Abraham Lincoln

by William Eleroy Curtis

He finally recovered his spirits and continued his law studies, politics, and surveying. He removed to Springfield two years later, became a partner of one of the leading attorneys of the State, and took quite an active part in the social affairs of the State capital. Although careless of forms and indifferent to the conventionalities of the day, he was recognized as a rising man, and his humor and conversational powers made him a great favorite. His name appears frequently in the reports of social events at that time; he was an habitual speaker at public banquets and one of the managers of a cotillion party given at the American House, December 16, 1839.

Copyright, 1900, by McClure, Phillips & Co.
AN INVITATION TO A SPRINGFIELD COTILLION PARTY
By special permission, from the collection of
C. F. Gunther, Esq., Chicago

About a year after the death of Anne Rutledge he became involved in a rather ludicrous complication with Miss Mary Owens. It was an undignified and mortifying predicament, but the way he carried himself showed his high sense of honor and obedience to his convictions of duty. It began with a jest. The young lady had visited Springfield, where she had received considerable attention, and Mrs. Able, her sister, before starting for a visit to Kentucky, told Lincoln that she would bring her sister back with her if he would agree to marry her. The bantering offer was accepted, and a few months later he learned with consternation that the young lady expected him to fulfil the agreement. Lincoln was greatly distressed, but his sense of honor would not permit him to deny his obligations. To Mrs. O. H. Browning, whose husband was afterwards a United States Senator and a member of the Cabinet, he explained his predicament, as follows: "I had told her sister that I would take her for better or for worse, and I make a point of honor and conscience in all things to stick to my word, especially if others had been induced to act on it, which in this case I have no doubt they had, for I was now fairly convinced that no other man on earth would have her, and hence the conclusion they were bent on holding me to my bargain. At once I determined to consider her my wife, and this done, all my powers of discovery were put to work in search of perfections in her which might be fairly set off against her defects."

She was several years his senior and not personally attractive, but he assumed that she was an honorable woman with an affectionate regard for him, and wrote her with the utmost candor, explaining his poverty and the sacrifices that she would have to make in marrying him. "I am afraid you would not be satisfied," he wrote; "you would have to be poor without the means of hiding your poverty. Do you believe you could bear that patiently? Whatever woman may cast her lot with mine, should any ever do so, it is my intention to do all in my power to make her happy and contented; and there is nothing I could imagine that would make me more unhappy than to fail in the effort. I know I should be much happier with you than the way I am, provided I saw no signs of discontent in you. What you have said to me may have been in the way of a jest, or I may have misunderstood it. If so, then let it be forgotten; if otherwise, I much wish you would think seriously before you decide. What I have said I will most positively abide by, provided you wish it. My opinion is that you had better not do it. You have not been accustomed to hardship, and it may be more severe than you now imagine. I know you are capable of thinking correctly on any subject, and if you deliberate maturely upon this before you decide, then I am willing to abide your decision."

Miss Owens was evidently not pleased with the situation, and replied with equal candor, telling Lincoln, among other unpleasant things, that she never had any intention or desire to marry him, for he was "deficient in those little links which go to make up a woman's happiness." He rejoiced at his release, but her words stung, and he wrote Mrs. Browning, "I was mortified in a hundred different ways. My vanity was deeply wounded by the reflection that I had so long been too stupid to discover her intentions, and at the same time never doubting that I understood them perfectly; and also that she, whom I had taught myself to believe nobody else would have, had actually rejected me with all my fancied greatness. And, to cap the whole, I then for the first time began to suspect that I was a little in love with her. But let it go; I will try and outlive it. Others have been made fools of by girls, but this can never with truth be said of me. I most emphatically, in this instance, made a fool of myself. I have now come to the conclusion never again to think of marrying, and for this reason, I never can be satisfied with any one who would be blockhead enough to have me."

But it was not long before he was again involved in the chains of Cupid. Miss Mary Todd, also of Kentucky, came to Springfield to visit her sister, the wife of Ninian W. Edwards, one of Lincoln's colleagues in the Legislature. She received much attention from the most prominent young men in Springfield, including Stephen A. Douglas, James Shields, and other of Lincoln's political associates and rivals; but it was soon apparent that she preferred him, and against the protests of Mr. and Mrs. Edwards, who were familiar with his hopeless pecuniary circumstances, they became engaged.

The course of their love did not run smooth. Their tastes were different. Miss Todd was absorbed in social pleasures and demanded admiration and devotion. Lincoln was absorbed in his studies and political affairs and was not so ardent a lover as she desired. Misunderstandings and reproaches were frequent, and at last Lincoln became so thoroughly convinced that they were unsuited to each other that he asked to be released from the engagement. The young woman consented with tears of anger and grief, and Lincoln, having discovered, when it was too late, the depth of her love for him, accused himself of a breach of honor so bitterly that it preyed upon his mind. He wrote Joshua F. Speed, of Kentucky, who was the most intimate friend he had, and whose brother was afterwards a member of his Cabinet, "I must regain my confidence in my own ability to keep my resolves when they are made. In that ability I once prided myself as the only or the chief gem of my character. That gem I have lost. How and where you know too well. I have not yet regained it, and until I do I cannot trust myself in any matter of much importance."

Everybody in Springfield knew of the broken engagement and that it was the cause of Mr. Lincoln's intense remorse and melancholy. He did not deny or attempt to disguise it. He wrote Mr. Stuart, his law partner, three weeks after the fatal first of January, "I am now the most miserable man living. If what I feel were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on earth. Whether I shall ever be better, I cannot tell; I awfully forebode that I shall not. To remain as I am is impossible; I must die or get better." To other of his intimates he spoke with equal freedom of the sense of dishonor and despair that possessed him, and they persuaded him to visit his friend Speed, who carried him off to Kentucky and kept him for several months. The visit did much to brighten his spirits, and his own distress was forgotten in his efforts to comfort Speed, who in the meantime had become engaged, was afraid that he did not love his sweetheart well enough to marry her, and confided his doubts to Lincoln.

In the mean time Miss Todd appears to have regained her self-possession and calmly awaited the will of the fates who were to restore relations with her sensitive and remorseful lover. The incident which finally brought them together was a comedy of national interest.