ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S EARLY HOME IN KENTUCKY

EARLY LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN

EARLY LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN.--HIS OWN RECORD.--HIS ANCESTRY.-CHANGES OF RESIDENCE.--DEATH AND FUNERAL OF HIS MOTHER.--ENTRANCE UPON POLITICAL LIFE.--A MEMBER OF THE LEGISLATURE AND OF CONGRESS.--THE MEXICAN WAR.

THE compiler of the "Dictionary of Congress" states, that while preparing that work for publication, in 1858, he sent to Mr. Lincoln the usual request for a sketch of his life, and received the following reply:

"BORN, FEBRUARY 12, 1809, in HARDIN COUNTY, KENTUCKY.

"EDUCATION DEFECTIVE.

"PROFESSION, A LAWYER.

"HAVE BEEN A CAPTAIN OF VOLUNTEERS IN BLACK HAWK WAR.

"POSTMASTER AT A VERY SMALL OFFICE.

"FOUR TIMES A MEMBER OF THE ILLINOIS LEGISLATURE, AND WAS A MEMBER OF THE LOWER HOUSE OF CONGRESS.

"YOURS, &C.,

" A. LINCOLN."

Around the facts stated with such characteristic modesty and brevity clusters the history of the early life of our late President. The ancestors of Abraham Lincoln were of English descent; and although they are believed to have originally emigrated to this country with the followers of William Penn, it is difficult to trace them farther back than to their place of residence in Berks It is also said that one Zachariah Riney, a Roman Catholic, having some connection with the Trappists, who had founded an institution on Pottinger's Creek, with Urban Guillet as superior, had the honor of instructing the future President in the rudiments. Whether Mr. Lincoln favored his other children, one a girl two years older than Abraham, and the other a boy two years his junior, to the same extent, is doubtful, for the routine of school life was not only broken in upon by his frequent demands upon his son's time, but finally it was interrupted altogether by his determination to abandon Kentucky and try his fortunes where his energies were not checked and repressed by the obstacles which slavery constantly thrust in his way. In 1817 Mr. Lincoln carried this plan into execution. The old home was sold, their small stock of valuables placed upon a raft, and the little family took their way to a new home in the wilds of Indiana, where free labor would have no competition with slave labor, and the poor white man might hope that in time his children could take an honorable position, won by industry and careful economy. The place of their destination was Spencer County, Indiana. For the last few miles they were obliged to cut their road as they went on. "With the resolution of veteran pioneers they toiled, sometimes being able to pick their way for a long distance without chopping, and then coming to a standstill in consequence of dense forests. Suffice it to say, that they were obliged to cut a road so much of the way that several days were employed in going eighteen miles. It was a difficult, wearisome, trying journey, and Mr. Lincoln often said, that he never passed through a harder experience than he did in going from Thompson's Ferry to Spenser County, Indiana."

Thus, before he was eight years old, Abraham Lincoln began the serious business of life. The cabin in which the family lived was built of logs, and even the aid of such a mere child was of account in the wilderness where they now found themselves, after seven days of weary travel. Their neighbors, none of whom lived nearer than two or three miles, welcomed the strangers, and lent a hand towards building the rude dwelling in which the future President lay down, after fatiguing but healthful toil, to dream the dreams of childhood, undisturbed by thoughts of the future.

But just as Abraham was becoming accustomed to his new residence, his home was made desolate by the death of his mother, which occurred when he was ten years old. She died long before she could have imagined, in her wildest dreams, the eminence and distinction which her son was to attain; but she was happy in the knowledge that, chiefly under her own tuition, for she had not in trusted his education entirely to the schoolmaster who chanced to settle within reach, her favorite son had learned to read the Bible--the book which, as a Christian woman, she prized above all others. It is impossible to estimate the influence which this faithful mother exerted in moulding the character of her child; but it is easy to believe that the earnestness with which she impressed upon his mind and heart the holy precepts, did much to develop those characteristics which in after years caused him to be known as pre-eminently the "Honest" man. There is touching evidence that Abraham held the memory of his mother in sacred remembrance. She had instructed him in the rudiments of writing, and Mr. Lincoln, in spite of the disparaging remarks of his neighbors, who regarded the accomplishment as entirely unnecessary, encouraged his son to per severe, until he was able to put his thoughts upon paper in a style which, although rude, caused him to be regarded as quite a prodigy among the illiterate neighbors. One of the very first efforts of his faltering pen was writing a letter to an old friend of his mother's, a travelling preacher, urging him to come and deliver a sermon over her grave. The invitation must have been couched in impressive, if not affecting language; for, although the letter was not written until nine months after his mother's remains had been deposited in their last resting-place, Parson Elkins, the preacher to whom it was extended, responded to the request, and three months subsequently, just a year after her decease, preached a sermon commemorative of the virtues of one whom her neighbors still held in affectionate and respectful remembrance. In his discourse it is said that the Parson alluded to the manner in which he had received the invitation, and Abraham's pen thereafter found frequent employment, in writing letters for the same neighbors who had before pretended to esteem lightly the accomplishment of which they at last recognized the value.

About two years after the death of Mrs. Lincoln, Mr. Lincoln married Mrs. Sally Johnston, a widow with three children. She proved an excellent mother to her step son and daughter, and a faithful wife. During the twelve years that the family remained in Indiana, Abraham's father encouraged him to improve all the opportunities offered for mental development. How scanty these privileges were, may be inferred from the fact that the entire number of days that he was able to attend school hardly exceeded one year. While in Indiana, one of his teachers was a Mr. Dorsey, who, a few months ago, was living in Schuyler County, Illinois, where he was looked up to with much respect by his neighbors, as one of those who had assisted in the early instruction of the then President of the United States. He tells with great satisfaction how his pupil, who was then remarked for the diligence and eagerness with which he pursued his studies, came to the log-cabin school-house arrayed in buckskin clothes, a raccoon-skin cap, and provided with an old arithmetic which had somewhere been found for him to begin his investigations into the "higher branches." In connection with his attendance upon Mr. Crawford's school, an incident is told which is sure to find a place in every biography of our late President. Books were, of course, very hard to find in the sparsely settled district of Indiana where the Lincoln family had their home, and every printed volume upon which Abraham could lay his hands was carefully guarded and eagerly devoured. Among the volumes in Mr. Crawford's scanty library was a copy of Ramsay Life of Washington, which Abraham secured permission

