this parting. To this people I owe all that I am. Here I have lived more
than a quarter of a century. Here my children were born and here one of
them lies buried. I know not how soon I shall see you again. I go to
assume a task more difficult than that which has devolved upon any other
man since the days of Washington. He never would have succeeded except
for the aid of Divine Providence, upon which he at all times relied.
I feel that I cannot succeed without the same Divine blessing which
sustained him; and on the same Almighty Being I place my reliance for
support. And I hope you, my friends, will all pray that I may receive
that Divine assistance, without which I cannot succeed, but with which
success is certain. Again I bid you an affectionate farewell."
Mrs. Lincoln died at the residence of her sister, Mrs. Ninian W.
Edwards, in Springfield, July 16, 1882. Dr. Thomas W. Dresser, her
physician during her last illness, says of her, "In the late years of
her life mental peculiarities were developed which finally culminated
in a slight apoplexy, producing paralysis of which she died. Among
the peculiarities alluded to, one of the most singular was the habit
she had during the last year or so of her life of immuring herself
in a perfectly dark room and, for light, using a small candle-light,
even when the sun was shining bright out of doors. No urging would
induce her to go out into the fresh air. Another peculiarity was the
accumulation of large quantities of silks and dress goods in trunks
and by the cart-load, which she never used and which accumulated until
it was really feared that the floor of the storeroom would give way.
She was bright and sparkling in conversation, and her memory remained
singularly good up to the very close of her life. Her face was animated
and pleasing, and to me she was always an interesting woman; and while
the whole world was finding fault with her temper and disposition, it
was clear to me that the trouble was really a cerebral disease."
In appearance Lincoln was a very plain man. Folks called him ugly, but
his ugliness was impressive. He was gaunt and awkward, his limbs and
arms were very long, his hands and feet were large, and his knuckles
were prominent. His neck was long, the skin was coarse and wrinkled and
the sinews showed under it. There was so little flesh upon his face that
his features were more pronounced than they otherwise would have been.
His nose and chin were especially prominent. In all his movements he was
as awkward as he was uncouth in appearance, but it was an awkwardness
that was often eloquent.
General Fry left this pen portrait: "Lincoln was tall and thin; his long
bones were united by large joints, and he had a long neck and an angular
face and head. Many likenesses represent his face well enough, but none
that I have ever seen do justice to the awkwardness and ungainliness
of his figure. His feet, hanging loosely to his ankles, were prominent
objects; but his hands were more conspicuous even than his feet,--due,
perhaps, to the fact that ceremony at times compelled him to clothe them
in white kid gloves, which always fitted loosely. Both in the height
of conversation and in the depth of reflection his hand now and then
ran over or supported his head, giving his hair habitually a disordered
aspect."
Mr. Lincoln's indifference about dress did not improve his appearance.
His old-fashioned "stovepipe hat" was as familiar an object around
Washington as it was in Springfield, and his family and associates
were unable to induce him to purchase a new one. He usually wore a suit
of broadcloth with a long frock coat, the customary garments of the
legal profession in the West and South in those days, and, instead of
an overcoat, a gray shawl which was more than half the time hanging
carelessly over one shoulder.
He enjoyed jokes at the expense of his personal appearance, and used to
appropriate to himself this ancient incident which has been told of so
many other ugly men. "In the days when I used to be on the circuit," he
often said, "I was once accosted in the cars by a stranger, who said,
'Excuse me, sir, but I have an article in my possession which belongs to
you.' 'How is that?' I asked, considerably astonished. The stranger took
a jack-knife from his pocket. 'This knife,' said he, 'was placed in my
hands some years ago with the injunction that I was to keep it until I
found a man uglier than myself. I have carried it from that time until
this. Allow me now to say, sir, that I think you are fairly entitled to
the property.'"
Another of his stories about himself concerned a certain honest old
farmer who, visiting the capital for the first time, was taken by the
member from his "deestrick" to some large gathering at which he was told
he could see the President. Unfortunately, Mr. Lincoln did not appear;
and the Congressman, being a bit of a wag and not liking to have his
constituent disappointed, pointed out a gentleman of a particularly
round and rubicund countenance. The worthy farmer, greatly astonished,
exclaimed, "Is that Old Abe? Well, I do declare! He's a better-looking
man than I expected to see; but it does seem as if his troubles had
driven him to drink."
