quality than marks the brilliant works of literary American humorists.  It was, like the comedy of Shakespeare, plainly if unaccountably akin with the graver and grander strain of thought and feeling that inspired the greatest of his speeches.  Physically his splendid health does not seem to have been impaired beyond recovery.  But it was manifestly near to breaking; and the “deep-cut lines” were cut still deeper, and the long legs were always cold.

The cloud over the North passed very suddenly.  The North indeed paid the penalty of a nation which is spared the full strain of a war at the first, and begins to discover its seriousness when the hope of easy victory has been many times dashed down.  It has been necessary to dwell upon the despondency which at one time prevailed; but it would be hard to rate too highly the military difficulty of the conquest undertaken by the North, or the trial involved to human nature by perseverance in such a task.  If the depression during the summer was excessive, as it clearly was, at least the recovery which followed was fully adequate to the occasion which produced it.  On September 2 Sherman telegraphed, “Atlanta is ours and fairly won.”  The strategic importance of earlier successes may have been greater, but the most ignorant man who looked at a map could see what it signified that the North could occupy an important city in the heart of Georgia.  Then they recalled Farragut’s victory of a month before.  Then there followed, close to Washington, putting an end to a continual menace, stirring and picturesquely brilliant beyond other incidents of the war, Sheridan’s repeated victories in the Shenandoah Valley.  The war which had been “voted a failure” was evidently not a failure.  At the same time men of high character conducted a vigorous campaign of speeches for Lincoln.  General Schurz, the German revolutionary Liberal, who lived to tell Bismarck at his table that he still preferred democracy to his amused host’s method of government, sacrificed his command in the Army—­for Lincoln told him it could not be restored—­to speak for Lincoln.  Even Chase was carried away, and after months of insidious detraction, went for Lincoln on the stump.  In the elections in November Lincoln was elected by an enormous popular majority, giving him 212 out of the 233 votes in the electoral college, where in form the election is made.  Three Northern States only, one of them his native State, had gone against him.  He made some little speeches to parties which came to “serenade” him; some were not very formal speeches, for, as he said, he was now too old to “care much about the mode of doing things.”  But one was this:  “It has long been a grave question whether any Government not too strong for the liberties of its people can be strong enough to maintain its existence in great emergencies.  On this point the present rebellion brought our Government to a severe test, and a Presidential election occurring in regular course