Lincoln  afterwards  opened  the  great  contest  with 
Douglas.  From  this  time  forward  he  submitted  all 
public  questions  to  what  he  called  'the  test  of  Bill  Hern 
don's  bone  philosophy';  and  their  arguments  were  close 
and  protracted." 
Lincoln's  attitude  on  slavery  aroused  formidable  oppo 
sition  among  his  friends,  and  even  in  his  own  family. 
Mrs.  Lincoln  was  decidedly  pro-slavery  in  her  views. 
Once  while  riding  with  a  friend  she  said:  "If  my  husband 
dies,  his  spirit  will  never  find  me  residing  outside  the 
limits  of  a  slave  State."  But  opposition,  whether  from 
without  or  within,  could  never  swerve  him  from  a  course  to 
which  conscience  and  reason  clearly  impelled  him.  Long 
before  Mr.  Herndon  published  the  call  for  the  Blooming- 
ton  convention,  he  had  said  to  a  deputation  of  men  from 
Chicago,  in  answer  to  the  inquiry  whether  Lincoln  could 
be  trusted  for  freedom:  "Can  you  trust  yourselves?  If 
you  can,  you  can  trust  Lincoln  forever." 
The  convention  met  at  Bloomington,  May  29,  1856. 
One  of  its  chief  incidents  was  a  speech  by  Lincoln.  This 
speech  was  one  of  the  great  efforts  of  his  life,  and  had  a 
powerful  influence  on  the  convention.  "Never,"  says 
one  of  the  delegates,  "  was  an  audience  more  completely 
electrified  by  human  eloquence.  Again  and  again  his 
hearers  sprang  to  their  feet,  and  by  long  continued  cheers 
expressed  how  deeply  the  speaker  had  aroused  them." 
"It  was  there,"  says  Mr.  Herndon  in  one  of  his  lectures, 
"that  Lincoln  was  baptized  and  joined  our  church.  He 
made  a  speech  to  us.  I  have  heard  or  read  all  of  Mr. 
Lincoln's  great  speeches;  and  I  give  it  as  my  opinion  that 
the  Bloomington  speech  was  the  grand  effort  of  his  life.
168     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
Heretofore,  and  up  to  this  moment,  he  had  simply  argued 
the  slavery  question  on  grounds  of  policy,  —  on  what  are 
called  the  statesman's  grounds,  —  never  reaching  the 
question  of  the  radical  and  eternal  right.  Now  he  was 
newly  baptized  and  freshly  born;  he  had  the  fervor  of  a 
new  convert;  the  smothered  flame  broke  out;  enthusiasm 
unusual  to  him  blazed  up;  his  eyes  were  aglow  with 
inspiration;  he  felt  a  new  and  more  vital  justice;  his 
heart  was  alive  to  the  right;  his  sympathies  burst  forth; 
and  he  stood  before  the  throne  of  the  eternal  Right,  in 
presence  of  his  God,  and  then  and  there  unburdened  his 
penitential  and  fired  soul.  This  speech  was  fresh,  new, 
genuine,  odd,  original;  filled  with  fervor  not  unmixed 
with  a  divine  enthusiasm;  his  head  breathing  out  through 
his  tender  heart  its  truths,  its  sense  of  right,  and  its  feeling 
of  the  good  and  for  the  good.  This  speech  was  full 
of  fire  and  energy  and  force;  it  was  logic;  it  was  pathos; 
it  was  enthusiasm;  it  was  justice,  equity,  truth,  right, 
and  good,  set  ablaze  by  the  divine  fires  of  a  soul  maddened 
by  wrong;  it  was  hard,  heavy,  knotty,  gnarly,  edged,  and 
heated.  I  attempted  for  about  fifteen  minutes,  as  was 
usual  with  me  then,  to  take  notes;  but  at  the  end  of  that 
time  I  threw  pen  and  paper  to  the  dogs,  and  lived  only  in 
the  inspiration  of  the  hour.  If  Mr.  Lincoln  was  six  feet  four 
inches  high  usually,  at  Bloomington  he  was  seven  feet,  and 
inspired  at  that.  From  that  day  to  the  day  of  his  death, 
he  stood  firm  on  the  right.  He  felt  his  great  cross,  had 
his  great  idea,  nursed  it,  kept  it,  taught  it  to  others,  and 
in  his  fidelity  bore  witness  of  it  to  his  death,  and  finally 
sealed  it  with  his  precious  blood." 
'  The  committee  on  resolutions  at  the  convention  found 
themselves,  after  hours  of  discussion,  unable  to  agree; 
and  at  last  they  sent  for  Lincoln.  He  suggested  that  all 
could  unite  on  the  principles  of  the  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence  and  hostility  to  the  extension  of  slavery.  "Let 
us,"  said  he,  "in  building  our  new  party  make  our  corner-
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     169 
stone  the  Declaration  of  Independence;  let  us  build  on 
this  rock,  and  the  gates  of  hell  shall  not  prevail  against 
us."  The  problem  was  mastered,  and  the  convention 
adopted  the  following: 
Resolved,  That  we  hold,  in  accordance  with  the  opin 
ions  and  practices  of  all  the  great  statesmen  of  all  parties 
for  the  first  sixty  years  of  the  administration  of  the 
government,  that  under  the  Constitution  Congress 
possesses  full  power  to  prohibit  slavery  in  the  territories; 
and  that  while  we  will  maintain  all  constitutional  rights 
of  the  South,  we  also  hold  that  justice,  humanity,  the 
principles  of  freedom,  as  expressed  in  our  Declaration  of 
Independence  and  our  National  Constitution,  and  the 
purity  and  perpetuity  of  our  government,  require  that 
that  power  should  be  exerted  to  prevent  the  extension  of 
slavery  into  territories  heretofore  free. 
The  Bloomington  convention  concluded  its  work  by 
choosing  delegates  to  the  National  Republican  con 
vention  to  be  held  at  Philadelphia  the  following  month, 
for  the  nomination  of  candidates  for  the  Presidency  and 
Vice-presidency  of  the  United  States.  And  thus  was 
organized  the  Republican  party  in  Illinois,  which  revolu 
tionized  the  politics  of  the  State  and  elected  Lincoln  to 
the  Presidency. 
The  people  of  Bloomington  seem  to  have  had  but 
little  sympathy  with  this  convention.  A  few  days  later, 
Herndon  and  Lincoln  tried  to  hold  a  ratification  meeting; 
but  only  three  persons  were  present  —  Lincoln,  Herndon, 
and  John  Pain.  "When  Lincoln  came  into  the  court 
room  where  the  meeting  was  to  be  held,"  says  Herndon, 
"there  was  an  expression  of  sadness  and  amusement  on 
his  face.  He  walked  to  the  stand,  mounted  it  in  a  kind 
of  mockery  —  mirth  and  sadness  all  combined  —  and 
said,  'Gentlemen,  this  meeting  is  larger  than  I  thought 
it  would  be.  I  knew  that  Herndon  and  myself  would 
come,  but  I  did  not  know  that  anyone  else  would  be  here; 
and  yet  another  has  come  —  you,  John  Pain.  These  are
170     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
sad  times,  and  seem  out  of  joint.  All  seems  dead;  but 
the  age  is  not  yet  dead;  it  liveth  as  sure  as  our  Maker 
liveth.  Under  all  this  seeming  want  of  life  and  motion, 
the  world  does  move  nevertheless.  Be  hopeful.  And 
now  let  us  adjourn  and  appeal  to  the  people.'  ' 
The  National  convention  of  the  Republican  party  met 
at  Philadelphia  in  June,  1856,  and  adopted  a  declaration 
of  principles  substantially  based  upon  those  of  the  Bloom- 
ington  convention.  John  C.  Fremont  was  nominated  as 
candidate  for  President.  Among  the  names  presented 
for  Vice-president  was  that  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  who 
received  110  votes.  William  L.  Dayton  received  259 
votes  and  was  unanimously  declared  the  nominee.  Fre 
mont  and  Dayton  thus  became  the  standard-bearers  of 
the  new  national  party.  When  the  news  reached  Lincoln, 
in  Illinois,  that  he  had  received  110  votes  as  nominee  for 
the  Vice-presidency,  he  could  not  at  first  believe  that  he 
was  the  man  voted  for,  and  said,  "No,  it  could  not  be; 
it  must  have  been  the  great  Lincoln  of  Massachusetts!" 
He  was  then  in  one  of  his  melancholy  moods,  full  of 
depression  and  despondency. 
In  the  stirring  presidential  campaign  of  1856,  Lincoln 
was  particularly  active,  and  rendered  most  efficient 
service  to  the  Republican  party.  He  spoke  constantly, 
discussing  the  great  question  of  "slavery  in  the  terri 
tories"  in  a  manner  at  once  original  and  masterly.  A 
graphic  picture  of  one  of  these  campaign  gatherings  is 
furnished  by  Hon.  William  Bross,  afterwards  Lieutenant- 
Governor  of  Illinois.  "I  first  met  Mr.  Lincoln,  to  know 
him,"  says  Governor  Bross,  "at  Vandalia,  the  old  capital 
of  the  State,  in  October,  1856.  There  was  to  be  a  political 
meeting  in  front  of  the  old  State  House,  in  the  center  of 
the  square,  at  2  o'clock.  Soon  after  that  hour  the  sono 
rous  voice  of  Dr.  Curdy  rang  through  the  town :  *  O,  yes ! 
O,  yes!  All  ye  who  want  to  hear  public  speaking,  draw 
near!'  The  crowd  at  once  began  to  gather  from  all  sides
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     171 
of  the  square.  The  Doctor  then  introduced  the  first 
speaker,  and  he  proceeded  to  make  the  best  presentation 
he  could  of  the  principles  of  the  newly-formed  Republican 
party,  and  the  reasons  why  Fremont,  'the  gallant  path 
finder  of  the  West,'  should  be  elected  President.  About 
the  time  the  first  speaker  closed  his  remarks,  Hon.  Eben- 
ezer  Peck  and  Abraham  Lincoln  arrived  and  took  the 
stand;  and  both  made  able  and  effective  speeches.  After 
that,  Lincoln  and  I  frequently  met  during  the  canvass, 
and  often  afterwards  I  spoke  with  him  from  the  same 
platform.  The  probable  result  of  an  election  was  often 
canvassed,  and  a  noticeable  fact  was  that  in  most  cases 
he  would  mark  the  probable  result  below  rather  than 
above  the  actual  majority." 
Some  lively  reminiscences  of  Lincoln's  appearance 
and  efforts  in  this  campaign  are  given  by  Mr.  Noah 
Brooks,  the  well-known  journalist  and  author,  who  at 
that  time  lived  in  Northern  Illinois  and  attended  many 
of  the  great  Republican  mass-meetings.  "At  one  of  these 
great  assemblies  in  Ogle  County,"  says  Mr.  Brooks,  "to 
which  the  country  people  came  on  horseback,  in  farm 
wagons,  or  afoot,  from  far  and  near,  there  were  several 
speakers  of  local  celebrity.  Dr.  Egan  of  Chicago,  famous 
for  his  racy  stories,  was  one;  and  Joe  Knox  of  Bureau 
County,  a  stump  speaker  of  renown,  was  another  attrac 
tion.  Several  other  orators  were  'on  the  bills'  for  this 
long-advertised  'Fremont  and  Dayton  rally,'  among 
them  being  a  Springfield  lawyer  who  had  won  some 
reputation  as  a  close  reasoner,  and  a  capital  speaker  on 
the  stump.  This  was  Abraham  Lincoln,  popularly  known 
as  'Honest  Abe  Lincoln.'  In  those  days  he  was  not  so 
famous  in  our  part  of  the  State  as  the  two  speakers  whom 
I  have  named.  Possibly  he  was  not  so  popular  among 
the  masses  of  the  people;  but  his  ready  wit,  his  unfailing 
good  humor,  and  the  candor  which  gave  him  his  character 
for  honesty,  won  for  him  the  admiration  and  respect  of
172     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
all  who  heard  him.  I  remember  once  meeting  a  choleric 
old  Democrat  striding  away  from  an  open-air  meeting 
where  Lincoln  was  speaking,  striking  the  earth  with  his 
cane  as  he  stumped  along,  and  exclaiming, '  He's  a  danger 
ous  man,  sir !  A  d  d  dangerous  man !  He  makes  you 
believe  what  he  says,  in  spite  of  yourself!*  It  was  Lin 
coln's  manner.  He  admitted  away  his  whole  case  ap 
parently  —  and  yet,  as  his  political  opponents  complained, 
he  usually  carried  conviction  with  him.  As  he  reasoned 
with  his  audience,  he  bent  his  long  form  over  the  railing 
of  the  platform,  stooping  lower  and  lower  as  he  pursued 
his  argument,  until,  having  reached  his  point,  he  clinched 
it,  usually  with  a  question,  and  then  suddenly  sprang 
upright,  reminding  one  of  the  springing  open  of  a  jack- 
knife  blade.  At  the  Ogle  County  meeting  to  which  I 
refer,  Lincoln  led  off,  the  raciest  speakers  being  reserved 
for  the  latter  part  of  the  political  entertainment.  I  am 
bound  to  say  that  Lincoln  did  not  awaken  the  boisterous 
applause  which  some  of  those  who  followed  him  did,  but 
his  speech  made  a  more  lasting  impression.  It  was 
talked  about  for  weeks  afterward  in  the  neighborhood, 
and  it  probably  changed  many  votes;  for  that  was  the 
time  when  Free-soil  votes  were  being  made  in  Northern 
Illinois." 
Mr.  Brooks  had  made  Lincoln's  acquaintance  early 
in  the  day  referred  to;  and  after  Lincoln  had  spoken, 
and  while  some  of  the  other  orators  were  entertaining 
the  audience,  the  two  drew  a  little  off  from  the  crowd  and 
fell  into  a  discussion  over  the  political  situation  and 
prospects.  "We  crawled  under  the  pendulous  branches 
of  a  tree,"  says  Mr.  Brooks,  "  and  Lincoln,  lying  flat  on 
the  ground,  with  his  chin  in  his  hands,  talked  on,  rather 
gloomily  as  to  the  present  but  absolutely  confident  as  to 
the  future.  I  was  dismayed  to  find  that  he  did  not 
believe  it  possible  that  Fremont  could  be  elected.  As 
if  half  pitying  my  youthful  ignorance,  but  admiring  my
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     173 
enthusiasm,  he  said,  *  Don't  be  discouraged  if  we  don't 
carry  the  day  this  year.  We  can't  do  it,  that's  certain. 
We  can't  carry  Pennsylvania;  those  old  Whigs  down 
there  are  too  strong  for  us.  But  we  shall  sooner  or  later 
elect  our  President.  I  feel  confident  of  that.'  'Do  you 
think  we  shall  elect  a  Free-soil  President  in  I860?'  I  asked. 
'Well,  I  don't  know.  Everything  depends  on  the  course 
of  the  Democracy.  There's  a  big  anti-slavery  element 
in  the  Democratic  party,  and  if  we  could  get  hold  of  that 
we  might  possibly  elect  our  man  in  1860.  But  it's  doubt 
ful,  very  doubtful.  Perhaps  we  shall  be  able  to  fetch  it 
by  1864;  perhaps  not.  As  I  said  before,  the  Free-soil 
party  is  bound  to  win  in  the  long  run.  It  may  not  be  in 
my  day;  but  it  will  be  in  yours,  I  do  really  believe.'  ' 
The  defeat  of  Fremont  soon  verified  Lincoln's  prediction 
on  that  score. 
A  peculiarly  interesting  episode  of  Lincoln's  life  belongs 
to  this  period,  though  unrelated  to  political  events.  This 
was  the  meeting,  in  a  professional  way,  with  Edwin  M. 
Stanton,  at  that  time  a  prominent  lawyer  of  Pittsburgh, 
afterwards  the  great  War  Secretary  of  President  Lin 
coln's  cabinet.  The  circumstances  were  briefly  these: 
Among  Lincoln's  law  cases  was  one  connected  with  the 
patent  of  the  McCormick  Reaper;  and  in  the  summer  of 
1857  he  visited  Cincinnati  to  argue  the  case  before  Judge 
McLean  of  the  United  States  Circuit  Court.  It  was  a 
case  of  great  importance,  involving  the  foundation 
patent  of  the  machine  which  was  destined  to  revolutionize 
the  harvesting  of  grain.  Reverdy  Johnson  was  on  one 
side  of  the  case,  and  E.  M.  Stanton  and  George  Harding 
on  the  other.  It  became  necessary,  in  addition,  to  have  a 
lawyer  who  was  a  resident  of  Illinois;  and  inquiry  was 
made  of  Hon.  E.  B.  Washburne,  then  in  Congress,  as 
to  whether  he  knew  a  suitable  man.  The  latter  replied 
that  "there  was  a  man  named  Lincoln  at  Springfield,  who 
had  considerable  reputation  in  the  State."  Lincoln  was
174     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
retained  in  the  case,  and  came  on  to  Cincinnati  with  a 
brief.  Stanton  and  Harding  saw  in  their  associate  coun 
sel  "a  tall,  dark,  uncouth  man,  who  did  not  strike  them 
as  of  any  account,  and,  indeed,  they  gave  him  hardly 
any  chance."  An  interesting  account  of  this  visit,  and 
of  various  incidents  connected  with  it,  has  been  prepared 
by  the  Hon.  W.  M.  Dickson  of  Cincinnati.  "Mr.  Lin 
coln  came  to  the  city,"  says  Mr.  Dickson,  "a  few  days 
before  the  argument  took  place,  and  remained  during  his 
stay  at  the  house  of  a  friend.  The  case  was  one  of  large 
importance  pecuniarily,  and  in  the  law  questions  involved. 
Reverdy  Johnson  represented  the  plaintiff.  Mr.  Lincoln 
had  prepared  himself  with  the  greatest  care;  his  ambition 
was  to  speak  in  the  case,  and  to  measure  swords  with  the 
renowned  lawyer  from  Baltimore.  It  was  understood 
between  his  client  and  himself,  before  his  coming,  that 
Mr.  Harding  of  Philadelphia  was  to  be  associated  with 
him  in  the  case,  and  was  to  make  the  'mechanical  argu 
ment.'  Mr.  Lincoln  was  a  little  surprised  and  annoyed 
after  reaching  Cincinnati,  to  learn  that  his  client  had  also 
associated  with  him  Mr.  Edwin  M.  Stanton,  of  Pitts 
burgh,  and  a  lawyer  of  our  own  bar;  the  reason  assigned 
being  that  the  importance  of  the  case  required  a  man 
of  the  experience  and  power  of  Mr.  Stanton  to  meet  Mr. 
Johnson.  The  reasons  given  did  not  remove  the  slight 
conveyed  in  the  employment,  without  consultation  with 
Lincoln,  of  this  additional  counsel.  He  keenly  felt  it, 
but  acquiesced.  The  trial  of  the  case  came  on;  the 
counsel  for  defense  met  each  morning  for  consultation. 
On  one  of  these  occasions  one  of  the  counsel  moved  that 
only  two  of  them  should  speak  in  the  case.  This  motion 
was  also  acquiesced  in.  It  had  always  been  understood 
that  Mr.  Harding  was  to  speak  to  explain  the  mechanism 
of  the  reapers.  So  this  motion  excluded  either  Mr.  -Lin 
coln  or  Mr.  Stanton.  By  the  custom  of  the  bar,  as  be 
tween  counsel  of  equal  standing  and  in  the  absence  of
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     175 
any  action  of  the  client,  the  original  counsel  speaks.  By 
this  rule  Mr.  Lincoln  had  precedence.  Mr.  Stanton 
suggested  to  Mr.  Lincoln  to  make  the  speech.  Mr. 
Lincoln  answered,  'No;  you  speak,'  Mr.  Stanton  re 
plied,  *I  will,'  and  taking  up  his  hat,  said  he  would  go 
and  make  preparation.  Mr.  Lincoln  acquiesced  in  this, 
but  was  deeply  grieved  and  mortified;  he  took  but  little 
more  interest  in  the  case,  though  remaining  until  the 
conclusion  of  the  trial.  He  seemed  to  be  greatly  de 
pressed,  and  gave  evidence  of  that  tendency  to  melan 
choly  which  so  marked  his  character.  His  parting  on 
leaving  the  city  cannot  be  forgotten.  Cordially  shaking 
the  hand  of  his  hostess,  he  said:  'You  have  made  my 
stay  here  most  agreeable,  and  I  am  a  thousand  times 
obliged  to  you;  but  as  for  repeating  my  visit,  I  must  say 
to  you  I  never  expect  to  be  in  Cincinnati  again.  I  have 
nothing  against  the  city,  but  things  have  so  happened 
here  as  to  make  it  undesirable  for  me  ever  to  return.' 
Thus  untowardly  met  for  the  first  time,  Lincoln  and 
Stanton.  Little  did  either  then  suspect  that  they  were 
to  meet  again  on  a  larger  theatre,  to  become  the  chief 
actors  in  a  great  historical  epoch." 
If  Lincoln  was  "surprised  and  annoyed"  at  the  treat 
ment  he  received  from  Stanton,  the  latter  was  no  less 
surprised,  and  a  good  deal  more  disgusted,  on  seeing 
Lincoln  and  learning  of  his  connection  with  the  case.  He 
made  no  secret  of  his  contempt  for  the  "long,  lank  crea 
ture  from  Illinois,"  as  he  afterwards  described  him, 
"wearing  a  dirty  linen  duster  for  a  coat,  on  the  back  of 
which  the  perspiration  had  splotched  wide  stains  that 
resembled  a  dirty  map  of  the  continent."  He  blurted 
out  his  wrath  and  indignation  to  his  associate  counsel, 
declaring  that  if  "that  giraffe"  was  permitted  to  appear 
in  the  case  he  would  throw  up  his  brief  and  leave  it. 
Lincoln  keenly  felt  the  affront,  but  his  great  nature  for 
gave  it  so  entirely  that,  recognizing  the  singular  abilities
176     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
of  Stanton  beneath  his  brusque  exterior,  he  afterwards, 
for  the  public  good,  appointed  him  to  a  seat  in  his  cabinet. 
Lincoln,  says  Mr.  Dickson,  "remained  in  Cincinnati 
about  a  week,  moving  freely  about.  Yet  not  twenty  men 
in  the  city  knew  him  personally,  or  knew  he  was  here; 
not  a  hundred  would  have  known  who  he  was  had  his 
name  been  given  to  them.  He  came  with  the  fond  hope 
of  making  fame  in  a  forensic  contest  with  Reverdy  John 
son.  He  was  pushed  aside,  humiliated  and  mortified. 
He  attached  to  the  innocent  city  the  displeasure  that 
filled  his  bosom,  and  shook  its  dust  from  his  feet." 
In  his  Autobiography,  Moncure  D.  Conway  records  a 
glimpse  of  Lincoln  during  his  Cincinnati  visit  that  seems 
worth  transcribing.  "  One  warm  evening  in  1859,  passing 
through  the  market-place  in  Cincinnati,  I  found  there 
a  crowd  listening  to  a  political  speech  in  the  open  air. 
The  speaker  stood  on  the  balcony  of  a  small  brick  house, 
some  lamps  assisting  the  moonlight.  Something  about 
the  speaker,  and  some  words  that  reached  me,  led  me  to 
press  nearer.  I  asked  the  speaker's  name,  and  learned 
that  it  was  Abraham  Lincoln.  Browning's  description  of 
the  German  professor,  *  Three  parts  sublime  to  one  gro 
tesque,'  was  applicable  to  this  man.  The  face  had  a 
battered  and  bronzed  look,  without  being  hard.  His  nose 
was  prominent,  and  buttressed  a  strong  and  high  forehead. 
His  eyes  were  high-vaulted,  and  had  an  expression  of 
sadness;  his  mouth  and  chin  were  too  close  together,  the 
cheeks  hollow.  On  the  whole,  Lincoln's  appearance  was 
not  attractive  until  one  heard  his  voice,  which  possessed 
variety  of  expression,  earnestness,  and  shrewdness  in  every 
tone.  The  charm  of  his  manner  was  that  he  had  no 
manner;  he  was  simple,  direct,  humorous.  He  pleasantly 
repeated  a  mannerism  of  his  opponent,  —  'This  is  what 
Douglas  calls  his  '  gur-reat  per-rinciple.'  But  the  next 
words  I  remember  were  these:  'Slavery  is  wrong."'
