A Year of Waiting and Trial--Again Defeated for the
Senate--Depression and Neglect--Lincoln Enlarging His
Boundaries--On the Stump in Ohio--A Speech to Kentuckians--Second
Visit to Cincinnati--A Short Trip to Kansas--Lincoln in New York
City--The Famous Cooper Institute Speech--A Strong and Favorable
Impression--Visits New England--Secret of Lincoln's Success as an
Orator--Back to Springfield--Disposing of a Campaign
Slander--Lincoln's Account of His Visit to a Five Points Sunday
School.
On the 2d of November, 1858, the State election was held in Illinois.
The chief significance of this election was due to the fact that the
Legislature then chosen would decide whether Douglas or Lincoln should
be sent to the Senate at Washington. The result showed that Lincoln had,
by his hard efforts, won a victory for his cause and for his party, but
not for himself. The Republican State ticket was elected by a majority
of about 4,000 votes; but in the Legislature a number of members held
over from the election of two years before, and the Republican gains,
though considerable, were not quite sufficient to overcome this adverse
element. When the Legislature met, Douglas was re-elected to the Senate
by a small majority. It is said that Lincoln was deeply grieved by his
defeat. When some one inquired of him how he felt over the result, he
answered that he felt "like the boy that stubbed his toe,--'it hurt too
bad to laugh, and he was too big to cry!'"
A few days after his return to Springfield, there was pressed on the
attention of the defeated candidate a matter which must have been
peculiarly unwelcome at the time, but which was accepted with habitual
fortitude. What this matter was is revealed in the following letter:
SPRINGFIELD, NOV. 16, 1858.
HON. N.B. JUDD--_My Dear Sir_:--Yours of the 15th is just received.
I wrote you the same day. As to the pecuniary matter, I am willing
to pay according to my ability, but I am the poorest hand living to
get others to pay. I have been on expense so long, without earning
anything, that I am absolutely without money now for even household
expenses. Still, if you can put in two hundred and fifty dollars
for me towards discharging the debt of the committee, I will allow
it when you and I settle the private matter between us. This, with
what I have already paid with an outstanding note of mine, will
exceed my subscription of five hundred dollars. This, too, is
exclusive of my ordinary expenses during the campaign, all of
which, being added to my loss of time and business, bears pretty
heavily upon one no better off than I am. But as I had the post of
honor, it is not for me to be over-nice.
You are feeling badly. _And this, too, shall pass away;_ never
fear.
Yours as ever,
A. LINCOLN.
Hon. E.M. Haines, who was a member of the Legislature of 1858-9, and a
supporter of Lincoln for the Senate, states that Lincoln seemed greatly
depressed by his defeat, and that his friends were also somewhat
disheartened regarding his future prospects, and neglected him to some
extent. "Some time after the Senatorial election," says Mr. Haines,
"Governor Bissell gave a reception at his house, which I attended with
my wife. After we had paid our respects to the Governor and Mrs.
Bissell, we passed on to an adjoining room, where there was quite a
throng of people engaged in conversation. Mr. Lincoln was standing near
the centre of the room, entirely alone, with his usual sad countenance,
and apparently unnoticed by anyone. I said to my wife, 'Here is Mr.
Lincoln; he looks as if he had lost all his friends; come and have an
introduction to him, and cheer him up.' Mr. Lincoln received us very
cordially, and we entered into a general conversation, apparently
unnoticed, and attracting no attention from others as they passed and
repassed around us. Dancing was going on in the adjacent rooms, and Mr.
Lincoln invited my wife to join him in the dancing, which she did, and
he apparently took much pleasure in the recreation. My wife afterwards
related to me much that Mr. Lincoln said in their conversation during
the evening. His despondency became much dispelled after they became
engaged in conversation; indeed, she said that he seemed to be putting
forth an effort to get out of the gloomy condition which had come upon
him from the result of his Senatorial canvass. He had occasion during
their conversation to refer to his age, remarking incidentally that he
was almost fifty years old; whereupon, as if suddenly reflecting that
his age was a good part of a man's life, and as if unwilling to
relinquish his hold upon the future, he suddenly braced himself up, and
said, 'But, Mrs. Haines, I feel that I am good for another fifty years
yet.'"
