Probably the reader has seen physiognomies (often old farmers,
sea-captains, and such) that, behind their homeliness, or even ugliness,
held superior points so subtle, yet so palpable, making the real life
of their faces almost as impossible to depict as a wild perfume or
fruit-taste, or a passionate tone of the living voice--and such was
Lincoln's face, the peculiar color, the lines of it, the eyes, mouth,
expression. Of technical beauty it had nothing--but to the eye of a
great artist it furnished a rare study, a feast and fascination. The
current portraits are all failures--most of them caricatures.