CHAPTER  XI 
The  Great  Lincoln-Douglas  Debate  —  Rivals  for  the  U.  S.  Senate  — 
Lincoln's  "  House-Divided-against-Itself  "  Speech — An  Inspired 
Oration  —  Alarming  His  Friends  —  Challenges  Douglas  to  a  Joint 
Discussion  —  The  Champions  Contrasted  —  Their  Opinions  of  Each 
Other  —  Lincoln  and  Douglas  on  the  Stump  —  Slavery  the  Leading 
Issue  —  Scenes  and  Anecdotes  of  the  Great  Debate  —  Pen-Picture 
of  Lincoln  on  the  Stump  —  Humors  of  the  Campaign  —  Some 
Sharp  Rejoinders  —  Words  of  Soberness  —  Close  of  the  Conflict. 
THE  year  1858  is  memorable  alike  in  the  career  of 
Lincoln  and  in  the  political  history  of  the  country. 
It  was  distinguished  by  the  joint  discussions  between  the 
two  great  political  leaders  of  Illinois,  which  rank  among 
the  ablest  forensic  debates  that  have  taken  place  since 
the  foundation  of  the  republic.  The  occasion  was  one 
to  call  out  the  greatest  powers  of  the  two  remarkable 
men  who  there  contested  for  political  supremacy.  It 
was  not  alone  that  Lincoln  and  Douglas  were  opposing 
candidates  for  a  high  office  —  that  of  Senator  of  the 
United  States:  they  were  the  champions  and  spokesmen 
of  their  parties  at  a  critical  period  when  great  issues 
were  to  be  discussed  and  great  movements  outlined  and 
directed.  It  was  naturally  expected  that  the  winner  in 
the  contest  would  become  the  political  leader  of  his  State. 
Little  was  it  imagined  that  the  loser  would  become  the 
leader  and  savior  of  the  Nation. 
On  the  21st  of  April  the  Democratic  convention  of 
Illinois  met  at  Springfield  and  announced  Stephen  A. 
Douglas,  then  United  States  Senator,  as  its  choice  for 
another  term.  June  16  the  Republican  convention  met 
at  the  same  place  and  declared  unanimously  that  "Abra 
ham  Lincoln  is  our  first  and  only  choice  for  United  States
178     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
Senator  to  fill  the  vacancy  about  to  be  created  by  the 
expiration  of  Mr.  Douglas's  term  of  office."  For  a  num 
ber  of  days  previous  to  the  meeting  of  the  Republican 
convention  Lincoln  had  been  engaged  in  preparing  a 
speech  for  the  occasion.  It  was  composed  after  his  usual 
method  —  the  separate  thoughts  jotted  down  as  they 
came  to  him,  on  scraps  of  paper  at  hand  at  the  moment, 
and  these  notes  were  arranged  in  order  and  elaborated 
into  a  finished  essay,  copied  on  large  sheets  of  paper  in  a 
plain  and  legible  handwriting.  This  was  the  speech 
which  afterwards  came  to  be  so  celebrated  as  the  "house- 
divided-against-itself "  speech.  Lincoln  was  gravely  con 
scious  of  its  unusual  importance,  and  gave  great  care  and 
deliberation  to  its  composition.  The  evening  of  June  16 
—  the  day  of  his  nomination  by  the  convention  — 
Lincoln  went  to  his  office,  accompanied  by  his  friend 
Herndon,  and  having  locked  the  door  proceeded  to  read 
his  speech.  Slowly  and  distinctly  he  read  the  first  para 
graph,  and  then  turned  to  Herndon  with,  "What  do  you 
think  of  that?"  Mr.  Herndon  was  startled  at  its  bold 
ness.  "I  think,"  said  he,  "it  is  all  true.  But  is  it  entirely 
politic  to  read  or  speak  it  as  it  is  written? "  "That  makes 
no  difference,"  said  Lincoln.  "That  expression  is  a 
truth  of  all  human  experience,  —  *  a  house  divided  against 
itself  cannot  stand.'  The  proposition  is  indisputably 
true,  and  has  been  true  for  more  than  six  thousand  years; 
I  want  to  use  some  universally  known  figure,  expressed 
in  simple  language,  that  may  strike  home  to  the  minds  of 
men  in  order  to  rouse  them  to  the  peril  of  the  times." 
Mr.  Herndon  was  convinced  by  Lincoln's  language,  and 
advised  him  to  deliver  the  speech  just  as  it  was  written. 
Lincoln  was  satisfied,  but  thought  it  would  be  prudent 
to  consult  a  few  other  friends  in  the  matter,  and  about  a 
dozen  were  called  in.  "After  seating  them  at  the  round 
table,"  says  John  Armstrong,  one  of  the  number,  "he 
read  that  clause  or  section  of  his  speech  which  reads,  *a
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     179 
house  divided  against  itself  cannot  stand/  etc.  He  read 
it  slowly  and  cautiously,  so  as  to  let  each  man  fully  under 
stand  it.  After  he  had  finished  the  reading,  he  asked 
the  opinions  of  his  friends  as  to  the  wisdom  or  policy  of 
it.  Every  man  among  them  condemned  the  speech  in 
substance  and  spirit,  especially  that  section  quoted  above, 
as  unwise  and  impolitic  if  not  untrue.  They  unani 
mously  declared  that  the  whole  speech  was  too  far  in 
advance  of  the  times.  Herndon  sat  still  while  they  were 
giving  their  respective  opinions  of  its  unwisdom  and 
impolicy;  then  he  sprang  to  his  feet  and  said,  *  Lincoln, 
deliver  it  just  as  it  reads.  If  it  is  in  advance  of  the  times, 
let  us  lift  the  people  to  its  level.  The  speech  is  true,  wise, 
and  politic,  and  will  succeed  now  or  in  the  future.  Nay, 
it  will  aid  you,  if  it  will  not  make  you  President  of  the 
United  States.'  Mr.  Lincoln  sat  still  a  moment,  then 
rose  from  his  chair,  walked  backwards  and  forwards  in 
the  hall,  stopped,  and  said:  'Friends,  I  have  thought 
about  this  matter  a  great  deal,  have  weighed  the  questions 
from  all  corners,  and  am  thoroughly  convinced  the  time 
has  come  when  this  speech  should  be  uttered;  and  if  it 
be  that  I  must  go  down  because  of  it,  then  let  me  go 
down  linked  to  truth  —  die  in  the  advocacy  of  what  is 
right  and  just.  This  nation  cannot  live  on  injustice;  "a 
house  divided  against  itself  cannot  stand,"  I  say  again 
and  again.'  This  was  spoken  with  emotion  —  the  effects 
of  his  love  of  truth,  and  sorrow  from  the  disagreement 
of  his  friends." 
On  the  next  evening  the  speech  was  delivered  to  an 
immense  audience  in  the  hall  of  the  House  of  Representa 
tives  at  Springfield.  "The  hall  and  lobbies  and  galleries 
were  even  more  densely  crowded  and  packed  than  at  any 
time  during  the  day,"  says  the  official  report;  and  as 
Lincoln  "approached  the  speaker's  stand,  he  was  greeted 
with  shouts  and  hurrahs,  and  prolonged  cheers."  The 
prophetic  sentences  which  dropped  first  from  the  lips  of
180     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
the  speaker  were  freighted  with  a  solemn  import  which 
even  he  could  scarcely  have  divined  in  full.  The  seers 
of  old  were  not  more  inspired  than  he  who  now,  out  of 
the  irresistible  conviction  of  his  heart,  said  to  his  surprised 
and  unbelieving  listeners: 
If  we  could  first  know  where  we  are  and  whither  we  are 
tending,  we  could  then  better  judge  what  to  do  and  how 
to  do  it.  We  are  now  far  on  in  the  fifth  year  since  a  policy 
was  initiated  with  the  avowed  object  and  confident 
promise  of  putting  an  end  to  slavery  agitation.  Under 
the  operation  of  that  policy,  that  agitation  has  not  only  not 
ceased,  but  has  constantly  augmented.  In  my  opinion 
it  will  not  cease  until  a  crisis  shall  have  been  reached  and 
passed.  *A  house  divided  against  itself  cannot  stand.' 
I  believe  this  Government  cannot  endure,  permanently, 
half  slave  and  half  free.  I  do  not  expect  the  Union  to  be 
dissolved  —  I  do  not  expect  the  house  to  fall  —  but  I  do 
expect  it  will  cease  to  be  divided.  It  will  become  all  one 
thing  or  all  the  other.  Either  the  opponents  of  slavery 
will  arrest  the  further  spread  of  it,  and  place  it  where  the 
public  mind  shall  rest  in  the  belief  that  it  is  in  course  of 
ultimate  extinction,  or  its  advocates  will  push  it  forward 
till  it  shall  become  alike  lawful  in  all  the  States  —  old  as 
well  as  new  —  North  as  well  as  South. 
Mr.  Jeriah  Bonham,  an  old  citizen  of  Illinois,  relates 
that  he  was  present  as  a  delegate  at  the  Springfield  con 
vention  and  heard  the  famous  speech  of  Lincoln.  Ac 
cording  to  Mr.  Bonham,  "The  speech  was  prepared  with 
unusual  care,  every  paragraph  and  sentence  carefully 
weighed.  The  firm  bedrock  of  principles,  the  issues  of 
the  campaign  on  which  he  proposed  to  stand  and  fight 
his  battles,  were  all  well  considered,  and  his  arguments 
were  incontrovertible.  In  that  memorable  speech  cul 
minated  all  the  grand  thoughts  he  had  ever  uttered, 
embodying  divinity,  statesmanship,  law,  and  morals,  and 
even  fraught  with  prophecy.  As  he  advanced  in  this 
argument  he  towered  to  his  full  height,  forgetting  himself 
entirely  as  he  grew  warm  in  his  work.  Men  and  women
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     181 
who  heard  that  speech  well  remember  the  wonderful 
transformation  wrought  in  Lincoln's  appearance.  The 
plain,  homely  man  towered  up  majestically;  his  face  lit 
as  with  angelic  light;  the  long,  bent,  angular  figure,  like 
the  strong  oak  of  the  forest,  stood  erect,  and  his  eyes 
flashed  with  the  fire  of  inspiration." 
The  party  that  had  nominated  Lincoln  for  the  Senate 
was  not  prepared  to  endorse  his  restriction  of  the  coming 
struggle  to  the  single  issue  of  the  slavery  question.  His 
friends  dreaded  the  result  of  his  uncompromising  frank 
ness,  while  politicians  quite  generally  condemned  it. 
Even  so  stanch  a  friend  as  Leonard  Swett,  whose  devo 
tion  to  Lincoln  never  wavered  throughout  his  whole 
career,  shared  these  apprehensions.  Says  Mr.  Swett: 
"The  first  ten  lines  of  that  speech  defeated  him.  The 
sentiment  of  the  'house  divided  against  itself  seemed 
wholly  inappropriate.  It  was  a  speech  made  at  the  com 
mencement  of  a  campaign,  and  apparently  made  for  the 
campaign.  Viewing  it  in  this  light  alone,  nothing  could 
have  been  more  unfortunate  or  inappropriate.  It  was 
saying  the  wrong  thing  first;  yet  he  felt  that  it  was  an 
abstract  truth,  and  that  standing  by  the  speech  would 
ultimately  find  him  in  the  right  place.  I  was  inclined  at 
the  time  to  believe  these  words  were  hastily  and  incon 
siderately  uttered;  but  subsequent  facts  have  convinced 
me  they  were  deliberate  and  had  been  well  matured." 
A  few  days  after  the  delivery  of  this  speech,  a  gentle 
man  named  Dr.  Long  called  on  Lincoln  and  gave  him 
a  foretaste  of  the  remarks  he  was  to  hear  during  the 
next  few  months.  "Well,  Lincoln,"  said  he,  "that  foolish 
speech  of  yours  will  kill  you  —  will  defeat  you  in  this 
contest,  and  probably  for  all  offices  for  all  time  to  come. 
I  am  sorry,  sorry,  very  sorry.  I  wish  it  was  wiped  out 
of  existence.  Don't  you  wish  so  too?"  Laying  down 
the  pen  with  which  he  had  been  writing,  and  slowly 
raising  his  head  and  adjusting  his  spectacles,  Lincoln
182     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
replied:  "Well,  Doctor,  if  I  had  to  draw  a  pen  across  and 
erase  my  whole  life  from  existence,  and  I  had  one  poor 
gift  or  choice  left  as  to  what  I  should  save  from  the 
wreck,  /  should  choose  that  speech,  and  leave  it  to  the 
world  unerased." 
The  Senatorial  campaign  was  now  well  begun.  Douglas 
opened  it  by  a  speech  at  Chicago  on  the  9th  of  July. 
Lincoln  was  present,  and  on  the  next  evening  spoke  in 
reply  from  the  same  place  —  the  balcony  of  the  Tremont 
House.  A  week  later  Douglas  spoke  at  Bloomington,  with 
Lincoln  again  in  the  audience.  The  notion  of  a  joint 
discussion  seems  to  have  originated  with  Lincoln,  who  on 
the  24th  of  July  addressed  a  note  to  Douglas  as  follows: 
HON.  S.  A.  DOUGLAS  — My  Dear  Sir:  — Will  it  be 
agreeable  to  you  to  make  an  arrangement  for  you  and 
myself  to  divide  time,  and  address  the  same  audiences 
during  the  present  canvass?  Mr.  Judd,  who  will  hand 
you  this,  is  authorized  to  receive  your  answer,  and,  if 
agreeable  to  you,  to  enter  into  the  terms  of  such  arrange 
ment.  Your  obedient  servant,  A.  LINCOLN. 
The  result  of  this  proposal  was  an  agreement  that  there 
should  be  a  joint  discussion  between  the  two  candidates 
in  each  of  the  seven  Congressional  districts  in  which  they 
had  not  both  already  been  heard.  Places  were  named 
and  dates  fixed  extending  to  the  middle  of  October.  It 
was  agreed  that  the  opening  speech  on  each  occasion 
should  occupy  one  hour;  the  reply,  one  hour  and  a  half; 
the  close,  half  an  hour;  and  that  Mr.  Douglas  should  have 
the  first  and  last  voice  in  four  of  the  seven  meetings. 
The  champions  who  were  thus  to  enter  the  lists  in  a 
decisive  trial  of  forensic  strength  and  skill  are  forcibly 
contrasted  by  Mr.  Speed,  who  says:  "They  were  the 
respective  leaders  of  their  parties  in  the  State.  They 
were  as  opposite  in  character  as  they  were  unlike  in  their 
persons.  Lincoln  was  long  and  ungainly;  Douglas  was 
short  and  compact.  Douglas,  in  all  elections,  was  the
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     183 
moving  spirit  and  manager.  He  was  content  with 
nothing  short  of  a  blind  submission  to  himself.  He 
could  not  tolerate  opposition  to  his  will  within  his  party 
organization.  He  held  the  reins  and  controlled  the 
movements  of  the  Democratic  chariot.  With  a  large 
State  majority,  with  many  able  and  ambitious  men  in  it, 
he  stepped  to  the  front  in  his  youth  and  held  his  place  till 
his  death.  Lincoln,  on  the  other  hand,  shrank  from  any 
controversy  with  his  friends.  His  party  being  in  a  minority 
in  the  State,  he  was  forced  to  the  front  because  his  friends 
thought  he  was  the  only  man  with  whom  they  could  win. 
In  a  canvass  his  friends  had  to  do  all  the  management. 
He  knew  nothing  of  how  to  reach  the  people  except  by 
addressing  their  reason.  If  the  situation  had  been  re 
versed  —  Lincoln  representing  the  majority  and  Douglas 
the  minority  —  I  think  it  most  likely  Lincoln  would 
never  have  had  the  place.  He  had  no  heart  for  a  fight 
with  friends." 
The  Hon.  James  G.  Elaine  has  given  a  masterly  de 
scription  and  analysis  of  the  comparative  powers  of  the 
two  illustrious  debaters.  Douglas,  says  Mr.  Elaine, 
"was  everywhere  known  as  a  debater  of  singular  skill. 
His  mind  was  fertile  in  resources.  He  was  a  master  of 
logic.  No  man  perceived  more  quickly  than  he  the 
strength  or  the  weakness  of  an  argument,  and  no  one 
excelled  him  in  the  use  of  sophistry  and  fallacy.  Where 
he  could  not  elucidate  a  point  to  his  own  advantage,  he 
would  fatally  becloud  it  for  his  opponent.  In  that 
peculiar  style  of  debate  which  in  intensity  resembles  a 
physical  combat,  he  had  no  equal.  He  spoke  with  extraor 
dinary  readiness.  There  was  no  halting  in  his  phrase. 
He  used  good  English,  terse,  vigorous,  pointed.  He 
disregarded  the  adornments  of  rhetoric  —  rarely  used  a 
simile.  He  was  utterly  destitute  of  humor,  and  had 
slight  appreciation  of  wit.  He  never  cited  historical 
precedents  except  from  the  domain  of  American  politics.
184     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
Inside  that  field  his  knowledge  was  comprehensive, 
minute,  critical;  beyond  it  his  learning  was  limited.  He 
was  not  a  reader.  His  recreations  were  not  in  literature. 
In  the  whole  range  of  his  voluminous  speaking,  it  would 
be  difficult  to  find  either  a  line  of  poetry  or  a  classical 
allusion.  But  he  was  by  nature  an  orator,  and  by  long 
practice  a  debater.  He  could  lead  a  crowd  almost  irre 
sistibly  to  his  own  conclusions.  He  could,  if  he  wished, 
incite  a  mob  to  desperate  deeds.  He  was,  in  short,  an 
able,  audacious,  almost  unconquerable  opponent  in 
public  discussion.  It  would  have  been  impossible  to 
find  any  man  of  the  same  type  able  to  meet  him  before 
the  people  of  Illinois.  Whoever  attempted  it  would 
probably  have  been  destroyed  in  the  first  encounter. 
But  the  man  who  was  chosen  to  meet  him,  who  chal 
lenged  him  to  the  combat,  was  radically  different  in  every 
phase  of  character.  Scarcely  could  two  men  be  more 
unlike  in  mental  and  moral  constitution  than  Abraham 
Lincoln  and  Stephen  A.  Douglas.  Lincoln  was  calm  and 
philosophic.  He  loved  the  truth  for  the  truth's  sake. 
He  would  not  argue  from  a  false  premise,  or  be  deceived 
himself  or  deceive  others  by  a  false  conclusion.  He  had 
pondered  deeply  on  the  issues  which  aroused  him  to 
action.  He  had  given  anxious  thought  to  the  problems 
of  free  government,  and  to  the  destiny  of  the  Republic. 
He  had  marked  out  a  path  of  duty  for  himself,  and  he 
walked  it  fearlessly.  His  mental  processes  were  slower 
but  more  profound  than  those  of  Douglas.  He  did  not 
seek  to  say  merely  the  thing  which  was  best  for  that 
day's  debate,  but  the  thing  which  would  stand  the  test 
of  time  and  square  itself  with  eternal  justice.  He  wished 
nothing  to  appear  white  unless  it  was  white.  His  logic 
was  severe  and  faultless.  He  did  not  resort  to  fallacy, 
and  could  detect  it  in  his  opponent  and  expose  it  with 
merciless  directness.  He  had  an  abounding  sense  of 
humor,  and  always  employed  it  in  illustration  of  his
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     185 
argument  —  but  never  for  the  mere  sake  of  provoking 
merriment.  In  this  respect  he  had  the  wonderful  aptness 
of  Franklin.  He  often  taught  a  great  truth  with  the  felici 
tous  brevity  of  an  Msop  fable.  His  words  did  not  flow  in 
an  impetuous  torrent,  as  did  those  of  Douglas;  but  they 
were  always  well  chosen,  deliberate  and  conclusive." 
Mr.  Arnold,  in  the  course  of  an  extended  comparison, 
says:  "At  the  time  of  these  discussions,  both  Lincoln  and 
Douglas  were  in  the  full  maturity  of  their  powers.  Doug 
las  was  forty-five  and  Lincoln  forty-nine  years  of  age. 
Physically  and  mentally,  they  were  as  unlike  as  possible. 
Douglas  was  short,  not  much  more  than  five  feet  high, 
with  a  large  head,  massive  brain,  broad  shoulders,  a  wide, 
deep  chest,  and  features  strongly  marked.  He  impressed 
every  one,  at  first  sight,  as  a  strong,  sturdy,  resolute, 
fearless  man.  Lincoln's  herculean  stature  has  already 
been  described.  A  stranger  who  listened  to  him  for  five 
minutes  would  say:  'This  is  a  kind,  genial,  sincere, 
genuine  man;  a  man  you  can  trust,  plain,  straightforward, 
honest,  and  true.'  If  this  stranger  were  to  hear  him  make 
a  speech,  he  would  be  impressed  with  his  clear  good  sense, 
by  his  wit  and  humor,  by  his  general  intelligence,  and  by 
the  simple,  homely,  but  pure  and  accurate  language  he 
used.  In  his  long  residence  at  Washington,  Douglas 
had  acquired  the  bearing  and  manners  of  a  gentleman 
and  a  man  of  the  world.  But  he  was  always  a  fascinating 
and  attractive  man,  and  always  and  everywhere  person 
ally  popular.  He  had  been  for  years  carefully  and 
thoroughly  trained  on  the  stump,  in  Congress,  and  in  the 
Senate,  to  meet  in  debate  the  ablest  speakers  in  the  State 
and  Nation.  For  years  he  had  been  accustomed  to  meet 
on  the  floor  of  the  Capitol  the  leaders  of  the  old  Whig 
and  Free-soil  parties.  Among  them  were  Webster  and 
Seward,  Fessenden  and  Crittenden,  Chase,  Trumbull, 
Hale  and  others  of  nearly  equal  eminence;  and  his  en 
thusiastic  friends  insisted  that  never,  either  in  single
186     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
conflict  or  when  receiving  the  assault  of  the  senatorial 
leaders  of  a  whole  party,  had  he  been  discomfited.  His 
style  was  bold,  vigorous,  and  aggressive;  at  times  even 
defiant.  He  was  ready,  fluent,  fertile  in  resources,  famil 
iar  with  national  and  party  history,  severe  in  denunciation, 
and  he  handled  with  skill  nearly  all  the  weapons  of  debate. 
His  iron  will  and  restless  energy,  together  with  great 
personal  magnetism,  made  him  the  idol  of  his  friends 
and  party.  His  long,  brilliant,  and  almost  universally 
successful  career,  gave  him  perfect  confidence  in  himself, 
and  at  times  he  was  arrogant  and  overbearing.  .  .  . 
Lincoln  also  was  a  thoroughly  trained  speaker.  He  had 
met  successfully,  year  after  year,  at  the  bar  and  on  the 
stump,  the  ablest  men  of  Illinois  and  the  Northwest, 
including  Lamborn,  Stephen  T.  Logan,  John  Calhoun, 
and  many  others.  He  had  contended,  in  generous 
emulation,  with  Hardin,  Baker,  Logan,  and  Browning; 
and  had  very  often  met  Douglas,  a  conflict  with  whom 
he  always  courted  rather  than  shunned.  His  speeches, 
as  we  read  them  to-day,  show  a  more  familiar  knowledge 
of  the  slavery  question  than  those  of  any  other  states 
man  of  our  country.  This  is  especially  true  of  the  Peoria 
speech  and  the  Cooper  Institute  speech.  Lincoln  was 
•powerful  in  argument,  always  seizing  the  strong  points, 
and  demonstrating  his  propositions  with  a  clearness  and 
logic  approaching  the  certainty  of  mathematics.  He  had, 
in  wit  and  humor,  a  great  advantage  over  Douglas.  Then 
he  had  the  better  temper;  he  was  always  good  humored, 
while  Douglas,  when  hard  pressed,  was  sometimes  irritable. 
Douglas  perhaps  carried  away  the  more  popular  applause; 
Lincoln  made  the  deeper  and  more  lasting  impression. 
