The Emporia weekly news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1881-1889, 1882-07-27
LINCOLN as a LOVER.

st. Louis Globe Democrat: The death
of the widow of Abraham Lincoln has
revived interest in the gossip about the
great martyrs love affairs while he was
young lawyer at Springfield, busy
with small cases in justices courts, and
dreaming of no higher distinction, we
may easily believe, than a county attor-
neyship or seat in the legislature.
How much of this gossip is true and
how much is false or exaggerated we
can not surely know; but it seems to be
reasonably certain that the future great
est figure in the stormiest period of his
country's history was very susceptible
to feminine charms, and treated matters
OF the heart so seriously at times as to
make himself a trifie ridiculous.
Though in no sense a handsome man,
and being little disposed TO society, he
seems to have had a singular faculty OF
getting himself mashed" as current
slang has it, on the pretty girls who
came in his way; and the pretty girls,
in his favor be II said, appear to have
manifested good deal of Partially for
him.
1t would not be difficult to show, by
facts about which there can be no doubt,
that Lincoln as lover was tickle, and
that his fancy turned lightly from one
passing face to another in a way that
was embarrassing and bewildering. And
yet he was far removed from insincerity
or any suspicion of trifing. To the
love that was on, though it lasted but a
day, he was royalty loyal, and there is
no evidence that he ever played with
women's hearts in mere wantonness. He
wrote sentimental verses, to be sure,
which Thackeray declares to be sign OF
inherent sham; and, worse still, he
lacked sufficient intrepidiiy TO keep
from publishing them. On the other
hand, however, he was quick to play
the veritable knight in defense Of lady's
good name, and once preferred to accept
a challenge to fight duel rather than be-
tray foolish girls responsibility for
some rhymes about arrival sutton. We
must conclude, therefore, that his way
wardness was honest, at least, and that
if he loved unwisely and too promiscu-
ouslV, the explanation must be sought
in some direction which shall not i'm
peach the sterling veracity of his nature.
The truth is, most likely, that AFTER the
manner of many another similar man,
he paid homage to woman in the alb
stract, and lacked that nice sense of
striking the average without: which in
dividual preference must always be
more or less superficial and devious, and
hence subject to what Froude calls "a
fatal facility of mistake" Some account
must also be taken of his characteristic
disposition to melancholy, which made
him an easy prey to the soft and SYM
pathetic ways of the sex, who know
what advantage lies in such a temper
ament The women guessed him in
tuitively, and forgave his changing judg- |
ments regarding them as individuals
because they knew he weighed them in
their own balances, and his very uncer-
tainty was a compliment to them as a
class. Women know men better than
men know themselves. Those who set
their caps for Lincoln and had him for a
lover by turns did not suspect, perhaps,
that he would ever be president; but
they saw more of the simplicity and no
bility which finally made him great and
precious than was ever seen by the men
who were with him constantly and knew
him intimately, according to the mascu-
line standard.
That such man should have made at
last an unlucky selection of wife is not
a matter for wonder nor for blame.
Certainly we may say, without dis
respect, that Mary Todd was not the
kind of woman he should have mar
RED. He was ardently devoted to
her, no doubt, and she must have
loved him; but the match was an i'm
proper one from the start and could
only result in disappointment and heart
ache for both parties 1t is an open Sc
cret that they lived unhappily together,
though they were both brave enough to
bear the mistake to the end without Sc
rioEs complaint or show of bitterness.
There was something sadly beautiful in
the great mans patient fidelity to the
woman whom he had welded in his
haste; and it is to be said for her, too,
with all her faults confessed, that there
is nothing more pathetic in the history
of the i'll mated pair than the story of
the last empty years of her life, when
she must have longed continually as on
ly women can for a second chance to
to prove herself all that generous and
tender husband hoped and expected
away back yonder when life was all be-
fore them. Let US trust that she has
found that chance, poor woman, in some
other sphere, where surely there is not
recognition merely, but also clemency
and peace