upon one occasion, to take home with him. During a severe storm he improved his leisure by reading his book. One night he laid it down carefully, as he thought, and the next morning he found it soaked through! The wind had changed, the storm had beaten in through a crack in the logs, and the appearance of the book was ruined. How could he face the owner under such circumstances? He had no money to offer as a return, but he took the book, went directly to Mr. Crawford, showed him the irreparable injury, and frankly and honestly offered to work for him until he should be satisfied. Mr. Crawford accepted the offer, and gave Abraham the book for his own, in return for three days' steady labor in "pulling fodder." This, and Weems Life of Washington, were. among the boy's favorite books, and the story that we have just told is so nearly parallel to the famous "hatchet" incident in the early days of the Father of his Country, that it is easy to believe that the frequent perusal of it im pressed upon his mind, more effectually than any solemn exhortation could have done, the precept that "honesty is the best policy," and thus assisted to develop that character of which integrity was so prominent a trait in after years. Among the other volumes which Mr. Lincoln was accustomed to refer to, as having been eagerly read in his youthful days, were a Life of Henry Clay, Esop Fables, and Bunyan Pilgrim's Progress. It is quite probable that the quaint phraseology of these last two volumes, and their direct and forcible illustrations, may have impressed upon the productions of Mr. Lincoln's pen that style which is one of their most peculiar and favorite characteristics.

When nineteen years old, Abraham Lincoln, moved, perhaps, equally by the desire to earn an honest liveli hood in the shape of "ten dollars a month and found," and by curiosity to see more of the world, made a trip down the Mississippi to New Orleans, upon a flat-boat. He went in company with the son of the owner of the boat, who intrusted a valuable cargo to their care. The trip was quite an eventful and exciting one, for on the

way down the great river they were attacked by seven negroes, who hoped to capture the boat and the cargo. They found, however, that they had undertaken a task to the execution of which they were unequal. After a spirited contest the negroes were driven back, and compelled to abandon their attempt, leaving our boatmen the undisputed masters of the field. Upon this trip young Lincoln's literary acquirements were called into useful action, and besides the stipulated ten dollars per month, he gained a substantial reputation as a youth of promising business talent.

During the twelve years that the family had been living in Indiana, the advancing tide of civilization had again encroached upon them almost imperceptibly, and in 1830 Thomas Lincoln, impatient of the restrictions which he found the gradually increasing population drawing around him, again determined to seek a new home farther west, and after fifteen days' journey came upon a site near Decatur, Macon County, Illinois, which seemed to him a desirable one. He immediately erected a log cabin, and, with the aid of his son, who was now twenty-one, proceeded to fence in his new farm. Abraham had little idea, while engaged in the unromantic occupation of mauling the rails which were to bound his father's possessions, that he was writing a page in his life which would be read by the whole nation years after ward. Yet so it proved to be. A writer, describing one of the incidents in the earlier political career of the late President, says:--

During the sitting of the Republican State Convention, at Decatur, a banner, attached to two of these rails, and bearing an appropriate inscription, was brought into the assemblage, and formally presented to that body, amid a scene of unparalleled enthusiasm. After that, they were in demand in every State of the Union in which free labor is honored, where they were borne in processions of the people, and hailed by hundreds of thousands of freemen as a symbol of triumph, and as a glorious vindication of freedom and of the rights and dignity of free labor. These. however, were far from being the first and only rails made by Lincoln. He was a practised hand at the business. Mr. Lincoln has now a cane made from one of the rails split by his own hands in boyhood.

Every one remembers how, during the presidential campaign of 1860, Mr. Lincoln was characterized as a "rail-splitter;" first, sneeringly, by his opponents; after wards by his own supporters, as the best possible proof that he was of and from the people.

Notwithstanding the increasing age of Thomas Lincoln, his disposition was so restless, and his desire for change so ineradicable, that, after a single year's residence in his new home, he determined to abandon it, and in the spring of 1831 started for Coles County, sixty or seventy miles to the eastward. Abraham determined not to follow his father in his journeyings, and possibly the want of his son's efficient help compelled him to forego further change, and to settle down for the rest of his days on the upper waters of the Kaskaskia and Embarras, where he died on January 17, 1851, in the seventy-third year of his age. In the spring of 1831, Abraham made his second trip to New Orleans, in the capacity of a flat-boatman, returning in the summer of the same year. The man who had employed him for this voyage was so well pleased with the energy and business capacity displayed by young Lincoln, that upon establishing a store at New Salem, some twenty miles from Springfield, soon afterward, he engaged him to assist him in the capacity of clerk, and also to superintend a flouring-mill in the immediate vicinity. In one of the celebrated debates during the Senatorial campaign, Mr. Douglas ventured to refer, in rather disparaging terms, to this year of Mr. Lincoln's life, taunting him with having been a grocery-keeper. To this Mr. Lincoln replied as follows:--

The judge is wofully at fault about his early friend Lincoln being a "grocery-keeper." I don't know as it would be a great sin, if I had been; but he is mistaken. Lincoln never kept a grocery anywhere in the world. It is true that Lincoln did work the latter part of one winter in a little still-house, up at the head of a hollow.

This frank statement drew the sting completely from the taunt of Senator Douglas. Some, at least, of those who were listening to the debate, knew that, at the time to which Mr. Lincoln referred, a winter of unusual severity had caused extreme suffering through that section of Illinois, and that he was not only anxious, but compelled, to take up with any occupation by which he might turn an honest penny in order to keep his father's family, who were even then partially dependent upon him, from positive want.

In 1832 the Black Hawk war broke out, and Mr. Lincoln, prompt as ever to answer the call of duty, joined a volunteer company and took the field against the Indians. That he had already gained a recognized position in the part of the State where he then lived, is clearly indicated by the fact that he was elected captain of his company. After a few weeks' ineffectual service, the force which had responded to the call of Governor Reynolds was disbanded. The troubles broke out anew, however, within a short time, and again Mr. Lincoln enlisted, this time also as a private. What rank was conferred upon him, if any, during this campaign is not recorded; but in spite of the pressure brought to bear upon him by older members of his company, to induce him to return home, he discharged his duties faithfully through the three months' campaign.