Douglas  did  not  disdain  an  immediate  ad  captandum 
triumph;  while  Lincoln  aimed  at  permanent  conviction. 
Sometimes,  when  Lincoln's  friends  urged  him  to  raise  a 
storm  of  applause,  which  he  could  always  do  by  his  happy 
illustrations  and  amusing  stories,  he  refused,  saying,
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     187 
'The  occasion  is  too  serious;  the  issues  are  too  grave.  I 
do  not  seek  applause,  or  to  amuse  the  people,  but  to 
convince  them.'  It  was  observed  in  the  canvass  that 
while  Douglas  was  greeted  with  the  loudest  cheers,  when 
Lincoln  closed  the  people  seemed  serious  and  thoughtful, 
and  could  be  heard  all  through  the  crowd,  gravely  and 
anxiously  discussing  the  subjects  on  which  he  had  been 
speaking." 
Soon  after  the  arrangements  for  the  debate  had  been 
made,  Senator  Douglas  visited  Alton,  Illinois.  A  dele 
gation  of  prominent  Democrats  there  paid  their  respects 
to  him,  and  during  the  conversation  one  of  them  con 
gratulated  Douglas  on  the  easy  task  he  would  have  in 
defeating  Lincoln;  at  the  same  time  expressing  surprise 
at  the  champion  whom  he  had  selected.  Douglas  replied: 
"Gentlemen,  you  do  not  know  Mr.  Lincoln.  I  have 
known  him  long  and  well,  and  I  know  that  I  shall  have 
anything  but  an  easy  task.  I  assure  you  I  would  rather 
meet  any  other  man  in  the  country  than  Abraham  Lincoln." 
This  was  Douglas's  mature  opinion  of  the  man  of  whom, 
years  before,  he  had  said,  in  his  characteristic  way:  "Of 
all    the    d  d   Whig    rascals    about    Springfield,   Abe 
Lincoln  is  the  ablest  and  honestest."  On  another  occa 
sion,  Douglas  said:  "I  have  known  Lincoln  for  nearly 
twenty-five  years.  There  were  many  points  of  sympathy 
between  us  when  we  first  got  acquainted.  We  were  both 
comparatively  boys,  and  both  struggling  with  poverty 
in  a  strange  land.  I  was  a  school-teacher  in  the  town  of 
Winchester,  and  he  a  flourishing  grocery-keeper  in  the 
town  of  Salem.  He  was  more  successful  in  his  occupation 
than  I  was  in  mine,  and  hence  more  fortunate  in  the 
world's  goods.  Lincoln  is  one  of  those  peculiar  men  who 
perform  with  admirable  skill  everything  they  undertake. 
I  made  as  good  a  school-teacher  as  I  could,  and  when  a 
cabinet-maker  I  made  as  good  bedsteads  and  tables  as  I 
could  —  although  my  old  boss  says  that  I  succeeded
188     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
better  with  bureaus  and  secretaries  than  with  anything 
else.  But  I  believe  that  Lincoln  was  always  more  suc 
cessful  in  business  than  I,  for  his  business  enabled  him  to 
get  into  the  Legislature.  I  met  him  there,  however,  and 
had. a  sympathy  with  him  because  of  the  up-hill  struggle 
we  both  had  had  in  life.  He  was  then  just  as  good  at 
telling  an  anecdote  as  now.  He  could  beat  any  of  the 
boys  in  wrestling  or  running  a  foot-race,  in  pitching  quoits 
or  pitching  a  copper;  and  the  dignity  and  impartiality 
with  which  he  presided  at  a  horse-race  or  fist-fight  ex 
cited  the  admiration  and  won  the  praise  of  everybody 
that  was  present.  I  sympathized  with  him  because  he 
was  struggling  with  difficulties,  and  so  was  I.  Mr. 
Lincoln  served  with  me  in  the  Legislature  of  1836;  then 
we  both  retired,  and  he  subsided,  or  became  submerged, 
and  was  lost  sight  of  as  a  public  man  for  some  years.  In 
1846,  when  Wilmot  introduced  his  celebrated  proviso, 
and  the  Abolition  tornado  swept  over  the  country,  Lincoln 
again  turned  up  as  a  Member  of  Congress  from  the  Sanga- 
mon  district.  I  was  then  in  the  Senate  of  the  United 
States,  and  was  glad  to  welcome  my  old  friend." 
Lincoln,  in  a  speech  delivered  two  years  before  the  joint 
debate,  had  spoken  thus  of  Senator  Douglas:  "Twenty-two 
years  ago,  Judge  Douglas  and  I  first  became  acquainted; 
we  were  both  young  then  —  he  a  trifle  younger  than  I. 
Even  then,  we  were  both  ambitious  —  I  perhaps  quite 
as  much  as  he.  With  me,  the  race  of  ambition  has  been 
a  failure  —  a  flat  failure;  with  him,  it  has  been  one  of 
splendid  success.  His  name  fills  the  nation,  and  is  not 
unknown  even  in  foreign  lands.  I  affect  no  contempt  for 
the  high  eminence  he  has  reached;  so  reached  that  the 
oppressed  of  my  species  might  have  shared  with  me  in 
the  elevation,  I  would  rather  stand  on  that  eminence 
than  wear  the  richest  crown  that  ever  pressed  a  monarch's 
brow." 
A  few  days  before  the  first  discussion  was  to  take  place,
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     189 
Lincoln,  who  had  become  conscious  that  some  of  his  party 
friends  distrusted  his  ability  to  meet  successfully  a  man 
who,  as  the  Democrats  declared  and  believed,  had  never 
had  his  equal  on  the  stump,  met  an  old  friend  from 
Vermilion  County,  and,  shaking  hands,  inquired  the 
news.  His  friend  replied,  "All  looks  well;  our  friends 
are  wide  awake,  but  they  are  looking  forward  with  some 
anxiety  to  these  approaching  joint  discussions  with 
Douglas."  A  shade  passed  over  Lincoln's  face,  a  sad 
expression  came  and  instantly  passed,  and  then  a  blaze  of 
light  flashed  from  his  eyes,  and  with  his  lips  compressed 
and  in  a  manner  peculiar  to  him,  half  serious  and  half 
jocular,  he  said:  "My  friend,  sit  down  a  minute,  and 
I  will  tell  you  a  story.  You  and  I,  as  we  have  travelled 
the  circuit  together  attending  court,  have  often  seen  two 
men  about  to  fight.  One  of  them,  the  big  or  the  little 
giant,  as  the  case  may  be,  is  noisy  and  boastful;  he  jumps 
high  in  the  air,  strikes  his  feet  together,  smites  his  fists, 
brags  about  what  he  is  going  to  do,  and  tries  hard  to 
'sheer'  the  other  man.  The  other  man  says  not  a  word; 
his  arms  are  at  his  side,  his  fists  are  clenched,  his  teeth 
set,  his  head  settled  firmly  on  his  shoulders;  he  saves  his 
breath  and  strength  for  the  struggle.  This  man  will  whip, 
as  sure  as  the  fight  comes  off.  Good-bye,  and  remember 
what  I  say." 
The  spirit  and  purpose  with  which  Lincoln  went  into 
the  contest  are  shown  also  in  the  following  words:  "I  shall 
not  ask  any  favors  at  all.  Judge  Douglas  asks  me  if  I 
wish  to  push  this  matter  to  the  point  of  personal  difficulty. 
I  tell  him,  No!  He  did  not  make  a  mistake,  in  one  of 
his  early  speeches,  when  he  called  me  an  'amiable'  man, 
though  perhaps  he  did  when  he  called  me  an  'intelligent' 
man.  I  again  tell  him,  No!  I  very  much  prefer,  when 
this  canvass  shall  be  over,  however  it  may  result,  that  we 
at  least  part  without  any  bitter  recollections  of  personal 
diflSculties."
190     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
The  speeches  in  these  joint  discussions  were  entirely 
extemporaneous  in  form,  yet  they  were  reported  and 
printed  in  all  the  prominent  papers  in  the  West,  and 
found  eager  readers  throughout  the  country.  The  voice 
and  manner,  which  add  so  much  to  the  effect  of  a  speaker, 
could  not  be  reproduced  on  the  printed  page;  nor  could 
full  justice  be  done,  in  a  hasty  transcript,  to  the  force 
and  fitness  of  the  language  employed.  Still,  the  impres 
sions  of  those  who  heard  them  at  the  time,  as  well  as  later 
and  cooler  analyses  of  them,  have  agreed  in  pronouncing 
these  debates  among  the  most  able  and  interesting  on 
record.  The  scenes  connected  with  the  different  meetings 
were  intensely  exciting.  Vast  throngs  were  invariably 
in  attendance,  while  a  whole  nation  was  watching  the 
result.  "At  Freeport,"  says  an  observer,  "Mr.  Douglas 
appeared  in  an  elegant  barouche  drawn  by  four  white 
horses,  and  was  received  with  great  applause.  But  when 
Mr.  Lincoln  came  up,  in  a  *  prairie  schooner,'  —  an  old- 
fashioned  canvas-covered  pioneer  wagon,  —  the  enthu 
siasm  of  the  vast  throng  was  unbounded." 
At  Charleston  Lincoln  opened  and  closed  the  day's 
debate.  It  was  the  fourth  discussion,  and  there  was 
no  more  doubt  of  his  ability  to  sustain  the  conflict.  Ac 
cording  to  Mr.  Arnold,  "Douglas's  reply  to  Lincoln  was 
mainly  a  defense.  Lincoln's  close  was  intensely  interest 
ing  and  dramatic.  His  logic  and  arguments  were  crush 
ing,  and  Douglas's  evasions  were  exposed  with  a  power 
and  clearness  that  left  him  utterly  discomfited.  Repub 
licans  saw  it.  Democrats  realized  it,  and  a  sort  of  panic 
seized  them,  and  ran  through  the  crowd  of  upturned 
faces.  Douglas  realized  his  defeat,  and,  as  Lincoln's 
blows  fell  fast  and  heavy,  he  lost  his  temper.  He  could 
not  keep  his  seat;  he  rose  and  walked  rapidly  up  and 
down  the  platform,  behind  Lincoln,  holding  his  watch 
in  his  hand,  and  obviously  impatient  for  the  call  of  'time.' 
A  spectator  says:  'He  was  greatly  agitated,  his  long
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     191 
grizzled  hair  waving  in  the  wind,  like  the  shaggy  locks  of 
an  enraged  lion/  It  was  while  Douglas  was  thus  exhibit 
ing  to  the  crowd  his  eager  desire  to  stop  Lincoln,  that  the 
latter,  holding  the  audience  entranced  by  his  eloquence, 
was  striking  his  heaviest  blows.  The  instant  the  second 
hand  of  his  watch  reached  the  point  at  which  Lincoln's 
time  was  up,  Douglas,  holding  up  the  watch,  called  out: 
*Sit  down,  Lincoln,  sit  down!  Your  time  is  up!'  Turn 
ing  to  Douglas,  Lincoln  said  calmly:  *I  will.  I  will  quit. 
I  believe  my  time  is  up.'  'Yes,'  said  a  voice  from  the 
platform,  *  Douglas  has  had  enough;  it  is  time  you  let 
up  on  him.'  ' 
The  institution  of  slavery  was,  of  course,  the  topic 
around  which  circled  all  the  arguments  in  these  joint 
discussions.  It  was  the  great  topic  of  the  hour  —  the 
important  point  of  division  between  the  Republican  and 
Democratic  parties.  Lincoln's  exposition  of  the  subject 
was  profound  and  masterly.  At  the  meeting  in  Quincy 
the  issue  was  defined  and  the  argument  driven  home 
with  unsparing  logic  and  directness.  In  closing  the 
debate,  he  said: 
I  wish  to  return  to  Judge  Douglas  my  profound  thanks 
for  his  public  annunciation  here  to-day,  to  be  put  on 
record,  that  his  system  of  policy  in  regard  to  the  institu 
tion  of  slavery  contemplates  that  it  shall  last  forever.  We 
are  getting  a  little  nearer  the  true  issue  of  this  contro 
versy,  and  I  am  profoundly  grateful  for  this  one  sentence. 
Judge  Douglas  asks  you,  'Why  cannot  the  institution  of 
slavery,  or,  rather,  why  cannot  the  nation,  part  slave  and 
part  free,  continue  as  our  fathers  made  it  forever?'  In 
the  first  place,  I  insist  that  our  fathers  did  not  make  this 
nation  half  slave  and  half  free,  or  part  slave  and  part 
free.  I  insist  that  they  found  the  institution  of  slavery 
existing  here.  They  did  not  make  it  so,  but  they  left  it 
so,  because  they  knew  of  no  way  to  get  rid  of  it  at  that 
time.  When  Judge  Douglas  undertakes  to  say  that,  as  a 
matter  of  choice,  the  fathers  of  the  Government  made 
this  nation  part  slave  and  part  free,  he  assumes  what  is
192     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
historically  a  falsehood.  More  than  that;  when  the 
fathers  of  the  Government  cut  off  the  source  of  slavery 
by  the  abolition  of  the  slave-trade,  and  adopted  a  system 
of  restricting  it  from  the  new  Territories  where  it  had 
not  existed,  I  maintain  that  they  placed  it  where  they 
understood,  and  all  sensible  men  understood,  it  was  in 
the  course  of  ultimate  extinction;  and  when  Judge 
Douglas  asks  me  why  it  cannot  continue  as  our  fathers 
made  it,  I  ask  him  why  he  and  his  friends  could  not  let 
it  remain  as  our  friends  made  it?  It  is  precisely  all  I  ask 
of  him  in  relation  to  the  institution  of  slavery,  that  it 
shall  be  placed  upon  the  basis  that  our  fathers  placed  it 
upon.  Mr.  Brooks,  of  South  Carolina,  once  said,  and 
truly  said,  that  when  this  Government  was  established, 
no  one  expected  the  institution  of  slavery  to  last  until 
this  day;  and  that  the  men  who  formed  this  Government 
were  wiser  and  better  than  the  men  of  these  days;  but 
the  men  of  these  days  had  experience  which  the  fathers 
had  not,  and  that  experience  had  taught  them  the  inven 
tion  of  the  cotton-gin,  and  this  had  made  the  perpetuation 
of  the  institution  of  slavery  a  necessity  in  this  coun 
try.  Judge  Douglas  could  not  let  it  stand  upon  the  basis 
on  which  our  fathers  placed  it,  but  removed  it,  and  put 
it  upon  the  cotton-gin  basis.  It  is  a  question,  therefore, 
for  him  and  his  friends  to  answer  —  why  they  could  not 
let  it  remain  where  the  fathers  of  the  Government 
originally  placed  it. 
In  these  debates  Lincoln  often  seemed  like  one  trans 
figured  —  carried  away  by  his  own  eloquence  and  the 
force  of  his  conviction.  He  said  to  a  friend  during  the 
canvass:  "Sometimes,  in  the  excitement  of  speaking,  I 
seem  to  see  the  end  of  slavery.  I  feel  that  the  time  is 
soon  coming  when  the  sun  shall  shine,  the  rain  shall 
fall,  on  no  man  who  shall  go  forth  to  unrequited  toil. 
.  .  .  How  this  will  come,  when  it  will  come,  by  whom 
it  will  come,  I  cannot  tell;  —  but  that  time  will  surely 
come."  Again,  at  the  first  encounter  at  Alton,  he  uttered 
these  pregnant  sentences: 
On  this  subject  of  treating  slavery  as  a  wrong,  and 
limiting  its  spread,  let  me  say  a  word.  Has  anything
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     193 
ever  threatened  the  existence  of  this  Union  save  and 
except  this  very  institution  of  slavery?  What  is  it  that 
we  hold  most  dear  among  us?  Our  own  liberty  and 
prosperity.  What  has  ever  threatened  our  liberty  and 
prosperity,  save  and  except  this  institution  of  slavery? 
If  this  is  true,  how  do  you  propose  to  improve  the  condi 
tion  of  things  by  enlarging  slavery?  —  by  spreading  it 
out  and  making  it  bigger?  You  may  have  a  wen  or 
cancer -upon  your  person,  and  not  be  able  to  cut  it  out 
lest  you  bleed  to  death;  but  surely  it  is  no  way  to  cure 
it  to  ingraft  it  and  spread  it  over  your  whole  body  —  that 
is  no  proper  way  of  treating  what  you  regard  a  wrong. 
This  peaceful  way  of  dealing  with  it  as  a  wrong  —  restrict 
ing  the  spread  of  it,  and  not  allowing  it  to  go  into  new 
countries  where  it  has  not  already  existed  —  that  is  the 
peaceful  way,  the  old-fashioned  way,  the  way  in  which 
the  fathers  themselves  set  us  the  example.  Is  slavery 
wrong?  That  is  the  real  issue.  That  is  the  issue  that 
will  continue  in  this  country  when  these  poor  tongues  of 
Judge  Douglas  and  myself  shall  be  silent.  It  is  the 
eternal  struggle  between  these  two  principles  —  right 
and  wrong  —  throughout  the  world.  They  are  two 
principles  that  have  stood  face  to  face  from  the  beginning 
of  time;  and  will  ever  continue  to  struggle.  The  one  is 
the  common  right  of  humanity,  and  the  other  the  divine 
right  of  kings.  It  is  the  same  principle,  in  whatever 
shape  it  develops  itself.  It  is  the  same  spirit  that  says: 
'You  work,  and  toil,  and  earn  bread,  and  I'll  eat  it.' 
No  matter  in  what  shape  it  comes,  whether  from  the 
mouth  of  a  king  who  seeks  to  bestride  the  people  of  his 
own  nation  and  live  by  the  fruit  of  their  labor,  or  from 
one  race  of  men  as  an  apology  for  enslaving  another  race, 
it  is  the  same  tyrannical  principle. 
On  still  another  occasion  he  used  these  unmistakable 
words : 
My  declarations  upon  this  subject  of  negro  slavery  may 
be  misrepresented,  but  cannot  be  misunderstood.  I  have 
said  that  I  do  not  understand  the  Declaration  to  mean 
that  all  men  were  created  equal  in  all  respects.  They  are 
not  our  equal  in  color.  But  I  suppose  that  it  does  mean 
to  declare  that  all  men  are  created  equal  in  some  respects;
194     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
they  are  equal  in  their  right  to  'life,  liberty,  and  the 
pursuit  of  happiness/  Certainly  the  negro  is  not  our 
equal  in  color,  perhaps  not  in  many  other  respects;  still, 
in  the  right  to  put  into  his  mouth  the  bread  that  his  own 
hands  have  earned,  he  is  the  equal  of  every  other  man,  white 
or  black. 
It  is  not  in  the  scope  of  this  narrative  to  print  extended 
quotations  from  the  speeches  made  in  this  memorable 
contest,  but  rather  to  give  such  reminiscences  and  anec 
dotes,  and  description  by  eye-witnesses,  as  will  best  serve 
to  bring  the  scenes  and  actors  vividly  to  mind.  Fortu 
nately,  many  such  records  are  still  in  existence,  and  from 
them  some  most  entertaining  personal  accounts  have 
been  obtained.  Among  these  is  an  impressive  pen- 
picture  of  Lincoln  on  the  stump,  as  admirably  sketched  by 
the  Rev.  Dr.  George  C.  Noyes,  of  Chicago.  "Mr.  Lin 
coln  in  repose,"  says  Dr.  Noyes,  "was  a  very  different 
man  in  personal  appearance  from  Mr.  Lincoln  on  the 
platform  or  on  the  stump,  when  his  whole  nature  was 
roused  by  his  masterful  interest  in  the  subject  of  his 
discourse.  In  the  former  case  he  was,  as  has  often  been 
described,  a  man  of  awkward  and  ungainly  appearance 
and  exceedingly  homely  countenance.  In  the  latter  case, 
he  was  a  man  of  magnificent  presence  and  remarkably 
impressive  manner.  The  writer  retains  to  this  day  a  very 
vivid  impression  of  his  appearance  in  both  these  charac 
ters,  and  both  on  the  same  day.  It  was  in  Jacksonville, 
in  the  summer  of  1858,  and  during  the  great  contest  with 
Douglas,  when  the  prize  contended  for  was  a  seat  in  the 
United  States  Senate.  The  day  was  warm;  the  streets 
were  dusty,  and  filled  with  great  crowds  of  people.  When 
Lincoln  arrived  on  the  train  from  Springfield,  he  was  met 
by  an  immense  procession  of  people  on  horseback,  in 
carriages,  in  wagons  and  vehicles  of  every  description, 
and  on  foot,  who  escorted  him  through  the  principal 
streets  to  his  hotel.  The  enthusiasm  of  the  multitude
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     195 
was  great;  but  Lincoln's  extremely  homely  face  wore  an 
expression  of  sadness.  He  rode  in  a  carriage  near  the 
head  of  the  procession,  looking  dust-begrimed  and  worn 
and  weary;  and  though  he  frequently  lifted  his  hat  in 
recognition  of  the  cheers  of  the  crowds  lining  the  streets, 
I  saw  no  smile  on  his  face,  and  he  seemed  to  take  no 
pleasure  in  the  demonstrations  of  enthusiasm  which  his 
presence  called  forth.  His  clothes  were  very  ill-fitting, 
and  his  long  arms  and  hands  protruded  far  through  his 
coat  sleeves,  giving  him  a  peculiarly  uncouth  appearance. 
Though  I  had  often  seen  him  before,  and  had  heard  him 
in  court  —  always  with  delight  in  his  clearness  and 
cogency  of  statement,  his  illuminating  humor,  and  his 
conspicuous  fairness  and  candor  —  yet  I  had  never  before 
seen  him  when  he  appeared  so  homely;  and  I  thought 
him  about  the  ugliest  man  I  had  ever  seen.  There  was 
nothing  in  his  looks  or  manner  that  was  prepossessing. 
Such  he  appeared  as  he  rode  in  the  procession  on  the  fore 
noon  of  that  warm  summer  day.  His  appearance  was 
not  different  in  the  afternoon  of  that  day,  when,  in  the 
public  square,  he  first  stood  before  the  great  multitude 
who  had  assembled  there  to  hear  him.  His  powers  were 
aroused  gradually  as  he  went  on  with  his  speech.  There 
was  much  play  of  humor.  *  Judge  Douglas  has,'  he  said, 
'one  great  advantage  of  me  in  this  contest.  When  he 
stands  before  his  admiring  friends,  who  gather  in  great 
numbers  to  hear  him,  they  can  easily  see,  with  half  an 
eye,  all  kinds  of  fat  offices  sprouting  out  of  his  fat  and 
jocund  face,  and,  indeed,  from  every  part  of  his  plump 
and  well-rounded  body.  His  appearance  is  therefore 
irresistibly  attractive.  His  friends  expect  him  to  be 
President,  and  they  expect  their  reward.  But  when  I 
stand  before  the  people,  not  the  sharpest  vision  is  able 
to  detect  in  my  lean  and  lank  person,  or  in  my  sunken 
and  hollow  cheeks,  the  faintest  sign  or  promise  of  an  office. 
I  am  not  a  candidate  for  the  Presidency,  and  hence  there
196     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
is  no  beauty  in  me  that  men  should  desire  me.5  The 
crowd  was  convulsed  with  laughter  at  this  sally.  As  the 
speech  went  on,  the  speaker,  though  often  impressing  his 
points  with  apposite  and  laughter-provoking  stories,  grew 
more  and  more  earnest.  He  showed  that  the  government 
was  founded  in  the  interest  of  freedom,  not  slavery.  He 
traced  the  steady  aggressions  of  the  slave  power  step  by 
step,  until  he  came  to  declare  and  to  dwell  upon  the  fact 
of  the  irrepressible  conflict  between  the  two.  Then,  as 
he  went  on  to  show,  with  wonderful  eloquence  of  speech 
and  of  manner,  that  the  country  must  and  would  ulti 
mately  become,  not  all  slave,  but  all  free,  he  was  trans 
figured  before  his  audience.  His  homely  countenance 
fairly  glowed  with  the  splendor  of  his  prophetic  speech; 
and  his  body,  no  longer  awkward  and  ungainly,  but 
mastered  and  swayed  by  his  thought,  became  an  obedient 
and  graceful  instrument  of  eloquent  expression.  The 
whole  man  seemed  to  speak.  He  seemed  like  some  grand 
Hebrew  prophet,  whose  face  was  glorified  by  the  bright 
visions  of  a  better  day  which  he  saw  and  declared.  His 
eloquence  was  not  merely  that  of  clear  and  luminous 
statement,  felicitous  illustration,  or  excited  yet  restrained 
feeling;  it  was  the  eloquence  also  of  thought.  With  some 
thing  of  the  imaginative,  he  united  rare  dialectic  power. 
