For that end he had been
born, and inheritance and opportunity and inclination had worked
together for that end's perfection. While Lincoln had wrested from a
scanty schooling a command of English clear and forcible always,
but, he feared, rough-hewn, lacking, he feared, in finish and in
breadth--of what use was it for such a one to try to fashion a speech
fit to take a place by the side of Everett's silver sentences? He
sighed. Yet the people had a right to the best he could give, and he
would give them his best; at least he could see to it that the words
were real and were short; at least he would not, so, exhaust their
patience. And the work might as well be done now in the leisure of the
journey. He put a hand, big, powerful, labor-knotted, into first one
sagging pocket and then another, in search of a pencil, and drew out
one broken across the end. He glanced about inquiringly--there was
nothing to write upon. Across the car the Secretary of State had just
opened a package of books and their wrapping of brown paper lay on
the floor, torn carelessly in a zigzag. The President stretched a long
arm.
"Mr. Seward, may I have this to do a little writing?" he asked, and
the Secretary protested, insisting on finding better material.
But Lincoln, with few words, had his way, and soon the untidy stump
of a pencil was at work and the great head, the deep-lined face, bent
over Seward's bit of brown paper, the whole man absorbed in his task.
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