Chapter 14

There is so much in Mr. Medill's editorial in the Chicago "Tribune," and he is entitled to speak with such authority, that we print it complete herewith.

Mr. Medill says:

THE NEW LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

It is apparent at the very outset that the new "Life of Abraham Lincoln," edited by Miss Ida M. Tarbell, the first installment of which appears in McCLURE'S MAGAZINE for the current month, will be one of the most important and interesting contributions yet made to Lincoln literature, as it will contain much matter hitherto unpublished, and will be enriched with a large number of new illustrations. It will be a study of Abraham Lincoln as a man, and thus will naturally commend itself to the people.

The first installment covers about the first twenty-one years of Lincoln's life, which were spent in Kentucky and Indiana. The story is told very briefly, in simple, easy style, and abounds with reminiscences secured from his contemporaries. It is not only full of new things, but it is so distinct and clear in local color that an interest attaches to it which is not found in other biographies. A large part of this credit must be awarded not alone to the text and to its careful editing, but also to the numerous pictures which upon every page illustrate the context and give the scenes of the story. It is particularly rich in portraits. Among these are portraits from an ambrotype taken at Macomb, Illinois, in 1858, during his debate with Douglas, the dress being the same as that in which Lincoln made his famous canvass for the Senate; a second from a photograph taken at Hannibal, Missouri, in 1858; a third from an ambrotype taken at Urbana, Illinois, in 1857; and a fourth from an ambrotype taken in a linen coat at Beardstown, Illinois.

The picture, however, which will attract the greatest interest is the frontispiece, from a daguerreotype which his son, Robert Lincoln, thinks was taken when his father was about forty years old. In this picture, which bears little resemblance to any other known portraits, he is dressed with scrupulous care. His hair is combed and brushed down with something like youthful vanity, and he has a smooth, bright, rather handsome face, and without sunken cheeks, strikingly resembling in contour and the shape of the head some of the early portraits of Ralph Waldo Emerson. It looks, however, as if it had been taken at an earlier age than forty. As the only portrait of Lincoln with a comparatively young face it will be treasured by all his admirers, and his son has conferred a distinct benefit by his courtesy in allowing it to be reproduced.

There are numerous other portraits, among them those of the Rev. Jesse Head, who married Lincoln's father and mother; of Austin Gollaher, who was a boy friend of Lincoln in Kentucky, and the only one now living; of his step-mother, Sarah Bush Lincoln; of Josiah Crawford, whom Lincoln served in Indiana as "hired boy;" of the well-known Dennis Hanks, cousin of Lincoln's mother; of John Hanks, also a cousin; of Judge John Pitcher, who assisted Lincoln in his earliest studies; and of Joseph Gentry, the only boy associate of Lincoln in Indiana now living. These portraits, in addition to the numerous views of scenes connected with Lincoln's boyhood, add greatly to the interest of the text. Mr. McClure, the proprietor of the magazine, is certainly to be congratulated upon the successful manner in which he has launched the opening chapters of the new "Life of Lincoln." The remaining ones, running a whole year, will be awaited with keen interest. It is said that Miss Tarbell has found and obtained a shorthand report of his unpublished but famous speech delivered at Bloomington, May 29, 1856, before the first Republican State convention ever held in Illinois. This is a great find and a very important addition to his published speeches. Many of those who heard it have always claimed that it was the most eloquent speech he ever made.

In an editorial in the "Standard-Union" of Brooklyn, Mr. Murat Halstead expresses the general feeling of all who knew Lincoln:

The magazine gives an admirable engraving of this portrait as the frontispiece, as "The earliest portrait of Abraham Lincoln, from a daguerreotype taken when Lincoln was about forty; owned by his son, the Hon. Robert T. Lincoln, through whose courtesy it is here reproduced for the first time." This is a very modest statement, considering the priceless discovery it announces. The portrait does not show a man "about forty" years old in appearance. "About" thirty would be the general verdict, if it were not that the daguerreotype was unknown when Lincoln was of that age. It does not seem, however, that he could have been more than thirty-five, and for that age the youthfulness of the portrait is wonderful. This is a new Lincoln, and far more attractive, in a sense, than anything the public has possessed. This is the portrait of a remarkably handsome man.... The head is magnificent, the eyes deep and generous, the mouth sensitive, the whole expression something delicate, tender, pathetic, poetic. This was the young man with whom the phantoms of romance dallied, the young man who recited poems and was fanciful and speculative, and in love and despair, but upon whose brow there already gleamed the illumination of intellect, the inspiration of patriotism. There were vast possibilities in this young man's face. He could have gone anywhere and done anything. He might have been a military chieftain, a novelist, a poet, a philosopher, ah! a hero, a martyr--and, yes, this young man might have been--he even was Abraham Lincoln! This was he with the world before him. It is good fortune to have the magical revelation of the youth of the man the world venerates. This look into his eyes, into his soul--not before he knew sorrow, but long before the world knew him--and to feel that it is worthy to be what it is, and that we are better acquainted with him and love him the more, is something beyond price.