States Senator, but without success-the Democrats having the control of the State, which they retained until the conflict arising out of the Nebraska bill, in 1854.

Nothing could more forcibly illustrate the complete rest and relaxation from political cares and anxieties which Mr. Lincoln enjoyed during these few years, than the fact that he found time, while practising his profession, to indulge the exercise of his inventive faculties. A correspondent of the Boston Advertiser, writing from Washington, thus states the form in which the mechanical genius of the ex-Congressman and future President found expression :

Occupying an ordinary and commonplace position in one of the showcases in the large hall of the Patent Office, is one little model which, in ages to come, will be prized as at once one of the most curious and one of the most sacred relics in that vast museum of unique and priceless things. This is a plain and simple model of a steamboat, roughly fashioned in wood, by the hand of Abraham Lincoln. It bears date in 1849, when the inventor was known simply as a successful lawyer and rising politician of Central Illinois. Neither his practice nor his politics took up so much of his time, as to prevent him from giving much attention to contrivances which he hoped might be of benefit to the world and of profit to himself.

The design of this invention is suggestive of one phase of Abraham Lincoln's early life, when he went up and down the Mississippi as a flatboatman, and became familiar with some of the dangers and inconveniences attending the navigation of the Western rivers. It is an attempt to make it an easy matter to transport vessels over shoals and snags and sawyers. The main idea is that of an apparatus resembling a noiseless bellows, placed on each side of the hull of the craft, just below the waterline, and worked by an odd but not complicated system of ropes, valves, and pulleys. When the keel of the vessel grates against the sand or obstruction, these bellows are to be filled with air; and, thus buoyed up, the ship is expected to float lightly and gayly over the shoal, which would otherwise have proved a serious interruption to her voyage.

The model, which is about eighteen or twenty inches long, and has the air of having been whittled with a knife out of a shingle and a cigarbox, is built without any elaboration or ornament, or any extra apparatus beyond that necessary to show the operation of buoying the steamer over the obstructions. Herein it differs from very many of the models which share with it the shelter of the immense halls of the Patent Office, and which are fashioned with wonderful nicety and exquisite finish, as if much of the labor and thought and affection of a lifetime had been de

voted to their construction. This is a model of a different kind; carved as one might imagine a retired rail-splitter would whittle, strongly, but not smoothly, and evidently made with a view solely to convey, by the simplest possible means, to the minds of the patent authorities, an idea of the purpose and plan of the simple invention. The label on the steamer's deck informs us that the patent was obtained; but we do not learn that the navigation of the western rivers was revolutionized by this quaint conception. The modest little model has reposed here sixteen years; and since it found its resting-place here on the shelf, the shrewd inventor has found it his task to guide the ship of state over shoals more perilous, and obstructions more obstinate, than any prophet dreamed of wher Abraham Lincoln wrote his bold autograph on the prow of this miniature steamer.

This curious episode, however, must not create the impression that Mr. Lincoln had allowed his mind to be entirely diverted from the observation of the important political events then transpiring. He undoubtedly noted carefully the development of those questions which subsequently absorbed so large a share of attention, and calculated accurately the influence which they would have upon the relations of the two great political organizations. He had fought slavery often enough to know what it was, and he was thoroughly conversant with the animus of its supporters. It is not, therefore, at all likely that he was taken by surprise when the Nebraska Bill was introduced, and the proposition was made by Stephen A. Douglas to repeal that very Missouri Compromise which he had declared to be "a sacred thing, which no ruthless hand would ever be reckless enough to disturb."

The Nebraska Bill was passed May 22, 1854, and the event gave new and increased force to the popular feeling in favor of freedom, which the proposition to repeal the Missouri Compromise had excited. Everywhere the friends of freedom gathered themselves together and rallied round her banner, to meet the conflict which was plainly now closely impending, and which had been forced upon the people by the grasping ambition of the slaveholders. The political campaign of that year in Illinois was one of the severest ever known. It was intensified by the fact that a United States Senator was to be chosen

by the legislature then to be elected, to fill the place of Shields, who had voted with Douglas in favor of the Nebraska Bill.

