were against Taylor, but not for anybody particularly before, are since taking ground, some for Scott and some for McLean.  Who will be nominated neither I nor any one else can tell.  Now, let me pray to you in turn.  My prayer is that you let nothing discourage or baffle you, but that, in spite of every difficulty, you send us a good Taylor delegate from your circuit.  Make Baker, who is now with you, I suppose, help about it.  He is a good hand to raise a breeze.”

In due time Mr. Lincoln’s sagacity and earnestness were both justified; for on June 12 he was able to write to an Illinois friend: 

“On my return from Philadelphia, where I had been attending the nomination of ‘Old Rough,’ I found your letter in a mass of others which had accumulated in my absence.  By many, and often, it had been said they would not abide the nomination of Taylor; but since the deed has been done, they are fast falling in, and in my opinion we shall have a most overwhelming, glorious triumph.  One unmistakable sign is that all the odds and ends are with us—­Barnburners, Native Americans, Tyler men, disappointed office-seeking Locofocos, and the Lord knows what.  This is important, if in nothing else, in showing which way the wind blows.  Some of the sanguine men have set down all the States as certain for Taylor but Illinois, and it as doubtful.  Cannot something be done even in Illinois?  Taylor’s nomination takes the Locos on the blind side.  It turns the war-thunder against them.  The war is now to them the gallows of Haman, which they built for us, and on which they are doomed to be hanged themselves.”

Nobody understood better than Mr. Lincoln the obvious truth that in politics it does not suffice merely to nominate candidates.  Something must also be done to elect them.  Two of the letters which he at this time wrote home to his young law partner, William H. Herndon, are especially worth quoting in part, not alone to show his own zeal and industry, but also as a perennial instruction and encouragement to young men who have an ambition to make a name and a place for themselves in American politics: 

“Last night I was attending a sort of caucus of the Whig members, held in relation to the coming presidential election.  The whole field of the nation was scanned, and all is high hope and confidence....  Now, as to the young men.  You must not wait to be brought forward by the older men.  For instance, do you suppose that I should ever have got into notice if I had waited to be hunted up and pushed forward by older men?  You young men get together and form a ‘Rough and Ready Club,’ and have regular meetings and speeches....  Let every one play the part he can play best,—­some speak, some sing, and all ‘holler.’  Your meetings will be of evenings; the older men, and the women, will go to hear you; so that it will not only contribute to the election of ‘Old Zach,’ but will be an interesting pastime, and improving to the intellectual faculties of all engaged.”