Many years after, during his congressional career, Mr. Lincoln referred thus humorously to his military services in this "war:"--

By the way, Mr. Speaker, did you know I was a military hero? Yes, sir, in the days of the Black Hawk war I fought, bled, and came away. Speaking of General Cass's career, reminds me of my own. I was not at Sullivan's defeat, but I was about as near to it as Cass was to Hull's surrender; and, like him, I saw the place soon after. It is quite certain that I did not break my sword, for I had none to break; but I bent my musket pretty badly on one occasion. If Cass broke his sword, the idea is, he broke it in desperation. I bent the musket by accident. If General Cass went in advance of me in picking whortleberries, I guess I surpassed him in charges upon the wild onions. If he saw any live fighting Indians, it was more than I did, but I had a great many bloody struggles with the mosquitoes; and although I never fainted from loss of blood, I certainly can say I was often very hungry.

His military career closed, Mr. Lincoln turned his attention to politics. He espoused the cause of Henry Clay- in opposition to that of General Jackson, who was very popular in that section of Illinois--and ran as a candidate for the State legislature. Although this contest took place three months before the presidential election, the same elements entered into it, and Mr. Lincoln was defeated, as he undoubtedly expected to be, although his failure must have been amply compensated for by the highly complimentary vote that he received in his own precinct, which gave him two hundred and seventy-seven votes out of two hundred and eighty-four east; and this, be it remembered, was the first and last time that he was ever beaten before the people. The contest ended, Mr. Lincoln settled down to business again. He purchased a store and stock of goods on credit, and secured the postmastership of the town; but the venture was un successful, and he sold out. Meanwhile, he was still employing every opportunity offered him to improve his mind. He had mastered grammar, and occupied his liesure time in general reading, taking care to write out a synopsis of every book he perused, so as to fix the con tents in his memory.

About this time he met John Calhoun, afterwards president of the Lecompton Constitutional Convention. Calhoun proposed to Lincoln to take up surveying, and himself aided in his studies. He had plenty of employment as a surveyor, and won a good reputation in this new line of business; but the financial crash of 1837 destroyed his business, and his instruments were finally sold under a sheriff's execution. This reverse again threw him back into political life, and as the best preparation for it he vigorously pursued his legal studies.

In 1834, Mr. Lincoln again ran for the legislature, and this time was elected. Then that political life commenced, which his countrymen's votes have since shown they fully appreciated. In 1836, Mr. Lincoln was again elected to the legislature as one of the seven representatives from Sangamon County, and during this term he was assigned a place on the Finance Committee, his membership of the Committee on Public Accounts and Expenditures during his first term having qualified him for this duty.

The following letter, which was written during this canvass, besides being an interesting reminiscence of Mr. Lincoln's early political life, is valuable as exhibiting, in a striking manner, his determination to be frank and honest, in all his dealings with the public and with his opponents:--

NEW SALEM, June 21, 1836.

DEAR COLONEL:--I am told that, during my absence last week, you passed through this place, and stated publicly that you were in possession of a fact or facts, which, if known to the public, would entirely destroy the prospects of N. W. Edwards and myself at the ensuing election; but that, through favor to us, you would forbear to divulge them.

No one has needed favors more than I, and, generally, few have been less unwilling to accept them; but in this case favor to me would be in justice to the public, and, therefore, I must beg your pardon for declining it. That I once had the confidence of the people of Sangamon county is sufficiently evident, and if I have since done any thing, either by design or misadventure, which, if known, would subject me to a forfeiture of that confidence, he that knows of that thing and conceals it, is a traitor to his country's interest.

I find myself wholly unable to form any conjecture of what fact or facts, real or supposed, you spoke. But my opinion of your veracity will not permit me, for a moment, to doubt that you, at least, believed what you said. I am flattered with the personal regard you manifested for me; but I do hope that, on more mature reflection, you will view the public interest as a paramount consideration, and therefore determine to let the worst come.

I here assure you that the candid statement of facts on your part, how ever low it may sink me, shall never break the ties of personal friendship between us.

I wish an answer to this, and you are at liberty to publish both, if you choose. Very respectfully,

A. LINCOLN.

Col. ROBERT ALLEN.

It was in this year ( 1836) that Mr. Lincoln first became acquainted with Mr. Douglas, whom he was destined to meet in so many hotly contested campaigns, but whom he did not then anticipate that he should, twenty-four years afterwards, defeat in a presidential election. The Democrats of course held the ascendency in the Illinois legislature at this time, and they took advantage of their strength to pass some extreme pro-slavery resolutions, branding as abolitionists" those who refused to indorse them. That his position might not be misunderstood, Mr. Lincoln took advantage of his parliamentary privilege to enter upon the Journal of the House, in connection with a colleague, his reasons for voting in opposition to the resolutions. This document, which now possesses historical interest, reads as follows:--

MARCH 3, 1837.

The following protest was presented to the House, which was read and ordered to be spread on the journals, to wit:

"Resolutions upon the subject of domestic slavery having passed both branches of the General Assembly at its present session, the undersigned hereby protest against the passage of the same.

"They believe that the institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy; but that the promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase than abate its evils.

"They believe that the Congress of the United States has no power, under the Constitution, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the different States.

"They believe that the Congress of the United States has the power, under the Constitution, to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia; but that the power ought not to be exercised, unless at the request of the people of said District.

"The difference between these opinions and those contained in the said resolutions, is their reason for entering this protest.

"(Signed)

" DAN STONE, "A. LINCOLN, Representatives from the County of Sangamon."

In 1838, Mr. Lincoln was for the third time elected to the State legislature; and among his six colleagues, as representatives from Sangamon County, was John Calhoun, since notorious for his connection with the Lecompton Constitution. His position as leader of the Whigs in the House was so well recognized, that he received the party vote for the Speakership, and was defeated by only one vote. In 1840, for the fourth successive term, Mr. Lincoln was returned to the legislature, and again received the vote of his party as the candidate for Speaker. Meanwhile, he had been vigorously engaged in canvas sing the State, in anticipation of the presidential election,

and had greatly enhanced his reputation by his repeated earnest and eloquent efforts.