One night Lincoln had a dream which he used to relate with great gusto
to his friends and family. He said that he was in some great assembly
and the crowd opened to let him pass. One of the multitude remarked,
"He is a common-looking fellow," whereupon Lincoln turned and rebuked
him, saying, "Friend, the Lord prefers common-looking people; that is
why he made so many of them."
As is well known, Mr. Lincoln's nature sought relief in trying
situations by recalling incidents or anecdotes of a humorous character.
It was his safety-valve, and when his memory awakened the story he
sought, there would be a sudden and radical transformation of his
features. His face would glow, his eyes would twinkle, and his lips
would curl and quiver. His face was often an impenetrable mask, and
people who watched him when a perplexing question was proposed, or when
he was in doubt as to his duty, could never interpret what was going
on in his mind. He never declined to face any person, however annoying
or dangerous, and this faith in his own strength sufficed to guide him
through some of the severest trials that have ever fallen to the lot of
a public man.
At times Mr. Lincoln stood almost transfigured, and those who were with
him declare that his face would light up with a beauty as if it were
inspired. When in repose it wore an expression of infinite sadness,
which was due to his natural melancholy temperament as well as to
the continual strain of anxiety and his familiarity with the horrors
inseparable from war. There was no heart so tender for the sufferings
and sorrows of the soldiers and their families in all the country, and
he seemed to share the anguish of the broken-hearted mothers whose sons
had fallen in battle or were starving in prison beyond his rescue.
When death entered his own household his sorrow could scarcely be
measured; his sympathetic soul yielded so often to importunities that
his generals declared that he was destroying the discipline of the army.
His own career had been an incessant struggle, a ceaseless endeavor,
and his tenderness is traceable to impressions thus formed. No man
ever occupied a similar position whose experience had been so closely
parallel with that of the plain people he represented. Nowhere in all
literature can be found a more appropriate or touching expression of
sympathy than his letter to Mrs. Bixby, of Boston, who, it was then
supposed, had given five sons to her country:
"DEAR MADAM:--I have been shown, in the files of the
War Department, a statement of the Adjutant-General of
Massachusetts, that you are the mother of five sons who have
died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and
fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to
beguile you from a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain
from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the
thanks of the Republic that they have died to save. I pray that
our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement,
and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost
and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a
sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.
"Yours very sincerely and respectfully,
"ABRAHAM LINCOLN."
Mr. D. R. Locke (Petroleum V. Nasby), of whose writings he was so fond,
said, "Those who accuse Lincoln of frivolity never knew him. I never
saw a more thoughtful face, I never saw a more dignified face, I never
saw so sad a face. He had humor of which he was totally unconscious,
but it was not frivolity. He said wonderfully witty things, but never
from a desire to be witty. His wit was entirely illustrative. He used
it because, and only because, at times he could say more in this way
and better illustrate the idea with which he was pregnant. He never
cared how he made a point so that he made it, and he never told a story
for the mere sake of telling a story. When he did it, it was for the
purpose of illustrating and making clear a point. He was essentially
epigrammatic and parabolic. He was a master of satire, which at times
was as blunt as a meat-axe and at others as keen as a razor; but it was
always kindly except when some horrible injustice was its inspiration,
and then it was terrible. Weakness he was never ferocious with, but
intentional wickedness he never spared."
One day the Hon. Thaddeus Stevens called at the White House with
an elderly lady in great trouble, whose son had been in the army,
but for some offence had been court-martialled and sentenced either
to death or imprisonment at hard labor for a long term. There were
extenuating circumstances, and after a full hearing the President
said, "Mr. Stevens, do you think this is a case which will warrant my
interference?" "With my knowledge of the facts and parties," was the
reply, "I should have no hesitation in granting a pardon." "Then,"
returned Mr. Lincoln, "I will pardon him," and he proceeded forthwith
to execute the paper. The gratitude of the mother was too deep for
expression, save by tears, and not a word was said until half-way down
the stairs, when she suddenly broke forth, in an excited manner,--
"I knew it was a Copperhead lie!"