He  felt  the  truth  before  he  expounded  it;  but  when  once 
it  was  felt  by  him,  then  his  logical  power  came  into  re 
markably  effective  play.  Step  by  step  he  led  his  hearers 
onward,  till  at  last  he  placed  them  on  the  summit  whence 
they  could  see  all  the  landscape  of  his  subject  in  harmo 
nious  and  connected  order.  Of  these  two  contrasted 
pictures  of  Lincoln,  it  is  only  the  last  which  shows  him  as 
he  was  in  his  real  and  essential  greatness.  And  not  this 
fully;  for  it  was  in  his  character  that  he  was  greatest. 
He  was  not  merely  a  thinker,  but  a  thinker  for  man, 
directing  his  thought  to  the  ends  of  justice,  freedom,  and 
humanity.  If  he  desired  and  sought  high  position,  it
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     197 
was  only  that  he  might  thus  better  serve  the  cause  of 
freedom  to  which  he  was  devoted.  From  the  time  when 
he  withdrew,  in  a  spirit  of  magnanimity  that  was  never 
appreciated,  in  favor  of  a  rival  candidate  for  the  United 
States  Senate,  it  was  evident  that  the  cause  was  more  to 
him  than  any  personal  advantage  or  advancement." 
Another  graphic  description  of  Lincoln's  appearance 
and  manner  on  the  stump  is  given  by  Mr.  Jeriah 
Bonham,  whose  accdunt  of  the  famous  "  house-divided- 
against-itself "  speech  has  already  found  a  place  in  this 
narrative.  "When  Mr.  Lincoln  took  the  stand,"  says 
Mr.  Bonham,  "he  did  not,  on  rising,  show  his  full  height, 
but  stood  in  a  stooping  posture,  his  long-tailed  coat 
hanging  loosely  around  his  body,  and  descending  over 
an  ill-fitting  pair  of  pantaloons  that  covered  his  not  very 
symmetrical  legs.  He  began  his  speech  in  a  rather  diffi 
dent  manner,  seeming  for  awhile  at  a  loss  for  words;  his 
voice  was  irregular,  even  a  little  tremulous,  as  he  began 
his  argument.  As  he  proceeded  he  seemed  to  gain  more 
confidence,  his  form  straightened  up,  his  face  brightened, 
his  language  became  free  and  animated.  Soon  he  had 
drawn  the  attention  of  the  crowd  by  two  or  three  well- 
told  stories  that  illustrated  his  argument;  and  then  he 
became  eloquent,  carrying  his  audience  at  will,  as  tumul 
tuous  applause  greeted  every  telling  point  he  made." 
Mrs.  John  A.  Logan,  in  her  "Recollections  of  a  Soldier's 
Wife,"  says:  "I  always  like  to  think  of  Mr.  Lincoln  as  he 
was  when  I  saw  him  with  the  eyes  of  an  opponent.  His 
awkwardness  has  not  been  exaggerated,  but  it  gave  no 
effect  of  self-consciou&ness.  There  was  something  about 
his  ungainliness  and  his  homely  face  which  would  have 
made  anyone  who  simply  passed  him  in  the  street  remem 
ber  him.  His  very  awkwardness  was  an  asset  in  public 
life,  in  that  it  attracted  attention  to  him.  Douglas,  on 
the  other  hand,  won  by  the  magnetism  of  his  personality. 
Lincoln  did  not  seem  to  have  any  magnetism,  though  of
198     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
course  he  actually  did  have  the  rarest  and  most  precious 
kind.  Give  Mr.  Lincoln  five  minutes  and  Mr.  Douglas 
five  minutes  before  an  audience  which  knew  neither,  and 
Mr.  Douglas  would  make  the  greater  impression.  But 
give  them  each  an  hour,  and  the  contrary  would  be 
true." 
In  the  party  that  attended  Lincoln  in  the  Senatorial 
campaign  was  the  Hon.  Andrew  Shuman,  afterwards 
Lieutenant-Governor  of  Illinois  and  one  of  the  veteran 
journalists  of  Chicago.  Mr.  Shuman  was  detailed  to 
report  the  joint  debates  for  his  paper;  and  he  accompanied 
Lincoln  through  nearly  all  of  the  campaign,  travelling 
with  him  by  night  —  sometimes  occupying  the  same 
room,  and  when  in  crowded  quarters  the  same  bed.  He 
thus  saw  much  of  Lincoln,  and  had  the  best  of  oppor 
tunities  for  studying  his  character;  not  only  hearing  all 
his  public  speeches,  but  having  long  conversations  with 
him  in  private,  and  listening  to  the  stories,  anecdotes, 
and  gay  or  grave  discourse  by  which  the  journeys  and  the 
frequent  "waits"  were  enlivened.  The  group  consisted 
of  several  gentlemen,  including  Norman  B.  Judd  of  Chi 
cago,  afterwards  a  member  of  Congress;  Robert  R.  Hitt, 
who  was  Lincoln's  shorthand  reporter,  afterwards  member 
of  Congress  from  Illinois;  Mr.  Villard,  later  the  President 
of  the  Northern  Pacific  Railroad,  then  a  newspaper  cor 
respondent;  Mr.  Shuman;  and,  at  various  times,  other 
politicians  and  journalists.  Of  this  party  Lincoln  was 
always  the  leading  spirit  in  conversation.  He  would  tell 
stories  himself,  and  draw  out  stories  from  others;  and  his 
laugh,  though  not  the  loudest,  was  always  the  heartiest. 
Then  he  would  pass  to  soberer  themes,  and  discuss  them 
with  a  tinge  of  that  melancholy  which,  however  he  might 
be  surrounded,  never  seemed  far  distant  from  him.  At 
night,  stopping  at  the  country  tavern  or  at  some  friend's 
house,  the  evenings  would  be  spent  in  discussion  and 
story-telling,  or  perhaps  in  a  humorous  review  of  the
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     199 
events  of  the  day;  and  after  retiring,  Lincoln  would 
entertain  his  companion,  often  far  into  the  night,  dis 
coursing  on  many  varied  subjects,  —  politics,  literature, 
views  of  human  life  and  character,  or  the  prominent  men 
and  measures  then  before  the  country. 
One  day,  according  to  Governor  Shuman,  Lincoln 
had  been  announced  to  speak  in  a  town  in  the  extreme 
southern  part  of  Illinois,  in  the  very  heart  of  "Egypt," 
where  there  was  a  strong  pro-slavery  sentiment;  and  it 
was  feared  there  might  be  trouble,  as  Lincoln's  anti- 
slavery  tendencies  were  well  known.  To  make  matters 
worse,  a  party  of  Kentuckians  and  Missourians  had  come 
over  to  attend  the  meeting,  and  it  was  noised  about  that 
they  would  not  allow  Lincoln  to  speak.  He  heard  of  it, 
and  both  he  and  his  friends  were  somewhat  apprehensive 
of  trouble.  The  place  of  the  meeting  was  a  grove  in  the 
edge  of  the  town,  the  speakers  occupying  an  improvised 
stand.  The  gathering  was  a  large  one,  and  it  had  every 
appearance  of  a  Southern  crowd.  It  was  customary  in 
those  times  for  the  men  in  that  section  of  the  country  to 
carry  pistols  and  ugly-looking  knives  strapped  to  their 
persons,  on  public  occasions.  It  was  a  semi-barbarous 
community,  and  their  hatred  of  the  Abolitionists,  as 
they  called  all  anti-slavery  men,  was  as  intense  as  was 
their  love  of  bad  whiskey.  Lincoln  privately  told  his 
friends,  who  in  that  locality  were  very  few  in  number, 
that  "if  only  they  will  give  me  a  fair  chance  to  say  a  few 
opening  words,  I'll  fix  them  all  right."  Before  mounting 
the  speaker's  stand  he  was  introduced  to  many  of  the 
crowd,  and  shook  their  hands  in  the  usual  Western  way. 
Getting  a  small  company  of  the  rough-looking  fellows 
around  him,  he  opened  on  them.  "Fellow-citizens  of 
Southern  Illinois  —  fellow-citizens  of  the  State  of  Ken 
tucky  —  fellow-citizens  of  Missouri,"  he  said,  in  a  tone 
more  of  conversation  than  of  oratory,  looking  them 
straight  in  the  eye,  "I  am  told  that  there  are  some  of
200     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
you  here  present  who  would  like  to  make  trouble  for  me. 
I  don't  understand  why  they  should.  I  am  a  plain,  com 
mon  man,  like  the  rest  of  you;  and  why  should  not  I  have 
as  good  a  right  to  speak  my  sentiments  as  the  rest  of  you? 
Why,  good  friends,  I  am  one  of  you;  I  am  not  an  inter 
loper  here!  I  was  born  in  Kentucky,  raised  in  Illinois, 
just  like  the  most  of  you,  and  worked  my  way  right  along 
by  hard  scratching.  I  know  the  people  of  Kentucky, 
and  I  know  the  people  of  Southern  Illinois,  and  I  think  I 
know  the  Missourians.  I  am  one  of  them,  and  therefore 
ought  to  know  them,  and  they  ought  to  know  me  better, 
and  if  they  did  know  me  better  they  would  know  that  I 
am  not  disposed  to  make  them  trouble;  then  why  should 
they,  or  any  one  of  them,  want  to  make  trouble  for  me? 
Don't  do  any  such  foolish  thing,  fellow-citizens.  Let  us 
be  friends,  and  treat  each  other  like  friends.  I  am  one 
of  the  humblest  and  most  peaceable  men  in  the  world  — 
would  wrong  no  man,  would  interfere  with  no  man's 
rights;  and  all  I  ask  is  that,  having  something  to  say,  you 
will  give  me  a  decent  hearing.  And,  being  Illinoisans, 
Kentuckians,  and  Missourians  —  brave  and  gallant  peo 
ple  —  I  feel  sure  that  you  will  do  that.  And  now  let  us 
reason  together,  like  the  honest  fellows  we  are."  Having 
uttered  these  words,  his  face  the  very  picture  of  good 
nature  and  his  voice  full  of  sympathetic  earnestness,  he 
mounted  the  speaker's  stand  and  proceeded  to  make  one 
of  the  most  impressive  speeches  against  the  further 
extension  of  slavery  that  he  ever  made  in  his  life.  He 
was  listened  to  attentively;  was  applauded  when  he 
indulged  in  flashes  of  humor,  and  once  or  twice  his  elo 
quent  passages  were  lustily  cheered.  His  little  opening 
remarks  had  calmed  the  threatening  storm,  had  con 
quered  his  enemies,  and  he  had  smooth  sailing.  From 
that  day  to  the  time  of  his  death,  Abraham  Lincoln 
held  a  warm  place  in  the  respect  of  very  many  of  those 
rough  and  rude  "Egyptians,"  and  he  had  no  warmer
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     201 
supporters  for  the  Presidency,  or  while  he  was  President, 
than  they  were. 
Mr.  Leonard  Volk,  the  sculptor  who  afterwards  made 
an  excellent  bust  of  Lincoln,  says:  "My  first  meeting 
with  Abraham  Lincoln  was  in  1858,  when  the  celebrated 
Senatorial  contest  opened  between  him  and  Stephen  A. 
Douglas.  I  was  invited  by  the  latter  to  accompany  him 
and  his  party  by  a  special  train  to  Springfield,  to  which 
train  was  attached  a  platform-car  having  on  board  a 
cannon,  which  made  considerable  noise  on  the  journey. 
At  Bloomington  we  all  stopped  over  night,  as  Douglas 
had  a  speech  to  make  there  in  the  evening.  The  party 
went  to  the  Landon  House  —  the  only  hotel,  I  believe, 
in  the  place  at  that  time.  While  we  were  sitting  in  the 
hotel  office  after  supper,  Mr.  Lincoln  entered,  carrying 
an  old  carpet-bag  in  his  hand,  and  wearing  a  weather- 
beaten  silk  hat  —  too  large,  apparently,  for  his  head  — 
a  long,  loosely-fitting  frock-coat  of  black  alpaca,  and  vest 
and  trousers  of  the  same  material.  He  walked  up  to 
the  counter,  and,  saluting  the  clerk  pleasantly,  passed 
the  bag  over  to  him,  and  inquired  if  he  was  too  late  for 
supper.  The  clerk  replied  that  supper  was  over,  but 
perhaps  enough  could  be  *  scraped  up'  for  him.  'All 
right,'  said  Mr.  Lincoln;  'I  don't  want  much.'  Mean 
while,  he  said,  he  would  wash  the  dust  off.  He  was 
certainly  very  dusty;  it  was  the  month  of  June,  and  quite 
warm.  While  he  was  so  engaged,  several  old  friends, 
who  had  learned  of  his  arrival,  rushed  in  to  see  him,  some 
of  them  shouting,  'How  are  you,  Old  Abe?'  Mr.  Lincoln 
grasped  them  by  the  hand  in  his  cordial  manner,  with 
the  broadest  and  pleasantest  smile  on  his  rugged  face. 
This  was  the  first  good  view  I  had  of  the  'coming  man.' 
The  next  day  we  all  stopped  at  the  town  of  Lincoln,  where 
short  speeches  were  made  by  the  contestants,  and  dinner 
was  served  at  the  hotel;  after  which,  as  Mr.  Lincoln  came 
out  on  the  plank-walk  in  front,  I  was  formally  presented
202     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
to  him.  He  saluted  me  with  his  natural  cordiality,  grasp 
ing  my  hand  in  both  his  large  hands  with  a  vice-like  grip, 
and  looking  down  into  my  face  with  his  beaming,  dark, 
full  eyes,  said:  'How  do  you  do?  I  am  glad  to  meet  you. 
I  have  read  of  you  in  the  papers.  You  are  making  a 
statue  of  Judge  Douglas  for  Governor  Matteson's  new 
house.'  'Yes,  sir,'  I  answered;  'and  sometime  when 
you  are  in  Chicago,  and  can  spare  the  time,  I  would  like 
to  have  you  sit  to  me  for  a  bust.'  'Yes,  I  will,  Mr.  Volk; 
I  shall  be  glad  to,  the  first  opportunity  I  have.'  All  were 
soon  on  board  the  long  train,  crowded  with  people,  going 
to  hear  the  speeches  at  Springfield.  The  train  stopped 
on  the  track,  near  Edward's  Grove,  in  the  northern  out 
skirts  of  the  town,  where  staging  was  erected  and  a  vast 
crowd  waited  under  the  shade  of  the  trees.  On  leaving 
the  train,  most  of  the  passengers  climbed  over  the  fences 
and  crossed  the  stubble-field,  taking  a  short-cut  to  the 
grove,  —  among  them  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  stalked  forward 
alone,  taking  immense  strides,  the  before-mentioned  car 
pet-bag  and  an  umbrella  in  his  hands,  and  his  coat 
skirts  flying  in  the  breeze.  I  managed  to  keep  pretty 
close  in  the  rear  of  the  tall,  gaunt  figure,  with  the  head 
craned  forward,  apparently  much  over  the  balance,  like 
the  Leaning  Tower  of  Pisa,  that  was  moving  something 
like  a  hurricane  across  that  rough  stubble-field." 
The  contest  between  Lincoln  and  Douglas  seemed  to 
be,  as  expressed  by  Dr.  Newton  Bateman,  "one  between 
sharpness  and  greatness."  Lincoln  seemed  to  Dr.  Bate 
man,  "a  man  strongly  possessed  by  a  belief  to  which 
he  was  earnestly  striving  to  win  the  people  over;  while 
the  aim  of  Mr.  Douglas  seemed  rather  to  be  simply 
to  defeat  Mr.  Lincoln."  Yet,  although  Lincoln  was 
usually  earnest  and  considerate  of  his  opponent,  he  could, 
when  occasion  required,  bring  his  powers  of  humor  and 
sarcasm  into  play  in  a  very  effective  manner.  A  few 
pointed  illustrations  may  be  given.  In  his  speech  at
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     203 
Galesburg,  Douglas  sneeringly  informed  the  citizens  that 
"Honest  Abe"  had  been  a  liquor-seller.  Lincoln  met 
this  with  the  candid  admission  that  once  in  early  life  he 
had,  under  the  pressure  of  poverty,  accepted  and  for  a 
few  months  held  a  position  in  a  store  where  it  was  neces 
sary  for  him  to  retail  liquor.  "  But  the  difference  between 
Judge  Douglas  and  myself  is  just  this,"  he  added,  "that 
while  I  was  behind  the  bar,  he  was  in  front  of  it." 
At  the  close  of  the  joint  discussion  at  Alton,  Douglas  led 
off  with  a  speech  an  hour  long,  in  which  he  showed  no 
little  irritability.  The  campaign  was  evidently  wearing 
on  him.  Lincoln,  on  the  contrary,  was  in  capital  spirits. 
"He  sat  taking  in  the  speech  of  Douglas  with  seeming 
immobility,"  says  Mr.  Jeriah  Bonham,  who  was  present, 
"and  when  it  was  ended,  he  rose  to  reply.  As  in  the 
opening  of  all  his  speeches,  he  spoke  slowly,  did  not  rise 
to  his  full  height,  leaning  forward  in  a  stooping  posture 
at  first,  his  person  showing  all  the  angularities  of  limb  and 
face.  For  the  first  five  or  ten  minutes  he  was  both 
awkward  and  diffident,  as  in  almost  monotonous  tones  he 
began  to  untangle  the  meshes  of  Douglas's  sophistry. 
Proceeding,  he  gained  confidence  gradually;  his  voice 
rang  out  strong  and  clear;  his  tall  form  towered  to  its 
full  height;  his  face  grew  radiant  with  impassioned  feeling, 
as  he  poured  forth  an  outburst  of  crushing  argument  and 
inspiring  eloquence.  The  people  became  wild  with 
enthusiasm,  but  his  voice  rang  loud  above  their  cheers. 
Frequently  in  his  speech  he  would  turn  toward  Douglas, 
and  say  with  emphasis,  'You  know  these  things  are  so, 
Mr.  Douglas ! '  or  '  You  know  these  things  are  not  so,  Mr. 
Douglas!'  At  one  time  he  bent  his  long  body  over  his 
adversary,  pouring  in  his  arguments  so  sharply,  that 
Douglas,  chafing  under  the  attack,  rose  to  explain;  but 
Lincoln  would  not  allow  it.  'Sit  down,  Mr.  Doug 
las!'  said  he  peremptorily.  'I  did  not  interrupt  you, 
and  you  shall  not  interrupt  me.  You  will  have  oppor-
204     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
tunity  to  reply  to  me  —  if  you  can  —  in  your  closing 
speech. ' 
A  good  story  is  told  of  the  occasion  on  which  Lincoln  and 
Douglas  spoke  in  Chicago.  A  well-known  citizen  who  on 
account  of  his  age  was  known  familiarly  as  "Father 
Brewster"  —a  man  of  standing,  and  a  member  of  the 
Board  of  Education  —  was  one  of  the  listeners  on  the 
platform.  Lincoln  admired  the  old  gentleman  very 
much,  and  the  admiration  was  mutual.  They  sat  to 
gether  while  Douglas  made  the  opening  speech.  He  spoke 
for  more  than  an  hour,  and  never  more  brilliantly.  When 
Lincoln's  turn  came  he  could  see  that  Father  Brewster 
was  exceedingly  anxious  as  to  the  outcome.  Lincoln 
arose,  let  out  all  the  joints  in  his  long  body,  slowly  removed 
his  overcoat  and  laid  it  across  Mr.  Brewster's  knees. 
"Father  Brewster,"  he  said,  "will  you  hold  my  overcoat 
while  I  stone  Stephen?"  Everybody  shouted  and  cheered, 
and  even  Douglas  joined  in  the  laugh  at  his  own  expense. 
Beneath  the  humors  and  excitements  of  the  campaign, 
the  prevailing  tone  of  Lincoln's  thought  was  deeply  serious 
and  reflective.  Toward  the  close,  when  indications 
pointed  to  his  defeat  for  the  Senate,  he  seemed  somewhat 
depressed,  and  occasionally  his  old  habitual  melancholy 
would  steal  over  him  and  impart  to  his  words  a  touching 
pathos.  On  such  an  occasion,  in  one  of  the  smaller  cities 
of  Illinois,  Douglas,  having  the  first  speech,  made  an 
unusually  brilliant  effort.  He  carried  the  crowd  with 
him;  and  when  Lincoln  rose  to  reply,  it  was  evident  that 
he  felt  his  disadvantage  —  felt,  too,  that  do  what  he  would 
final  defeat  was  probable.  He  made  a  good  speech,  but 
not  one  of  his  best.  Concluding  his  argument,  he  stopped 
and  stood  silent  for  a  moment,  looking  around  upon  the 
throng  of  half-indifferent,  half-friendly  faces  before  him, 
with  those  deep-sunken  weary  eyes  that  always  seemed 
full  of  unshed  tears.  Folding  his  hands,  as  if  they  too 
were  tired  of  the  hopeless  fight,  he  said,  in  his  peculiar
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     205 
monotone:  "My  friends,  it  makes  little  difference,  very 
little  difference,  whether  Judge  Douglas  or  myself  is 
elected  to  the  United  States  Senate;  but  the  great  issue 
which  we  have  submitted  to  you  to-day  is  far  above  and 
beyond  any  personal  interests  or  the  political  fortunes  of 
any  man.  And,  my  friends,  that  issue  will  live  and 
breathe  and  burn  when  the  poor,  feeble,  stammering 
tongues  of  Judge  Douglas  and  myself  are  silent  in  the 
grave."  The  crowd  swayed  as  if  smitten  by  a  mighty 
wind.  The  simple  words,  and  the  manner  in  which  they 
were  spoken,  touched  every  heart  to  the  core. 
Lincoln  spoke  in  all  about  fifty  times  during  the  cam 
paign.  At  its  close,  says  Mr.  Arnold,  "both  Douglas 
and  Lincoln  visited  Chicago.  Douglas  was  so  hoarse 
that  he  could  hardly  articulate,  and  it  was  painful  to  hear 
him  attempt  to  speak.  Lincoln's  voice  was  clear  and 
vigorous,  and  he  really  seemed  in  better  tone  than  usual. 
His  dark  complexion  was  bronzed  by  the  prairie  sun  and 
winds;  his  eye  was  clear,  his  step  firm,  and  he  looked  like 
a  trained  athlete,  ready  to  enter,  rather  than  one  who 
had  closed,  a  conflict." 
Of  the  speeches  in  this  campaign,  Mr.  Henry  J.  Ray 
mond,  the  distinguished  journalist,  pronounced  the  fol 
lowing  well-considered  opinion:  "While  Douglas  fully 
sustained  his  previous  reputation,  and  justified  the  esti 
mate  his  friends  had  placed  upon  his  abilities,  he  labored 
under  the  comparative  disadvantage  of  being  much  better 
known  to  the  country  at  large  than  was  his  antagonist. 
During  his  long  public  career,  people  had  become  partially 
accustomed  to  his  manner  of  presenting  arguments  and 
enforcing  them.  The  .novelty  and  freshness  of  Lincoln's 
addresses,  on  the  other  hand,  the  homeliness  and  force 
of  his  illustrations,  their  wonderful  pertinence,  his  ex- 
haustless  humor,  his  confidence  in  his  own  resources, 
engendered  by  his  firm  belief  in  the  justice  of  the  cause 
he  so  ably  advocated,  never  once  rising,  however,  to  the
206     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
point  of  arrogance  or  superciliousness,  fastened  upon  him 
the  eyes  of  the  people  everywhere,  friends  and  opponents 
alike.  It  was  not  strange  that  more  than  once,  during 
the  course  of  the  unparalleled  excitement  which  marked 
this  canvass,  Douglas  should  have  been  thrown  off  his 
guard  by  the  singular  self-possession  displayed  by  his 
antagonist,  and  by  the  imperturbable  firmness  with  which 
he  maintained  and  defended  a  position  once  taken.  The 
unassuming  confidence  which  marked  Lincoln's  conduct 
was  early  imparted  to  his  supporters,  and  each  succeed 
ing  encounter  added  largely  to  the  number  of  his  friends, 
until  they  began  to  indulge  the  hope  that  a  triumph  might 
be  secured  in  spite  of  the  adverse  circumstances  under 
which  the  struggle  was  commenced." 