During the winter following the Senatorial debate Lincoln was occupied
with his private affairs. The love of public speaking had become so
strong with him that he prepared a lecture and delivered it to the
public at several places during the winter. It was somewhat humorous in
character, but was not much of a success, and he soon declined further
invitations to deliver it. To one correspondent he wrote, in March,
1859: "Your note, inviting me to deliver a lecture in Galesburg, is
received. I regret to say that I cannot do so now. I must stick to the
courts for awhile. I read a sort of a lecture to three different
audiences during the last month and this; but I did so under
circumstances which made it a waste of time, of no value whatever."
The following autumn (1859) Senator Douglas visited Ohio and made
speeches for the Democratic party there. From the Republican ranks there
arose a cry for Lincoln, whose superiority to Douglas in the great
debate of the preceding year was still fresh in the public mind. He
promptly answered it, and spoke in that State with marked effect. At
Cincinnati he addressed himself especially to Kentuckians, and said, in
a strain which is now seen to be prophetic:
I should not wonder if there were some Kentuckians in this
audience; we are close to Kentucky; but whether that be so or not,
we are on elevated ground, and by speaking distinctly I should not
wonder if some of the Kentuckians would hear me on the other side
of the river. For that purpose I propose to address a portion of
what I have to say to the Kentuckians. I say, then, in the first
place, to the Kentuckians, that I am what they call, as I
understand it, a 'Black Republican.' I think slavery is wrong,
morally and politically. I desire that it should be no further
spread in these United States, and I should not object if it should
gradually terminate in the whole Union. While I say this for
myself, I say to you Kentuckians, that I understand you differ
radically with me upon this proposition; that you believe slavery
is a good thing; that slavery is right; that it ought to be
extended and perpetuated in this Union. Now, there being this broad
difference between us, I do not pretend, in addressing myself to
you Kentuckians, to attempt proselyting you; that would be a vain
effort. I will tell you, so far as I am authorized to speak for the
opposition, what we mean to do with you. We mean to treat you, as
nearly as we possibly can, as Washington, Jefferson, and Madison
treated you. We mean to leave you alone, and in no way to interfere
with your institution; to abide by all and every compromise of the
Constitution, and, in a word, coming back to the original
proposition, to treat you, so far as degenerated men (if we have
degenerated) may, according to the examples of those noble
fathers--Washington, Jefferson and Madison. We mean to remember
that you are as good as we; that there is no difference between
us, other than the difference of circumstances. We mean to
recognize and bear in mind always, that you have as good hearts in
your bosoms as other people, or as we claim to have, and treat you
accordingly. We mean to marry your girls, when we have a
chance--the white ones, I mean--and I have the honor to inform you
that I once did have a chance in that way. I have told you what we
mean to do. I want to know now what _you_ mean to do. I often hear
it intimated that you mean to divide the Union whenever a
Republican, or anything like it, is elected President of the United
States. [A voice--'That is so.'] 'That is so,' one of them says; I
wonder if he is a Kentuckian? [A voice--'He is a Douglas man.']
Well, then, I want to know what you are going to do with your half
of it? Are you going to split the Ohio down through, and push your
half off a piece? Or are you going to keep it right alongside of us
outrageous fellows? Or are you going to build up a wall some way
between your country and ours, by which that movable property of
yours can't come over here any more, to the danger of your losing
it? Do you think you can better yourselves on that subject by
leaving us here under no obligation whatever to return those
specimens of your movable property that come hither? You have
divided the Union because we would not do right with you, as you
think, upon that subject; when we cease to be under obligations to
do anything for you, how much better off do you think you will be?
Will you make war upon us and kill us all? Why, gentlemen, I think
you are as gallant and as brave men as live; that you can fight as
bravely in a good cause, man for man, as any other people living;
that you have shown yourselves capable of this upon various
occasions; but man for man, you are not better than we are, and
there are not so many of you as there are of us. You will never
make much of a hand at whipping us. If we were fewer in numbers
than you, I think that you could whip us; if we were equal, it
would likely be a drawn battle; but being inferior in numbers, you
will make nothing by attempting to master us.
The Hon. W.M. Dickson, whose interesting account of Lincoln's first
visit to Cincinnati and the disappointments attending it has already
been given in this narrative, says of this second visit as contrasted
with the obscurity of the first: "Lincoln returned to the city with a
fame wide as the continent, with the laurels of the Douglas contest on
his brow, and the Presidency almost in his grasp. He returned, greeted
with the thunder of cannon, the strains of martial music, and the joyous
plaudits of thousands of citizens thronging the streets. He addressed a
vast concourse on Fifth Street Market; was entertained in princely style
at the Burnet House; and there received with courtesy the foremost
citizens, come to greet this Western rising star."
