Lincoln was plunged willy-nilly into the society he shunned at home, on
entering the legislature at Springfield. A newspaper there published
the account--from her side--of a young lady's difference with a noted
politician, General James Shields. He married a sister of Lincoln's
wife, and there was a feud between them. Shields flew to the editor to
demand the name of the maligner, as he called the correspondent, or the
editor must meet him with dueling weapon--or his horsewhip. In the
Western States the whip was snapped at literary men as the cane was
flourished in England at the date, 1842.
The editor consulted with Lincoln as a lawyer and a friend. With his
enmity as to Shields, the friend promptly advised him to say "I did
it!" This was, in fact, sheer justice, for it was Lincoln's wife who
uttered the articles. And, by the way, their style and rustic humor
were much in the vein of the "Widow Bedott" and the "Samantha" papers
of later times. Mrs. Lincoln was not the mere housekeeper the scribes
accuse her of being. Lincoln knew what was her value when he read his
speeches first to her for an opinion, as Molière courted his stewardess
for opinions. Sumner heeded her counsel.
Abraham championed the mysterious "Aunt 'Becca," who had characterized
Shields as "a ballroom dandy floating around without heft or substance,
just like a lot of cat-fur where cats have been fighting." Is not this
quite Lincolnian?
Thus put forward, Lincoln received a challenge.
Trial by battle-personal still ruled. The politicians coupled with the
necessity of going out with weapons to maintain an assertion in speech
or publication were Jefferson Davis, Jackson, the President; Henry
Clay, the amiable; Sam Houston, Sergeant S. Prentiss, etc.
Shields naturally challenged the lady's champion. As the challenged
party, Lincoln, who had cooled in the interim, not only chose
broadswords (not at all "the gentleman's arm in an affair of honor"),
but, what is more, descanted on the qualities of the cutlas in such a
droll manner and words that the second went off laughing. He imparted
his unseemly mirth to his opponent's seconds, and all the parties
concerned took the cue to soften down the irritation between two
persons formerly "chums," and relatives so close.
The meeting took place by the river-side out of Alton, where the
leaking out of the gallantry of Lincoln in taking up the cudgels for
the lady led to an explanation, although no such enlightenment ought to
be permitted on the ground. Besides, all was ludicrous--the broadswords
intolerably broad.
The principals shook hands. But the plotters were not content with this
peaceful ending. They had determined that the outside spectators on the
town side of the river should be "in at the (sham) death." They rigged
up a log in a coat and sheet like a man wounded and reclining in the
bottom of a boat, and pretended it was one of the duelists, badly
stricken, whom they were escorting to town for surgical assistance. The
explosion of laughter receiving the two principals when the hoax was
revealed caused the incident to be a sore point to both Lincoln and
Shields.
* * * * *
"WANTING TO DANCE THE WORST WAY."
A Miss Mary Todd had come to visit a sister married in the neighborhood
of Springfield. Lincoln was there as a member of the legislature
sitting. He had eschewed society, though he liked it, in favor of
study, but now rewarded himself for achieving this fruit of application
by joining the movements around him. He made the acquaintance of Miss
Todd, vivacious, sprightly, keenly insighted so as to divine he would
prove superior in fate to Stephen Douglas, also courting her. Although
unsuited by nature and his means to shine in the ballroom, Lincoln
followed his flame thither. Using the vernacular, he asked for her
hand, saying earnestly:
"Miss Todd, I should like to dance with you _the worst way._"
After he had led his partner to her seat, a friend asked how the clumsy
partner had carried himself.
"He kept his word. He did dance the worst way!"
* * * * *
"THE STATUTE FIXES ALL THAT!"
Even Lincoln's marriage was to be accompanied by a diversion of that
merry imp of incongruity always with him--as Shakespeare's most stately
heroes are attended by a comic servant. He married Miss Mary Todd, of
Kentucky, at Springfield, at the age of thirty-three. It was the first
wedding performed with all the ceremonial of the Episcopalian sect.
This was to the awe of the Honorable Judge Tom C. Brown, an old man,
and friend and patron of our Abraham. He watched the ecclesiastical
functionary to the point of Lincoln's placing the ring on his bride's
finger, when the irate old stager exclaimed at the formula: "With this
ring I thee endow with all my goods," etc.
"Grace to Goshen! Lincoln, the statute fixes all that!"
* * * * *