Politics had interfered so seriously with Mr. Lincoln's legal studies, which had been energetically prosecuted during the intervals of legislative duty, that at the close of this term he declined a renomination, in order that he might devote his whole time to the practice of his profession. As already stated, he had been admitted to the bar in 1836; and on April 15, 1837, he settled permanently in Springfield, the seat of Sangamon County, which was destined to be his future home. His friend and former colleague in the legislature, Hon. John T. Stuart, was his partner.

One incident of his law practice partakes deeply of the romantic. It is authentic, however, and is well worth narrating. When Mr. Lincoln first went out into the world, to earn a living for himself, he worked for a Mr. Armstrong, of Petersburg, Menard County, who, with his wife, took a great interest in him, lent him books to read, and, after the season for work was over, encouraged him to remain with them until he should find some thing "to turn his hand to." They also hoped much from his influence over their son, an over-indulged and somewhat unruly boy. The sequel, which is thus graphically told by the Cleaveland Leader, shows how these good people reaped their reward for their generosity to the young man whom they so generously took under their protection. That journal says:--

Some few years since, the eldest son of Mr. Lincoln's old friend, Armstrong, the chief supporter of his widowed mother--the good old man having some time previously passed from earth--was arrested on the charge of murder. A young man had been killed during a riotous mêlée in the night-time at a camp-meeting, and one of his associates stated that the death-wound was inflicted by young Armstrong. A preliminary examination was gone into, at which the accuser testified so positively, that there seemed no doubt of the guilt of the prisoner, and therefore he was held for trial. As is too often the case, the bloody act caused an undue degree of excitement in the public mind. Every improper incident in the life of the prisoner--each act which bore the least semblance to rowdyism--each schoolboy quarrel,--was suddenly remembered and magnified, until they pictured him as a fiend of the most horrible hue. As these rumors spread abroad they were received as gospel truth, and a feverish desire for vengeance seized upon the infatuated populace, whilst only prison bars prevented a horrible death at the hands of a mob. The events were heralded in the county papers, painted in highest colors, accompanied by rejoicing over the certainty of punishment being meted out to the guilty party. The prisoner, overwhelmed by the circumstances under which he found himself placed, fell into a melancholy condition bordering on despair, and the widowed mother, looking through her tears, saw no cause for hope from earthly aid.

At this juncture, the widow received a letter from Mr. Lincoln, volunteering his services in an effort to save the youth from the impending stroke. Gladly was his aid accepted, although it seemed impossible for even his sagacity to prevail in such a desperate case; but the heart of the attorney was in his work, and he set about it with a will that knew no such word as fail. Feeling that the poisoned condition of the public mind was such as to preclude the possibility of impanelling an impartial jury in the court having jurisdiction, he procured a change of venue and a postponement of the trial. He then went studiously to work unravelling the history of the case, and satisfied himself that his client was the victim of malice, and that the statements of the accuser were a tissue of false hoods.

When the trial was called on, the prisoner, pale and emaciated, with hopelessness written on every feature, and accompanied by his half hoping, half-despairing mother--whose only hope was in a mother's belief of her son's innocence, in the justice of the God she worshipped, and in the noble counsel, who, without hope of fee or reward upon earth, had undertaken the cause--took his seat in the prisoners' box, and with a "stony firmness" listened to the reading of the indictment. Lincoln sat quietly by, while the large auditory looked on him as though wondering what he could say in defence of one whose guilt they regarded as certain. The examination of the witnesses for the State was begun, and a well arranged mass of evidence, circumstantial and positive, was introduced, which seemed to impale the prisoner beyond the possibility of extrication. The counsel for the defence propounded but few questions, and those of a character which excited no uneasiness on the part of the prosecutor- merely, in most cases, requiring the main witnesses to be definite as to the time and place. When the evidence of the prosecution was ended, Lincoln introduced a few witnesses to remove some erroneous impressions in regard to the previous character of his client, who, though somewhat rowdyish, had never been known to commit a vicious act; and to show that a greater degree of ill feeling existed between the accuser and the accused, than the accused and the deceased.

The prosecutor felt that the case was a clear one, and his opening speech was brief and formal. Lincoln arose, while a deathly silence pervaded the vast audience, and in a clear and moderate tone began his

argument. Slowly and carefully he reviewed the testimony, pointing out the hitherto unobserved discrepancies in the statements of the principal witness. That which had seemed plain and plausible he made to appear crooked as a serpent's path. The witness had stated that the affair took place at a certain hour in the evening, and that, by the aid of the brightly shining moon, he saw the prisoner inflict the death-blow with the slung shot. Mr. Lincoln showed that at the hour referred to the moon had not yet appeared above the horizon, and consequently the whole tale was a fabrication.

An almost instantaneous change seemed to have been wrought in the minds of his auditors, and the verdict of "not guilty" was at the end of every tongue. But the advocate was not content with this intellectual* achievement. His whole being had for months been bound up in this work of gratitude and mercy, and as the lava of the over charged crater bursts from its imprisonment, so great thoughts and burning words leaped forth from the soul of the eloquent Lincoln. He drew a picture of the perjurer so horrid and ghastly, that the accuser could sit under it no longer, but reeled and staggered from the court-room, whilst the audience fancied they could see the brand upon his brow. Then in words of thrilling pathos Lincoln appealed to the jurors as fathers of some who might become fatherless, and as husbands of wives who might be widowed, to yield to no previous impressions, no ill-founded prejudice, but to do his client justice; and as he alluded to the debt of gratitude which he owed the boy's sire, tears were seen to fall from many eyes unused to weep.

It was near night when he concluded, by saying that if justice was done--as he believed it would be--before the sun should set, it would shine upon his client a free man. The jury retired, and the court adjourned for the day. Half an hour had not elapsed, when, as the officers of the court and the volunteer attorney sat at the tea-table of their hotel, a messenger announced that the jury had returned to their seats. All repaired immediately to the court-house, and whilst the prisoner was being brought from the jail, the court-room was filled to overflowing with citizens from the town. When the prisoner and his mother entered, silence reigned as completely as though the house were empty. The fore man of the jury, in answer to the usual inquiry from the court, delivered the verdict of "Not Guilty!" The widow dropped into the arms of her son, who lifted her up and told her to look upon him as before, free and innocent. Then, with the words, "Where is Mr. Lincoln?" he rushed across the room and grasped the hand of his deliverer, whilst his heart was too full for utterance. Lincoln turned his eyes toward the West, where the sun still lingered in view, and then, turning to the youth, said: "It is not yet sundown and you are free." I confess that my cheeks were not wholly unwet by tears, and I turned from the affecting scene. As I cast a glance behind, I saw Abraham Lincoln obeying the Divine injunction by comforting the widowed and fatherless.

