46 North American Forests and Forestry 



they see its beauties, and feel its rugged strength, 

 merely in the tourist's superficial attitude ? How- 

 ever that may be, it is certain that to the back- 

 woodsmen we owe the conception of an America 

 extending throughout the continent, and even be- 

 yond, the ideal of a nation, strong, united, able to 

 lead in the affairs of the world, and ready to assume 

 such leadership when the opportunity offers, with- 

 out timid deference to foreign objections. The 

 generation which conceived this ideal passed away 

 just as its realization was made possible by the new 

 nation's baptism of fire, the Civil War ; and as if it 

 had been the special aim of Providence to set up a 

 conspicuous mark at the end of the period when 

 the forest-born generation had accomplished its 

 task, the President who guided us through the tre- 

 mendous struggle was the very personification of 

 that class of men, — the backwoodsman glorified. In 

 Abraham Lincoln all the repulsive characteristics 

 of the type, its coarseness, its brutality, its self-will, 

 had become gradually subdued through a long, 

 steadfast career of ever-widening responsibilities. 

 When, finally, the greatest responsibility was cast 

 upon this man that can fall to the lot of an Ameri- 

 can, all the dross had disappeared, and nothing re- 

 mained but the pure metal — strong, keen, tempered 

 to perfection, and yet at other times as soft and 

 pliable as gold without alloy. When from the lips 

 of that man, already under the shadow of death, — 

 although the throng that drank in his words knew 

 it not, — came those sentences of the Second 