In December of the same year Lincoln visited Kansas and addressed the
people of that troubled State upon the political questions then before
the country. At Leavenworth, Atchison, Elwood, and other places, he was
met by large gatherings of eager listeners who were charmed and
convinced by his fresh and reassuring utterances. His journeys were
complete ovations, and he returned to Illinois leaving a host of new
friends behind him. As several of Lincoln's biographers make no
reference to his Kansas visit, and the entire matter seems more or less
obscured, the following letter, lately written by Mr. Harry W. Stewart,
of Carlsbad, New Mexico, is of much interest: "I have recently seen a
reference to Lincoln's visit to Kansas as if the fact were not clearly
established. In this connection I may offer a personal recollection of
my father, James G. Stewart, who was a physician practicing in the
little town of Elwood, Kansas, from 1856 to 1860. He said that both
Lincoln and Seward came out and spoke in St. Joseph, Mo., just across
the river from Elwood. On each occasion a large following of 'free
state' men went over to St. Jo to hear the speech and incidentally to
support the speaker in case of violence, which had been freely
predicted. According to this reminiscence, Lincoln crossed the Missouri
into Kansas, my father having the honor of taking him in a buggy to a
small town fourteen miles distant from Elwood in Doniphan County. They
drove out to Troy, where Mr. Lincoln made a speech. From here I think he
went on to Lawrence and other places before returning to St. Joseph, but
have no account of his movements beyond Troy. I think it was in the year
1858 and must have been in the summer time, for the party took Mr.
Lincoln over the Missouri on a ferry. It did not make trips oftener than
about once in two hours. When Lincoln came to the bank on the Missouri
side the boat had just gone. There was no waiting-room or benches to sit
on and some of the party were inclined to think they were in hard luck.
When Lincoln found out how it was, he said: 'It's all right. We'll sit
right down on the sand and wait for the boat.' Then they all sat down on
the ground and listened to genuine Lincoln stories till the time was up.
My father often spoke with delight of this incident. I have looked in
vain in Lincoln histories for a more definite account of this Kansas
trip. Of the actual fact there can be no doubt."
Lincoln's fame, as we have seen, had now extended to the East, where he
seems to have been looked upon as a rising man and an interesting figure
in national politics. Invitations to visit the East now began to reach
him. In the following February (1860) he went to Brooklyn, for the
purpose of delivering a lecture in Mr. Beecher's church. The invitation
had given him much pleasure, and he prepared himself thoroughly; indeed,
it is said that no effort of his life cost him so much labor as this. In
the Plymouth congregation of Brooklyn there was an association of young
men which was successful in getting an annual course of six lectures of
the highest order. This association discerned in Lincoln a man worthy of
a place in its course, and invited him to give such a lecture.
Meanwhile, some prominent Republican politicians of New York had heard
of him as a possible candidate for the Presidency, and desired him to
make a speech in that city in order to determine whether he would be the
man to present to the Republican National convention in case Mr. Seward
could not be nominated. Lincoln informed these gentlemen of his Brooklyn
engagement, but said he would speak in New York if the Brooklyn club
gave its consent. That club agreed to this arrangement; and thus it was
decided that Lincoln's speech should be delivered in New York City,
instead of Brooklyn, as had been first intended. Mr. R.C. McCormick, who
was a member of the committee in charge of the arrangements, says: "When
Mr. Lincoln came to New York City, there was some confusion in the
arrangements. He had at first been invited to appear in Brooklyn, but
upon deliberation his friends thought it best that he should be heard in
New York. Reaching the Astor House on Saturday, February 25, he was
surprised to find by announcement in the public prints that he was to
speak at the Cooper Institute. He said he must review his address if it
was to be delivered in New York. What he had prepared for Mr. Beecher's
church-folks might not be altogether appropriate to a miscellaneous
political audience. Saturday was spent in a review of the speech, and on
Sunday morning he went to Plymouth church, where apparently he greatly
enjoyed the service. On Monday morning I waited upon him with several
members of the Young Men's Republican Union, into whose hands the
preparations for the meeting at the Cooper Institute had fallen. We
found him in a suit of black, much wrinkled from its careless packing in
a small valise. He received us cordially, apologizing for the awkward
and uncomfortable appearance he made in his new suit, and expressing
himself surprised at being in New York. His form and manner were indeed
