dreamed dreams of Elysium far exceeding all that anything earthly could realise. He had loved Ann Rutledge, and his love for her had promised a union very different from that which was now in store for him. Marriage, as it has been stereotyped by our present civilisation is, at the best, a sufficiently exacting relationship for a man of scrupulously conscientious temper; the character of the two parties in this case rendered it exceptionally difficult. Thus we can hardly speak of Lincoln's as a fortunate marriage. Yet a happier one might, conceivably, have contributed less to develop a character which grew in strength and nobility with every difficulty it overcame, since it would have called for less of the patience and tenderness which were now to be demanded by the conditions of his home.

The story of Lincoln's engagement has carried us too hastily past other events of the period over which it cast its stormy lights and shadows. Lincoln and Douglas often met on the political battle-fields of 1840, during that historic canvass when, owing to the indiscretion of a Southern journal, which had scornfully alluded to the supposed rusticity of the Whig candidate, a wild wave of popular feeling overwhelmed the Democratic party. Lincoln had taken his share in organising the Whigs, and now spoke at many of their huge, open-air meetings. He might have been seen standing in a waggon on some large, open space, addressing the thousands of farmers who were gathered by the excitement of the contest from the whole region round. It is amusing to find this whilom advocate of "cold, unimpassioned reason" shouting, cheering, and proclaiming himself eager for any "war-club" with

F

which to effect the success of "Log-Cabin " Harrison and the discomfiture of Andrew Jackson's followers.

The only incident of the campaign that concerns us is that known among his biographer as "the skinning of Thomas." Lincoln had been stung by this antagonist into a vigorous vindication whose scathing ridicule and irresistible mimicry reduced the aggressor to tears of humiliation. From the party point of view the performance was a complete success, and partly as such, but partly from the fact that it seemed somewhat out of character for Lincoln, it was the talk of the town. The victor, however, was not satisfied. He hunted up his victim and with generous words took the sting out of his punishment. It was, indeed, a somewhat unworthy success of which he was ashamed. Such exhibitions of his power to annihilate an opponent who had been guilty of foul-play, caused him too much sympathetic suffering and remorse to be often repeated.

The presidential campaign being over, and the Whig candidate duly elected, Lincoln went back to the law. But in April, 1841, his partner, Major Stuart, who, as we have seen, had defeated Douglas for Congress, left Springfield for Washington. At this juncture, Stephen Logan, then perhaps the most accurate, studious, and best technically equipped lawyer in the State, having lost his own partner from the same cause, entered into a new combination with Lincoln. A little weazened man, with a shrill voice, even more careless of his appearance, if that were possible, than his tall junior, Logan had many of the qualities that Lincoln lacked, and their partnership not only produced a very powerful alliance, but encouraged the younger man in the serious study of the law. But Logan had

a very different temper from his partner's, and while accumulating affluence for himself seems to have allotted but a small share of their earnings to Lincoln. The latter, though he always regarded wealth as "simply a superfluity of things we don't need," was naturally generous and could not long continue in close relations with a man of this character. After two years and a half, he separated from Logan and became the senior in a partnership with William H. Herndon,1 afterwards his biographer. This continued to the end of his life.

After eight years in the State legislature, Lincoln's ambition, quickened perhaps by Miss Todd, and by his late partner's success, now began to look towards Washington. His friends, also, by this time, had recognised that his ability and faithful service of the State demanded wider recognition. In 1841, he seems to have been offered the party nomination for the governorship of Illinois, an office he had formerly coveted. But he now declined the offer, partly because he desired to go to Washington, partly because he could not afford wholly to relinquish his legal work. Friends of Mrs Lincoln assert that, for her part, she had already reserved her future husband for the Presidency. Presumably she did not, at the time, regard the Executive Mansion at Springfield as upon the direct road to that higher office. And it may be they were both more eager for the political life and society of Washington than for anything else that Illinois could offer them.

1 Herndon, who also came from Kentucky, was nine years Lincoln's junior, and his father was one of the " Long Nine." The young man had been Speed's clerk, and seems to have become acquainted with Lincoln in the New Salem days when he visited cousins in that village. He was later a student in Logan & Lincoln's office.

Whatever the cause for declining to contest the governorship, their immediate ambition was destined to disappointment. Lincoln did not receive the nomination for Congress till 1846, and one, at least, of the reasons assigned by him for this delay sounds almost as singular to us as it did at the time to him. He was denounced by some as the candidate of the aristocratic section of his party-presumbly because of his marriage-and by the more orthodox for Deism, and for having talked about fighting a duel.

The accusation of rationalism was not ill founded. Anyone who will read the temperance address delivered by him on Washington's Birthday (22nd February) 1842, in the Presbyterian church Springfield, must recognise the recurring appeal to Reason, and feel the unmistakable air of detachment from organised Christianity which breathes in certain paragraphs. It strikes again the note of revulsion from all passion, and of an ardent expectation of the proximate Reign of Reason, the "absolute control of mind."

There was a rumour abroad that he had formerly written an attack upon orthodoxy after the manner of Tom Paine. And altogether it can hardly be wondered that the religionists of the county now looked askance upon his nomination and gave the place to a less disputable candidate. Lincoln was never, as far as is known, a member of any denomination, though his father seems to have been a religious man, and he himself in later life went regularly to the Presbyterian church in Washington which his wife. attended. The lengthy defence of Deism which he seems to have written at New Salem, had been

consigned to Speed's stove by a politic companion, in fear lest it should be published to the world. Probably the man acted wisely. Lincoln's role was not to be that of a Colonel Ingersoll.

Neither was it to be that of a temperance lecturer. Indeed he once positively declined the title of a temperance man " with which a political opponent was attempting to label him; adding simply, "I'm temperate in this, to wit-I don't drink." But the subject of temperance, especially in the sense of selfcontrol, was one which always interested him deeply. He had a wholesome human sympathy for the victims of the alcohol habit, and his faith in the efficacy of friendship made him detest the attitude of those Levites and Pharisees who, calling themselves Christians, yet refused to associate with publicans and sinners. All these, and other characteristics of the man, are illustrated in the following passages from his address in the Presbyterian Church :

"But,' say some, 'we are no drunkards, and we shall not acknowledge ourselves such by joining a reform drunkard's society, whatever our influence might be.' Surely no Christian will adhere to this objection.

"If they believe, as they profess, that Omnipotence condescended to take on himself the form of sinful man, and, as such, to die an ignominious death for their sakes, surely they will not refuse submission to the infinitely lesser condescension, for the temporal and perhaps eternal salvation of a large, erring, and unfortunate class of their fellow-creatures. Nor is the

condescension very great. In my judgment, such of us as have never fallen victims have been spared more by the absence of appetite, than from any