A writer in the San Francisco Bulletin, in the course of an article giving reminiscences of Mr. Lincoln, thus sketches still another phase of his legal career:--

A number of years ago, the writer of this lived in one of the judicial circuits of Illinois in which Abraham Lincoln had an extensive, though not very lucrative practice. The terms of the court were held quarterly, and usually lasted about two weeks. The occasions were always seasons of great importance and much gayety in the little town that had the honor of being the county seat. Distinguished members of the Bar from surrounding and even from distant counties, ex-judges and ex-members of Congress attended, and were personally, and many of them popularly known to almost every adult, male and female, of the limited population. They came in by stages and on horseback. Among them, the one above all whose arrival was looked forward to with the most pleasurable anticipations, and whose possible absence--although he never was absent- was feared with the liveliest emotions of anxiety, was "Uncle Abe," as he was lovingly called by us all. Sometimes he might happen to be a day or two late, and then, as the Bloomington stage came in at sundown, the Bench and the Bar, jurors and the general citizens, would gather in crowds at the hotel where he always put up, to give him a welcome if he should happily arrive, and to experience the keenest feelings of disappointment if he should not. If he arrived, as he alighted and stretched out both his long arms to shake hands with those nearest to him and with those who approached--his homely face handsome in its broad and sun shiny smile, his voice touching in its kindly and cheerful accents--every one in his presence felt lighter in heart and became joyous. He brought light with him. He loved his fellow-men with all the strength of his great nature, and those who came in contact with him could not help reciprocating the love. His tenderness of the feelings of others was of sensitiveness in the extreme.

For several years after settling in Springfield, Mr. Lincoln remained a bachelor, residing in the family of Hon. William Butler, who was, a few years since, elected State Treasurer. On November 4th, 1842, he married Miss Mary Todd, daughter of Hon. Robert S. Todd, of Lexington, Kentucky. She now mourns the violent and untimely death of her lamented husband.

Mr. Lincoln's love for Henry Clay, which was enkindled by the life of that statesman, which he read when a boy, grew with his years, and when he reached manhood it had deepened into enthusiastic admiration. In 1844 he stumped Illinois for him, and even extended his labors to

Indiana. None felt more keenly than he the unexpected defeat of his favorite. In 1846 Mr. Lincoln was induced to accept the nomination for Congress, and in the district which had, two years before, given Mr. Clay, for President, a majority of nine hundred and fourteen votes, he astonished himself and his friends by rolling up a majority of fifteen hundred and eleven. To add to the significance of his triumph, he was the only Whig representative from Illinois, which had then seven members in that body. This Congress had before it subjects of great importance and interest to the country. The Mexican War was in progress, and Congress had to deal with grave questions arising out of it, besides determining and providing the means by which it was to be carried on. The irrepressible Slavery Question was there also, in many of its Protean forms,--in questions on the right of petition, in questions as to the District of Columbia, in many questions as to the Territories.

Mr. Lincoln was charged by his enemies in later years, when political hostility was hunting sharply for material out of which to make capital against him, with lack of patriotism, alleging that he voted against the war. The charge was sharply and clearly made by Judge Douglas, at the first of their joint discussions in the Senatorial contest of 1858. In his speech at Ottawa, he said of Mr. Lincoln, that "while in Congress he distinguished him self by his opposition to the Mexican war, taking the side of the common enemy against his own country, and when he returned home he found that the indignation of the people followed him everywhere."

No better answer can be given to this charge than that which Mr. Lincoln himself made, in his reply to this speech. He says: "I was an old Whig, and whenever the Democratic party tried to get me to vote that the war had been righteously begun by the President, I would not do it. But whenever they asked for any money or land-warrants, or any thing to pay the soldiers there, during all that time I gave the same vote that Judge Douglas did. You can think as you please as to whether that was consistent. Such is the truth, and the Judge has a right to make all he can out of it. But when he, by a general charge, conveys the idea that I withheld supplies from the soldiers who were fighting in the Mexican war, or did any thing else to hinder the soldiers, he is, to say the least, grossly and altogether mistaken, as a consultation of the records will prove to him."

We need no more thorough refutation of this imputation upon his patriotism than is embodied in this clear and distinct denial. It required no little sagacity, at that time, to draw a clear line of demarcation between sup porting the country while engaged in war, and sustaining the war itself, which Mr. Lincoln, in common with the great body of the party with which he was connected, regarded as utterly unjust. The Democratic party made vigorous use of the charge everywhere. The whole foundation of it, doubtless, was the fact which Mr. Lincoln states, that, whenever the Democrats tried to get him "to vote that the war had been righteously begun," he would not do it. He showed, in fact, on this point, the same clearness and directness, the same keen eye for the important point in a controversy, and the same tenacity in holding it fast, and thwarting his opponent's utmost efforts to obscure it and cover it up, to draw attention to other points and raise false issues, which were the marked characteristics of his great controversy with Judge Douglas at a subsequent period of their political history. It is always popular, because it always seems patriotic, to stand by the country when engaged in war--and the people are not invariably disposed to judge leniently of efforts to prove their country in the wrong as against any foreign power. In this instance, Mr. Lincoln saw that the strength of the position of the Administration before the people, in reference to the beginning of the war, was in the point, which they lost no opportunity of reiterating, viz.: that Mexico had shed the blood of our citizens on our own soil. This position he believed to be false, and he accordingly attacked it in a series of resolutions requesting the President to give the House information

on that point; which President Polk would have found as difficult to dodge as Douglas found it to dodge the questions which Mr. Lincoln proposed to him.