very odd, and we thought him the most unprepossessing public man we had
ever met. I spoke to him of the manuscript of his forthcoming address,
and suggested to him that it should be given to the press at his
earliest convenience, in order that it might be published in full on the
morning following its delivery. He appeared in much doubt as to whether
any of the papers would care to print it; and it was only when I
accompanied a reporter to his room and made a request for it, that he
began to think his words might be of interest to the metropolitan
public. He seemed wholly ignorant of the custom of supplying slips to
the different journals from the office first putting the addresses in
type, and was charmingly innocent of the machinery so generally used,
even by some of our most popular orators, to give success and _éclat_ to
their public efforts. The address was written upon blue foolscap paper,
all in his own hand, and with few interlineations. I was bold enough to
read portions of it, and had no doubt that its delivery would create a
marked sensation throughout the country. Lincoln referred frequently to
Douglas, but always in a generous and kindly manner. It was difficult to
regard them as antagonists. Many stories of the famous Illinois debates
were told us, and in a very short time his frank and sparkling
conversation won our hearts and made his plain face pleasant to us all.
During the day it was suggested that he should be taken up Broadway and
shown the city, of which he knew but little--stating, I think, that he
had been here but once before. At one place he met an Illinois
acquaintance of former years, to whom he said, in his dry, good-natured
way: 'Well, B., how have you fared since you left Illinois?' To which B.
replied, 'I have made a hundred thousand dollars, and lost all. How is
it with you, Mr. Lincoln?' 'Oh, very well,' said Lincoln. 'I have the
cottage at Springfield, and about eight thousand dollars in money. If
they make me Vice-president with Seward, as some say they will, I hope I
shall be able to increase it to twenty thousand; and that is as much as
any man ought to want.' We visited a photographic establishment upon
the corner of Broadway and Bleeker streets, where he sat for his
picture, the first taken in New York. At the gallery he met and was
introduced to Hon. George Bancroft, and had a brief conversation with
that gentleman, who welcomed him to New York. The contrast in the
appearance of the men was most striking; the one courtly and precise in
his every word and gesture, with the air of a trans-Atlantic statesman;
the other bluff and awkward, his very utterance an apology for his
ignorance of metropolitan manners and customs. 'I am on my way to
Massachusetts,' he said to Mr. Bancroft, 'where I have a son at school,
who, if report be true, already knows much more than his father.'"
On the evening of February 27 a large and brilliant audience gathered at
Cooper Institute, to hear the famous Western orator. The scene was one
never to be forgotten by those who witnessed it. Upon the platform sat
many of the prominent men of the Republican party, and in the body of
the hall were many ladies. The meeting was presided over by the
distinguished citizen and poet William Cullen Bryant, of whom Mr.
Lincoln afterward said, "It was worth a journey to the East merely to
see such a man." The orator of the evening was introduced by Mr. Bryant
with some very complimentary allusions, especially to his controversy
with Douglas. "When Mr. Lincoln came on the platform and was introduced
by Mr. Bryant," says one who was present, "he seemed a giant in contrast
with him. His first sentence was delivered in a peculiarly high-keyed
voice, and disappointed us. In a short time the sharp points of his
address began to come, and he had not been speaking for half an hour
before his audience seemed wild with enthusiasm." Another account says:
"His manner was, to a New York audience, a very strange one, but it was
captivating. He held the vast meeting spell-bound, and as one by one
his oddly expressed but trenchant and convincing arguments confirmed the
soundness of his political conclusions, the house broke out in wild and
prolonged enthusiasm. I think I never saw an audience more thoroughly
carried away by an orator." This speech was full of trenchant passages,
which called forth tumultuous applause. The following is a specimen:
I defy anyone to show that any living man in the whole world ever
did, prior to the beginning of the present century (and I might
almost say prior to the beginning of the last half of the present
century), declare that, in his understanding, any proper division
of local from Federal authority, or any part of the Constitution,
forbade the Federal Government to control slavery in the Federal
territories. To those who now so declare, I give not only our
fathers who framed the government under which we live, but with
them all other living men within the century in which it was
framed, among whom to search, and they shall not be able to find
the evidence of a single man agreeing with them.