Mr. Lincoln took a prominent part in this campaign. He met Judge Douglas before the people on two occasions, the only ones when the Judge would consent to such a meeting. The first time was at the State Fair at Springfield, on October 4th. This was afterwards con sidered to have been the greatest event of the whole can vass. Mr. Lincoln opened the discussion; and in his clear and eloquent, yet homely way, exposed the tergiversations of which his opponent had been guilty, and the fallacy of his pretexts for his present course.

Mr. Douglas had always claimed to have voted for the repeal of the Missouri Compromise because he sustained the "great principle" of popular sovereignty, and desired that the inhabitants of Kansas and Nebraska should govern themselves, as they were well able to do. The fallacy of drawing from these premises the conclusion that they therefore should have the right to establish slavery there, was most clearly and conclusively exposed by Mr. Lincoln, so that no one could thereafter be misled by it, unless he was a willing dupe of pro-slavery sophistry.

"My distinguished friend," said he, "says it is an insult to the emigrants of Kansas and Nebraska to suppose that they are not able to govern themselves. We must not slur over an argument of this kind because it happens to tickle the ear. It must be met and answered. I admit that the emigrant to Kansas and Nebraska is competent to govern himself, but I deny his right to govern any other person without that person's consent."

The two opponents met again at Peoria. We believe it is universally admitted that on both of these occasions Mr. Lincoln had decidedly the advantage. The result of the election was the defeat of the Democrats, and the election of anti-Nebraska men to the legislature, to secure the election of a United States Senator who would be true to freedom, if they could be brought to unite upon a can

didate. Mr. Lincoln was naturally the candidate of those who were of Whig antecedents. Judge Trumbull was as naturally the candidate of some who had really come out from the Democratic party-though they still called themselves Free Democrats.

There was danger, of course, in such a posture of affairs, and Mr. Lincoln, in that spirit of patriotism which he has always shown, by his own personal exertions secured the votes of his friends for Judge Trumbull, who was accordingly chosen Senator. The charge was afterwards made by the enemies of both, that there had been in this matter a breach of faith on the part of Judge Trumbull, and that Mr. Lincoln had the right to feel, and did feel, aggrieved at the result. Mr. Lincoln himself, however, expressly denied, in his speech at Charleston, September 18, 1858, that there had been any such breach of faith.

CHAPTER II.

THE LINCOLN DOUGLAS DEBATE.

PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 1856.-DOUGLAS AT SPRINGFIELD IN 1857.— LINCOLN'S REPLY.-THE GREAT DEBATE.-ELOQUENT DEFENCE OF THE DOCTRINES OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY.-RESULT OF THE Contest.

THE pressure of the slavery contest at last fully organized the Republican party, which held its first convention for the nomination of President and Vice-President at Philadelphia, on June 17, 1856. John C. Fremont was nominated for President, and William L. Dayton for Vice-President. Mr. Lincoln's name was prominent before the convention for the latter office, and on the informal ballot he stood next to Mr. Dayton, receiving 110 votes. Mr. Lincoln's name headed the Republican electoral ticket in Illinois, and he took an active part in the canvass, but the Democrats carried the State, though only by a plurality vote.

Meanwhile, Senator Douglas embraced every opportunity to keep himself and his doctrines before the people, but whichever way he turned, he found his vigilant antagonist constantly in his front. For twenty years the two had been so invariably opposed to each other in politics, that whenever Mr. Douglas made a speech, the people instinctively anticipated a reply from Mr. Lincoln; and there was a special Providence in thus opposing to the wily, deceptive sophistries of the former the clear, incisive common sense of the latter, which the multitude could not avoid comprehending. Early in June, 1857, Senator Douglas made his famous speech in Springfield, which was universally accepted as a declaration that he meant to sustain all the acts of the Lecompton Convention, even though a pro-slavery constitution