"
The serious side of this letter is undoubtedly genuine and candid, while
the somewhat over-exaggeration of the comic side points as clearly that
he had not fully recovered from the mental suffering he had undergone
in the long conflict between doubt and duty. From the beginning, the
match-making zeal of the sister had placed the parties in a false
position, produced embarrassment, and created distrust. A different
beginning might have resulted in a very different outcome, for Lincoln,
while objecting to her corpulency, acknowledges that in both feature and
intellect she was as attractive as any woman he had ever met; and Miss
Owens's letters, written after his death, state that her principal
objection lay in the fact that his training had been different from
hers, and that "Mr. Lincoln was deficient in those little links which
make up the chain of a woman's happiness." She adds: "The last message I
ever received from him was about a year after we parted in Illinois.
Mrs. Able visited Kentucky, and he said to her in Springfield, 'Tell
your sister that I think she was a great fool because she did not stay
here and marry me.'" She was even then not quite clear in her own mind
but that his words were true.
V
Springfield Society--Miss Mary Todd--Lincoln's Engagement--His Deep
Despondency--Visit to Kentucky--Letters to Speed--The Shields
Duel--Marriage--Law Partnership with Logan--Hardin Nominated for
Congress, 1843--Baker Nominated for Congress, 1844--Lincoln Nominated and
Elected, 1846
The deep impression which the Mary Owens affair made upon Lincoln is
further shown by one of the concluding phrases of his letter to Mrs.
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