"What do you mean, madam?" asked Mr. Stevens.
"Why, they told me he was an ugly looking man," she replied with
vehemence. "He is the handsomest man I ever saw in all my life."
The doorkeepers at the White House had standing orders that, no matter
how great might be the throng, the President would see every person who
came to him with a petition for the saving of life. A woman carrying a
baby came three days in succession. Her husband had deserted from the
army, and had been caught and sentenced to be shot. While going through
the anteroom, Mr. Lincoln heard the child cry, rang a bell, and, when
the doorkeeper came, asked,--
"Daniel, is there a woman with a baby in the anteroom? Send her to me at
once."
She went in, told her story, and the President pardoned her husband. As
she came out from his presence her lips were moving in prayer and the
tears were streaming down her cheeks.
"Madam, it was the baby that did it!" said the messenger.
Mr. A. B. Chandler, who had charge of the telegraph office at the War
Department, says that on several occasions Lincoln came to the office
near midnight with a message written by his own hand in order that
there should be no mistake or delay in sending respite to a condemned
soldier. "I think," said Mr. Chandler, "he never failed to interpose his
power to prevent the execution of a soldier for sleeping at his post,
or any other than a wilful and malicious act; and even in such cases,
when brought to his attention, he made the most careful review of the
facts, and always seemed more anxious to find the offender innocent than
guilty; and when guilty he was disposed to take into consideration,
as far as possible, any extenuating circumstances in favor of the
wrong-doer.
"On New Year's morning, 1864," continued Mr. Chandler, "Mr. Lincoln was
about opening the door of the military telegraph office. A woman stood
in the hall, crying. Mr. Lincoln had observed this, and as soon as he
was seated he said to Major Eckert, 'What is the woman crying about just
outside your door? I wish you would go and see,' said Mr. Lincoln. So
the major went out and learned that the woman had come to Washington
expecting to be able to go to the army and see her soldier husband,
which was not altogether unusual for ladies to do while the army was in
the winter-quarters; but very strict orders had recently been issued
prohibiting women from visiting the army, and she found herself with her
child, in Washington, incurring more expense than she supposed would
be necessary, with very little money, and in great grief. This being
explained to the President, he said, in his frank, off-hand way, 'Come,
now, let's send her down: what do you say?'
"The major explained the strict orders that the Department had issued
lately, the propriety of which Mr. Lincoln recognized, but he was still
unwilling to yield his purpose. Finally the major suggested that a leave
of absence to come to Washington might be given the woman's husband.
The President quickly adopted the suggestion, and directed that Colonel
Hardie, an assistant adjutant-general on duty in an adjoining room,
should make an official order permitting the man to come to Washington."
But when provoked, or when his sense of justice was violated, Lincoln
showed a terrible temper. It is related that on one occasion when the
California delegation in Congress called upon him to present a nominee
for an office, they disputed the right of Senator Baker, of Oregon,
to be consulted respecting the patronage of the Pacific coast. One of
them unwisely attacked the private character and motives of the Oregon
Senator, forgetting that he had been one of Lincoln's oldest and closest
friends in Illinois. The President's indignation was aroused instantly,
and he defended Baker and denounced his accusers with a vehemence that
is described as terrible. The California delegation never questioned the
integrity of his friends again.
"Of all public men," said John B. Alley, "none seemed to have so little
pride of opinion. He was always learning, and did not adhere to views
which he found to be erroneous, simply because he had once formed and
held them. I remember that he once expressed an opinion to me, on an
important matter, quite different from what he had expressed a short
time before, and I said, 'Mr. President, you have changed your mind
entirely within a short time.' He replied, 'Yes, I have; and I don't
think much of a man who is not wiser to-day than he was yesterday.' A
remark full of wisdom and sound philosophy. Mr. Lincoln was so sensible,
so broad-minded, so philosophical, so noble in his nature, that he saw
only increasing wisdom in enlarged experience and observation."
