t he persisted in speaking on the
following day at Indianapolis. He paused in Chicago only long enough
to give a public address, and then passed on into Iowa.[878] Among his
own people he unbosomed himself as he had not done before in all these
weeks of incessant public speaking. "I am no alarmist. I believe that
this country is in more danger now than at any other moment since I
have known anything of public life. It is not personal ambition that
has induced me to take the stump this year. I say to you who know me,
that the presidency has no charms for me. I do not believe that it is
my interest as an ambitious man, to be President this year if I could.
But I do love this Union. There is no sacrifice on earth that I would
not make to preserve it."[879]

While Douglas was in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, he received a dispatch from
his friend, Forney, announcing that the Republicans had carried
Pennsylvania in the October State election. Similar intelligence came
from Indiana. The outcome in November was thus clearly foreshadowed.
Recognizing the inevitable, Douglas turned to his Secretary with the
laconic words, "Mr. Lincoln is the next President. We must try to save
the Union. I will go South."[880] He at once made appointments to
speak in Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia, as soon as he should have
met his Western engagements. His friends marvelled at his powers of
endurance. For weeks he had been speaking from hotel balconies, from
the platform of railroad coaches, and in halls to monster
mass-meetings.[881] Not infrequently he spoke twice and thrice a day,
for days together. It was often said that he possessed the
constitution of the United States; and he caught up the jest with
delight, remarking that he believed he had. Small wonder if much that
he said was trivial and unworthy of his attention;[882] in and through
all his utterance, nevertheless, coursed the passionate current of his
love for the Union, transfiguring all that was paltry and commonplace.
From Iowa he passed into Wisconsin and Michigan, finally entering
upon his Southern mission at St. Louis, October 19th. "I am not here
to-night," he told his auditors, with a shade of weariness in his
voice, "to ask your votes for the presidency. I am not one of those
who believe that I have any more personal interest in the presidency
than any other good citizen in America. I am here to make an appeal to
you in behalf of the Union and the peace of the country."[883]

It w