Referring to the South, and the growing political discontent in that
quarter, he said:
Let all who believe that our fathers understood this question just
as well as, and even better than, we do now, speak as they spoke
and act as they acted upon it. This is all Republicans ask--all
Republicans desire--in relation to slavery. As those fathers marked
it, so let it be again marked, as an evil not to be extended, but
to be tolerated and protected only because, and so far as, its
actual presence among us makes that toleration and protection a
necessity. Let all the guarantees those fathers gave it be not
grudgingly but fully and fairly maintained.
His counsel to the young Republican party was timely and full of wisdom.
A few words now to Republicans: It is exceedingly desirable that
all parts of this great Confederacy shall be at peace, and in
harmony one with another. Let us Republicans do our part to have it
so. Even though much provoked, let us do nothing through passion
and ill-temper. Even though the Southern people will not so much as
listen to us, let us calmly consider their demands, and yield to
them, if in our deliberate view of our duty we possibly can.
The address closed with the following impressive words:
Wrong as we think slavery is, we can yet afford to let it alone
where it is, because that much is due to the necessity arising from
its actual presence in the nation; but can we, while our votes will
prevent it, allow it to spread into the National Territories, and
to overrun us here in these free States? If our sense of duty
forbids this, then let us stand by our duty, fearlessly and
effectively. Let us be diverted by none of those sophistical
contrivances wherewith we are so industriously plied and
belabored--contrivances such as groping for some middle ground
between the right and the wrong, vain as the search for a man who
should be neither a living man nor a dead man,--such as a policy of
'don't care' on a question about which all true men do care,--such
as Union appeals, beseeching true Union men to yield to
Disunionists, reversing the divine rule, and calling not the
sinners but the righteous to repentance,--such as invocations of
Washington, imploring men to unsay what Washington said and undo
what Washington did. Neither let us be slandered from our duty by
false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of
destruction to the Government nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us
have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us to the
end dare to do our duty as we understand it.
The Cooper Institute speech made a profound impression upon the public.
All who saw and heard Lincoln on that occasion felt the influence of his
strange but powerful personality; and acute minds recognized in the
unsophisticated Western lawyer a new force in American politics. This
speech made Lincoln known throughout the country, and undoubtedly did
more than anything else to secure him the nomination for the Presidency.
Aside from its extensive publication in the newspapers, various editions
of it appeared in pamphlet form, one of the best of which was issued by
Messrs. C.C. Nott and Cephas Brainard, who appended to their edition an
estimate of the speech that is well worth reprinting here: "No one who
has not actually attempted to verify its details can understand the
patient research and historical labor which it embodies. The history of
our earlier politics is scattered through numerous journals, statutes,
pamphlets, and letters; and these are defective in completeness and
accuracy of statement, and in indexes and tables of contents. Neither
can any one who has not travelled over this precise ground appreciate
the accuracy of every trivial detail, or the self-denying impartiality
with which Mr. Lincoln has turned from the testimony of 'the fathers' on
the general question of slavery to present the single question which he
discusses. From the first line to the last, from his premises to his
conclusion, he travels with a swift, unerring directness which no
logician ever excelled,--an argument complete and full, without the
affectation of learning, and without the stiffness which usually
accompanies dates and details. A single easy, simple sentence of plain
Anglo-Saxon words contains a chapter of history that, in some instances,
has taken days of labor to verify, and must have cost the author months
of investigation to acquire; and though the public should justly
estimate the labor bestowed on the facts which are stated, they cannot
estimate the greater labor involved on those which are omitted--how many
pages have been read--how many works examined--what numerous statutes,
resolutions, speeches, letters, and biographies have been looked
through. Commencing with this address as a political pamphlet, the
reader will leave it as an historical work--brief, complete, profound,
impartial, truthful,--which will survive the time and the occasion that
called it forth, and be esteemed hereafter no less for its intrinsic
worth than for its unpretending modesty."