Samuel  Bowles,  editor  of  the  Springfield  (Mass.)  "Re 
publican,"  said  that  Lincoln  "handled  Douglas  as  he 
would  an  eel — by  main  strength.  Sometimes,  perhaps,  he 
handled  him  so  strongly  that  he  slipped  through  his  fingers." 
"In  this  canvass,"  says  Mr.  Lamon,  "Mr.  Lincoln 
earned  a  reputation  as  a  popular  debater  second  to  that 
of  no  man  in  America  —  certainly  not  second  to  that  of 
his  famous  antagonist.  He  kept  his  temper;  he  was  not 
prone  to  personalities;  he  was  fair,  frank,  and  manly; 
and,  if  the  contest  had  shown  nothing  else,  it  would  have 
shown  at  least  that  *  Old  Abe '  could  behave  like  a  gentle 
man  under  very  trying  circumstances.  His  marked 
success  in  these  discussions  was  probably  no  surprise  to 
the  people  of  the  Springfield  district,  who  knew  him  as 
well  as  they  did  Mr.  Douglas,  or  even  better.  But  in 
the  greater  part  of  the  State,  and  throughout  the  Union, 
the  series  of  brilliant  victories  successively  won  by  an 
obscure  man  over  an  orator  of  such  wide  experience  and 
renown  was  received  with  exclamations  of  astonishment 
alike  by  listeners  and  readers." 
Caleb  Gushing,  the  distinguished  Massachusetts  lawyer, 
was  one  of  those  acute  minds  whose  attention  was  at-
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     207 
traded  to  Lincoln  by  his  debates  with  Douglas.  Mr. 
Gushing  said  that  these  debates  showed  Lincoln  to  be  the 
superior  of  Douglas  "in  every  vital  element  of  power"; 
and  added  that  "the  world  does  not  yet  know  how  much 
of  a  man  Lincoln  really  is."  It  was  soon  to  know  him 
much  more  clearly.  In  less  than  two  years  after  the 
great  debate  this  lately  obscure  Illinois  lawyer  was 
elected  President  of  the  United  States.
CHAPTER  XII 
A  Year  of  Waiting  and  Trial  —  Again  Defeated  for  the  Senate  — 
Depression  and  Neglect — Lincoln  Enlarging  His  Boundaries  — 
On  the  Stump  in  Ohio  —  A  Speech  to  Kentuckians  —  Second  Visit 
to  Cincinnati  —  A  Short  Trip  to  Kansas  —  Lincoln  in  New  York 
City  —  The  Famous  Cooper  Institute  Speech  —  A  Strong  and 
Favorable  Impression  —  Visits  New  England  —  Secret  of  Lincoln's 
Success  as  an  Orator  —  Back  to  Springfield  —  Disposing  of  a 
Campaign  Slander — Lincoln's  Account  of  His  Visit  to  a  Five 
Points  Sunday  School. 
ON  the  2d  of  November,  1858,  the  State  election  was 
held  in  Illinois.  The  chief  significance  of  this 
election  was  due  to  the  fact  that  the  Legislature  then 
chosen  wrould  decide  whether  Douglas  or  Lincoln  should 
be  sent  to  the  Senate  at  Washington.  The  result  showed 
that  Lincoln  had,  by  his  hard  efforts,  won  a  victory  for 
his  cause  and  for  his  party,  but  not  for  himself.  The 
Republican  State  ticket  was  elected  by  a  majority  of 
about  4,000  votes;  but  in  the  Legislature  a  number  of 
members  held  over  from  the  election  of  two  years  before, 
and  the  Republican  gains,  though  considerable,  were  not 
quite  sufficient  to  overcome  this  adverse  element.  When 
the  Legislature  met,  Douglas  was  re-elected  to  the  Senate 
by  a  small  majority.  It  is  said  that  Lincoln  was  deeply 
grieved  by  his  defeat.  When  some  one  inquired  of  him 
how  he  felt  over  the  result,  he  answered  that  he  felt  "like 
the  boy  that  stubbed  his  toe,  —  '  it  hurt  too  bad  to  laugh, 
and  he  was  too  big  to  cry!' 
A  few  days  after  his  return  to  Springfield,  there  was 
pressed  on  the  attention  of  the  defeated  candidate  a 
matter  which  must  have  been  peculiarly  unwelcome 
at  the  time,  but  which  was  accepted  with  habitual
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     209 
fortitude.    What  this  matter  was  is  revealed  in  the  fol 
lowing  letter: 
SPRINGFIELD,  Nov.  16,  1858. 
HON.  N.  B.  JUDD  —  My  Dear  Sir:  —  Yours  of  the  15th 
is  just  received.  I  wrote  you  the  same  day.  As  to  the 
pecuniary  matter,  I  am  willing  to  pay  according  to  my 
ability,  but  I  am  the  poorest  hand  living  to  get  others  to 
pay.  I  have  been  on  expense  so  long,  without  earning 
anything,  that  I  am  absolutely  without  money  now  for  even 
household  expenses.  Still,  if  you  can  put  in  two  hundred 
and  fifty  dollars  for  me  towards  discharging  the  debt  of 
the  committee,  I  will  allow  it  when  you  and  I  settle  the 
private  matter  between  us.  This,  with  what  I  have 
already  paid  with  an  outstanding  note  of  mine,  will  ex 
ceed  my  subscription  of  five  hundred  dollars.  This,  too, 
is  exclusive  of  my  ordinary  expenses  during  the  campaign, 
all  of  which,  being  added  to  my  loss  of  time  and  busi 
ness,  bears  pretty  heavily  upon  one  no  better  off  than  I 
am.  But  as  I  had  the  post  of  honor,  it  is  not  for  me  to 
be  over-nice. 
You  are  feeling  badly.  And  this,  too,  shall  pass  away; 
never  fear. 
Yours  as  ever, 
A.  LINCOLN. 
Hon.  E.  M.  Haines,  who  was  a  member  of  the  Legis 
lature  of  1858-9,  and  a  supporter  of  Lincoln  for  the 
Senate,  states  that  Lincoln  seemed  greatly  depressed 
by  his  defeat,  and  that  his  friends  were  also  somewhat 
disheartened  regarding  his  future  prospects,  and  neglected 
him  to  some  extent.  "Some  time  after  the  Senatorial 
election,"  says  Mr.  Haines,  "Governor  Bissell  gave  a 
reception  at  his  house,  which  I  attended  with  my  wife. 
After  we  had  paid  our  respects  to  the  Governor  and  Mrs. 
Bissell,  we  passed  on  to  an  adjoining  room,  where  there 
was  quite  a  throng  of  people  engaged  in  conversation. 
Mr.  Lincoln  was  standing  near  the  centre  of  the  room, 
entirely  alone,  with  his  usual  sad  countenance,  and  ap 
parently  unnoticed  by  anyone.  I  said  to  my  wife,  'Here
210     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
is  Mr.  Lincoln;  he  looks  as  if  he  had  lost  all  his  friends; 
come  and  have  an  introduction  to  him,  and  cheer  him 
up.'  Mr.  Lincoln  received  us  very  cordially,  and  we 
entered  into  a  general  conversation,  apparently  unno 
ticed,  and  attracting  no  attention  from  others  as  they 
passed  and  repassed  around  us.  Dancing  was  going  on 
in  the  adjacent  rooms,  and  Mr.  Lincoln  invited  my  wife 
to  join  him  in  the  dancing,  which  she  did,  and  he  appar 
ently  took  much  pleasure  in  the  recreation.  My  wife 
afterwards  related  to  me  much  that  Mr.  Lincoln  said  in 
their  conversation  during  the  evening.  His  despond 
ency  became  much  dispelled  after  they  became  engaged 
in  conversation;  indeed,  she  said  that  he  seemed  to  be 
putting  forth  an  effort  to  get  out  of  the  gloomy  condition 
which  had  come  upon  him  from  the  result  of  his  Sena 
torial  canvass.  He  had  occasion  during  their  conversa 
tion  to  refer  to  his  age,  remarking  incidentally  that  he 
was  almost  fifty  years  old;  whereupon,  as  if  suddenly 
reflecting  that  his  age  was  a  good  part  of  a  man's  life,  and 
as  if  unwilling  to  relinquish  his  hold  upon  the  future,  he 
suddenly  braced  himself  up,  and  said,  'But,  Mrs.  Haines, 
I  feel  that  I  am  good  for  another  fifty  years  yet.' ' 
During  the  winter  following  the  Senatorial  debate 
Lincoln  was  occupied  with  his  private  affairs.  The  love 
of  public  speaking  had  become  so  strong  with  him  that  he 
prepared  a  lecture  and  delivered  it  to  the  public  at  sev 
eral  places  during  the  winter.  It  was  somewhat  humorous 
in  character,  but  was  not  much  of  a  success,  and  he  soon 
declined  further  invitations  to  deliver  it.  To  one  corre 
spondent  he  wrote,  in  March,  1859:  "Your  note,  inviting 
me  to  deliver  a  lecture  in  Galesburg,  is  received.  I 
regret  to  say  that  I  cannot  do  so  now.  I  must  stick  to 
the' courts  for  awhile.  I  read  a  sort  of  a  lecture  to  three 
different  audiences  during  the  last  month  and  this;  but 
I  did  so  under  circumstances  which  made  it  a  waste  of 
time,  of  no  value  whatever."
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     211 
The  following  autumn  (1859)  Senator  Douglas  visited 
Ohio  and  made  speeches  for  the  Democratic  party  there. 
From  the  Republican  ranks  there  arose  a  cry  for  Lincoln, 
whose  superiority  to  Douglas  in  the  great  debate  of  the 
preceding  year  was  still  fresh  in  the  public  mind.  He 
promptly  answered  it,  and  spoke  in  that  State  with 
marked  effect.  At  Cincinnati  he  addressed  himself  es 
pecially  to  Kentuckians,  and  said,  in  a  strain  which  is 
now  seen  to  be  prophetic: 
I  should  not  wonder  if  there  were  some  Kentuckians 
in  this  audience;  we  are  close  to  Kentucky;  but  whether 
that  be  so  or  not,  we  are  on  elevated  ground,  and  by 
speaking  distinctly  I  should  not  wonder  if  some  of  the 
Kentuckians  would  hear  me  on  the  other  side  of  the 
river.  For  that  purpose  I  propose  to  address  a  portion 
of  what  I  have  to  say  to  the  Kentuckians.  I  say,  then,  in 
the  first  place,  to  the  Kentuckians,  that  I  am  what  they 
call,  as  I  understand  it,  a  'Black  Republican.'  I  think 
slavery  is  wrong,  morally  and  politically.  I  desire  that 
it  should  be  no  further  spread  in  these  United  States,  and 
I  should  not  object  if  it  should  gradually  terminate  in  the 
whole  Union.  While  I  say  this  for  myself,  I  say  to  you 
Kentuckians,  that  I  understand  you  differ  radically  with 
me  upon  this  proposition;  that  you  believe  slavery  is  a 
good  thing;  that  slavery  is  right;  that  it  ought  to  be 
extended  and  perpetuated  in  this  Union.  Now,  there 
being  this  broad  difference  between  us,  I  do  not  pretend, 
in  addressing  myself  to  you  Kentuckians,  to  attempt 
proselyting  you;  that  would  be  a  vain  effort.  I  will 
tell  you,  so  far  as  I  am  authorized  to  speak  for  the  oppo 
sition,  what  we  mean  to  do  with  you.  We  mean  to  treat 
you,  as  nearly  as  we  possibly  can,  as  Washington,  Jeffer 
son,  and  Madison  treated  you.  We  mean  to  leave  you 
alone,  and  in  no  way  to  interfere  with  your  institution; 
to  abide  by  all  and  every  compromise  of  the  Constitution, 
and,  in  a  word,  coming  back  to  the  original  proposition, 
to  treat  you,  so  far  as  degenerated  men  (if  we  have  de 
generated)  may,  according  to  the  examples  of  those  noble 
fathers  —  Washington,  Jefferson  and  Madison.  We  mean 
to  remember  that  you  are  as  good  as  we;  that  there  is  no
212     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
difference  between  us,  other  than  the  difference  of  circum 
stances.  We  mean  to  recognize  and  bear  in  mind  always, 
that  you  have  as  good  hearts  in  your  bosoms  as  other 
people,  or  as  we  claim  to  have,  and  treat  you  accordingly. 
We  mean  to  marry  your  girls,  when  we  have  a  chance  — 
the  white  ones,  I  mean  —  and  I  have  the  honor  to  inform 
you  that  I  once  did  have  a  chance  in  that  way.  I  have 
told  you  what  we  mean  to  do.  I  want  to  know  now  what 
you  mean  to  do.  I  often  hear  it  intimated  that  you 
mean  to  divide  the  Union  whenever  a  Republican,  or 
anything  like  it,  is  elected  President  of  the  United  States. 
[A  voice  — 'That  is  so.']  'That  is  so,'  one  of  them 
says;  I  wonder  if  he  is  a  Kentuckian?  [A  voice  —  'He 
is  a  Douglas  man.']  Well,  then,  I  want  to  know  what 
you  are  going  to  do  with  your  half  of  it?  Are  you  going 
to  split  the  Ohio  down  through,  and  push  your  half  off  a 
piece?  Or  are  you  going  to  keep  it  right  alongside  of  us 
outrageous  fellows?  Or  are  you  going  to  build  up  a  wall 
some  way  between  your  country  and  ours,  by  which 
that  movable  property  of  yours  can't  come  over  here  any 
more,  to  the  danger  of  your  losing  it?  Do  you  think  you 
can  better  yourselves  on  that  subject  by  leaving  us  here 
under  no  obligation  whatever  to  return  those  specimens 
of  your  movable  property  that  come  hither?  You  have 
divided  the  Union  because  we  would  not  do  right  with 
you,  as  you  think,  upon  that  subject;  when  we  cease  to 
be  under  obligations  to  do  anything  for  you,  how  much 
better  off  do  you  think  you  will  be?  Will  you  make  war 
upon  us  and  kill  us  all?  Why,  gentlemen,  I  think  you 
are  as  gallant  and  as  brave  men  as  live;  that  you  can 
fight  as  bravely  in  a  good  cause,  man  for  man,  as  any 
other  people  living;  that  you  have  shown  yourselves 
capable  of  this  upon  various  occasions;  but  man  for  man, 
you  are  not  better  than  we  are,  and  there  are  not  so  many 
of  you  as  there  are  of  us.  You  will  never  make  much  of  a 
hand  at  whipping  us.  If  we  were  fewer  in  numbers  than 
you,  I  think  that  you  could  whip  us;  if  we  were  equal,  it 
would  likely  be  a  drawn  battle;  but  being  inferior  in  num 
bers,  you  will  make  nothing  by  attempting  to  master  us. 
The  Hon.  W.  M.  Dickson,  whose  interesting  account 
of  Lincoln's  first  visit  to  Cincinnati  and  the  disappoint 
ments  attending  it  has  already  been  given  in  this  narra-
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     213 
live,  says  of  this  second  visit  as  contrasted  with  the 
obscurity  of  the  first:  "Lincoln  returned  to  the  city  with 
a  fame  wide  as  the  continent,  with  the  laurels  of  the 
Douglas  contest  on  his  brow,  and  the  Presidency  almost 
in  his  grasp.  He  returned,  greeted  with  the  thunder  of 
cannon,  the  strains  of  martial  music,  and  the  joyous 
plaudits  of  thousands  of  citizens  thronging  the  streets. 
He  addressed  a  vast  concourse  on  Fifth  Street  Market; 
was  entertained  in  princely  style  at  the  Burnet  House; 
and  there  received  with  courtesy  the  foremost  citizens, 
come  to  greet  this  Western  rising  star." 
In  December  of  the  same  year  Lincoln  visited  Kansas 
and  addressed  the  people  of  that  troubled  State  upon  the 
political  questions  then  before  the  country.  At  Leaven- 
worth,  Atchison,  Elwood,  and  other  places,  he  was  met 
by  large  gatherings  of  eager  listeners  who  were  charmed 
and  convinced  by  his  fresh  and  reassuring  utterances. 
His  journeys  were  complete  ovations,  and  he  returned  to 
Illinois  leaving  a  host  of  new  friends  behind  him.  As 
several  of  Lincoln's  biographers  make  no  reference  to  his 
Kansas  visit,  and  the  entire  matter  seems  more  or  less 
obscured,  the  following  letter,  lately  written  by  Mr. 
Harry  W.  Stewart,  of  Carlsbad,  New  Mexico,  is  of  much 
interest:  "I  have  recently  seen  a  reference  to  Lincoln's 
visit  to  Kansas  as  if  the  fact  were  not  clearly  established. 
In  this  connection  I  may  offer  a  personal  recollection  of 
my  father,  James  G.  Stewart,  who  was  a  physician  prac 
ticing  in  the  little  town  of  Elwood,  Kansas,  from  1856  to 
1860.  He  said  that  both  Lincoln  and  Seward  came  out 
and  spoke  in  St.  Joseph,  Mo.,  just  across  the  river  from 
Elwood.  On  each  occasion  a  large  following  of  'free 
state'  men  went  over  to  St.  Jo  to  hear  the  speech  and 
incidentally  to  support  the  speaker  in  case  of  violence, 
which  had  been  freely  predicted.  According  to  this 
reminiscence,  Lincoln  crossed  the  Missouri  into  Kansas, 
my  father  having  the  honor  of  taking  him  in  a  buggy  to
214     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
a  small  town  fourteen  miles  distant  from  Elwood  in  Doni- 
phan  County.  They  drove  out  to  Troy,  where  Mr. 
Lincoln  made  a  speech.  From  here  I  think  he  went  on 
to  Lawrence  and  other  places  before  returning  to  St. 
Joseph,  but  have  no  account  of  his  movements  beyond 
Troy.  I  think  it  was  in  the  year  1858  and  must  have 
been  in  the  summer  time,  for  the  party  took  Mr.  Lincoln 
over  the  Missouri  on  a  ferry.  It  did  not  make  trips 
oftener  than  about  once  in  two  hours.  When  Lincoln 
came  to  the  bank  on  the  Missouri  side  the  boat  had  just 
gone.  There  was  no  waiting-room  or  benches  to  sit  on 
and  some  of  the  party  were  inclined  to  think  they  were 
in  hard  luck.  When  Lincoln  found  out  how  it  was,  he 
said:  'It's  all  right.  We'll  sit  right  down  on  the  sand 
and  wait  for  the  boat.'  Then  they  all  sat  down  on  the 
ground  and  listened  to  genuine  Lincoln  stories  till  the 
time  was  up.  My  father  often  spoke  with  delight  of  this 
incident.  I  have  looked  in  vain  in  Lincoln  histories  for 
a  more  definite  account  of  this  Kansas  trip.  Of  the 
actual  fact  there  can  be  no  doubt." 
Lincoln's  fame,  as  we  have  seen,  had  now  extended  to 
the  East,  where  he  seems  to  have  been  looked  upon  as  a 
rising  man  and  an  interesting  figure  in  national  politics. 
Invitations  to  visit  the  East  now  began  to  reach  him.  In 
the  following  February  (1860)  he  went  to  Brooklyn,  for 
the  purpose  of  delivering  a  lecture  in  Mr.  Beecher's  church. 
The  invitation  had  given  him  much  pleasure,  and  he 
prepared  himself  thoroughly;  indeed,  it  is  said  that  no 
effort  of  his  life  cost  him  so  much  labor  as  this.  In  the 
Plymouth  congregation  of  Brooklyn  there  was  an  associa 
tion  of  young  men  which  was  successful  in  getting  an 
annual  course  of  six  lectures  of  the  highest  order.  This 
association  discerned  in  Lincoln  a  man  worthy  of  a  place 
in  its  course,  and  invited  him  to  give  such  a  lecture. 
Meanwhile,  some  prominent  Republican  politicians  of 
New  York  had  heard  of  him  as  a  possible  candidate  for
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN    215 
the  Presidency,  and  desired  him  to  make  a  speech  in  that 
city  in  order  to  determine  whether  he  would  be  the  man 
to  present  to  the  Republican  National  convention  in  case 
Mr.  Seward  could  not  be  nominated.  Lincoln  informed 
these  gentlemen  of  his  Brooklyn  engagement,  but  said 
he  would  speak  in  New  York  if  the  Brooklyn  club  gave 
its  consent.  That  club  agreed  to  this  arrangement;  and 
thus  it  was  decided  that  Lincoln's  speech  should  be 
delivered  in  New  York  City,  instead  of  Brooklyn,  as  had 
been  first  intended.  Mr.  R.  C.  McCormick,  who  was  a 
member  of  the  committee  in  charge  of  the  arrangements, 
says:  "When  Mr.  Lincoln  came  to  New  York  City,  there 
was  some  confusion  in  the  arrangements.  He  had  at 
first  been  invited  to  appear  in  Brooklyn,  but  upon  de 
liberation  his  friends  thought  it  best  that  he  should  be 
heard  in  New  York.  Reaching  the  Astor  House  on 
Saturday,  February  25,  he  was  surprised  to  find  by 
announcement  in  the  public  prints  that  he  was  to  speak 
at  the  Cooper  Institute.  He  said  he  must  review  his 
address  if  it  was  to  be  delivered  in  New  York.  What  he 
had  prepared  for  Mr.  Beecher's  church-folks  might  not 
be  altogether  appropriate  to  a  miscellaneous  political 
audience.  Saturday  was  spent  in  a  review  of  the  speech, 
and  on  Sunday  morning  he  went  to  Plymouth  church, 
where  apparently  he  greatly  enjoyed  the  service.  On 
Monday  morning  I  waited  upon  him  with  several  mem 
bers  of  the  Young  Men's  Republican  Union,  into  whose 
hands  the  preparations  for  the  meeting  at  the  Cooper 
Institute  had  fallen.  We  found  him  in  a  suit  of  black, 
much  wrinkled  from  its  careless  packing  in  a  small  valise. 
He  received  us  cordially,  apologizing  for  the  awkward 
and  uncomfortable  appearance  he  made  in  his  new  suit, 
and  expressing  himself  surprised  at  being  in  New  York. 
His  form  and  manner  were  indeed  very  odd,  and  we 
thought  him  the  most  unprepossessing  public  man  we 
had  ever  met.  I  spoke  to  him  of  the  manuscript  of  his
216     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
forthcoming  address,  and  suggested  to  him  that  it  should 
be  given  to  the  press  at  his  earliest  convenience,  in  order 
that  it  might  be  published  in  full  on  the  morning  following 
its  delivery.  He  appeared  in  much  doubt  as  to  whether 
any  of  the  papers  would  care  to  print  it;  and  it  was  only 
when  I  accompanied  a  reporter  to  his  room  and  made  a 
request  for  it,  that  he  began  to  think  his  words  might  be 
of  interest  to  the  metropolitan  public.  He  seemed 
wholly  ignorant  of  the  custom  of  supplying  slips  to  the 
different  journals  from  the  office  first  putting  the  addresses 
in  type,  and  was  charmingly  innocent  of  the  machinery 
so  generally  used,  even  by  some  of  our  most  popular 
orators,  to  give  success  and  eclat  to  their  public  efforts. 
