Lucas, of Springfield, who was on the field, stated that he “had no doubt Lincoln meant to fight.  Lincoln was no coward, and he would unquestionably have held his own against his antagonist, for he was a powerful man and well skilled in the use of the broadsword.  Lincoln said to me, after the affair was all over, ‘I could have split him in two.’” But there can be little doubt that he was well pleased that the affair proved a bloodless one.

The mention of Miss Mary Todd, in the preceding paragraph, brings us to Lincoln’s marriage with that lady, which occurred in 1842, he being then in his thirty—­fourth year.  Miss Todd was the daughter of the Hon. Robert T. Todd, of Lexington, Kentucky.  She came to Springfield in 1839, to live with her sister, Mrs. Ninian W. Edwards.  “She was young,” says Mr. Lamon, “just twenty-one,—­her family was of the best and her connections in Illinois among the most refined and distinguished people.  Her mother having died when she was a little girl, she had been educated under the care of a French lady.  She was gifted with rare talents, had a keen sense of the ridiculous, a ready insight into the weaknesses of individual character, and a most fiery and ungovernable temper.  Her tongue and her pen were equally sharp.  Highbred, proud, brilliant, witty, and with a will that bent every one else to her purpose, she took Lincoln captive.  He was a rising politician, fresh from the people, and possessed of great power among them.  Miss Todd was of aristocratic and distinguished family, able to lead through the awful portals of ’good society’ whomsoever they chose to countenance.  It was thought that a union between them could not fail of numerous benefits to both parties.  Mr. Edwards thought so; Mrs. Edwards thought so; and it was not long before Mary Todd herself thought so.  She was very ambitious, and even before she left Kentucky announced her belief that she was destined to be the wife of some future President.  For a while she was courted by Douglas as well as by Lincoln.  Being asked which of them she intended to have, she answered, ’The one that has the best chance of being President.’  She decided in favor of Lincoln; and in the opinion of some of her husband’s friends she aided to no small extent in the fulfilment of the prophecy which the bestowal of her hand implied.”  Mrs. Edwards, Miss Todd’s sister, has related that “Lincoln was charmed with Mary’s wit and fascinated with her quick sagacity, her will, her nature and culture.  I have happened in the room,” she says, “where they were sitting, often and often, and Mary led the conversation.  Lincoln would listen, and gaze on her as if drawn by some superior power—­irresistibly so.  He listened, but seldom said a word.”