As a part of the history of Mr. Lincoln's Congressional career, we give these resolutions, omitting the preamble, which simply reproduces the language employed by President Polk in his message, to convey the impression that the Mexicans were the aggressors, and that the way was undertaken to repel invasion, and to avenge the shed ding of the blood of our fellow-citizens on our own soil. The quaint phraseology of the resolutions stamps them as the production of Mr. Lincoln's pen. They read as follows:

Resolved by the House of Representatives, That the President of the United States be respectfully requested to inform this House--

	1st. Whether the spot on which the blood of our citizens was shed, as in his messages declared, was or was not within the territory of Spain, at least after the treaty of 1819, until the Mexican revolution.
	2d. Whether that spot is or is not within the territory which was wrested from Spain by the revolutionary Government of Mexico.
	3d. Whether that spot is or is not within a settlement of people, which settlement has existed ever since long before the Texas revolution, and until its inhabitants fled before the approach of the United States army.
	4th. Whether that settlement is or is not isolated from any and all other settlements by the Gulf and the Rio Grande on the south and west, and by wide uninhabited regions on the north and east.
	5th. Whether the people of that settlement, or a majority of them, or any of them, have ever submitted themselves to the government or laws of Texas or of the United States, by consent or by compulsion, either by accepting office, or voting at elections, or paying tax, or serving on juries, or having process served upon them, or in any other way.
	6th. Whether the people of that settlement did or did not flee from the approach of the United States army, leaving unprotected their homes and their growing crops, before the blood was shed, as in the messages stated; and whether the first blood so shed, was or was not shed within the enclosure of one of the people who had thus fled from it.
	7th. Whether our citizens, whose blood was shed, as in his messages declared, were or were not, at that time, armed officers and soldiers, sent into that settlement by the military order of the President, through the Secretary of War.
	8th. Whether the military force of the United States was or was not so sent into that settlement after General Taylor had more than once intimated to the War Department that, in his opinion, no such movement was necessary to the defence or protection of Texas.

These resolutions, which Mr. Polk would have found it very inconvenient to answer, were laid over, under the rule, and were never acted upon, although Mr. Lincoln commented on them in a speech, made January 12, 1848, which, by the way, was his first formal appearance in the House. In this speech he discussed, in his homely but forcible manner, the absurdities and contradictions of Mr. Polk's message, and exposed its weaknesses.

In these times, when questions of so much greater magnitude and importance have overshadowed those which occupied or agitated the public mind twenty years ago, it seems strange that political opponents could even then have compelled Mr. Lincoln to defend his course in Congress, as having been prompted by patriotic motives. The nation which has been plunged into mourning by his sudden and violent death, would now regard as gratuitous and puerile any argument, the purpose of which should be to prove that Mr. Lincoln's action upon this Mexican question was governed by the same inflexible ideas of honor and right which ruled him so unwaveringly throughout his entire public career, and which have since made his memory sacred.

A Whig from conviction, Mr. Lincoln acted consistently with his party upon all questions of public concern. On June 20, 1848, after the nomination of General Cass as the Democratic candidate for the Presidency, Mr. Lincoln made an able speech in support of the line of policy the Whigs had pursued regarding internal improvements. He ridiculed mercilessly the position taken by General Cass upon this important question, and, in concluding his remarks, thus stated his own views, while he dealt a severe blow at the same pseudo chivalric spirit of the South, which he has since been chiefly instrumental in humbling to the dust. He said:

How to do something, and still not to do too much, is the desideratum Let each contribute his mite in the way of suggestion. The late Silas

Wright, in a letter to the Chicago convention, contributed his, which was worth something; and I now contribute mine, which may be worth nothing. At all events, it will mislead nobody, and therefore will do no harm. I would not borrow money. I am against an overwhelming, crushing system. Suppose that, at each session, Congress shall first determine how much money can, for that year, be spared for improvements; then apportion that sum to the most important objects. So far all is easy; but how shall we determine which are the most important? On this question comes the collision of interests. I shall be slow to acknowledge that your harbor or your river is more important than mine, and vice versâ. To clear this difficulty, let us have that same statistical information which the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Vinton] suggested at the beginning of this session. In that information we shall have a stern, unbending basis of facts--a basis in nowise subject to whim, caprice, or local interest. The pre-limited amount of means will save us from doing too much, and the statistics will save us from doing what we do in wrong places. Adopt and adhere to this course, and, it seems to me, the difficulty is cleared.

One of the gentlemen from South Carolina [Mr. Rhett] very much deprecates these statistics. He particularly objects, as I understand him, to counting all the pigs and chickens in the land. I do not perceive much force in the objection. It is true, that if every thing be enumerated, a portion of such statistics may not be very useful to this object. Such products of the country as are to be consumed where they are produced, need no roads and rivers, no means of transportation, and have no very proper connection with this subject. The surplus, that which is produced in one place to be consumed in another; the capacity of each locality for producing a greater surplus; the natural means of transportation, and their susceptibility of improvement; the hindrances, delays, and losses of life and property during transportation, and the causes of each, would be among the most valuable statistics in this connection. From these it would readily appear where a given amount of expenditure would do the most good. These statistics might be equally accessible, as they would he equally useful, to both the Nation and the States. In this way, and by these means, let the Nation take hold of the larger works, and the States the smaller ones; and thus, working in a meeting direction, discreetly, but steadily and firmly, what is made unequal in one place may be equalized in another, extravagance avoided, and the whole country put on that career of prosperity which shall correspond with its extent of territory, its natural resources, and the intelligence and enterprise of its people.

The nomination of General Taylor as the Whig candidate for the Presidency, by the Convention of that party at Philadelphia, to which Mr. Lincoln was a delegate, fairly opened the campaign, and Congress prolonged its session until August 14th, as the members,--Senators and Representatives alike,--insisted, each for himself, upon expressing his views, and defining his position in full, for the benefit of his constituents. The only speech of any length made by Mr. Lincoln, subsequent to that from which we have already quoted, was delivered July 27th, when he defended, with characteristic shrewdness and ability, the position General Taylor had taken regarding the exercise of the veto power. This speech is, perhaps, more strongly marked by Mr. Lincoln's peculiarities than any other of his Congressional utterances. The keen sarcasm with which he exposed the inconsistencies of both General Cass and Mr. Van Buren, is not surpassed in any of his subsequent efforts.

Upon the adjournment of Congress, the members entered energetically into the popular canvass, Mr. Lincoln first making a visit to New England, where he delivered a number of effective campaign speeches in support of General Taylor. The journals of the day note his presence at the Massachusetts State Convention during his brief visit to New England, and speak in terms of the highest praise of an address which he delivered at New Bedford. He felt conscious, however, that he could labor more effectively among his Western friends, and accordingly spent most of his time during the canvass in that section of the country. Although he failed to carry his own State for his favorite candidate, his disappointment was entirely forgotten in General Taylor's election.

