notice, and found all the accused guilty, as undoubtedly they were. The men were a miserable parcel of fellows, belonging in that class of the community called "roughs," except only Mudd, who was a country doctor. Mrs. Surratt was a fit companion for such company. Herold, Atzerodt and Payne were hanged on July 7; O'Laughlin, Spangler, Arnold, and Mudd were sent to the Dry Tortugas, there to be kept at hard labor in the military prison for life, save Spangler, whose term was six years. Mrs. Surratt was also found guilty and condemned to be hanged. Five members of the commission signed a petition to President Johnson to commute this sentence, but he refused, and on July 7 she also met the fate which no one could deny that she deserved. John H. Surratt escaped for the time, but was apprehended and tried in the District of Columbia, in 1867; he had then the advantage of process under the regular criminal law, and the result was that on September 22, 1868, a nolle prosequi was entered, and he was set free, to swell the multitude of villains whose impunity reflects no great credit upon our system of dealing with crime.
Besides those who have been named, the government also charged several other persons with complicity in the plot. Among these were Jefferson Davis and some members of that notorious colony of Confederates who, in the wholesome and congenial safety of Canada, had been plotting mean crimes during the war. Of course, since
these men could not be captured and actually placed upon trial, there was little object in seeking evidence against them, and only so much was produced as came to the possession of the government incidentally in the way of its endeavor to convict those prisoners who were in its possession. Under these circumstances there was not sufficient evidence to prove that any one of them aided or abetted, or had a guilty knowledge of, the conspiracy; yet certainly there was evidence enough to place them under such suspicion, that, if they were really innocent, they deserve commiseration for their unfortunate situation.
It is startling to contemplate the responsibility so lightly taken by the mad wretch who shortly and sharply severed the most important life which any man was living on the fourteenth day of April, 1865. Very rarely, in the course of the ages, have circumstances so converged upon a single person and a special crisis as to invest them with the importance which rested upon this great leader at this difficult time. Yet, in the briefest instant that can be measured, an ignoble tippler had dared to cut the life-thread from which depended no small portion of the destinies of millions of people. How the history of this nation might have been changed, had Mr. Lincoln survived to bear his influential part in reconstructing and reuniting the shattered country, no man can tell. Many have indulged in the idle speculation, though to
do so is but to waste time. The life which he had already lived gives food enough for reflection and for study without trying to evolve out of arbitrary fancy the further things which might have been attempted by him, which might have been of wise or of visionary conception, might have brilliantly succeeded or sadly failed.
It is only forty years since Abraham Lincoln became of much note in the world, yet in that brief time he has been the subject of more varied discussion than has been expended upon any other historical character, save, perhaps, Napoleon; and the kind of discussion which has been called forth by Lincoln is not really to be likened to that which has taken place concerning Napoleon or concerning any other person whomsoever. The great men of the various eras and nations are comprehensible, at least upon broad lines. The traits to which each owes his peculiar power can be pretty well agreed upon; the capacity of each can be tolerably well expressed in a formula; each can be intelligibly described in fairly distinct phrases; and whether this be in the spirit of admiration or of condemnation will, in all cases which admit of doubt, be largely a question of the personal sympathies of the observer. But Lincoln stands apart in striking solitude,—an enigma to all men. The world eagerly asks of each person who endeavors to write or speak of him: What illumination have you for us? Have you solved the mystery? Can you explain this man? The task has been essayed
many times; it will be essayed many times more; it never has been, and probably it never will be entirely achieved. Each biographer, each writer or speaker, makes his little contribution to the study, and must be content to regard it merely as a contribution. For myself, having drawn the picture of the man as I see him, though knowing well that I am far from seeing him all, and still farther from seeing inwardly through him, yet I know that I cannot help it by additional comments. Very much more than is the case with other men, Lincoln means different things to different persons, and the aspect which he presents depends to an unusual degree upon the moral and mental individuality of the observer. Perhaps this is due to the breadth and variety of his own nature. As a friend once said to me: Lincoln was like Shakespeare, in that he seemed to run through the whole gamut of human nature. It was true. From the superstition of the ignorant backwoodsman to that profoundest faith which is the surest measure of man's greatness, Lincoln passed along the whole distance. In his early days he struck his roots deep down into the common soil of the earth, and in his latest years his head towered and shone among the stars. Yet his greatest, his most distinctive, and most abiding trait was his humanness of nature; he was the expression of his people; at some periods of his life and in some ways it may be that he expressed them in their uglier forms, but generally he displayed them in their noblest and most beautiful
developments; yet, for worse or for better, one is always conscious of being in close touch with him as a fellow man. People often call him the greatest man who ever lived; but, in fact, he was not properly to be compared with any other. One may set up a pole and mark notches upon it, and label them with the names of Julius Caesar, William of Orange, Cromwell, Napoleon, even Washington, and may measure these men against each other, and dispute and discuss their respective places. But Lincoln cannot be brought to this pole, he cannot be entered in any such competition. This is not necessarily because he was greater than any of these men; for, before this could be asserted, the question would have to be settled: How is greatness to be estimated? One can hardly conceive that in any age of the world or any combination of circumstances a capacity and temperament like that of Caesar or Napoleon would not force itself into prominence and control. On the other hand, it is easy to suppose that, if precisely such a great moral question and peculiar crisis as gave to Lincoln his opportunity had not arisen contemporaneously with his years of vigor, he might never have got farther away from obscurity than does the ordinary member of Congress. Does this statement limit his greatness, by requiring a rare condition to give it play? The question is of no serious consequence, since the condition existed; and the discussion which calls it forth is also of no great consequence. For what is gained
by trying to award him a number in a rank-list of heroes? It is enough to believe that probably Lincoln alone among historical characters could have done that especial task which he had to do. It was a task of supreme difficulty, and like none which any other man ever had to undertake; and he who was charged with it was even more distantly unlike any other man in both moral and mental equipment. We cannot force lines to be parallel, for our own convenience or curiosity, when in fact they are not parallel. Let us not then try to compare and to measure him with others, and let us not quarrel as to whether he was greater or less than Washington, as to whether either of them, set to perform the other's task, would have succeeded with it, or, perchance, would have failed. Not only is the competition itself an ungracious one, but to make Lincoln a competitor is foolish and useless. He was the most individual man who ever lived; let us be content with this fact. Let us take him simply as Abraham Lincoln, singular and solitary, as we all see that he was; let us be thankful if we can make a niche big enough for him among the world's heroes, without worrying ourselves about the proportion which it may bear to other niches; and there let him remain forever, lonely, as in his strange lifetime, impressive, mysterious, unmeasured, and unsolved.