Page:McClure's Magazine volume 10.djvu/154

340

gathered by this magazine a series of eight are published herewith. Representing Mr. Lincoln at intervals in the seventeen last and most fruitful years of his life, they give trustworthy and interesting data for a study both of the man's appearance and of his character.

I.—The earliest portrait (page 339) was taken when Lincoln was about forty years old; that is, when he was serving his only term in Congress. Indeed, it is not impossible that this daguerreotype was made in Washington, since at that time one of the rooms of the capitol was set aside for a daguerreotyper, and most of the members of Congress had their portraits made by what was still a new process and one regarded with curiosity. The Lincoln of this daguerreotype is a curious contradiction to the Lincoln in the popular mind. His dress, instead of being "uncouth," as tradition represents it,