demagogism, to be found in the public utterances of Mr. Lincoln. He has always addressed the intelligence of men, never their prejudice, their passion, or their ignorance. The First American. Extract from Ode Recited at the Harvard Commemoration, July 21, 1865. BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. V. Whither leads the path To ampler fates that leads? Of youth's vainglorious weeds; Ere yet the sharp, decisive word Light the black lips of cannon, and the sword But some day the live coal behind the thought, Or from the shrine serene Of God's pure altar brought, Bursts up in flame; the war of tongue and pen Some day the soft Ideal that we wooed But then to stand beside her, Who stands self-poised on manhood's solid earth, Not forced to frame excuses for his birth, Fed from within with all the strength he needs. VI. Such was he, our Martyr-Chief, Whom late the Nation he had led, With ashes on her head, Wept with the passion of an angry grief : And cannot make a man For him her Old-World moulds aside she threw, With stuff untainted shaped a hero new, Once more a shepherd of mankind indeed, But by his clear-grained human worth, In that sure-footed mind's unfaltering skill, That bent like perfect steel to spring again and thrust. His was no lonely mountain-peak of mind, Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars, A sea-mark now, now lost in vapors blind; Broad prairie rather, genial, level-lined, Fruitful and friendly for all human-kind, Yet also nigh to heaven and loved of loftiest stars. Nothing of Europe here, Or then, of Europe fronting mornward still, Could Nature's equal scheme deface Here was a type of the true elder race, And one of Plutarch's men talked with us face to face. I praise him not; it were too late; And some innative weakness there must be In him who condescends to victory xlvi LINCOLN'S PERSONAL APPEARANCE Such as the Present gives, and cannot wait, He knew to bide his time, And can his fame abide, Still patient in his simple faith sublime, These all are gone, and, standing like a tower, The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing man, Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame, New birth of our new soil, the first American. Lincoln's Personal Appearance.* BY WILLIAM H. HERNDON. He was about six feet four inches high, and when he left this city was fifty-one years old, having good health and no gray hairs, or but few on his head. He was thin, wiry, sinewy, rawboned; thin through the breast to the back, and narrow across the shoulders; standing, he leaned forward was what may be called stoop-shouldered, inclining to the consumptive by build. His usual weight was one hundred and sixty pounds. His organization—rather his structure and functions-worked slowly. His blood had to run a long distance from his heart to the extremities of his frame, and his nerve-force had *From an address delivered in Springfield, Illinois, December 12, 1865. to travel through dry ground a long distance before his muscles were obedient to his will. His structure was loose and leathery; his body was shrunk and shrivelled, having dark skin, dark hair,-looking woe-struck. The whole man, body and mind, worked slowly, creakingly, as if it needed oiling. Physically, he was a very powerful man, lifting with ease four hundred or six hundred pounds. His mind was like his body, and worked slowly but strongly. When he walked, he moved cautiously but firmly, his long arms and hands on them, hanging like giant's hands, swung down by his side. He walked with even tread, the inner sides of his feet being parallel. He put the whole foot flat down on the ground at once, not landing on the heel; he likewise lifted his foot all at once, not rising from the toe, and hence he had no spring to his walk. He had economy of fall and lift of foot, though he had no spring or apparent ease of motion in his tread. He walked undulatory, up and down, catching and pocketing tire, weariness, and pain, all up and down his person, preventing them from locating. The first opinion of a stranger, or a man who did not observe closely, was that his walk implied shrewdness, cunning,-a tricky man; but his was the walk of caution and firmness. In sitting down on a common chair he was no taller than ordinary men. His legs and arms were, abnormally, unnaturally long, and in undue proportion to the balance of his body. It was only when he stood up that he loomed above other men. Mr. Lincoln's head was long and tall from the base of the brain and from the eyebrows. His head ran backwards, his forehead rising as |