ssed by the grasp of thought and
aptness of expression which marked his great debate with Douglas,
yet as a through-going Free Soiler and a member of the radical wing
of Republicanism, my prepossessions were against him. He was a
Kentuckian, and a conservative Whig, who had supported General
Taylor in 1848, and General Scott four years later, when the Whig
party finally sacrificed both its character and its life on the
altar of slavery. His nomination, moreover, had been secured
through the diplomacy of conservative Republicans, whose morbid
dread of "abolitionism" unfitted them, as I believed, for leadership
in the battle with slavery which had now become inevitable, while
the defeat of Mr. Seward had been to me a severe disappointment
and a real personal grief. The rumor was also current, and generally
credited, that Simon Cameron and Caleb B. Smith were to be made
Cabinet Ministers, in recognition of the important services rendered
by the friends of these gentlemen in the Chicago Convention. Still,
I did not wish to do Mr. Lincoln the slightest injustice, while I
hoped and believed his courage and firmness would prove equal to
the emergency.

On meeting him I found him far better looking than the campaign
pictures had represented. His face, when lighted up in conversation,
was not unhandsome, and the kindly and winning tones of his voice
pleaded for him like the smile which played about his rugged
features. He was full of anecdote and humor, and readily found
his way to the hearts of those who enjoyed a welcome to his fireside.
His face, however, was sometimes marked by that touching expression
of sadness which became so generally noticeable in the following
years. On the subject of slavery I was gratified to find him less
reserved and more emphatic than I expected. The Cabinet rumor
referred to was true. He felt bound by the pledges which his
leading friends had made in his name pending the National Convention;
and the policy on which he acted in these and many other appointments
was forcibly illustrated on a subsequent occasion, when I earnestly
protested against the appointment of an incompetent and unworthy
man as Commissioner of Patents. "There is much force in what you
say," said he, "but, in the balancing of matters, I guess I shall
have to appoint him." This "balancing of matters" was a source of
infinite vexation during his administration, as it has been to
every one of his successors; and its m