eved,
further, that the maintenance of the great Republic was essential, not
only for the interests of its own citizens, but for the interests of
free government throughout the world. He spoke with full sympathy of the
difficulties and problems resting upon the South, and he insisted that
the matters at issue could be adjusted only with a fair recognition of
these difficulties. Aggression from either side of Mason and Dixon's
Line must be withstood.

I was but a boy when I first looked upon the gaunt figure of the man who
was to become the people's leader, and listened to his calm but forcible
arguments in behalf of the principles of the Republican party. It is not
likely that at the time I took in, with any adequate appreciation, the
weight of the speaker's reasoning. I have read the address more than
once since and it is, of course, impossible to separate my first
impressions from my later direct knowledge. I do remember that I was at
once impressed with the feeling that here was a political leader whose
methods differed from those of any politician to whom I had listened.
His contentions were based not upon invective or abuse of "the other
fellow," but purely on considerations of justice, on that everlasting
principle that what is just, and only what is just, represents the
largest and highest interests of the nation as a whole. I doubt whether
there occurred in the whole speech a single example of the stories which
had been associated with Lincoln's name. The speaker was evidently
himself impressed with the greatness of the opportunity and with the
dignity and importance of his responsibility. The speech in fact gave
the keynote to the coming campaign.

It is hardly necessary to add that it also decided the selection of the
national leader not only for the political campaign, but through the
coming struggle. If it had not been for the impression made upon New
York and the East generally by Lincoln's speech and by the man himself,
the vote of New York could not have been secured in the May convention
for the nomination of the man from Illinois.

Robert Lincoln (writing to me in July, 1908) says:

"After my father's address in New York in February, 1860, he made a
trip to New England in order to visit me at Exeter, N.H., where I
was then a student in the Phillips Academy. It had not been his plan
to do any speaking in New England, but, as a result of the address
in New York, he received several