how would it be received by the doubtful and the pro-slavery elements? Yet Lincoln said: "Friends, I have thought about this matter a great deal; have surveyed the question well from all corners, and I am thoroughly convinced the time has come when it should be uttered; and if it must be that I go down because of this speech, then let me go down linked to truth-die in the advocacy of what is right and just. This Nation cannot live on injustice. A house divided against itself cannot stand,' I say again and again."

The speech was delivered as written, and it may not be amiss to quote here its most important portion:

"Gentlemen of the convention:

If we could first know where we

In my

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 continually augmented. 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 to fall; but I do expect that 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 course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it forward until it shall become alike lawful in all the states, old as well as new, north as well as south."

These were, indeed, bold words, such words as no man had before dared to speak, and it went from end to end of the land, filling the minds of the friends of slavery with rage and fury and its enemies with awe and wonder, as if a prophet had spoken true presage of coming misfortune. The effect in the election was exactly what had been predicted. Though the Republicans had a popular majority, they failed to secure control of the legislature. Douglas was reëlected and Lincoln once more sacrificed to his sense of right and devotion to principle.

The defeat was, however, more glorious and of infinitely greater value than any victory could have been, for the eyes of the most unwilling and optimistic were forced to face a great and awful truth; the mask had fallen, and from that hour "the irrepressible conflict" was recognized and declared. A rallying cry was given to the not yet homogeneous Republican party, and the way to future success opened. A few days after the speech was made, Dr. Long, a very warm friend and well-wisher, called upon Lincoln and expressed his deep regret that he should have involved himself in such hopeless ruin.

Lincoln's answer was a noble one: "Well, Doctor, if I

had to draw a pen across and erase my whole life, and I had one poor gift or choice left, as to what I should save from the wreck, I should choose that speech and leave it to the world unerased."

Another important result of the campaign, aside from its effect in unifying the Republican party, was that Douglas was compelled to so declare himself as to divorce him forever from the southern Democracy. He was compelled either to give up his Presidential and senatorial ambition, or to divide his party. He chose the latter course, and the success of the Republican party in 1860 was the result.

In April, 1859, while Lincoln was at the Doane house, in Champaign, the young editor of the Central Illinois Gazette, published at that place, was seized with an inspiration, and placed his name at the column head of that paper as a candidate for the Republican Presidential nomination. Marked copies of the paper were sent broadcast over the state, and the movement for Lincoln's nomination thus early took definite form. As it grew, he himself assented to it without false modesty, and it soon came to be regarded as more than a probability.

It will not be well, however, to pass on to the wider relations of Mr. Lincoln's life, without giving some account of him as a lawyer. Law practice in the west was a very different work in 1840 than it is now. The judicial district to which Sangamon county belonged included eight counties, and court was held in each of these twice a year. There were, of course, no railroads, nor was there any other adequate public means of conveyance. Lawyers did not, as nowadays, sit in their offices, wait for retainers, prepare their cases and only go to court when they had a cause on the calendar. They took their horses (or, if too poor to own a horse, as was Lincoln for some time after his admission, borrowed one), packed their papers and most necessary law books, and "rode the cir cuit," staying in each county until the court adjourned to another, then followed to that. Retainers were often taken after a cause was called for trial, and presence of mind and readiness of expedient filled the places. now taken by deep learning and careful closet preparation.

Of course such a system gave great opportunities for the display of certain qualities which find little field in modern practice. Court week, in these young frontier communities, was an event to be looked forward to, as a break in the monotony of life. People attended the trials, as they now go to the opera or theatre, as a means of amusement. Nearly every one within riding distance of the court-houses was pretty sure to be present as principal, witness, juryman or spectator, and the successful trial lawyer became a kind of popular hero. Hence the bar was the most traveled of any road to public office.

A man of Lincoln's ability and eloquence, his genial personal character, his ready wit, love of anecdote and wealth of expedient, was certain to

be both successful and popular in such a community and with such a court system. Business and fees came to him in plenty, his arrival was welcome to bench and bar, and he was never so genial and entertaining as among his professional brethren, when, after court adjourned, they gathered in the tavern to while away the hours until bed-time.

He was singularly conscientious as a lawyer and would never make himself the instrument of injustice. He could not defend a man whom he deemed guilty on a point which he did not believe well taken. Many stories are told to illustrate this peculiarity. He was admitted to practice in the circuit court of the United States, on the third day of December, 1839. Rising to present a matter to the court, he said: "This is the first case I have ever had in this court, and I have therefore examined it with great care. As the court will perceive, by looking at the abstract of the record, the only question in this case is one of authority. I have not been able to find any authority sustaining my side of the case, but I have found several cases directly in point on the other side. I will now give these cases, and then submit the case."

If any lawyer, before or since, ever made such an argument, it has not been reported.

On one occasion Mr. Lincoln was associated with another lawyer in the defense of a man indicted for murder. After the prosecution had rested its case, Lincoln turned to his colleague and said: "This man is guilty. If you can say anything for him, do it. I can't." The defense was continued and, by the ability of the associate counsel, the prisoner was acquitted. Lincoln refused to share in the fee. When once thoroughly convinced that he had a case, he was a very hard fighter, and was strong in points of law, handling witnesses and influencing juries. He was very liberal in giving his time and services to needy clients, always supposing them to be in the right, and was loved by clients, jurymen and judges alike.

Many years after the incidents above related, when Lincoln had reached the front rank in the bar and was recognized as the leading statesman of Illinois, a man named Metzgar was murdered at a camp-meeting in Mason. county. Two men, James H. Norris and William D. Armstrong, were indicted for the crime. Norris was tried, convicted and sentenced to a term of imprisonment. The feeling against Armstrong was so bitter that it was thought he could not obtain a fair trial in Mason county, and the venue was changed to Cass county, where he was tried in 1858. The prisoner was a son of the very Armstrong who was one of the Clary's Grove boys, and whom Lincoln had so well shaken nearly thirty years before. He was a ruffian and a loafer, but was innocent of the crime, and was too poor to hire anyone to help him prove it. Lincoln had rocked him in his cradle when a baby, and had cut wood to help his mother through her arduous household work. Now the mother, grown old and feeble, wrote to Lin