In December, when the Thirtieth Congress reassembled for its second session, Mr. Lincoln took his seat; but the exhaustion consequent upon the exciting political campaign just closed, reacted upon Congress, and precluded the possibility of any exciting discussions. Important action was taken, however, upon the slavery question in some of its phases. It is needless to state, that du ring his entire Congressional service Mr. Lincoln steadily and persistently cast his vote upon the side of freedom. He repeatedly recorded against laying on the table, without consideration, petitions in favor of the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, and against the slave-trade.

On the question of abolishing slavery in the District, he took rather a prominent part. A Mr. Gott had introduced a resolution directing the proper committee to introduce a bill abolishing the slave-trade in the District. On January 16 (1849), Mr. Lincoln moved the following amendment, instructing the Committee to intro duce a bill not for the abolition of the slave-trade, but of slavery, within the District:--

Resolved, That the Committee on the District of Columbia be instructed to report a bill in substance as follows:

	SEC. 1. Be it enacted by the, Senate and House of Representatives of the United States, in Congress assembled, That no person now within the District of Columbia, nor now owned by any person or persons now resident within it, nor hereafter born within it, shall ever be held in slavery within said District.
	SEC. 2. That no person now within said District, or now owned by any person or persons now resident within the same, or hereafter born within it, shall ever be held in slavery without the limits of said District: Pro vided, That the officers of the Government of the United States, being citizens of the slaveholding States, coming into said District on public business, and remaining only so long as may be reasonably necessary for that object, may be attended into and out of said District, and while there, by the necessary servants of themselves and their families, without their right to hold such servants in service being impaired.
	SEC. 3. That all children born of slave mothers within said District, on or after the 1st day of January, in the year of our Lord 1850, shall be free; but shall be reasonably supported and educated by the respective owners of their mothers, or by their heirs or representatives, and shall serve reasonable service as apprentices to such owners, heirs, or representatives, until they respectively arrive at the age of ----- years, when they shall be entirely free: And the municipal authorities of Washington and Georgetown, within their respective jurisdictional limits, are hereby empowered and required to make all suitable and necessary provision for enforcing obedience to this section, on the part of both masters and ap prentices.
	SEC. 4. That all persons now within this District, lawfully held as slaves, or now owned by any person or persons now resident within said District, shall remain such at the will of their respective owners, their heirs, or legal representatives: Provided, that such owner, or his legal representatives, may at any time receive from the Treasury of the United States the full value of his or her slave, of the class in this section mentioned, upon which such slave shall be forthwith and forever free: And pro vided further, That the President of the United States, the Secretary of State, and the Secretary of the Treasury, shall be a board for determining the value such slaves as their owners desire to emancipate under this section, and whose duty it shall be to hold a session for the purpose on the first Monday of each calendar month, to receive all applications, and, on satisfactory evidence in each case that the person presented for valuation is a slave, and of the class in the section mentioned, and is owned by the applicant, shall value such slave at his or her full cash value, and give to the applicant an order on the Treasury for the amount, and also to such slave a certificate of freedom.
	SEC. 5. That the municipal authorities of Washington and George town, within their respective jurisdictional limits, are hereby empowered and required to provide active and efficient means to arrest and deliver up to their owners all fugitive slaves escaping into said District. SEC. 6. That the elective officers within said District of Columbia are hereby empowered and required to open polls, at all the usual places of holding elections, on the first Monday of April next, and receive the vote of every free white citizen above the age of twenty-one years, having resided within said District for the period of one year or more next preceding the time of such voting for or against this act, to proceed in taking said votes, in all respects not herein specified, as at elections under the municipal laws, and with as little delay as possible to transmit correct statements of the votes so cast to the President of the United States; and it shall be the duty of the President to count such votes immediately, and if a majority of them be found to be for this act, to forthwith issue his proclamation giving notice of the fact; and this act shall only be in full force and effect on and after the day of such proclamation. SEC. 7. That involuntary servitude for the punishment of crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall in no wise be prohibited by this act. SEC. 8. That for all purposes of this act, the jurisdictional limits of Washington are extended to all parts of the District of Columbia not. included within the present limits of Georgetown.

A bill was afterwards reported by the committee for bidding the introduction of slaves into the District for sale or hire. This bill also MR. Lincoln supported, but in vain. The time for the success of such measures, involving to an extent attacks upon slavery, had not yet come.

The question of the Territories also came up in many ways. The Wilmot Proviso had made its first appearance

in the previous session, in the August before, but it was repeatedly before this Congress also, when efforts were made to apply it to the territory which we procured from Mexico, and to Oregon. On all occasions when it was before the House it was supported by Mr. Lincoln, and he stated during his contest with Judge Douglas, that he had voted for it, in one way and another, about forty times." He thus showed himself, in 1847, to be the same friend of freedom for the Territories which he was afterwards, du ring the heat of the Kansas struggle.

Another instance in which the slavery question was before the House, was in the famous Pacheco case. This was a bill to reimburse the heirs of Antonio Pacheco for the value of a slave who was hired by a United States officer in Florida, but ran away and joined the Seminoles, and, being taken in arms with them, was sent out of Florida with them, when they were transported to the West. The bill was reported to the House by the Committee on Military Affairs. This committee was com posed of nine. Five of these were slaveholders, and these made the majority report. The others, not being slaveholders, reported against the bill. The ground taken by the majority was, that slaves were regarded as property by the Constitution, and when taken for public service should be paid for as property. The principle involved in the bill, therefore, was the same one which the slaveholders had struggled in so many ways to maintain. As they sought afterwards to have it established by a decision of the Supreme Court, so now they tried to have it recognized by Congress, and Mr. Lincoln op posed it there, as heartily as he afterwards withstood it when it took the more covert, but no less dangerous shape of a judicial dictum.

Mr. Lincoln's congressional career terminated at the close of this session ( March 4, 1849), and, for reasons satisfactory to himself, he declined a renomination, although his re-election, had he consented to become a candidate, was morally certain. In this same year, how ever, he was the Whig candidate in Illinois for United States Senator, but without success--the Democrats having the control of the State, which they retained until the conflict arising out of the Nebraska bill, in 1854.