Senator Conners, of California, said, "One morning I called on the
President to talk with him on some public business, and as soon as
we met he began by asking if I knew Captain Maltby, now living in
California, saying, 'He is visiting here and his wife is with him.'
I replied that I knew of him, and had heard he was in Washington. He
said that when he first came to Springfield, where he was unknown, and
a carpet-bag contained all he owned in the world, and he was needing
friends, Captain Maltby and his wife took him into their modest
dwelling; that he lived with them while he 'put out his shingle' and
sought business.
"He had known Maltby during the period of the Black Hawk War. No one
was ever treated more kindly than he was by them. He had risen in
the world and they were poor, and Captain Maltby wanted some place
which would give him a living. 'In fact,' said he, 'Maltby wants to
be Superintendent of the Mint at San Francisco, but he is hardly
equal to that. I want to find some place for him, and into which he
will fit, and I know nothing about these things.' I said, 'There is
a place--Superintendent of Indian Affairs in California--where the
incumbent should be superseded for cause, and the place is simply a
great farm, where the government supplies the means of carrying it
on; there is an abundance of Indian labor, and making it produce and
accounting for the products are the duties principally.' He replied,
'Maltby is the man for this place,' and he was made entirely happy by
being able to serve an old and good man."
II
THE LEADER OF THE SPRINGFIELD BAR
Abraham Lincoln inherited his love of learning from his mother, who was
superior in intelligence and refinement to the women of her class and
time. His ambition to become a lawyer was inspired by a copy of the
Revised Statutes of Indiana which accidentally fell into his hands when
he was a mere boy in the swampy forests of the southern section of that
State. In the brief autobiography already referred to, which he prepared
for the newspapers to gratify public curiosity when he was nominated as
a candidate for President, he says that he "went to school by littles;
in all, it did not amount to more than a year," and he afterwards told
a friend that he "read through every book he ever heard of in that
country for a circuit of fifty miles." These included Weems's "Life of
Washington," Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress," Æsop's "Fables," "Robinson
Crusoe," a History of the United States whose author is not named, the
Bible, and the Statutes of Indiana.
This is the catalogue he gave of the books he knew in his youth. His
biographer included Plutarch's "Lives," and when the advanced sheets
of the campaign sketch reached Lincoln he gave a curious exhibition of
his habitual accuracy by calling attention to the fact that this was
not exact when it was written, "for, up to that moment in my life, I
had never seen that early contribution to human history; but I want
your book, even if it is nothing more than a mere campaign sketch, to
be faithful to the facts, and, in order that the statement might be
literally true, I secured the book (Plutarch's 'Lives') a few weeks ago
and have sent for you to tell you that I have just read it through."
It is quite remarkable that a country lad, almost illiterate, should
have found a volume of statutes interesting reading, but Lincoln read
and reread it until he had almost committed its contents to memory, and
in after-years, when any one cited an Indiana law, he could usually
repeat the exact text and often give the numbers of the page, chapter,
and paragraph. The book belonged to David Turnham, who seems to have
been a constable or magistrate in that part of Indiana, and this
volume constituted his professional library. The actual copy is now
preserved in the library of the New York Law Institute. The binding
is worn and the title-page and a few leaves at the end are missing.
Besides the statutes as enacted up to 1824, it contains the Declaration
of Independence, the Constitutions of the United States and the State
of Indiana, and the Act of Virginia, passed in 1783, by which "The
territory North Westward of the river Ohio" was conveyed to the United
States, and the ordinance of 1787 for governing that territory, of which
Article VI. reads:
"There shall neither be slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said
territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crime, whereof the party
shall be duly convicted; provided always, that any person escaping
into the same, from whom labor or service is lawfully claimed, in any
one of the original States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed,
and conveyed to the person claiming his or her labor or service as
aforesaid."