The  address  was  written  upon  blue  foolscap  paper,  all 
in  his  own  hand,  and  with  few  interlineations.  I  was 
bold  enough  to  read  portions  of  it,  and  had  no  doubt  that 
its  delivery  would  create  a  marked  sensation  throughout 
the  country.  Lincoln  referred  frequently  to  Douglas, 
but  always  in  a  generous  and  kindly  manner.  It  was 
difficult  to  regard  them  as  antagonists.  Many  stories 
of  the  famous  Illinois  debates  were  told  us,  and  in  a  very 
short  time  his  frank  and  sparkling  conversation  won  our 
hearts  and  made  his  plain  face  pleasant  to  us  all.  Dur 
ing  the  day  it  was  suggested  that  he  should  be  taken  up 
Broadway  and  shown  the  city,  of  which  he  knew  but 
little  —  stating,  I  think,  that  he  had  been  here  but  once 
before.  At  one  place  he  met  an  Illinois  acquaintance  of 
former  years,  to  whom  he  said,  in  his  dry,  good-natured 
way :  *  Well,  B.,  how  have  you  fared  since  you  left  Illinois? ' 
To  which  B.  replied,  'I  have  made  a  hundred  thousand 
dollars,  and  lost  all.  How  is  it  with  you,  Mr.  Lincoln?' 
'Oh,  very  well,'  said  Lincoln.  'I  have  the  cottage  at 
Springfield,  and  about  eight  thousand  dollars  in  money. 
If  they  make  me  Vice-president  with  Seward,  as  some 
say  they  will,  I  hope  I  shall  be  able  to  increase  it  to 
twenty  thousand;  and  that  is  as  much  as  any  man  ought
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     217 
to  want/  We  visited  a  photographic  establishment  upon 
the  corner  of  Broadway  and  Bleeker  streets,  where  he  sat 
for  his  picture,  the  first  taken  in  New  York.  At  the 
gallery  he  met  and  was  introduced  to  Hon.  George  Ban 
croft,  and  had  a  brief  conversation  with  that  gentleman, 
who  welcomed  him  to  New  York.  The  contrast  in  the 
appearance  of  the  men  was  most  striking;  the  one  courtly 
and  precise  in  his  every  word  and  gesture,  with  the  air 
of  a  trans- Atlantic  statesman;  the  other  bluff  and  awk 
ward,  his  very  utterance  an  apology  for  his  ignorance  of 
metropolitan  manners  and  customs.  '  I  am  on  my  way  to 
Massachusetts,'  he  said  to  Mr.  Bancroft,  'where  I  have  a 
son  at  school,  who,  if  report  be  true,  already  knows  much 
more  than  his  father.'  ' 
On  the  evening  of  February  27  a  large  and  brilliant 
audience  gathered  at  Cooper  Institute,  to  hear  the  famous 
Western  orator.  The  scene  was  one  never  to  be  for 
gotten  by  those  who  witnessed  it.  Upon  the  platform 
sat  many  of  the  prominent  men  of  the  Republican  party, 
and  in  the  body  of  the  hall  were  many  ladies.  The 
meeting  was  presided  over  by  the  distinguished  citizen  and 
poet  William  Cullen  Bryant,  of  whom  Mr.  Lincoln  after 
ward  said,  "It  was  worth  a  journey  to  the  East  merely 
to  see  such  a  man."  The  orator  of  the  evening  was  intro 
duced  by  Mr.  Bryant  with  some  very  complimentary 
allusions,  especially  to  his  controversy  with  Douglas. 
"When  Mr.  Lincoln  came  on  the  platform  and  was  intro 
duced  by  Mr.  Bryant/'  says  one  who  was  present,  "he 
seemed  a  giant  in  contrast  with  him.  His  first  sentence 
was  delivered  in  a  peculiarly  high-keyed  voice,  and  dis 
appointed  us.  In  a  short  time  the  sharp  points  of  his 
address  began  to  come,  and  he  had  not  been  speaking  for 
half  an  hour  before  his  audience  seemed  wild  with  en 
thusiasm."  Another  account  says:  "His  manner  was,  to 
a  New  York  audience,  a  very  strange  one,  but  it  was  cap 
tivating.  He  held  the  vast  meeting  spell-bound,  and  as
218     EVERY-DAY   LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
one  by  one  his  oddly  expressed  but  trenchant  and  con 
vincing  arguments  confirmed  the  soundness  of  his  political 
conclusions,  the  house  broke  out  in  wild  and  prolonged 
enthusiasm.  I  think  I  never  saw  an  audience  more  thor 
oughly  carried  away  by  an  orator."  This  speech  was 
full  of  trenchant  passages,  which  called  forth  tumultuous 
applause.  The  following  is  a  specimen: 
I  defy  anyone  to  show  that  any  living  man  in  the 
whole  world  ever  did,  prior  to  the  beginning  of  the  present 
century  (and  I  might  almost  say  prior  to  the  beginning 
of  the  last  half  of  the  present  century),  declare  that,  in 
his  understanding,  any  proper  division  of  local  from 
Federal  authority,  or  any  part  of  the  Constitution,  forbade 
the  Federal  Government  to  control  slavery  in  the  Federal 
territories.  To  those  who  now  so  declare,  I  give  not  only 
our  fathers  who  framed  the  government  under  which  we 
live,  but  with  them  all  other  living  men  within  the  century 
in  which  it  was  framed,  among  whom  to  search,  and  they 
shall  not  be  able  to  find  the  evidence  of  a  single  man 
agreeing  with  them. 
Referring  to  the  South,  and  the  growing  political  dis 
content  in  that  quarter,  he  said: 
Let  all  who  believe  that  our  fathers  understood  this 
question  just  as  well  as,  and  even  better  than,  we  do  now, 
speak  as  they  spoke  and  act  as  they  acted  upon  it.  This 
is  all  Republicans  ask  —  all  Republicans  desire  —  in 
relation  to  slavery.  As  those  fathers  marked  it,  so  let 
it  be  again  marked,  as  an  evil  not  to  be  extended,  but  to 
be  tolerated  and  protected  only  because,  and  so  far  as, 
its  actual  presence  among  us  makes  that  toleration  and 
protection  a  necessity.  Let  all  the  guarantees  those 
fathers  gave  it  be  not  grudgingly  but  fully  and  fairly 
maintained. 
His  counsel  to  the  young  Republican  party  was  timely 
and  full  of  wisdom. 
A  few  words  now  to  Republicans:  It  is  exceedingly 
desirable  that  all  parts  of  this  great  Confederacy  shall  be
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     219 
at  peace,  and  in  harmony  one  with  another.  Let  us 
Republicans  do  our  part  to  have  it  so.  Even  though 
much  provoked,  let  us  do  nothing  through  passion  and 
ill-temper.  Even  though  the  Southern  people  will  not 
so  much  as  listen  to  us,  let  us  calmly  consider  their  de 
mands,  and  yield  to  them,  if  in  our  deliberate  view  of  our 
duty  we  possibly  can. 
The  address  closed  with  the  following  impressive 
words : 
Wrong  as  we  think  slavery  is,  we  can  yet  afford  to  let 
it  alone  where  it  is,  because  that  much  is  due  to  the 
necessity  arising  from  its  actual  presence  in  the  nation; 
but  can  we,  while  our  votes  will  prevent  it,  allow  it  to 
spread  into  the  National  Territories,  and  to  overrun  us 
here  in  these  free  States?  If  our  sense  of  duty  forbids 
this,  then  let  us  stand  by  our  duty,  fearlessly  and  effect 
ively.  Let  us  be  diverted  by  none  of  those  sophistical 
contrivances  wherewith  we  are  so  industriously  plied  and 
belabored  —  contrivances  such  as  groping  for  some  middle 
ground  between  the  right  and  the  wrong,  vain  as  the 
search  for  a  man  who  should  be  neither  a  living  man  nor 
a  dead  man,  —  such  as  a  policy  of  *  don't  care*  on  a 
question  about  which  all  true  men  do  care,  —  such  as 
Union  appeals,  beseeching  true  Union  men  to  yield  to 
Disunionists,  reversing  the  divine  rule,  and  calling  not 
the  sinners  but  the  righteous  to  repentance,  —  such  as 
invocations  of  Washington,  imploring  men  to  unsay  what 
Washington  said  and  undo  what  Washington  did.  Neither 
let  us  be  slandered  from  our  duty  by  false  accusations 
against  us,  nor  frightened  from  it  by  menaces  of  destruc 
tion  to  the  Government  nor  of  dungeons  to  ourselves. 
Let  us  have  faith  that  right  makes  might;  and  in  that 
faith,  let  us  to  the  end  dare  to  do  our  duty  as  we  under 
stand  it. 
The  Cooper  Institute  speech  made  a  profound  im 
pression  upon  the  public.  All  who  saw  and  heard  Lin 
coln  on  that  occasion  felt  the  influence  of  his  strange  but 
powerful  personality;  and  acute  minds  recognized  in  the 
unsophisticated  Western  lawyer  a  new  force  in  American
220     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
politics.  This  speech  made  Lincoln  known  throughout 
the  country,  and  undoubtedly  did  more  than  anything 
else  to  secure  him  the  nomination  for  the  Presidency. 
Aside  from  its  extensive  publication  in  the  newspapers, 
various  editions  of  it  appeared  in  pamphlet  form,  one  of 
the  best  of  which  was  issued  by  Messrs.  C.  C.  Nott  and 
Cephas  Brainard,  who  appended  to  their  edition  an  esti 
mate  of  the  speech  that  is  well  worth  reprinting  here: 
"No  one  who  has  not  actually  attempted  to  verify  its 
details  can  understand  the  patient  research  and  historical 
labor  which  it  embodies.  The  history  of  our  earlier 
politics  is  scattered  through  numerous  journals,  statutes, 
pamphlets,  and  letters;  and  these  are  defective  in  com 
pleteness  and  accuracy  of  statement,  and  in  indexes  and 
tables  of  contents.  Neither  can  any  one  who  has  not 
travelled  over  this  precise  ground  appreciate  the  accu 
racy  of  every  trivial  detail,  or  the  self-denying  impartiality 
with  which  Mr.  Lincoln  has  turned  from  the  testimony 
of  'the  fathers'  on  the  general  question  of  slavery  to 
present  the  single  question  which  he  discusses.  From 
the  first  line  to  the  last,  from  his  premises  to  his  con 
clusion,  he  travels  with  a  swift,  unerring  directness 
which  no  logician  ever  excelled,  —  an  argument  complete 
and  full,  without  the  affectation  of  learning,  and  without 
the  stiffness  which  usually  accompanies  dates  and  details. 
A  single  easy,  simple  sentence  of  plain  Anglo-Saxon  words 
contains  a  chapter  of  history  that,  in  some  instances,  has 
taken  days  of  labor  to  verify,  and  must  have  cost  the 
author  months  of  investigation  to  acquire;  and  though 
the  public  should  justly  estimate  the  labor  bestowed  on 
the  facts  which  are  stated,  they  cannot  estimate  the 
greater  labor  involved  on  those  which  are  omitted  — 
how  many  pages  have  been  read  —  how  many  works  ex 
amined —  what  numerous  statutes,  resolutions,  speeches, 
letters,  and  biographies  have  been  looked  thr6ugh.  Com 
mencing  with  this  address  as  a  political  pamphlet,  the
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     221 
reader  will  leave  it  as  an  historical  work  —  brief ,  complete, 
profound,  impartial,  truthful,  —  which  will  survive  the 
time  and  the  occasion  that  called  it  forth,  and  be  es 
teemed  hereafter  no  less  for  its  intrinsic  worth  than  for 
its  unpretending  modesty." 
Lincoln's  oldest  son,  Robert,  was  at  this  time  a  stu 
dent  in  Harvard  University,  and,  chiefly  to  visit  him, 
Lincoln  made  a  brief  trip  to  New  England.  While 
there  he  spoke  at  Concord  and  Manchester  in  New 
Hampshire;  at  Woonsocket  in  Rhode  Island;  and  at 
Hartford,  New  Haven,  Norwich,  Meriden,  and  Bridge 
port  in  Connecticut.  These  speeches  were  heard  with 
delight  by  large  audiences,  and  received  hearty  praise 
from  the  press.  At  Manchester,  "The  Mirror,"  a  neu 
tral  paper,  published  the  following  remarks  on  Lincoln's 
style  of  oratory:  "He  spoke  an  hour  and  a  half,  with  great 
fairness,  great  apparent  candor,  and  with  wonderful 
interest.  He  did  not  abuse  the  South,  the  administration, 
or  the  Democrats,  nor  indulge  in  any  personalities,  with 
the  exception  of  a  few  hits  at  *  Douglas's  notions.'  He 
is  far  from  prepossessing  in  personal  appearance,  and  his 
voice  is  disagreeable;  and  yet  he  wins  attention  and 
good-will  from  the  start.  He  indulges  in  no  flowers  of 
rhetoric,  no  eloquent  passages.  He  is  not  a  wit,  a  hu 
morist,  or  a  clown;  yet  so  fine  a  vein  of  pleasantry  and 
good-nature  pervades  what  he  says,  gliding  over  a  deep 
current  of  poetical  arguments,  that  he  keeps  his  hearers 
in  a  smiling  mood,  ready  to  swallow  all  he  says.  His 
sense  of  the  ludicrous  is  very  keen;  and  an  exhibition  of 
that  is  the  clincher  of  all  his  arguments —  not  the  ludi 
crous  acts  of  persons,  but  ludicrous  ideas.  For  the  first 
half-hour  his  opponents  would  agree  with  every  word 
he  uttered;  and  from  that  point  he  began  to  lead  them 
off  little  by  little,  until  it  seemed  as  if  he  had  got  them 
all  into  his  fold." 
The  Rev.  John.  P.  Gulliver,  of  Norwich,  Connecticut,
222     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
has  given  a  most  interesting  reminiscence  of  Lincoln's 
speech  in  that  city  while  on  his  tour  through  New  Eng 
land.  On  the  morning  following  the  speech  he  met  Lin 
coln  on  a  railroad  train,  and  entered  into  conversation 
with  him.  In  speaking  of  his  speech,  Mr.  Gulliver  re 
marked  to  Lincoln  that  he  thought  it  the  most  remarkable 
one  he  ever  heard.  "Are  you  sincere  in  what  you  say?" 
inquired  Lincoln.  "I  mean  every  word  of  it,"  replied 
the  minister;  "indeed,  I  learned  more  of  the  art  of  public 
speaking  last  evening  than  I  could  from  a  whole  course 
of  lectures  on  rhetoric."  Then  Lincoln  informed  him  of 
a  "most  extraordinary  circumstance"  that  had  occurred 
at  New  Haven  a  few  days  previous.  A  professor  of 
rhetoric  in  Yale  College,  he  had  been  told,  came  to  hear 
him,  took  notes  of  his  speech,  and  gave  a  lecture  on  it 
to  his  class  the  following  day,  and,  not  satisfied  with 
that,  followed  him  to  Meriden  the  next  evening  and 
heard  him  again  for  the  same  purpose.  All  this  seemed 
to  Lincoln  to  be  "very  extraordinary."  He  had  been 
sufficiently  astonished  by  his  success  in  the  West,  but  he 
had  no  expectation  of  any  marked  success  in  the  East, 
particularly  among  literary  and  learned  men.  "Now," 
said  Lincoln,  "I  should  like  very  much  to  know  what  it  is 
in  my  speech  which  you  thought  so  remarkable,  and 
which  interested  my  friend  the  professor  so  much."  Mr. 
Gulliver's  answer  was:  "The  clearness  of  your  statements, 
the  unanswerable  style  of  your  reasoning,  and  especially 
your  illustrations,  which  were  romance  and  pathos  and 
fun  and  logic  all  welded  together."  After  Mr.  Gulliver 
had  fully  satisfied  his  curiosity  by  a  further  exposition 
of  the  politician's  peculiar  power,  Lincoln  said:  "I  am 
much  obliged  to  you  for  this.  I  have  been  wishing  for 
a  long  time  to  find  someone  who  would  make  this  analy 
sis  for  me.  It  throws  light  on  a  subject  which  has  been 
dark  to  me.  I  can  understand  very  readily  how  such  a 
power  as  you  have  ascribed  to  me  will  account  for  the
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     223 
effect  which  seems  to  be  produced  by  my  speeches.  I  hope 
you  have  not  been  too  flattering  in  your  estimate.  Cer 
tainly  I  have  had  a  most  wonderful  success  for  a  man  of 
my  limited  education."  Mr.  Gulliver  then  inquired 
into  the  processes  by  which  he  had  acquired  his  educa 
tion,  and  was  rewarded  with  many  interesting  details. 
When  they  were  about  to  part,  the  minister  said:  "Mr. 
Lincoln,  may  I  say  one  thing  to  you  before  we  separate?" 
"Certainly;  anything  you  please,"  was  the  response. 
"You  have  just  spoken,"  said  Mr.  Gulliver,  "of  the 
tendency  of  political  life  in  Washington  to  debase  the 
moral  convictions  of  our  representatives  there,  by  the  ad 
mixture  of  considerations  of  mere  political  expediency. 
You  have  become,  by  the  controversy  with  Mr.  Douglas, 
one  of  our  leaders  in  this  great  struggle  with  slavery, 
which  is  undoubtedly  the  struggle  of  the  nation  and  the 
age.  What  I  would  like  to  say  is  this,  and  I  say  it  with 
a  full  heart:  Be  true  to  your  principles,  and  we  will  be 
true  to  you,  and  God  will  be  true  to  us  all."  Mr.  Lincoln, 
touched  by  the  earnestness  of  his  interlocutor,  took  his 
hand  in  both  his  own,  and,  with  his  face  full  of  sym 
pathetic  light,  exclaimed:  "I  say  amen  to  that!  amen 
to  that!" 
After  the  New  England  tour,  Lincoln  returned  to 
his  home  in  Springfield.  As  often  happens,  those  least 
appreciative  of  his  success  were  his  own  neighbors;  and 
certain  reflections  gained  vogue  concerning  his  motives 
in  visiting  the  East.  It  was  charged  that  he  had  been 
mercenary;  that  his  political  speeches  had  been  paid 
for.  Something  of  this  sort  having  been  brought  to 
Lincoln's  notice,  he  disposed  of  the  matter  in  the  following 
manly  and  characteristic  letter: 
C.  F.  McNEiLL,  ESQ.  —  Dear  Sir:  —  Reaching  home 
yesterday,  I  found  yours  of  the  23d  March,  enclosing 
a  slip  from  the  'Middleport  Press/  It  is  not  true  that 
I  ever  charged  anything  for  a  political  speech  in  my  life;
224     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
but  this  much  is  true:  Last  October  I  was  requested  by 
letter  to  deliver  some  sort  of  speech  in  Mr.  Beecher's 
church  in  Brooklyn,  $200  being  offered  in  the  first  letter. 
I  wrote  that  I  could  do  it  in  February,  provided  they  would 
take  a  political  speech  if  I  could  find  time  to  get  up  no 
other.  They  agreed;  and  subsequently  I  informed  them 
the  speech  would  have  to  be  a  political  one.  When  I 
reached  New  York,  I  learned  for  the  first  time  that  the 
place  was  changed  to  Cooper  Institute.  I  made  the 
speech,  and  left  for  New  England,  where  I  have  a  son  at 
school,  neither  asking  for  pay  nor  having  any  offered  me. 
Three  days  after,  a  check  for  $200  was  sent  me,  and  I 
took  it,  and  did  not  know  it  was  wrong.  My  understand 
ing  now  is  —  though  I  knew  nothing  of  it  at  the  time  — 
that  they  did  charge  for  admittance  at  the  Cooper  Insti 
tute,  and  that  they  took  in  more  than  twice  $200.  I  have 
made  this  explanation  to  you  as  a  friend;  but  I  wish  no 
explanation  made  to  our  enemies.  What  they  want  is  a 
squabble  and  a  fuss;  and  that  they  can  have  if  we  explain; 
and  they  cannot  have  it  if  we  don't.  When  I  returned 
through  New  York  from  New  England,  I  was  told  by  the 
gentleman  who  sent  me  the  check  that  a  drunken  vaga 
bond  in  the  club,  having  learned  something  about  the 
$200,  made  the  exhibition  out  of  which  the  'Herald' 
manufactured  the  article  quoted  by  the  'Press'  of  your 
town.  My  judgment  is,  and  therefore  my  request  is, 
that  you  give  no  denial,  and  no  explanations. 
Thanking  you  for  your  kind  interest  in  the  matter,  I 
remain, 
Yours   truly,  A.  LINCOLN. 
It  appears  that  on  the  Sunday  which  Lincoln  spent 
in  New  York  City  he  visited  a  Sunday  School  in  the 
notorious  region  called  Five  Points,  and  there  made  a 
short  address  to  the  scholars.  After  his  return  to  Spring 
field,  one  of  his  neighbors,  hearing  of  this,  thought  it 
would  be  a  good  subject  for  bantering  Lincoln  about, 
and  accordingly  visited  him  for  that  purpose.  This 
neighbor  was  generally  known  as  "Jim,"  just  as  Lincoln 
was  called  "Abe."  The  following  account  of  his  visit, 
furnished  by  Mr.  Edward  Eggleston,  shows  that  he  did
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     225 
not  derive  as  much  fun  from  the  "bantering"  as  he  had 
expected:  "He  started  for  'Old  Abe's'  office;  but  burst 
ing  open  the  door  impulsively,  found  a  stranger  in  con 
versation  with  Mr.  Lincoln.  He  turned  to  retrace  his 
steps,  when  Lincoln  called  out,  'Jim !  What  do  you  want? ' 
'Nothing.'  'Yes,  you  do;  come  back.'  After  some 
entreaty  'Jim'  approached  Mr.  Lincoln,  and  remarked, 
with  a  twinkle  in  his  eye,  '  Well,  Abe,  I  see  you  have  been 
making  a  speech  to  Sunday  School  children.  What's 
the  matter?'  'Sit  down,  Jim,  and  I'll  tell  you  all  about 
it.'  And  with  that  Lincoln  put  his  feet  on  the  stove,  and 
began:  'When  Sunday  morning  came,  I  didn't  know 
exactly  what  to  do.  Mr.  Washburne  asked  me  where  I 
was  going.  I  told  him  I  had  nowhere  to  go;  and  he 
proposed  to  take  me  down  to  the  Five  Points  Sunday 
School,  to  show  me  something  worth  seeing.  I  was  very 
much  interested  by  what  I  saw.  Presently,  Mr.  Pease 
came  up  and  spoke  to  Mr.  Washburne,  who  introduced 
me.  Mr.  Pease  wanted  us  to  speak.  Washburne  spoke, 
and  then  I  was  urged  to  speak.  I  told  them  I  did  not 
know  anything  about  talking  to  Sunday  Schools,  but 
Mr.  Pease  said  many  of  the  children  were  friendless  and 
homeless,  and  that  a  few  words  would  do  them  good. 
Washburne  said  I  must  talk.  And  so  I  rose  to  speak; 
but  I  tell  you,  Jim,  I  didn't  know  what  to  say.  I  re 
membered  that  Mr.  Pease  said  they  were  homeless  and 
friendless,  and  I  thought  of  the  time  when  I  had  been 
pinched  by  terrible  poverty.  And  so  I  told  them  that  I 
had  been  poor;  that  I  remembered  when  my  toes  stuck 
out  through  my  broken  shoes  in  winter;  when  my  arms 
were  out  at  the  elbows;  when  I  shivered  with  the  cold. 
And  I  told  them  there  was  only  one  rule;  that  was,  always 
do  the  very  best  you  can.  I  told  them  that  I  had  always 
tried  to  do  the  very  best  I  could;  and  that,  if  they  would 
follow  that  rule,  they  would  get  along  somehow.  That 
was  about  what  I  said.  And  when  I  got  through,  Mr.
226     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
Pease  said  it  was  just  the  thing  they  needed.  And  when 
the  school  was  dismissed,  all  the  teachers  came  up  and 
shook  hands  with  me,  and  thanked  me;  although  I  did 
not  know  that  I  had  been  saying  anything  of  any  account. 
But  the  next  morning  I  saw  my  remarks  noticed  in  the 
papers.'  Just  here  Mr.  Lincoln  put  his  hand  in  his  pocket, 
and  remarked  that  he  had  never  heard  anything  that 
touched  him  as  had  the  songs  which  those  children  sang. 
With  that  he  drew  forth  a  little  book,  saying  that  they 
had  given  him  one  of  the  books  from  which  they  sang. 
