McClures Magazine, Volume VI, No. 3. February 1896 | Page 3

poet, a philosopher, ah! a hero, a
martyr--and, yes, this young man might have been--he even was
Abraham Lincoln! This was he with the world before him. It is good
fortune to have the magical revelation of the youth of the man the
world venerates. This look into his eyes, into his soul--not before he
knew sorrow, but long before the world knew him--and to feel that it is
worthy to be what it is, and that we are better acquainted with him and
love him the more, is something beyond price."]
[Illustration: LINCOLN IN 1859.
From a photograph in the collection of H.W. Fay, De Kalb, Illinois.
The original was made by S.M. Fassett, of Chicago; the negative was
destroyed in the Chicago fire. This picture was made at the solicitation
of D.B. Cook, who says that Mrs. Lincoln pronounced it the best
likeness she had ever seen of her husband. Rajon used the Fassett
picture as the original of his etching, and Kruell has made a fine
engraving of it.]
[Illustration: LINCOLN IN THE SUMMER OF 1860.

From a copy (made by E.A. Bromley of the Minneapolis "Journal" staff)
of a photograph owned by Mrs. Cyrus Aldrich, whose husband, now
dead, was a congressman from Minnesota. In the summer of 1860 Mr.
M.C. Tuttle, a photographer of St. Paul, wrote to Mr. Lincoln
requesting that he have a negative taken and sent to him for local use in
the campaign. The request was granted, but the negative was broken in
transit. On learning of the accident, Mr. Lincoln sat again, and with the
second negative he sent a jocular note wherein he referred to the fact,
disclosed by the picture, that in the interval he had "got a new coat." A
few copies of the picture were made by Mr. Tuttle, and distributed
among the Republican editors of the State. It has never before been
reproduced. Mrs. Aldrich's copy was presented to her by William H.
Seward, when he was entertained at the Aldrich homestead (now the
Minneapolis City Hospital) in September, 1860. A fine copy of this
same photograph is in the possession of Mr. Ward Monroe, of Jersey
City, N.J.]
William F. Berry, the partner of Lincoln, was the son of a Presbyterian
minister, the Rev. John Berry, who lived on Rock Creek, five miles
from New Salem. The son had strayed from the footsteps of the father,
for he was a hard drinker, a gambler, a fighter, and "a very wicked
young man." Lincoln cannot in truth be said to have chosen such a
partner, but rather to have accepted him from the force of
circumstances. It required only a little time to make it plain that the
partnership was wholly uncongenial. Lincoln displayed little business
capacity. He trusted largely to Berry; and Berry rapidly squandered the
profits of the business in riotous living. Lincoln loved books as Berry
loved liquor, and hour after hour he was stretched out on the counter of
the store or under a shade tree, reading Shakespeare or Burns.
[Illustration: LINCOLN EARLY IN 1861.--PROBABLY THE
EARLIEST PORTRAIT SHOWING HIM WITH A BEARD.
From a photograph in the collection of H.W. Fay of De Kalb, Illinois,
taken probably in Springfield early in 1861. It is supposed to have been
the first, or at least one of the first, portraits made of Mr. Lincoln after
he began to wear a beard. As is well known, his face was smooth until
about the end of 1860; and when he first allowed his beard to grow, it
became a topic of newspaper comment, and even of caricature. A pretty
story relating to Lincoln's adoption of a beard is more or less familiar.

A letter written to the editor of the present Life, under date of
December 6, 1895, by Mrs. Grace Bedell Billings, tells this story, of
which she herself as a little girl was the heroine, in a most charming
way. The letter will be found printed in full at the end of this article, on
page 240.]
His thorough acquaintance with the works of these two writers dates
from this period. In New Salem there was one of those curious
individuals sometimes found in frontier settlements, half poet, half
loafer, incapable of earning a living in any steady employment, yet
familiar with good literature and capable of enjoying it--Jack Kelso. He
repeated passages from Shakespeare and Burns incessantly over the
odd jobs he undertook or as he idled by the streams--for he was a
famous fisherman--and Lincoln soon became one of his constant
companions. The taste he formed in company with Kelso he retained
through life. William D. Kelley tells an incident which shows that
Lincoln had a really intimate knowledge of Shakespeare. Mr. Kelley
had taken McDonough, an actor, to call at the