LINCOLN AS A HARRISON MAN.

87

Har

In 1840, the country was deeply stirred by the presidential campaign of that year. Martin Van Buren was nominated by the Democrats, and General William H. Harrison by the Whigs. Lincoln was one of the presidential electors on the Harrison ticket, and he took a lively interest in the canvass, making speeches and going on long expeditions for the sake of his candidate. rison lived in Ohio, where he had been one of the earlier pioneers. The dwelling of the pioneer, of course, was a log-cabin; his favorite drink was supposed to be "hard" or sour, fermented apple-cider. In a very short time, the Harrison campaign became “the log-cabin and hard-cider campaign." Even in the staid, old-fashioned cities and towns of the Eastern States, log cabins were built for rallying-places. Barrels of hard-cider were kept on tap, and, instead of the customary tin cup for drinking purposes, gourds were ostentatiously hung out. Coon-skins were nailed on the outer walls of these symbolic log-cabins. In some places, extravagant expedients were resorted to in order to rouse public enthusiasm. In Boston, for example, a huge ball was made by covering a wood framework, some fifty feet in circumference, with painted cloth; and on the ends was lettered the legend, "This is the ball that is rolling on." The novel device was rolled through the streets of the city, on the occasion of a log-cabin parade, the big ball being guided by ropes hitched to its axis. Campaign songsters, flags, and all sorts of inventions to stir up the people, were scattered broadcast all over the country.

Lincoln threw himself, heart and soul, into this extraordinary and memorable canvass. At a great meeting in Springfield, Edward Baker, Lincoln's close friend, was speaking in a large room next below the floor on which Lincoln's office was. A trap-door, once used for ventilating purposes, was cut in the ceiling over the spot where the speaker stood. Lincoln raised this slightly and listened to Baker's harangue. Presently, Baker, losing his temper, assailed the Democrats very hotly, and, as some of these were present, they made a rush for the speaker, crying : "Pull him off the platform!" To their intense surprise, the trap-door was lifted, and Lincoln's large feet, wellknown by their proportions, appeared; then his legs, and finally his body, slid down, and the tall son of the backwoods stood defiantly by the side of Baker. Quieting the rising tide by a wave of his hand, Lincoln said; "Gentlemen, let us not disgrace the age and country in which we live. This is a land where freedom of speech is guaranteed. Baker has a right to speak, and a right to be permitted to do so. I am here to protect him, and no man shall take him from this stand if I can prevent it." Lincoln had sufficient reputation for courage and muscle, as well as for fairness, to warrant that Baker should have no further interruption.

His First Love Affair-A Disappointment-Dark Days-The LincolnShields "Duel "-Good Advice on the Subject of Quarrelling-Lincoln and Van Buren-A Roadside Symposium-Congressional Expectations.

WH

tenderly attached to a young lady of that village, Miss Ann Rutledge. It is not known that the pair were ever engaged to be married, but it is known that a very cordial affection existed between the twain. At that time, Lincoln, who was ever looking on the dark and practical side of life, was in no condition to marry; he was not only poor, but was burdened with debts, and with a very uncertain future before him. It is hardly likely that he would have engaged himself to marry while his prospects in life were so very dim and discouraging. But Miss Rutledge died suddenly, and while yet in the bloom of youth. This sad event impressed Lincoln with the deepest melancholy, and it is said that he never was as cheerful afterwards. To the day of his death, it is likely, the taking out of life of Ann Rutledge, who seems to have been cut down most untimely, was to Lincoln a forcible lesson of the vanity of human expectations. It was at this time,

so far as we know, that an old poem, beginning with the line

66

Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?”

greatly impressed him with its sadness and pathetic reminders of death, decay, and disappointment. The poem sunk insensibly into his memory, and it was a favorite with him ever after.

It does not appear that Lincoln was ever what is called "a lady's man." He delighted in the society and conversation of cultivated and sprightly women, always, but he was not greatly addicted to such society when a young man making his way in the world. He was obliged to live laborious days, and sit up far into the night pursuing his studies, his reading, his course of thought. But in 1840 there came to Springfield from Kentucky his destiny in the person of Miss Mary Todd. She was a daughter of Robert Todd. It was one of her relatives, John Todd, who gave name to Lexington, Kentucky. When at the breaking out of the Revolution, John Todd was encamped hard by the site of the present city, he heard from the far east the news of the battle of Lexington, and he bestowed on the settlement yet unborn the title it wears unto this day. The Todd family was one of ancient and honorable standing in Kentucky. Mary Todd's sister was the wife of Ninian W. Edwards, a man of substance in Springfield, and it was to visit her that Miss Todd had reached the Illinois capital.

Mary Todd was courted and flattered by the young

A DISAPPOINTMENT.

91

men of Springfield, and as the young ladies of those days were more interested in politics than many of the present age, she soon made the acquaintance of Abraham Lincoln, then regarded as a rising man. It will never be known just how a matrimonial engagement between Lincoln and Miss Todd became settled and then unsettled. It may be sufficient for us to know that after the engagement was fixed, there was a misunderstanding betwixt the two, and that Lincoln released the young lady from the engagement, and that she declined to be released. Immediately after, he fell into a state of the most profound melancholy. He was tortured with the idea that he might have been bound by other obligations, or that he was not wholly a free man. Certain it is that he was so affected by what seems to have been a needless remorse, that his mind was in danger of being unsettled. pitiable plight, his friend, Joshua F. Speed, who had closed out his business in Springfield, returned to Kentucky, taking Lincoln with him. There, in the restful quiet of the Speed mansion, Lincoln recovered his mental health and vigor, and then returned to Springfield.

In this

At that time a well-known character in the city was James Shields, a brisk and hot-headed young man from the County Tyrone, Ireland. Shields was an active Democrat, ever dipping into all sorts of adventures, and he had lately been elected State Auditor, an office of some importance, with a good income attached to it. Lincoln anonymously printed in the Sangamon Journal a witty letter purporting to come from "The Lost Townships,"