Lincoln's oldest son, Robert, was at this time a student in Harvard
University, and, chiefly to visit him, Lincoln made a brief trip to New
England. While there he spoke at Concord and Manchester in New
Hampshire; at Woonsocket in Rhode Island; and at Hartford, New Haven,
Norwich, Meriden, and Bridgeport in Connecticut. These speeches were
heard with delight by large audiences, and received hearty praise from
the press. At Manchester, "The Mirror," a neutral paper, published the
following remarks on Lincoln's style of oratory: "He spoke an hour and a
half, with great fairness, great apparent candor, and with wonderful
interest. He did not abuse the South, the administration, or the
Democrats, nor indulge in any personalities, with the exception of a few
hits at 'Douglas's notions.' He is far from prepossessing in personal
appearance, and his voice is disagreeable; and yet he wins attention and
good-will from the start. He indulges in no flowers of rhetoric, no
eloquent passages. He is not a wit, a humorist, or a clown; yet so fine
a vein of pleasantry and good-nature pervades what he says, gliding over
a deep current of poetical arguments, that he keeps his hearers in a
smiling mood, ready to swallow all he says. His sense of the ludicrous
is very keen; and an exhibition of that is the clincher of all his
arguments--not the ludicrous acts of persons, but ludicrous ideas. For
the first half-hour his opponents would agree with every word he
uttered; and from that point he began to lead them off little by little,
until it seemed as if he had got them all into his fold."
The Rev. John. P. Gulliver, of Norwich, Connecticut, has given a most
interesting reminiscence of Lincoln's speech in that city while on his
tour through New England. On the morning following the speech he met
Lincoln on a railroad train, and entered into conversation with him. In
speaking of his speech, Mr. Gulliver remarked to Lincoln that he thought
it the most remarkable one he ever heard. "Are you sincere in what you
say?" inquired Lincoln. "I mean every word of it," replied the minister;
"indeed, I learned more of the art of public speaking last evening than
I could from a whole course of lectures on rhetoric." Then Lincoln
informed him of a "most extraordinary circumstance" that had occurred at
New Haven a few days previous. A professor of rhetoric in Yale College,
he had been told, came to hear him, took notes of his speech, and gave a
lecture on it to his class the following day, and, not satisfied with
that, followed him to Meriden the next evening and heard him again for
the same purpose. All this seemed to Lincoln to be "very extraordinary."
He had been sufficiently astonished by his success in the West, but he
had no expectation of any marked success in the East, particularly among
literary and learned men. "Now," said Lincoln, "I should like very much
to know what it is in my speech which you thought so remarkable, and
which interested my friend the professor so much." Mr. Gulliver's answer
was: "The clearness of your statements, the unanswerable style of your
reasoning, and especially your illustrations, which were romance and
pathos and fun and logic all welded together." After Mr. Gulliver had
fully satisfied his curiosity by a further exposition of the
politician's peculiar power, Lincoln said: "I am much obliged to you for
this. I have been wishing for a long time to find someone who would make
this analysis for me. It throws light on a subject which has been dark
to me. I can understand very readily how such a power as you have
ascribed to me will account for the effect which seems to be produced
by my speeches. I hope you have not been too flattering in your
estimate. Certainly I have had a most wonderful success for a man of my
limited education." Mr. Gulliver then inquired into the processes by
which he had acquired his education, and was rewarded with many
interesting details. When they were about to part, the minister said:
"Mr. Lincoln, may I say one thing to you before we separate?"
"Certainly; anything you please," was the response. "You have just
spoken," said Mr. Gulliver, "of the tendency of political life in
Washington to debase the moral convictions of our representatives there,
by the admixture of considerations of mere political expediency. You
have become, by the controversy with Mr. Douglas, one of our leaders in
this great struggle with slavery, which is undoubtedly the struggle of
the nation and the age. What I would like to say is this, and I say it
with a full heart: Be true to your principles, and we will be true to
you, and God will be true to us all." Mr. Lincoln, touched by the
earnestness of his interlocutor, took his hand in both his own, and,
with his face full of sympathetic light, exclaimed: "I say _amen_ to
that! _amen to that_!"
After the New England tour, Lincoln returned to his home in Springfield.