He  began  to  read  a  piece  with  all  the  earnestness  of  his 
great,  earnest  soul.  In  the  middle  of  the  second  verse 
his  friend  'Jim'  felt  a  choking  in  his  throat  and  a  tick 
ling  in  his  nose.  At  the  beginning  of  the  third  verse  he 
saw  that  the  stranger  was  weeping,  and  his  own  tears 
fell  fast.  Turning  toward  Lincoln,  who  was  reading 
straight  on,  he  saw  the  great  blinding  tears  in  his  eyes, 
so  that  he  could  not  possibly  see  the  pages.  He  was 
repeating  that  little  song  from  memory.  How  often  he 
had  read  it,  or  how  long  its  sweet  and  simple  accents 
continued  to  reverberate  through  his  soul,  no  one  can 
know."
CHAPTER  XIII 
Looking  Towards  the  Presidency  —  The  Elinois  Republican  Conven 
tion  of  1860  — A  "Send-Off"  for  Lincoln  — The  National  Re 
publican  Convention  at  Chicago  —  Contract  of  the  Leading 
Candidates  —  Lincoln  Nominated  —  Scenes  at  the  Convention  — 
Sketches  by  Eye- Witnesses — Lincoln  Hearing  the  News  —  The 
Scene  at  Springfield  —  A  Visit  to  Lincoln  at  His  Home  —  Recol 
lections  of  a  Distinguished  Sculptor  —  Receiving  the  Committee 
of  the  Convention —  Nomination  of  Douglas —  Campaign  of  1860 
—  Various  Campaign  Reminiscences — Lincoln  and  the  Tall 
Southerner  — The  Vote  of  the  Springfield  Clergy  — A  Graceful 
Letter  to  the  Poet  Bryant  —  "  Looking  up  Hard  Spots." 
IN  
the  latter  part  of  the  year  1859,  after  Lincoln  had 
gained  considerable  national  prominence  through 
events  already  briefly  narrated,  some  of  his  friends  began 
to  consider  the  expediency  of  bringing  him  forward  as  a 
candidate  for  the  Presidency  in  1860.  The  young  Repub 
lican  party  had  thus  far  been  in  the  minority,  and  the 
necessity  was  generally  felt  of  nominating  a  man  who 
would  not  render  himself  objectionable  by  advocating 
extreme  or  unpopular  measures.  The  subject  was  men 
tioned  to  Lincoln,  but  he  seems  not  to  have  taken  it  very 
seriously.  He  said  that  there  were  distinguished  men 
in  the  party  who  were  more  worthy  of  the  nomination, 
and  whose  public  services  entitled  them  to  it.  Toward 
spring  in  1860  Lincoln  consented  to  a  conference  on  the 
subject  with  some  of  his  more  intimate  friends.  The 
meeting  took  place  in  a  committee-room  in  the  State 
House.  Mr.  Bushnell,  Mr.  Hatch  (then  Secretary  of 
State),  Mr.  Judd  (Chairman  of  the  Republican  State 
Central  Committee),  Mr.  Peck,  and  Mr.  Grimshaw  were 
present.  They  were  unanimous  in  opinion  as  to  the 
expediency  and  propriety  of  making  Lincoln  a  candidate.
228     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
But  he  was  still  reluctant;  he  doubted  that  he  could  get 
the  nomination  even  if  he  wished  it,  and  asked  until  the 
next  morning  to  consider  the  matter.  The  next  day  he 
authorized  his  friends  to  work  for  him,  if  they  so  desired, 
as  a  candidate  for  the  Presidency,  at  the  National  Repub 
lican  convention  to  be  held  in  May  at  Chicago. 
It  is  evident  that  while  Lincoln  had  no  serious  expec 
tation  of  receiving  the  nomination,  yet  having  consented 
to  become  a  candidate  he  was  by  no  means  indifferent 
on  the  subject.  The  following  confidential  letter  to  his 
friend  N.  B.  Judd  shows  his  feelings  at  this  time. 
SPRINGFIELD,  ILL.,  FEBRUARY  9,  1860. 
HON.  N.  B.  JUDD  —  Dear  Sir:  —  I  am  not  in  a  position 
where  it  would  hurt  much  for  me  not  to  be  nominated  on 
the  national  ticket;  but  I  am  where  it  would  hurt  some 
for  me  not  to  get  the  Illinois  delegates.  What  I  expected 
when  I  wrote  the  letter  to  Messrs.  Dole  and  others  is  now 
happening.  Your  discomfited  assailants  are  more  bitter 
against  me,  and  they  will,  for  revenge  upon  me,  lay  to 
the  Bates  egg  in  the  South  and  the  Seward  egg  in  the 
North,  and  go  far  towards  squeezing  me  out  in  the  middle 
with  nothing.  Can  you  not  help  me  a  little  in  this 
matter  in  your  end  of  the  vineyard?  (I  mean  this  to  be 
private.) 
Yours  as  ever,  A.  LINCOLN. 
It  would  seem  that  the  original  intention  of  Lincoln's 
friends  had  been  to  bring  him  out  as  a  candidate  for  the 
Vice-Presidency.  Hon.  E.  M.  Haines  states  that  as  early 
as  the  spring  of  1859,  before  the  adjournment  of  the 
Legislature  of  which  he  was  a  member,  some  of  the 
Republican  members  discussed  the  feasibility  of  urging 
Lincoln's  name  for  the  Vice-Presidency.  Lincoln  appears 
not  to  have  taken  very  strongly  to  the  suggestion.  "I 
recollect,"  says  Mr.  Haines,  "that  one  day  Mr.  Lincoln 
came  to  my  desk  in  the  House  of  Representatives,  to 
make  some  inquiry  regarding  another  member;  and 
during  the  conversation,  referring  to  his  growing  reputa-
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     229 
tion,  I  remarked  to  him  that  I  did  not  know  that  we  would 
be  able  to  make  him  President,  but  perhaps  we  could  do 
the  next  best  thing,  and  make  him  Vice-President.  He 
brightened  up  somewhat,  and  answered  by  a  story  which 
I  do  not  clearly  recall,  but  the  application  of  which  was 
that  he  scarcely  considered  himself  a  big  enough  man 
for  President,  while  the  Vice-Presidency  was  scarcely  big 
enough  office  for  one  who  had  aspired  to  a  seat  in  the 
Senate  of  the  United  States." 
On  the  9th  and  10th  of  May,  1860,  the  Republicans  of 
Illinois  met  in  convention  at  Decatur.  Lincoln  was 
present,  although  he  is  said  to  have  been  there  as  a  mere 
spectator.  It  was,  Mr.  Lamon  tells  us,  "A  very  large  and 
spirited  body,  comprising  the  most  brilliant  as  well  as  the 
shrewdest  men  in  the  party.  It  was  evident  that  some 
thing  of  more  than  usual  importance  was  expected  to 
transpire.  A  few  moments  after  the  convention  organized, 
*  Old  Abe '  was  seen  squatting,  or  sitting  on  his  heels,  just 
within  the  door  of  the  convention  building.  Governor 
Oglesby  rose  and  said,  amid  increasing  silence,  'I  am 
informed  that  a  distinguished  citizen  of  Illinois,  and  one 
whom  Illinois  will  ever  delight  to  honor,  is  present;  and 
I  wish  to  move  that  this  body  invite  him  to  a  seat  on  the 
stand.'  Here  the  Governor  paused,  as  if  to  work  curiosity 
up  to  the  highest  point;  then  he  shouted  the  magic  name, 
'Abraham  Lincoln!'  A  roar  of  applause  shook  every 
board  and  joist  of  the  building.  The  motion  was  seconded 
and  passed.  A  rush  was  made  for  the  hero,  who  still 
sat  on  his  heels.  He  was  seized  and  jerked  to  his  feet. 
An  effort  was  made  to  'jam  him  through  the  crowd'  to 
his  place  of  honor  on  the  stage;  but  the  crowd  was  too 
dense.  Then  he  was  *  boosted '  —  lifted  up  bodily  — 
and  lay  for  a  few  seconds  sprawling  and  kicking  upon  the 
heads  and  shoulders  of  the  great  throng.  In  this  manner 
he  was  gradually  pushed  toward  the  stand,  and  finally 
reached  it,  doubtless  to  his  great  relief,  'in  the  arms  of
230     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
some  half-dozen  gentlemen,'  who  set  him  down  in  full 
view  of  his  clamorous  admirers.  'The  cheering  was  like 
the  roar  of  the  sea.  Hats  were  thrown  up  by  the  Chicago 
delegation,  as  if  hats  were  no  longer  useful/  Mr.  Lincoln 
rose,  bowed,  smiled,  blushed,  and  thanked  the  assembly 
as  well  as  he  could  in  the  midst  of  such  a  tumult.  A 
gentleman  who  saw  it  all  says,  'I  then  thought  him  one 
of  the  most  diffident  and  worst-plagued  men  I  ever  saw.' 
At  another  stage  of  the  proceedings,  Governor  Oglesby 
rose  again  with  another  provoking  and  mysterious  speech. 
'There  was,'  he  said,  'an  old  Democrat  outside  who  had 
something  he  wished  to  present  to  the  convention.' 
'Receive  it!'  'Receive  it!'  cried  some.  'What  is  it?' 
'What  is  it?'  yelled  some  of  the  lower  Egyptians,  who 
seemed  to  have  an  idea  that  the  'old  Democrat'  might 
want  to  blow  them  up  with  an  infernal  machine.  The 
door  opened;  and  a  fine,  robust  old  fellow,  with  an  open 
countenance  and  bronzed  cheeks,  marched  into  the  midst 
of  the  assemblage,  bearing  on  his  shoulder  'two  small 
triangular  heart  rails,'  surmounted  by  a  banner  with  this 
inscription:  '  Two  rails  from  a  lot  made  by  Abraham 
Lincoln  and  John  Hanks,  in  the  Sangamon  Bottom,  in  the 
year  1830.'  The  sturdy  rail-bearer  was  old  John  Hanks 
himself,  enjoying  the  great  field-day  of  his  life.  He  was 
met  with  wild  and  tumultuous  cheers,  prolonged  through 
several  minutes;  and  it  was  observed  that  the  Chicago 
and  Central-Illinois  men  sent  up  the  loudest  and  longest 
cheering.  The  scene  was  tempestuous  and  bewildering. 
But  it  ended  at  last;  and  now  the  whole  body,  those  in 
the  secret  and  those  out  of  it,  clamored  for  a  speech  from 
Mr.  Lincoln,  who  in  the  meantime  'blushed,'  but  seemed 
to  shake  with  inward  laughter.  In  response  to  the 
repeated  calls  he  rose  and  said:  'Gentlemen,  I  suppose 
you  want  to  know  something  about  those  things'  (point 
ing  to  old  John  and  the  rails).  'Well,  the  truth  is,  John 
Hanks  and  I  did  make  rails  in  the  Sangamon  Bottom.
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     231 
I  don't  know  whether  we  made  those  rails  or  not;  the 
fact  is,  I  don't  think  they  are  a  credit  to  the  makers' 
(laughing  as  he  spoke).  'But  I  do  know  this:  I  made 
rails  then,  and  I  think  I  could  make  better  ones  than 
these  now.'  By  this  time  the  innocent  Egyptians  began 
to  open  their  eyes;  they  saw  plainly  enough  the  admirable 
Presidential  scheme  unfolded  to  their  view.  The  result 
of  it  all  was  a  resolution  declaring  that  '  Abraham  Lincoln 
is  the  first  choice  of  the  Republican  party  of  Illinois  for 
the  Presidency,  and  instructing  the  delegates  to  the 
Chicago  convention  to  use  all  honorable  means  to  secure 
his  nomination,  and  to  cast  the  vote  of  the  State  as  a  unit 
for  him.'  " 
On  the  16th  of  May,  1860,  the  National  Republican 
convention  met  at  Chicago.  An  immense  building 
called  "The  Wigwam,"  erected  for  the  occasion,  was 
filled  with  an  excited  throng  numbering  fully  twelve 
thousand.  After  the  usual  preliminaries  the  convention 
settled  down  to  the  serious  work  of  nominating  a  candidate 
for  the  Presidency.  From  the  outset  the  contest  was 
clearly  between  Abraham  Lincoln  of  Illinois  and  William 
H.  Seward  of  New  York.  On  the  first  ballot,  Seward's  vote 
of  173  \  was  followed  by  Lincoln  with  102  —  the  latter 
having  more  than  double  the  vote  of  his  next  competitor, 
Simon  Cameron  of  Pennsylvania  (51  votes),  who  was 
followed  by  Salmon  P.  Chase  of  Ohio  (49  votes)  and 
Edward  Bates  of  Missouri  (48  votes).  A  contrast  be 
tween  these  two  remarkable  men,  Seward  and  Lincoln, 
now  political  antagonists  but  soon  to  be  intimately  asso 
ciated  at  the  head  of  the  Government  —  one  as  President 
and  the  other  as  his  prime  minister  —  is  most  interesting 
and  instructive.  Seward  was  a  trained  statesman  and 
experienced  politician  of  ripe  culture  and  great  sagacity, 
the  acknowledged  leader  of  the  Republican  party,  New 
York's  ex-Governor  and  now  its  most  distinguished 
Senator.  His  position  and  career  were  therefore  far  more
232     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN 
conspicuous  than  those  of  Lincoln.  His  supporters  in 
the  convention  were  well-organized,  bold,  confident,  and 
expected  that  he  would  be  nominated  by  acclamation. 
Lincoln,  on  the  other  hand,  was  still  essentially  a  coun 
try  lawyer,  who  had  come  into  prominence  mainly  as 
the  competitor  of  Senator  Douglas  in  Illinois  in  1858. 
With  all  his  native  strength  of  mind  and  force  of  character, 
he  was,  compared  with  the  polished  Seward,  a  rude  back 
woodsman,  unskilled  in  handling  the  reins  of  government, 
unfamiliar  with  the  wiles  of  statecraft,  and  unused  to 
the  company  of  diplomats  and  social  leaders.  His  political 
reputation,  and  his  support  in  the  convention,  were  chiefly 
Western.  Yet  his  Cooper  Institute  speech,  delivered 
three  months  before  the  convention  met,  had  done  much 
for  him  in  the  East;  and  the  homely  title  of  "Honest  Old 
Abe"  had  extended  throughout  the  free  States.  Unlike 
Seward,  he  had  no  political  enemies,  and  was  the  second 
choice  of  most  of  the  delegates  whose  first  choice  was 
some  other  candidate. 
In  political  management  and  strategy  the  Western  men 
at  the  convention  soon  showed  that  they  were  at  best  a 
match  for  those  from  the  East.  Soon  after  the  opening 
of  the  convention,  Lincoln's  friends  saw  that  there  was  an 
organized  body  of  men  in  the  crowd  who  cheered  vocifer 
ously  whenever  Seward's  name  wTas  mentioned.  "At  a 
meeting  of  the  Illinois  delegation  at  the  Tremont  House," 
says  Mr.  Arnold,  "on  the  evening  of  the  first  day,  at 
which  Judd,  Davis,  Cook  and  others  were  present,  it  was 
decided  that  on  the  second  day  Illinois  and  the  WTest 
should  be  heard.  There  was  then  living  in  Chicago  a 
man  whose  voice  could  drown  the  roar  of  Lake  Michigan 
in  its  wildest  fury;  nay,  it  was  said  that  his  shout  could 
be  heard  on  a  calm  day  across  that  lake.  Cook  of  Ottawa 
knew  another  man  living  on  the  Illinois  river,  a  Dr.  Ames, 
who  had  never  found  his  equal  in  his  ability  to  shout  and 
hurrah.  He  was,  however,  a  Democrat.  Cook  telegraphed
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     233 
to  him  to  come  to  Chicago  by  the  first  train.  These  two 
men  with  stentorian  voices  met  some  of  the  Illinois  dele 
gation  at  the  Tremont  House,  and  were  instructed  to 
organize  each  a  body  of  men  to  cheer  and  shout,  which 
they  speedily  did,  out  of  the  crowds  which  were  in  attend 
ance  from  the  Northwest.  They  were  placed  on  oppo 
site  sides  of  the  Wigwam,  and  instructed  that  when  they 
saw  Cook  take  out  his  white  handkerchief  they  were  to 
cheer  and  not  to  cease  until  he  returned  it  to  his  pocket. 
Cook  was  conspicuous  on  the  platform,  and  at  the  first 
utterance  of  the  name  of  Lincoln,  simultaneously  with 
the  wave  of  Cook's  handkerchief,  there  went  up  such  a 
cheer,  such  a  shout  as  had  never  before  been  heard,  and 
which  startled  the  friends  of  Seward  as  the  cry  of  'Mar- 
mion'  on  Flodden  Field  'startled  the  Scottish  foe/  The 
New  Yorkers  tried  to  follow  when  the  name  of  Seward 
was  spoken,  but,  beaten  at  their  own  game,  their  voices 
were  drowned  by  the  cheers  for  Lincoln.  This  was  kept 
up  until  Lincoln  was  nominated,  amidst  a  storm  of 
applause  probably  never  before  equalled  at  a  political 
convention." 
The  result  on  the  first  ballot,  with  Seward  leading 
Lincoln  by  71 J  votes,  has  already  been  given.  On  the 
second  ballot  Seward  gained  11  votes,  giving  him  184J; 
while  Lincoln  made  the  astonishing  gain  of  78  votes, 
giving  him  a  total  of  181  and  reducing  Seward's  lead  of 
71  \  votes  to  3|  votes.  There  was  no  longer  doubt  of 
the  result.  The  third  ballot  came,  and  Lincoln,  passing 
Seward  who  had  fallen  off  3^  votes  from  the  previous 
ballot,  ran  rapidly  up  to  231  \  votes  —  233  being  the 
number  required  to  nominate.  Lincoln  now  lacked  but 
a  vote  and  a  half  to  make  him  the  nominee.  At  this 
juncture,  the  chairman  of  the  Ohio  delegation  rose  and 
changed  four  votes  from  Chase  to  Lincoln,  giving  him 
the  nomination.  The  Wigwam  was  shaken  to  its  founda 
tion  by  the  roaring  cheers.  The  multitude  in  the  streets
234     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF   LINCOLN 
answered  the  multitude  within,  and  in  a  moment  more 
all  the  volunteer  artillery  of  Chicago  joined  in  the  grand 
acclamation.  After  a  time  the  business  of  the  conven 
tion  proceeded,  amid  great  excitement.  All  the  votes 
that  had  heretofore  been  cast  against  Lincoln  were  cast 
for  him  before  this  ballot  concluded.  The  convention 
completed  its  work  by  the  nomination  of  Hannibal 
Hamlin  of  Maine  for  Vice-President. 
Mr.  F.  B.  Carpenter,  who  was  present  at  Lincoln's 
nomination,  furnishes  a  graphic  sketch  of  this  dramatic 
episode.  "The  scene  surpassed  description.  Men  had 
been  stationed  upon  the  roof  of  the  Wigwam  to  com 
municate  the  result  of  the  different  ballots  to  the  thou 
sands  outside,  far  outnumbering  the  packed  crowd  inside. 
To  these  men  one  of  the  secretaries  shouted:  'Fire  the 
salute !  Lincoln  is  nominated ! '  Then,  as  the  cheering  in 
side  died  away,  the  roar  began  on  the  outside,  and  swelled 
up  from  the  excited  masses  like  the  noise  of  many  waters. 
This  the  insiders  heard,  and  to  it  they  replied.  Thus 
deep  called  to  deep  with  such  a  frenzy  of  sympathetic 
enthusiasm  that  even  the  thundering  salute  of  cannon 
was  unheard  by  many  on  the  platform.  When  the  ex 
citement  had  partly  subsided,  Mr.  Evarts  of  New  York 
arose,  and  in  appropriate  words  expressed  his  grief  that 
Seward  had  not  been  nominated.  He  then  moved  that 
the  nomination  of  Abraham  Lincoln  be  made  unanimous. 
Governor  John  A.  Andrew  of  Massachusetts  and  Hon. 
Carl  Schurz  of  Wisconsin  seconded  the  motion,  and  it  was 
carried.  Then  the  enthusiasm  of  the  multitude  burst 
out  anew.  A  large  banner,  prepared  by  the  Pennsyl 
vania  delegation,  was  conspicuously  displayed,  bearing 
the  inscription,  'Pennsylvania  good  for  twenty  thousand 
majority  for  the  people's  candidate,  Abe  Lincoln.'  Dele 
gates  tore  up  the  sticks  and  boards  bearing  the  names 
of  their  several  States,  and  waved  them  aloft  over  their 
heads.  A  brawny  man  jumped  upon  the  platform,  and
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     235 
pulling  his  coat-sleeves  up  to  his  elbows,  shouted:  *I 
can't  stop!  Three  times  three  more  cheers  for  our  next 
President,  Abe  Lincoln!'  A  full-length  portrait  of  the 
candidate  was  produced  upon  the  platform.  Mr.  Greeley 
telegraphed  to  the  N.  Y.  Tribune:  *  There  was  never 
another  such  scene  in  America.'  Chicago  went  wild. 
One  hundred  guns  were  fired  from  the  top  of  the  Tremont 
House.  At  night  the  city  was  in  a  blaze  of  glory.  Bon 
fires,  processions,  torchlights,  fire-works,  illuminations 
and  salutes,  *  filled  the  air  with  noise  and  the  eye  with 
beauty.'  *  Honest  Old  Abe'  was  the  utterance  of  every 
man  in  the  streets.  The  Illinois  delegation  before  it 
separated  *  resolved'  that  the  millennium  had  come." 
Governor  Andrew,  who  was  destined  to  have  highly 
important  and  intimate  relations  with  Lincoln  during  the 
Civil  War,  records  his  first  impressions  of  him  in  a  few 
vivid  sentences.  "  Beyond  the  experiences  of  the  journey 
from  Boston  to  Chicago,"  says  Andrew's  biographer, 
"beyond  even  the  strain  and  excitement  of  those  hours 
in  caucus  and  convention,  was  the  impression  made  on 
him  by  Lincoln  as  he  saw  him  for  the  first  time." 
Andrew  was  one  of  the  committee  of  delegates  who  went 
to  Springfield  to  notify  Lincoln  of  his  nomination  at 
Chicago.  He  and  the  other  delegates,  he  says,  "saw  in 
a  flash  that  here  was  a  man  who  was  master  of  himself. 
For  the  first  time  they  understood  that  he  whom  they 
had  supposed  to  be  little  more  than  a  loquacious  and 
clever  State  politician,  had  force,  insight,  conscience;  that 
their  misgivings  were  vain.  .  .  .  My  eyes  were  never 
visited  with  the  vision  of  a  human  face  in  which  more 
transparent  honesty  and  more  benignant  kindness  were 
combined  with  more  of  the  intellect  and  firmness  which 
belong  to  masculine  humanity.  I  would  trust  my  case 
with  the  honesty  and  intellect  and  heart  and  brain  of 
Abraham  Lincoln  as  a  lawyer;  and  I  would  trust  my 
country's  cause  in  the  care  of  Abraham  Lincoln  as  its
236     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF   LINCOLN 
chief  magistrate,  while  the  wind  blows  and  the  water 
runs." 
Dr.  J.  G.  Holland  gives  a  vivid  picture  of  Lincoln's 
reception  of  the  exciting  news.  "In  the  little  city  of 
Springfield,"  says  Dr.  Holland,  "in  the  heart  of  Illinois, 
two  hundred  miles  from  where  these  exciting  events  were 
in  progress,  sat  Abraham  Lincoln,  in  constant  telegraphic 
communication  with  his  friends  in  Chicago.  He  was 
apprised  of  the  results  of  every  ballot,  and  with  some  of 
his  friends  sat  in  the  *  Journal'  office  receiving  and  com 
menting  upon  the  dispatches.  It  was  one  of  the  decisive 
moments  of  his  life  —  a  moment  on  which  hung  his  fate 
as  a  public  man,  his  place  in  history.  He  fully  appre 
ciated  the  momentous  results  of  the  convention  to  himself 
and  the  nation,  and  foresaw  the  nature  of  the  great  strug 
gle  which  his  nomination  and  election  would  inaugurate. 
