more unsatisfactory every month. Nor were they improved by an incident which occurred one day in Congress during the discussion of the Kansas question. The leading Senator from the State of Massachusetts, Mr. Sumner, delivered a speech, which Mr. Butler, a Senator of South Carolina, considered to be personally offensive to himself; whereupon a Mr. Brooks, also a Representative from South Carolina, struck Mr. Sumner with a cane, whilst in his seat in the Senate; the blow being so severe that he suffered from its effects for some years.

A decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, in what was afterwards known as the Dred Scott case, concerning the status of the negroes, also gave rise to additional bad feeling towards the Slave party. This judgment declared that by law "the negro had no rights or privileges, but such as those which the political power of the Government might choose to grant to him, and that Congress had no more right to prohibit the carrying of slaves into any State or Territory than it had to prohibit the carrying of horses, or other property, whose secured possession was guaranteed by the Constitution." The decision startled the Northern people of the United States, and led to increased efforts being made to prevent Slavery from spreading into the Western Territories.

It was while the Kansas struggle was going on that on the 16th of June, 1858-the Republican State Convention met at Springfield, and Abraham

Lincoln was again nominated for the United States Senate. It was on the following evening that the "House divided against itself" speech was delivered by him before the Convention. The opening of this memorable address was in these words, and, of course, referred to the clouds which already darkened the State of Kansas, and were rapidly gathering throughout the length and breadth of the country:

"If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it. We are now far on into the fifth year since a policy was initiated with the avowed object and confident promise of putting an end to Slavery agitation. Under the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only not ceased, but has constantly augmented. In my opinion, it will not cease until a crisis shall have been reached and passed. 'A house divided against itself cannot stand.' I believe this Government cannot endure permanently, half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved I do not expect the house will fall-but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other. Either the opponents of Slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it forward till it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new, North as well as South."

This was a bold speech; but Lincoln was not the man to hesitate in giving expression to what he really felt; and though some of the more moderate of his party at first thought that he had exceeded the bounds of prudence in his remarks, yet all soon began to acknowledge their wisdom and truth. Their effect indeed was wonderful; and to Abraham Lincoln the Republican party of Illinois henceforth looked for guidance in their contest against the Slave party, and in their defence of the Union which appeared to be in jeopardy. For it was now becoming abundantly clear that the powerful Southerners were prepared to risk their all either in causing Slavery to be extended, or, failing that, in bringing about the secession of the Slave States from the Union.

At the same time that Lincoln was brought forward as a candidate for the Senate, his old rival, Douglas, also entered into the contest in opposition to him. The two canvassed the States together, and wherever the one spoke, the other made a speech in reply, Douglas supporting the Slavery party and Lincoln denouncing it. The Kansas struggle was now at its height, and public interest being centred in the Slave question, their joint debate attracted the attention of the whole country. It was during this campaign that Lincoln openly declared that "he was impliedly if not expressly pledged to a belief in the right and duty of Congress to prohibit Slavery in all the United States Territories."

But though the result of the contest was a majority for Lincoln of over 4,000 votes given by the people themselves, yet owing to there being disproportionate representation in the State Legislature, the Members of which had the final election in their hands, Douglas was returned to the Senate. Lincoln was naturally somewhat disappointed and aggrieved at his defeat; and when it was afterwards referred to by a friend, he said that, "he felt like a boy who had stamped upon his toe-it hurt him too much to laugh, and he was too big to cry!"

Speaking of the contest between Lincoln and Douglas, a prominent politician of Illinois, in a speech delivered in 1863, said, "Douglas went through this campaign like a conquering hero. He had his special train of cars, his band of music, his bodyguard of devoted friends, and a cannon carried on the train, the firing from which announced his approach to the place of meeting. Such a canvass involved necessarily very large expenditure; and it has been said that Douglas did not spend less than fifty thousand dollars in it, Some idea of the frugal habits of Mr. Lincoln may be gathered when I tell you that at the close of this electoral campaign, which lasted for several months, Mr. Lincoln said, with the idea apparently that he had been somewhat extravagant, 'I do not believe that I have spent a cent less than five hundred dollars in this canvass !'"

The speeches of Lincoln during this contest had

created the greatest enthusiasm for the cause he was advocating; and throughout the canvass he earned a reputation as an able and eloquent debater second to that of no man in America. His "house divided against itself" speech had, too, been echoed in the remotest corners of the country, and his energetic fight with Douglas had, we are told, "even inspired hope in the far-off cotton and rice fields of the South, where the toiling blacks, to use the words of Whittier, began even more eagerly than ever to pray for liberty:

Nearly two years now passed by, during which Lincoln enlarged his experience of the country and the people by travelling in various parts of the United States, where he delivered lectures, and gave addresses. Among other places he went to New York (in which city he delivered a most important speech) besides several large towns; he also paid a visit to Kansas, where the free settlers received him with open arms; and wherever he appeared he most favourably impressed all hearers. When in New York he visited. one of the charitable institutions of the city, known as the Five Points Home of Industry, and the Superinten