It is an interesting coincidence that Abraham Lincoln should not only
have received the impressions which guided him in the choice of his
career from this volume, but also his first knowledge of the legal side
of slavery. Before he finished that book he knew the principles upon
which the government of the United States was founded and how they were
applied in the States. Its contents were fastened upon his memory by
copying long extracts with a quill of a turkey-buzzard and ink home-made
from the juice of the brier root. When he had no paper he wrote upon
a shingle, and, after he had committed to memory the paragraphs so
preserved, he would shave off the shingle with his knife and write
others. When he was in the field ploughing or cultivating he took a book
with him, and when he stopped to rest would pull it from his pocket and
read until it was time to resume work again. In after-life, even when
he came to the White House, he used to speak of the impressions made
upon his mind by the "Life of Washington," and always contended that it
was better for the young men of the country to regard Washington in the
light of a demigod, as Parson Weems describes him, than to shake their
faith in the greatest hero of American history by narrating his mistakes
and follies as if he were a common man.
He never lost his love for "Pilgrim's Progress" or "Robinson Crusoe."
The characters in both were real to him, and to the end of his days he
could repeat Æsop's "Fables" verbatim.
In those days schools were very scarce and poor; the teachers were
usually incompetent itinerant adventurers or men too lazy or feeble to
do the manual labor required of frontiersmen. They were paid a trifling
fee for each scholar and "boarded 'round." Nothing was expected of
them in the way of education beyond a knowledge of the three R's, and
Lincoln, of all famous self-made men, owed the least of his intellectual
strength and knowledge to teachers and books and the most to observation
and human contact. When he was upon his eventful "speaking trip," as
he called it, in New England, in the spring of 1860, a clergyman of
Hartford was so impressed by the language and logic of his address that
he inquired where he was educated. Mr. Lincoln replied,--
"Well, as to education, the newspapers are correct. I never went to
school more than six months in my life. I can say this: that among
my earliest recollections I remember how, when a mere child, I used
to get irritated when anybody talked to me in a way that I could not
understand. I can remember going to my little bedroom, after hearing the
neighbors talk of an evening with my father, and spending no small part
of the night trying to make out what was the exact meaning of some of
their, to me, dark sayings.
"I could not sleep, although I tried to, when I got on such a hunt for
an idea until I had caught it; and when I thought I had got it I was
not satisfied until I had repeated it over and over again, until I had
put it in language plain enough, as I thought, for any boy I knew to
comprehend. This was a kind of passion with me, and it has stuck by me;
for I am never easy now, when I am handling a thought, until I have
bounded it north and bounded it south and bounded it east and bounded it
west."
Among the papers of the late Charles Lanman there is a sketch of
Mr. Lincoln, written in his own hand. Mr. Lanman was editor of the
_Congressional Directory_ at the time that Mr. Lincoln was elected to
Congress, and, according to the ordinary custom, forwarded to him, as
well as to all the other members-elect, a blank to be filled out with
facts and dates which might be made the basis for a biographical sketch
in the _Directory_. Lincoln's blank was returned promptly filled up in
his own handwriting, with the following information:
"Born February 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky.
"Education defective.
"Profession, lawyer.
"Military service, captain of volunteers in the Black Hawk War.
"Offices held: postmaster at a very small office; four times a member
of the Illinois Legislature, and elected to the Lower House of the next
Congress."
Mr. Leonard Swett, who was closely identified with Mr. Lincoln for many
years, says,--
"In the fall of 1853, as I was riding with Mr. Lincoln, I said, 'I have
heard a great many curious incidents of your early life, and I would be
obliged if you would begin at your earliest recollection and tell me the
story of it continuously.'
"'I can remember,' he said, 'our life in Kentucky: the cabin, the
stinted living, the sale of our possessions, and the journey with my
father and mother to Southern Indiana.' I think he said he was then
about six years old. Shortly after his arrival in Indiana his mother
died. 'It was pretty pinching times at first in Indiana, getting the
cabin built, and the clearing for the crops, but presently we got
reasonably comfortable, and my father married again.'
"He had very faint recollections of his own mother, he was so young when
she died; but he spoke most kindly of her and of his step-mother, and
her cares for him in providing for his wants.