and it has been an inspiration to the nations of Europe in their efforts to destroy the traffic in human beings on the continent of Africa.

There is an aspect of Mr. Lincoln's career which must attract attention and command sympathy. His loneliness in his office and in the performance of his duties is deeply pathetic. It is true that Congress accepted and endorsed his measures, generally, as they were presented from time to time; but there were bitter complaints on account of his delays on the slavery question, and not infrequently doubts were expressed as to the sincerity of his avowed opinions. There were little intrigues in Congress, personal rivalries in the Cabinet, and aspirations in regard to the succession.

The commanders of the Army of the Potomac, from McDowell to Meade, each and all had failed to win victories, or they had failed to secure the reasonable advantages of victories won.

Mr. Lincoln's supremacy, not of official position merely, but of character as well, was shown in his preliminary statement when he was about to read the Proclamation of Emancipation to the members of his Cabinet. He was then about to take the most important step ever taken by a President of the United States, and yet he informed the men, and the only men whose opinions he could command, by virtue of his office, that the main question was not open for discussion; that that question had been by him already decided, and that suggestions from them would be received only in reference to the formality of the document.

Our estimate of Mr. Lincoln is not lowered by the fact that he chose to act upon his own judgment in a matter of the supremest gravity, and in relation to which, and

from the nature of the case, the sole responsibility was upon him. On the great question of the abolition of slavery he had formed a definite conclusion - a conclusion on which he could act, and on which he did act neither prematurely nor after unnecessary delay. The Proclamation was issued when the exigencies of the War justified its issue as a military necessity, and when, as a concurrent fact, the public mind was first prepared to receive it and to give to the measure the requisite support.

Mr. Lincoln prepared the way for the reorganization of the Government upon a new basis. Under him the old order of things was overthrown, and the introduction of a new order became possible. Through his agency the Constitution of the United States has been brought into harmony with the Declaration of Independence.

The system of slavery has perished. The institutions of the country, in a good degree, are reconciled with the principles of freedom, as applied in the affairs of government; and in these changes we find additional guaranties for the perpetuity of the Union.

Every just eulogy on Mr. Lincoln is a continuing encomium of the Republican Party. By the election of 1860 he became the head of that party, and during the four years and more of his official life he never claimed to be better nor wiser than the party with which he was identified.

From first to last he had the full confidence of the army and of the masses of the voters in the Republican Party; and of that confidence Mr. Lincoln was always assured. Hence he was able to meet the aspirations of rivals and the censures of the disappointed with a good degree of composure.

To the honor of the masses of the

Republican Party it can be said that they never faltered in their devotion to the President, and in that devotion and in the fidelity of the President to the party, were the foundations laid on which the present greatness of the country rests; for great the country is, whatever may be our opinion of the causes, or our estimate of the intensity of the calamities that now afflict us.

The measure of gratitude due to Mr. Lincoln and to the Republican Party may be estimated by a comparison of the condition of the country when that party accepted power in March, 1861, with its condition in 1885 and 1893 when it yielded the administration to the successors of the men who had well-nigh wrecked the Government in a former generation. Speaking for the Republican Party we may say, "we found the Union a mass of sand; we left it a structure of granite. We found the Union a byword among the nations of the earth; we left it illustrious and envied for the exhibition of warlike powers; for the development of the nation's industrial and financial resources in times of peace; for the unwavering fidelity with which every pecuniary obligation was met; for the generous treatment measured out with an unstinted hand to the conquered foe, and, finally, for the cheerful recognition of the duty resting upon the country to enfranchise, to raise up, to recreate the millions that had been brought out of bondage."

This work was not accomplished fully in Mr. Lincoln's life; but he was the leader of ideas and policies which could have had no other proper consummation. At the end it must be said of Mr. Lincoln that he was a great man in a great place, burdened with great responsibilities, which he used for the benefit of his country and for the welfare of the human race.

Among American statesmen he is conspicuously alone. From Washington and Grant he is separated by the absence, on his part, of military service and military renown. On the statesmanship side of his career there is no one from Washington, and thence along the entire line of public men, who can be compared with him; and we may wisely commit to other ages, and perhaps to other lands, the full discussion and final decision of the relative claims of Washington and Lincoln to the first place in the list of American statesmen.

In conclusion, I repeat my estimate of Mr. Lincoln as it is registered in, or under, the corner stone of his monument at Springfield, Ill. :

"President Lincoln excelled all his contemporaries, as he also excelled most of the eminent rulers of every time, in the humanity of his nature; in the constant assertion of reason over passion and feeling; in the art of dealing with men; in fortitude, never disturbed by adversity; in capacity for delay when action was fraught with peril; in the power of immediate and resolute decision when delays were dangerous; in comprehensive judgment which forecasts the final and best opinions of nations and of posterity; and in the union of enlarged patriotism, wise philanthropy, and the highest political justice, by which he was enabled to save a nation and to emancipate a race."

FROM LIBBY PRISON.

THE SOUTH FEARED LINCOLN'S RENOMINATION.

BY GEN. NEAL DOW.

I NEVER SAW Mr. Lincoln, going off to the War as I did at the beginning, and being always in the Department of the Gulf. I had no means of learning anything of what was going on in the North, being almost all the time beyond the reach of newspapers and the mails. In our Department there were but few officers who were displeased with the President for his emancipation of the slaves.

When I was in Libby Prison preparation was made to blow up the part of it which contained eleven hundred officers. Arrangements were made to do this at a moment's notice; the proof of it was abundant and conclusive. We had facilities for communication with Washington without the knowledge of the rebels. At that time there was great fear that France and England would acknowledge the Confederacy. I availed myself of my opportunities to communicate with Mr. Lincoln and assure him that eleven hundred lives could not be sacrificed to so great advantage to the country as to have us all blown up by the rebels. We were assured that we should be destroyed in that way if an attempt were made to capture Richmond, at that time almost entirely without defence. Some of our company wrote to the