At  last,  in  the  midst  of  intense  excitement,  a  messenger 
from  the  telegraph  office  entered  with  the  decisive  dis 
patch  in  his  hand.  Without  handing  it  to  anyone,  he 
took  his  way  solemnly  to  the  side  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  and 
said:  'The  convention  has  made  a  nomination,  and  Mr. 
Seward  is   the  second  man  on  the  list.'  Then  he 
jumped  upon  the  editorial  table  and  shouted,  '  Gentlemen, 
I  propose  three  cheers  for  Abraham  Lincoln,  the  next 
President  of  the  United  States!'  and  the  call  was  bois 
terously  responded  to.  He  then  handed  the  dispatch 
to  Mr.  Lincoln,  who  read  it  in  silence,  and  then  aloud. 
After  exchanging  greetings  and  receiving  congratulations 
from  those  around  him,  he  strove  to  get  out  of  the  crowd, 
and  as  he  moved  off  he  remarked  to  those  near  him: 
'Well,  there  is  a  little  woman  who  will  be  interested  in 
this  news,  and  I  will  go  home  and  tell  her,'  and  he  hurried 
on,  with  the  crowd  following  and  cheering." 
As  soon  as  the  news  spread  about  Springfield  a  salute 
of  a  hundred  guns  was  fired,  and  during  the  afternoon 
Lincoln's  friends  and  neighbors  thronged  his  house  to
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     237 
tender  their  congratulations  and  express  their  joy.  "In 
the  evening,"  says  one  narrator,  "the  State  House  was 
thrown  open  and  a  most  enthusiastic  meeting  held  by 
the  Republicans.  At  the  close  they  marched  in  a  body  to 
the  Lincoln  mansion  and  called  for  the  nominee.  Mr. 
Lincoln  appeared,  and  after  a  brief,  modest,  and  hearty 
speech,  invited  as  many  as  could  get  into  the  house  to 
enter;  the  crowd  responding  that  after  the  fourth  of 
March  they  would  give  him  a  larger  house.  The  people 
did  not  retire  until  a  late  hour,  and  then  moved  off  re 
luctantly,  leaving  the  excited  household  to  their  rest." 
Among  the  more  significant  and  intimate  of  the  per 
sonal  reminiscences  of  Lincoln  are  those  by  Mr.  Leonard 
W.  Volk,  the  distinguished  sculptor  already  mentioned 
in  these  pages.  Mr.  Volk  arrived  in  Springfield  on  the 
day  of  Lincoln's  nomination,  and  had  some  unusually 
interesting  conversation  with  him.  He  had  already, 
only  a  month  before,  made  the  life-mask  of  Lincoln  that 
became  so  well  and  favorably  known.  It  is  one  of  the 
last  representations  showing  him  without  a  beard.  The 
circumstances  and  incidents  attending  the  taking  of  this 
life-mask,  as  narrated  by  Mr.  Volk,  are  well  worth  re 
producing  here.  "One  morning  in  April,  1860,"  says 
Mr.  Volk,  "I  noticed  in  the  paper  that  Abraham  Lincoln 
was  in  Chicago,  —  retained  as  one  of  the  counsel  in  a 
*  Sand-bar'  trial  in  which  the  Michigan  Central  Railroad 
was  either  plaintiff  or  defendant.  I  at  once  decided  to 
remind  him  of  his  promise  to  sit  to  me,  made  two  years 
before.  I  found  him  in  the  United  States  District  Court 
room,  his  feet  on  the  edge  of  the  table,  and  his  long  dark 
hair  standing  out  at  every  imaginable  angle.  He  was 
surrounded  by  a  group  of  lawyers,  such  as  James  F.  Joy, 
Isaac  N.  Arnold,  Thomas  Hoyne,  and  others.  Mr. 
Arnold  obtained  his  attention  in  my  behalf,  when  he 
instantly  arose  and  met  me  outside  the  rail,  recognizing 
me  at  once  with  his  usual  grip  of  both  hands.  He  re-
238     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF  LINCOLN 
membered  his  promise,  and  said,  in  answer  to  my  ques 
tion,  that  he  expected  to  be  detained  by  the  case  for  a 
week.  He  added :  *  I  shall  be  glad  to  give  you  the  sittings. 
When  shall  I  come,  and  how  long  will  you  need  me  each 
time?'  Just  after  breakfast  every  morning  would,  he 
said,  suit  him  the  best,  and  he  could  remain  till  court 
opened  at  ten  o'clock.  I  answered  that  I  would  be  ready 
for  him  the  next  morning  (Thursday).  'Very  well,  Mr. 
Volk,  I  will  be  there,  and  I'll  go  to  a  barber  and  have  my 
hair  cut  before  I  come.'  I  requested  him  not  to  let  the 
barber  cut  it  too  short,  and  said  I  would  rather  he  would 
leave  it  as  it  was;  but  to  this  he  would  not  consent.  .  .  . 
He  was  on  hand  promptly  at  the  time  appointed;  indeed, 
he  never  failed  to  be  on  time.  My  studio  was  in  the 
fifth  story.  There  were  no  elevators  in  those  days,  and 
I  soon  learned  to  distinguish  his  step  on  the  stairs,  and 
am  sure  he  frequently  came  up  two,  if  not  three,  steps  at 
a  stride.  When  he  sat  down  the  first  time  in  that  hard, 
wooden,  low-armed  chair  which  I  still  possess,  and  which 
has  been  occupied  by  Douglas,  Seward,  and  Generals 
Grant  and  Dix,  he  said,  'Mr.  Volk,  I  have  never  sat 
before  to  sculptor  or  painter  —  only  for  daguerreotypes 
and  photographs.  What  shall  I  do?'  I  told  him  I  would 
only  take  the  measurements  of  his  head  and  shoulders 
that  time,  and  that  the  next  morning  I  would  make  a 
cast  of  his  face,  which  would  save  him  a  number  of  sittings. 
He  stood  up  against  the  wall,  and  I  made  a  mark  above 
his  head,  and  then  measured  up  to  it  from  the  floor  and 
said:  'You  are  just  twelve  inches  taller  than  Judge 
Douglas;  that  is,  just  six  feet  four  inches.' 
"Before  commencing  the  cast  next  morning,  and 
knowing  Mr.  Lincoln's  fondness  for  a  story,  I  told  him 
one  in  order  to  remove  what  I  thought  an  apprehensive 
expression  —  as  though  he  feared  the  operation  might 
be  dangerous.  He  sat  naturally  in  the  chair  when  I  made 
the  cast,  and  saw  every  move  I  made  in  a  mirror  opposite,
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     239 
as  I  put  the  plaster  on  without  interference  with  his 
eyesight  or  his  free  breathing  through  the  nostrils.  It 
was  about  an  hour  before  the  mould  was  ready  to  be 
removed,  and  being  all  in  one  piece,  with  both  ears  per 
fectly  taken,  it  clung  pretty  hard,  as  the  cheek-bones 
were  higher  than  the  jaws  at  the  lobe  of  the  ear.  He 
bent  his  head  low,  and  worked  the  cast  off  without  break 
ing  or  injury;  it  hurt  a  little,  as  a  few  hairs  of  the  tender 
temples  pulled  out  with  the  plaster  and  made  his  eyes 
water. 
"He  entered  my  studio  on  Sunday  morning,  remarking 
that  a  friend  at  the  hotel  (Tremont  House)  had  invited 
him  to  go  to  church,  'but,'  said  Mr.  Lincoln,  *I  thought 
I'd  rather  come  and  sit  for  the  bust.  The  fact  is,'  he 
continued,  'I  don't  like  to  hear  cut-and-dried  sermons. 
No  —  when  I  hear  a  man  preach,  I  like  to  see  him  act 
as  if  he  were  fighting  bees!'  And  he  extended  his  long 
arms,  at  the  same  time  suiting  the  action  to  the  words. 
He  gave  me  on  this  day  a  long  sitting  of  more  than  four 
hours,  and  when  it  was  concluded  we  went  to  our  family 
apartment  to  look  at  a  collection  of  photographs  which 
I  had  made  in  1855-6-7  in  Rome  and  Florence.  While 
sitting  in  the  rocking-chair,  he  took  my  little  son  on  his 
lap  and  spoke  kindly  to  him,  asking  his  name,  age,  etc. 
I  held  the  photographs  up  and  explained  them  to  him; 
but  I  noticed  a  growing  weariness,  and  his  eyelids  closed 
occasionally  as  if  he  were  sleepy,  or  were  thinking  of 
something  besides  Grecian  and  Roman  statuary  and 
architecture.  Finally  he  said,  'These  things  must  be 
very  interesting  to  you,  Mr.  Volk;  but  the  truth  is,  I 
don't  know  much  of  history,  and  all  I  do  know  of  it 
I  have  learned  from  law  books.' 
"The  sittings  were  continued  daily  till  the  Thursday 
following;  and  during  their  continuance  he  would  talk 
almost  unceasingly,  telling  some  of  the  funniest  and  most 
laughable  of  stories,  but  he  talked  little  of  politics  or
240     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF   LINCOLN 
religion  during  these  sittings.  He  said,  'I  am  bored 
nearly  every  time  I  sit  down  to  a  public  dining-table  by 
some  one  pitching  into  me  on  politics/  Many  people, 
presumably  political  aspirants  with  an  eye  to  future 
prospects,  besieged  my  door  for  interviews,  but  I  made 
it  a  rule  to  keep  it  locked,  and  I  think  Mr.  Lincoln  appre 
ciated  the  precaution.  On  our  last  sitting  I  noticed  that 
Mr.  Lincoln  was  in  something  of  a  hurry.  I  had  finished 
the  head,  but  desired  to  represent  his  breast  and  brawny 
shoulders  as  nature  presented  them;  so  he  stripped  off 
his  coat,  waistcoat,  shirt,  cravat,  and  collar,  threw  them 
on  a  chair,  pulled  his  undershirt  down  a  short  distance, 
tying  the  sleeves  behind  him,  and  stood  up  without  a 
murmur  for  an  hour  or  so.  I  then  said  I  had  done,  and 
was  a  thousand  times  obliged  to  him  for  his  promptness 
and  patience,  and  offered  to  assist  him  to  re-dress,  but  he 
said,  'No,  I  can  do  it  better  alone.*  I  kept  at  my  work 
without  looking  toward  him,  wishing  to  catch  the  form  as 
accurately  as  possible  while  it  was  fresh  in  my  memory. 
He  left  hurriedly,  saying  he  had  an  engagement;  and 
with  a  cordial  'Good-bye!  I  will  see  you  again  soon,' 
passed  out.  A  few  minutes  after,  I  recognized  his  steps 
rapidly  returning.  The  door  opened  and  in  he  came, 
exclaiming,  '  Hello,  Mr.  Volk !  I  got  down  on  the  sidewalk, 
and  found  I  had  forgotten  to  put  on  my  undershirt,  and 
thought  it  wouldn't  do  to  go  through  the  streets  this  way.' 
Sure  enough,  there  were  the  sleeves  of  that  garment 
dangling  below  the  skirts  of  his  broadcloth  frock-coat! 
I  went  at  once  to  his  assistance,  and  helped  to  undress 
and  re-dress  him  all  right,  and  out  he  went  with  a  hearty 
laugh  at  the  absurdity  of  the  thing." 
Returning  to  the  visit  with  Lincoln  at  Springfield  on 
the  day  of  his  nomination,  Mr.  Volk  says:  "The  after 
noon  was  lovely  —  bright  and  sunny,  neither  too  warm 
nor  too  cool;  the  grass,  trees,  and  the  hosts  of  blooming 
roses,  so  profuse  in  Springfield,  appeared  to  be  vying
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     241 
with  the  ringing  bells  and  waving  flags.  I  went  straight 
to  Mr.  Lincoln's  unpretentious  little  two-story  house. 
He  saw  me  from  his  door  or  window  coming  down  the 
street,  and  as  I  entered  the  gate  he  was  on  the  platform  in 
front  of  the  door,  and  quite  alone.  His  face  looked 
radiant.  I  exclaimed:  'I  am  the  first  man  from  Chicago, 
I  believe,  who  has  the  honor  of  congratulating  you  on 
your  nomination  for  President.'  .  Then  those  two  great 
hands  took  both  of  mine  with  a  grasp  never  to  be  forgot 
ten.  And  while  shaking  them,  I  said:  'Now  that  you 
will  doubtless  be  the  next  President  of  the  United  States, 
I  want  to  make  a  statue  of  you,  and  shall  do  my  best  to 
do  you  justice.'  Said  he,  *I  don't  doubt  it,  for  I  have 
come  to  the  conclusion  that  you  are  an  honest  man,'  and 
with  that  greeting  I  thought  my  hands  were  in  a  fair 
way  of  being  crushed.  I  was  invited  into  the  parlor, 
and  soon  Mrs.  Lincoln  entered,  holding  a  rose-bouquet 
in  her  hand,  which  she  presented  to  me  after  the  intro 
duction;  and  in  return  I  gave  her  a  cabinet-size  bust  of 
her  husband,  which  I  had  modelled  from  the  large  one, 
and  happened  to  have  with  me.  Before  leaving  the 
house  it  was  arranged  that  Mr.  Lincoln  would  give 
Saturday  forenoon  to  obtaining  full-length  photographs 
to  serve  me  for  the  proposed  statue.  On  Saturday 
evening,  the  committee  appointed  by  the  convention  to 
notify  Mr.  Lincoln  formally  of  his  nomination,  headed 
by  Mr.  Ashmun  of  Massachusetts,  reached  Springfield 
by  special  train,  bearing  a  large  number  of  people,  two 
or  three  hundred  of  whom  carried  rails  on  their  shoulders, 
marching  in  military  style  from  the  train  to  the  old  State 
House  Hall  of  Representatives,  where  they  stacked  them 
like  muskets.  The  evening  was  beautiful  and  clear,  and 
the  entire  population  was  astir.  The  bells  pealed,  flags 
waved,  and  cannon  thundered  forth  the  triumphant 
nomination  of  Springfield's  distinguished  citizen.  The 
bonfires  blazed  brightly,  and  especially  in  front  of  that
242     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF  LINCOLN 
prim-looking  white  house  on  Eighth  street.  The  com 
mittee  and  the  vast  crowd  following  it  passed  in  at  the 
front  door,  and  made  their  exit  through  the  kitchen  door 
in  the  rear,  Mr.  Lincoln  giving  them  all  a  hearty  shake 
of  the  hand  as  they  passed  him  in  the  parlor.  By  ap 
pointment,  I  was  to  cast  Mr.  Lincoln's  hands  on  the 
Sunday  following  this  memorable  Saturday,  at  nine  A.M. 
I  found  him  ready,  but  he  looked  more  grave  and  serious 
than  he  had  appeared  on  the  previous  days.  I  wished 
him  to  hold  something  in  his  right  hand,  and  he  looked 
for  a  piece  of  pasteboard,  but  could  find  none.  I  told 
him  a  round  stick  would  do  as  well  as  anything.  There 
upon  he  went  to  the  wood-shed,  and  I  heard  the  saw  go, 
and  he  soon  returned  to  the  dining-room  (where  I  did  the 
work),  whittling  off  the  end  of  a  piece  of  broom-handle. 
I  remarked  to  him  that  he  need  not  whittle  off  the  edges. 
'Oh,  well,'  said  he,  'I  thought  I  would  like  to  have  it 
nice.'  When  I  had  successfully  cast  the  mould  of  the 
right  hand,  I  began  the  left,  pausing  a  few  moments  to 
hear  Mr.  Lincoln  tell  me  about  a  scar  on  the  thumb. 
*  You  have  heard  that  they  call  me  a  rail-splitter,  and  you 
saw  them  carrying  rails  in  the  procession  Saturday  even 
ing;  well,  it  is  true  that  I  did  split  rails,  and  one  day, 
while  I  was  sharpening  a  wedge  on  a  log,  the  axe  glanced 
and  nearly  took  my  thumb  off,  and  there  is  the  scar,  you 
see.'  The  right  hand  appeared  swollen  as  compared  with 
the  left,  on  account  of  excessive  hand-shaking  the  evening 
before;  this  difference  is  distinctly  shown  in  the  cast. 
That  Sunday  evening  I  returned  to  Chicago  with  the 
moulds  of  his  hands,  three  photographic  negatives  of 
him,  the  identical  black  alpaca  campaign  suit  of  1858, 
and  a  pair  of  Lynn  newly-made  pegged  boots.  The 
clothes  were  all  burned  up  in  the  great  Chicago  fire.  The 
casts  of  the  face  and  hands  I  saved  by  taking  them  with 
me  to  Rome,  and  they  have  crossed  the  sea  four  times. 
The  last  time  I  saw  Mr.  Lincoln  was  in  January,  1861,  at
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     243 
his  house  in  Springfield.  His  little  parlor  was  full  of 
friends  and  politicians.  He  introduced  me  to  them  all, 
and  remarked  to  me  aside  that  since  he  had  sat  to  me  for 
his  bust,  eight  or  nine  months  before,  he  had  lost  forty 
pounds  in  weight.  This  was  easily  perceptible,  for  the 
lines  of  his  jaws  were  very  sharply  defined  through  the 
short  beard  which  he  was  allowing  to  grow.  Then  he 
turned  to  the  company  and  explained  in  a  general  way 
that  I  had  made  a  bust  of  him  before  his  nomination, 
and  that  he  was  then  giving  daily  sittings  to  another 
sculptor;  that  he  had  sat  to  him  for  a  week  or  more,  but 
could  not  see  the  likeness,  though  he  might  yet  bring  it 
out.  'But,'  continued  Mr.  Lincoln,  'in  two  or  three  days 
after  Mr.  Volk  began  my  bust,  there  was  the  animal 
himself!'  And  this  was  about  the  last,  if  not  the  last, 
remark  I  ever  heard  him  utter,  except  the  good-bye  and 
his  good  wishes  for  my  success." 
Saturday,  May  19,  the  committee  of  the  Chicago  con 
vention  arrived  at  Springfield  to  notify  Mr.  Lincoln  of 
his  nomination.  The  Hon.  George  Ashmun,  as  chair 
man  of  the  committee,  delivered  the  formal  address,  to 
which  Lincoln  listened  with  dignity,  but  with  an  air 
of  profound  sadness,  as  though  the  trials  in  store  for  him 
had  already  "cast  their  shadows  before."  In  response 
to  the  address,  Lincoln  said: 
MR.  CHAIRMAN  AND  GENTLEMEN  OF  THE  COMMITTEE: 
—  I  tender  to  you  and  through  you  to  the  Republican 
National  convention,  and  all  the  people  represented  in  it, 
my  profoundest  thanks  for  the  high  honor  done  me,  which 
you  now  formally  announce.  Deeply  and  even  pain 
fully  sensible  of  the  great  responsibility  which  is  insepa 
rable  from  this  high  honor  —  a  responsibility  which  I 
could  almost  wish  had  fallen  upon  some  one  of  the  far 
more  eminent  men  and  experienced  statesmen  whose 
distinguished  names  were  before  the  convention  —  I 
shall,  by  your  leave,  consider  more  fully  the  resolutions 
of  the  convention,  denominated  the  platform,  and,  with-
244     EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF   LINCOLN 
out  unnecessary  and  unreasonable  delay,  respond  to  you, 
Mr.  Chairman,  in  writing,  not  doubting  that  the  platform 
will  be  found  satisfactory,  and  the  nomination  gratefully 
accepted.  And  now  I  will  not  longer  defer  the  pleasure 
of  taking  you,  and  each  of  you,  by  the  hand. 
A  letter  was  then  handed  Lincoln  containing  the 
official  notice,  accompanied  by  the  resolutions  of  the 
convention.  To  this  letter  he  replied,  a  few  days  later, 
as  follows: 
SPRINGFIELD,  ILLINOIS,  MAY  23,  1860. 
SIR  —  I  accept  the  nomination  tendered  to  me  by  the 
convention  over  which  you  presided,  of  which  I  am 
formally  apprised  in  a  letter  of  yourself  and  others  acting 
as  a  Committee  of  the  Convention  for  that  purpose. 
The  declaration  of  principles  and  sentiments  which 
accompanies  your  letter  meets  my  approval,  and  it  shall 
be  my  care  not  to  violate  it,  or  disregard  it  in  any  part. 
Imploring  the  assistance  of  Divine  Providence,  and  with 
due  regard  to  the  views  and  feelings  of  all  who  were 
represented  in  the  convention,  to  the  rights  of  all  the 
States  and  Territories  and  people  of  the  nation,  to  the 
inviolability  of  the  Constitution,  and  the  perpetual 
union,  harmony  and  prosperity  of  all,  I  am  most  happy 
to  co-operate  for  the  practical  success  of  the  principles 
declared  by  the  convention. 
In  June  Mr.  Douglas  was  nominated  for  the  Presidency 
by  the  Democratic  convention,  which  met  at  Baltimore 
on  the  18th.  Mr.  Douglas  made  a  personal  canvass, 
speaking  in  most  of  the  states,  North  and  South,  and 
exerting  all  the  powers  of  which  he  was  master  to  win 
success.  The  campaign,  as  Mr.  Arnold  states,  "has  had 
no  parallel.  The  enthusiasm  of  the  people  was  like  a 
great  conflagration,  like  a  prairie  fire  before  a  wild  tornado. 
A  little  more  than  twenty  years  had  passed  since  Owen 
Lovejoy,  brother  of  Elijah  Love  joy,  on  the  bank  of  the 
Mississippi,  kneeling  on  the  turf  not  then  green  over  the 
grave  of  the  brother  who  had  been  killed  for  his  fidelity 
to  freedom,  had  sworn  eternal  war  against  slavery.  From
EVERY-DAY    LIFE    OF    LINCOLN     245 
that  time  on,  he  and  his  associate  Abolitionists  had  gone 
forth  preaching  their  crusade  against  oppression,  with 
hearts  of  fire  and  tongues  of  lightning;  and  now  the 
consummation  was  to  be  realized  of  a  President  elected 
on  the  distinct  ground  of  opposition  to  the  extension  of 
slavery.  For  years  the  hatred  of  that  institution  had 
been  growing  and  gathering  force.  Whittier,  Bryant, 
Lowell,  Longfellow,  and  others,  had  written  the  lyrics  of 
liberty;  the  graphic  pen  of  Mrs.  Stowe,  in  *  Uncle  Tom's 
Cabin,'  had  painted  the  cruelties  of  the  overseer  and  the 
slaveholder;  but  the  acts  of  slaveholders  themselves 
did  more  to  promote  the  growth  of  anti-slavery  than  all 
other  causes.  The  persecutions  of  Abolitionists  in  the 
South;  the  harshness  and  cruelty  attending  the  execu 
tion  of  the  fugitive  laws;  the  brutality  of  Brooks  in 
knocking  down,  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate,  Charles  Sum- 
ner,  for  words  spoken  in  debate:  these  and  many  other 
outrages  had  fired  the  hearts  of  the  people  of  the  free 
States  against  this  barbarous  institution.  Beecher,  Phil 
lips,  Channing,  Sumner,  and  Seward,  with  their  eloquence; 
Chase  with  his  logic;  Lincoln,  with  his  appeals  to  the 
principles  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  to 
the  opinions  of  the  founders  of  the  republic,  his  clear 
statements,  his  apt  illustrations,  and,  above  all,  his  wise 
moderation,  —  all  had  swelled  the  voice  of  the  people, 
which  found  expression  through  the  ballot-box,  and  which 
declared  that  slavery  should  go  no  further." 
Among  the  various  reminiscences  of  the  memorable 
Presidential  campaign  of  1860,  some  of  peculiar  interest 
are  furnished  by  Dr.  Newton  Bateman,  President  of 
Knox  College,  Illinois.  Dr.  Bateman  had  known 
Lincoln  since  1842;  and  from  the  year  1858,  when  Dr. 
Bateman  was  elected  State  Superintendent  of  Public 
Instruction  in  Illinois,  to  the  close  of  Lincoln's  resi 
dence  in  Springfield  in  1861,  they  saw  each  other  daily. 
The  testimony  of  so  intimate  an  acquaintance,  and  one