" The editor, as in duty bound, asked Lincoln
what he should do, and was instructed to give Lincoln's name, and not to
mention the ladies. Then followed a letter from Shields to Lincoln
demanding retraction and apology, Lincoln's reply that he declined to
answer under menace, and a challenge from Shields. Thereupon Lincoln
instructed his "friend" as follows: If former offensive correspondence
were withdrawn and a polite and gentlemanly inquiry made, he was
willing to explain that:
"I did write the 'Lost Townships' letter which appeared in the 'Journal'
of the 2d instant, but had no participation in any form in any other
article alluding to you. I wrote that wholly for political effect; I had
no intention of injuring your personal or private character or standing
as a man or a gentleman; and I did not then think, and do not now think,
that that article could produce or has produced that effect against you,
and had I anticipated such an effect I would have forborne to write it.
And I will add that your conduct toward me, so far as I know, had always
been gentlemanly, and that I had no personal pique against you and no
cause for any.... If nothing like this is done, the preliminaries of the
fight are to be:
"_First_. Weapons: Cavalry broadswords of the largest size, precisely
equal in all respects, and such as now used by the cavalry company at
Jacksonville.
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