Nothing could more forcibly illustrate the complete rest and relaxation from political cares and anxieties which Mr. Lincoln enjoyed during these few years, than the fact that he found time, while practising his profession, to indulge the exercise of his inventive faculties. A correspondent of the Boston Advertiser, writing from Washington, thus states the form in which the mechanical genius of the ex-Congressman and future President found expression:--

Occupying an ordinary and commonplace position in one of the show cases in the large hall of the Patent Office, is one little model which, in ages to come, will be prized as at once one of the most curious and one of the most sacred relics, in that vast museum of unique and priceless things. This is a plain and simple model of a steamboat, roughly fashioned in wood, by the hand of Abraham Lincoln. It bears date in 1849, when the inventor was known simply as a successful lawyer and rising politician of Central Illinois. Neither his practice nor his politics took up so much of his time, as to prevent him from giving much attention to contrivances which he hoped might be of benefit to the world and of profit to himself.

The design of this invention is suggestive of one phase of Abraham Lincoln's early life, when he went up and down the Mississippi as a flat boatman, and became familiar with some of the dangers and inconveniences attending the navigation of the Western rivers. It is an attempt to make it an easy matter to transport vessels over shoals and snags and sawyers. The main idea is that of an apparatus resembling a noiseless bellows, placed on each side of the hull of the craft, just below the water line, and worked by an odd but not complicated system of ropes, valves, and pulleys. When the keel of the vessel grates against the sand or obstruction, these bellows are to be filled with air; and, thus buoyed up, the ship is expected to float lightly and gayly over the shoal, which would otherwise have proved a serious interruption to her voyage.

The model, which is about eighteen or twenty inches long, and has the air of having been whittled with a knife out of a shingle and a cigar box, is built without any elaboration or ornament, or any extra apparatus beyond that necessary to show the operation of buoying the steamer over the obstructions. Herein it differs from very many of the models which share with it the shelter of the immense halls of the Patent Office, and which are fashioned with wonderful nicety and exquisite finish, as if much of the labor and thought and affection of a lifetime had been devoted to their construction. This is a model of a different kind; carved as one might imagine a retired rail-splitter would whittle, strongly, but not smoothly, and evidently made with a view solely to convey, by the simplest possible means, to the minds of the patent authorities, an idea of the purpose and plan of the simple invention. The label on the steamer's deck informs us that the patent was obtained; but we do not learn that the navigation of the western rivers was revolutionized by this quaint conception. The modest little model has reposed here sixteen years; and since it found its resting-place here on the shelf, the shrewd inventor has found it his task to guide the ship of state over shoals more perilous, and obstructions more obstinate, than any prophet dreamed of when Abraham Lincoln wrote his bold autograph on the prow of this miniature steamer.

This curious episode, however, must not create the impression that Mr. Lincoln had allowed his mind to be entirely diverted from the observation of the important political events then transpiring. He undoubtedly noted carefully the development of those questions which subsequently absorbed so large a share of attention, and calculated accurately the influence which they would have upon the relations of the two great political organizations. He had fought slavery often enough to know what it was, and he was thoroughly conversant with the animus of its supporters. It is not, therefore, at all likely that he was taken by surprise when the Nebraska Bill was introduced, and the proposition was made by Stephen A. Douglas to repeal that very Missouri Compromise which he had declared to be "a sacred thing, which no ruthless hand would ever be reckless enough to disturb."

The Nebraska Bill was passed May 22, 1854, and the event gave new and increased force to the popular feel ing in favor of freedom, which the proposition to repeal the Missouri Compromise had excited. Everywhere the friends of freedom gathered themselves together and rallied round her banner, to meet the conflict which was plainly now closely impending, and which had been forced upon the people by the grasping ambition of the slave holders. The political campaign of that year in Illinois was one of the severest ever known. It was intensified by the fact that a United States Senator was to be chosen by the legislature then to be elected, to fill the place of Shields, who had voted with Douglas in favor of the Nebraska Bill.

Mr. Lincoln took a prominent part in this campaign. He met Judge Douglas before the people on two occasions, the only ones when the Judge would consent to such a meeting. The first time was at the State Fair at Springfield, on October 4th. This was afterwards considered to have been the greatest event of the whole canvass. Mr. Lincoln opened the discussion; and in his clear and eloquent, yet homely way, exposed the tergiversations of which his opponent had been guilty, and the fallacy of his pretexts for his present course.

Mr. Douglas had always claimed to have voted for the repeal of the Missouri Compromise because he sustained the "great principle" of popular sovereignty, and de sired that the inhabitants of Kansas and Nebraska should govern themselves, as they were well able to do. The fallacy of drawing from these premises the conclusion that they therefore should have the right to establish slavery there, was most clearly and conclusively exposed by Mr. Lincoln, so that no one could thereafter be misled by it, unless he was a willing dupe of pro-slavery sophistry.

"My distinguished friend," said he, "says it is an insult to the emigrants of Kansas and Nebraska to sup pose that they are not able to govern themselves. We. must not slur over an argument of this kind because it happens to tickle the ear. It must be met and answered. I admit that the emigrant to Kansas and Nebraska is competent to govern himself, but I deny his right to govern any other person without that person's consent."

The two opponents met again at Peoria. We believe it is universally admitted that on both of these occasions Mr. Lincoln had decidedly the advantage. The result of the election was the defeat of the Democrats, and the election of anti-Nebraska men to the legislature, to secure the election of a United States Senator who would be true to freedom, if they could be brought to unite upon a candidate. Mr. Lincoln was naturally the candidate of those who were of Whig antecedents. Judge Trumbull was as naturally the candidate of some who had really come out from the Democratic party--though they still called themselves Free Democrats.

There was danger, of course, in such a posture of affairs, and Mr. Lincoln, in that spirit of patriotism which he has always shown, by his own personal exertions secured the votes of his friends for Judge Trumbull, who was accordingly chosen Senator. The charge was after wards made by the enemies of both, that there had been in this matter a breach of faith on the part of Judge Trumbull, and that Mr. Lincoln had the right to feel, and did feel, aggrieved at the result. Mr. Lincoln himself, however, expressly denied, in his speech at Charleston, September 18, 1858, that there had been any such breach of faith.