In offering this volume to the public I shall attempt no apology for
its shortcomings, other than to say that its production is the result
of the unexpected popularity of the series of articles, relating to the
illustrious subject of whom it mainly treats, which were commenced in
the New York “Independent” soon after the assassination.
Written in a spirit of enthusiasm and affection, which there has
been no effort to disguise, the book is, nevertheless, a simple
matter-of-fact record of daily experience and observation, fragmentary,
but _true_, in all essential particulars. There has been no disposition
to select from, embellish, or suppress, any portion of the material
in my possession. The incidents given were not in any sense isolated
exceptions to the daily routine of Mr. Lincoln’s life. My aim has been
throughout these pages to portray _the man_ as he was revealed to me,
without any attempt at idealization.
In addition to my own reminiscences, I have woven into the book various
personal incidents, published and unpublished, which bear intrinsic
evidence of genuineness,--attaching in these instances, where it seemed
necessary and proper, the sources of such contributions.
I am not one of those inclined to believe that Mr. Lincoln, in
the closing months of his career, reached the full measure of his
greatness. Man may not read the future: but it is my firm conviction,
that, had he lived through his second term, he would have continued
to grow, as he had grown, in the estimation and confidence of his
countrymen; rising to a grander moral height with every emergency,
careful always to weigh every argument opposed to his convictions, but,
once mounted upon those convictions, grounded in righteousness, as
immovable as one of the giant ranges of our own Rocky Mountains!
Aspiring in no sense to the dignity of a biography, this volume will
fulfil its object if it helps to any better knowledge of one, who,
apart from the reverence with which he ever will be regarded for his
connection with the cause of human Freedom, was the best product
and exemplar which the world has yet seen of American soil and
institutions; the study of whose character, illustrating as it did the
highest form of statesmanship, founded upon truth, justice, and solid
integrity, combining the deepest wisdom with a child-like freshness and
simplicity,--will be of perpetual interest and value.