the warm personal friend of Lincoln, stepped quickly to the edge of the platform. With hand outstretched in an easy graceful gesture, he said:

"Fellow Citizens: I introduce to you Abraham Lincoln, the President-elect of the United States of America."

Again the silence of death, as the once ragged, lonely, barefoot boy from a Kentucky cabin stepped forward into the fiercest light that ever beat on human head.

He quickly adjusted his glasses, drew his tall figure to its full height, and began to read his address, his face suddenly radiant with the poise of conscious reserve power, oblivious of crowd, ceremony, hostility or friendship. His voice was strong, high pitched, clear, ringing, and his articulation singularly and beautifully perfect. His words carried to the outer edge of the vast silent throng.

Betty watched his mobile features with increasing fascination. His bushy eyebrows and the muscles. of his sensitive face moved and flashed in sympathy with every emotion. In a countenance of such large and rugged lines every movement spoke unusual power. The lift of an eyebrow, the curve of the lip, the flash of the eye were gestures more eloquent than the impassioned sweep of the ordinary orator's arm. He made no gesture with hand or arm or the mass of his towering body. No portrait of this man had ever been made. She had seen many pictures and not one of them had suggested the deep, subtle, indirect expression of his face-something that seemed to link him with the big forces of nature.

The crowd was feeling this now and men were lean

ing forward from their seats on the platform. The venerable Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Roger B. Taney, whose clear, accurate and mercilessly logical decision on Slavery had created the storm which swept Lincoln into power, was watching him with bated breath, and not for an instant during the Inaugural address did he lower his sombre eyes from the face of the speaker.

John C. Breckenridge, the retiring Vice-President, his defeated opponent from the Southern States, the proud Kentucky chevalier, was listening with keen and painful intensity, his handsome cultured features pale with the consciousness of coming tragedy.

His opening words had been reassuring to the South, but woke no response from the silent thousands who stood before him as he went on:

"I have no purpose directly or indirectly to in*terfere with the institution of Slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so."

The simplicity, directness and clearness of this statement could find no parallel in the pompous words of his predecessors. The man was talking in the + language of the people. It was something new under

the sun.

And then, with the clear ring of a trumpet, each syllable falling clean cut and sharp with marvellous distinctness, he continued:

"I hold that the Union of these States is perpetual

He paused for an instant, his voice suddenly failing from deep emotion and then, as if stung by the silence with which this thrilling thought was received, he

uttered the only words not written in his manuscript, and made the only gesture of his entire address. His great fist came down with a resounding smash on the table and in tones heard by the last man who hung on the edge of the throng, he said:

"No State has the right to secede!"

And still no cheer came from the strangely silent crowd-only a vague shiver swept the hearts of the Southern people before him. If the North loved the Union they were giving no tokens to the tall, lonely figure on that platform.

At last the sentences, big with the fate of millions, were slowly and tenderly spoken:

"I shall take care that the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the States. Doing this I deem to be a simple duty on my part, and I shall perform it

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At last he had touched the hidden powder magazine with an electric spark, and a cheer swept the crowd. It died away at last-rose with new power and rose a third time before it subsided, and the clear voice went on:

"I trust this will not be regarded as a menace, but only as the declared purpose of the Union that it will constitutionally defend and maintain itself. In doing this there needs be no bloodshed or violence; and there shall be none unless it be forced upon the National authority. The power confided in me will be used to hold and occupy and possess the property and places belonging to the Government."

Again the powder mine exploded, and a cheer rose. The grim walls of Fort Sumter and Pickens, in far off Southern waters, flashed red before every eye.

The applause suddenly died away into the old silence, and a man in the crowd before the platform yelled:

"We're for Jefferson Davis !"

There was no answer and no disorder-only the shrill cry of the Southerner through the silence, and the speaker continued his address. Senator Douglas looked uneasily over the crowd toward the spot from whence came the cry. His brow wrinkled with a frown. John Vaughan leaned toward Betty and whispered half to himself:

"I wonder if those cheers were defiance after all?” But the girl was too intent on the words of the speaker to answer. His next sentence brought a smile and a nod of approval from Senator Douglas.

"But beyond what may be necessary for those objects, there will be no invasion, no using of force against or among the people anywhere"

Again and again Douglas nodded his approval and spoke it in low tones:

"Good! Good! That means no coercion."

And then, followed in solemn tones, the fateful sentences:

"In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine is the momentous issue of civil war. The Government will not assail you unless you first assail it. You can have no conflict without yourselves being the aggressors. You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the Government, while I shall have the most solemn one to 'preserve, protect and defend it. You can forbear the assault upon it; I can not shrink from the defense of it"

Again he paused, and the crowd hung spellbound

as he began his closing paragraph in tender persuasive accents throbbing with emotion, his clear voice breaking for the first time:

"I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."

The closing words fell from his sensitive lips with the sad dreamy eyes blinded by tears.

At last he had touched the hearts of all. The sincerity and beauty of the simple appeal for the moment hushed bitterness and passion and the cheer was

universal.

His

The black-robed figure of the venerable Chief Justice stepped forward with extended open Bible. bony, trembling fingers and cadaverous intellectual face gave the last touch of dramatic contrast between the old and new régimes.

The tall, dark man reverently laid his left hand on the open Book, raised his right arm, and slowly repeated the words of the oath:

"I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, so help me God!"

The words had scarcely died on his lips when the distant boom of cannon proclaimed the new President.