nize. Meanwhile the so-called regular Legislature, which Congress had sanctioned, passed bill for the election of delegates by the people to frame a State Constitution for Kansas. An election was accordingly held; the Convention met, and after a stormy and protracted session, completed its work. The Lecompton Constitution, as it was called, when laid before Congress, met with strong opposition from the Republicans, on the ground that it had been fraudulently concocted. The President, however, gave it all his influence, believing that it would bring peace to the country, while not preventing Kansas from being a free State, should its people so desire; and finally, after a struggle of extraordinary violence and duration, it received the sanction of Congress.

But quiet was not restored. In the North, the feeling against the President and his party became intense. The election in 1860 resulted in the triumph of Abraham Lincoln, the Republican candidate for the Presidency. The period between Lincoln's election and his inauguration was one of peculiar trial to President Buchanan. An attempt to incite a slave insurrection, made at Harper's Ferry, in 1859, by John Brown, of Kansas, for which he was hanged by the authorities of Virginia, had created a profound sensation in the South, where it was regarded by many as indicative of the fixed purpose of the North to destroy slavery at all hazards. The election of Lincoln following

so soon after this event, added strength to their apprehensions. As soon as the result of the canvass became known, South Carolina seceded from the Union. Mr. Buchanan, apparently regarding the fears and complaints of the South. as not without some just grounds, seems to have endeavored to bring about a peaceful solution of the difficulties before him by attempts at conciliation. But however good his intentions may have been, his policy, which has been characterized as weak, vacillating, and cowardly, so signally failed, that when, on the 4th of March, 1861, he retired from the Presidency, he handed over to his successor an almost hopelessly divided Union, from which seven States had already seceded.

Mr. Buchanan also used his influence for the purchase of Cuba as a means of extending slave territory. He permitted the seizure of Southern forts and arsenals, and the removal of muskets from Northern to Southern armories as the secession movements matured, and in his message of December, 1860, he directly cast upon the North the blame of the disrupted Union.

Remaining in Washington long enough to witness the installation of Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Buchanan withdrew to the privacy of Wheatland, his country home, near Lancaster, in Pennsylvania. Here he spent the remainder of his days, taking no prominent part in public affairs. In 1866, he published a volume entitled, Mr. Buchanan's

Administration, in which he explained and defended the policy he had pursued while in the Presidential office. He never married. His death occurred at his mansion at Wheatland, on the 1st of June, 1868.

S

ABRAHAM LINCOLN,

IXTEENTH President of the Union, was born in Hardin County, Kentucky, on the 12th of February, 1809. His parents were extremely poor, and could give him but scant opportunities of education. It is supposed that his ancestors came to this country from England among the original followers of William Penn. About the middle of the last century they lived in Berks County, Pennsylvania, whence one branch of the family moved to Virginia. The subject of this sketch was taught to read and write by his mother, a woman of intelligence far above her humble station. When he was in his eighth year, the family removed to the then wilderness of Spencer County, Indiana, where, in the course of three or four years, the boy Abraham, who was quick and eager to learn, had a chance to acquire the rudiments of the more ordinary branches of such a common-school education as was to be obtained in that rude frontier district; but his mother died when he was about eleven years old,

which was to him a sad loss. At the age of nineteen, he set out in a flat-boat, containing a cargo of considerable value, on a voyage to New Orleans. While passing down the Mississippi, they were attacked by a thieving band of negroes, but they courageously beat off the robbers, and succeeded in reaching their destination safely.

In 1830, Lincoln's father removed to Decatur County, Illinois. Here Abraham assisted in establishing the new home. It was on this occasion that he split the famous rails from which, years after, he received his name of "the rail-splitter." During the severe winter which followed, by his exertions and skill as a hunter, he contributed greatly in keeping the family from starvation. The next two years he passed through as a farmhand and as a clerk in a country store. In the Black-Hawk War, which broke out in 1832, he served creditably as a volunteer, and on his return home ran for the Legislature, but was defeated. He next tried store-keeping, but failed; and then, having learned something of surveying, worked two or three years quite successfully as a surveyor for the Government. In 1834, he was elected to the Legislature, in which he did the extremély unpopular act of recording his name against some pro-slavery legislation of that body. He soon after took up the study of law, being admitted to the bar in 1837, when he removed to Springfield, and began to practice. John T. Stuart