As often happens, those least appreciative of his success were his own
neighbors; and certain reflections gained vogue concerning his motives
in visiting the East. It was charged that he had been mercenary; that
his political speeches had been paid for. Something of this sort having
been brought to Lincoln's notice, he disposed of the matter in the
following manly and characteristic letter:
C.F. McNEILL, ESQ.--_Dear Sir:_--Reaching home yesterday, I found
yours of the 23d March, enclosing a slip from the 'Middleport
Press.' It is not true that I ever charged anything for a political
speech in my life; but this much is true: Last October I was
requested by letter to deliver some sort of speech in Mr. Beecher's
church in Brooklyn, $200 being offered in the first letter. I wrote
that I could do it in February, provided they would take a
political speech if I could find time to get up no other. They
agreed; and subsequently I informed them the speech would have to
be a political one. When I reached New York, I learned for the
first time that the place was changed to Cooper Institute. I made
the speech, and left for New England, where I have a son at school,
neither asking for pay nor having any offered me. Three days after,
a check for $200 was sent me, and I took it, and did not know it
was wrong. My understanding now is--though I knew nothing of it at
the time--that they did charge for admittance at the Cooper
Institute, and that they took in more than twice $200. I have made
this explanation to you as a friend; but I wish no explanation made
to our enemies. What they want is a squabble and a fuss; and that
they can have if we explain; and they cannot have it if we don't.
When I returned through New York from New England, I was told by
the gentleman who sent me the check that a drunken vagabond in the
club, having learned something about the $200, made the exhibition
out of which the 'Herald' manufactured the article quoted by the
'Press' of your town. My judgment is, and therefore my request is,
that you give no denial, and no explanations.
Thanking you for your kind interest in the matter, I remain,
Yours truly, A. LINCOLN.
It appears that on the Sunday which Lincoln spent in New York City he
visited a Sunday School in the notorious region called Five Points, and
there made a short address to the scholars. After his return to
Springfield, one of his neighbors, hearing of this, thought it would be
a good subject for bantering Lincoln about, and accordingly visited him
for that purpose. This neighbor was generally known as "Jim," just as
Lincoln was called "Abe." The following account of his visit, furnished
by Mr. Edward Eggleston, shows that he did not derive as much fun from
the "bantering" as he had expected: "He started for 'Old Abe's' office;
but bursting open the door impulsively, found a stranger in conversation
with Mr. Lincoln. He turned to retrace his steps, when Lincoln called
out, 'Jim! What do you want?' 'Nothing.' 'Yes, you do; come back.' After
some entreaty 'Jim' approached Mr. Lincoln, and remarked, with a twinkle
in his eye, 'Well, Abe, I see you have been making a speech to Sunday
School children. What's the matter?' 'Sit down, Jim, and I'll tell you
all about it.' And with that Lincoln put his feet on the stove, and
began: 'When Sunday morning came, I didn't know exactly what to do. Mr.
Washburne asked me where I was going. I told him I had nowhere to go;
and he proposed to take me down to the Five Points Sunday School, to
show me something worth seeing. I was very much interested by what I
saw. Presently, Mr. Pease came up and spoke to Mr. Washburne, who
introduced me. Mr. Pease wanted us to speak. Washburne spoke, and then I
was urged to speak. I told them I did not know anything about talking to
Sunday Schools, but Mr. Pease said many of the children were friendless
and homeless, and that a few words would do them good. Washburne said I
must talk. And so I rose to speak; but I tell you, Jim, I didn't know
what to say. I remembered that Mr. Pease said they were homeless and
friendless, and I thought of the time when I had been pinched by
terrible poverty. And so I told them that I had been poor; that I
remembered when my toes stuck out through my broken shoes in winter;
when my arms were out at the elbows; when I shivered with the cold. And
I told them there was only one rule; that was, always do the very best
you can. I told them that I had always tried to do the very best I
could; and that, if they would follow that rule, they would get along
somehow. That was about what I said. And when I got through, Mr. Pease
said it was just the thing they needed. And when the school was
dismissed, all the teachers came up and shook hands with me, and thanked
me; although I did not know that I had been saying anything of any
account. But the next morning I saw my remarks noticed in the papers.'
Just here Mr. Lincoln put his hand in his pocket, and remarked that he
had never heard anything that touched him as had the songs which those
children sang. With that he drew forth a little book, saying that they
had given him one of the books from which they sang. He began to read a
piece with all the earnestness of his great, earnest soul. In the middle
of the second verse his friend 'Jim' felt a choking in his throat and a
tickling in his nose. At the beginning of the third verse he saw that
the stranger was weeping, and his own tears fell fast. Turning toward
Lincoln, who was reading straight on, he saw the great blinding tears in
his eyes, so that he could not possibly see the pages. He was repeating
that little song from memory. How often he had read it, or how long its
sweet and simple accents continued to reverberate through his soul, no
one can know."