ch had
slowly been forming in Lowell's own mind."

In a letter to Richard Watson Gilder, Lowell says: "The passage about
Lincoln was not in the ode as originally recited, but added
immediately after. More than eighteen months before, however, I had
written about Lincoln in the _North American Review_--an article that
pleased him. I _did_ divine him earlier than most men of the Brahmin
caste."

It is a singular fact that the other great New England poets,
Longfellow, Whittier, and Holmes, had almost nothing to say about
Lincoln.

150. Wept with the passion, etc.: An article in the _Atlantic
Monthly_ for June, 1885, began with this passage: "The funeral
procession of the late President of the United States has passed
through the land from Washington to his final resting-place in the
heart of the prairies. Along the line of more than fifteen hundred
miles his remains were borne, as it were, through continued lines of
the people; and the number of mourners and the sincerity and unanimity
of grief was such as never before attended the obsequies of a human
being; so that the terrible catastrophe of his end hardly struck more
awe than the majestic sorrow of the people."

170. Outward grace is dust: An allusion to Lincoln's awkward and
rather unkempt outward appearance.

173. Supple-tempered will: One of the most pronounced traits of
Lincoln's character was his kindly, almost femininely gentle and
sympathetic spirit. With this, however, was combined a determination
of steel.

175-178. Nothing of Europe here: There was nothing of Europe in him,
or, if anything, it was of Europe in her early ages of freedom before
there was any distinction of slave and master, groveling Russian Serf
and noble Lord or Peer.

180. One of Plutarch's men: The distinguished men of Greece and Rome
whom Plutarch immortalized in his _Lives_ are accepted as types of
human greatness.

182. Innative: Inborn, natural.

187. He knew to bide his time: He knew how to bide his time, as in
Milton's _Lycidas_, "He knew himself to sing." Recall illustrations of
Lincoln's wonderful patience and faith.

198. The first American: In a prose article, Lowell calls him "The
American of Americans." Compare Tennyson's "The last great
Englishman," in the _Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington_.
Stanza IV of Tennyson's ode should be compared with this Lincoln
stanza.

202. Along whose course, etc.: Along the course leading to the
"inspiring goal." The c