Lincoln, the unknown

15W.hen the newly formed Republican party met in Chicagoin the spring of 1860 to nominate a Presidential candidate, fewpeople dreamed that Abraham Lincoln had a chance. A shorttime before that, he himself had written to a newspaper editor:"I must in all candor say I do not think myself fit for the presidency."It was generally accepted in 1860 that the nomination honorswere going to the handsome William H. Seward of New York.There could hardly be any question about that, for straw ballotswere taken on the trains carrying the delegates to Chicago, andthey gave Seward twice as many votes as all the other candidatescombined. On many of the trains there was not a single ballotcast for Abraham Lincoln. It is possible that some of the delegatesdid not even know that such a man existed.The convention met on Seward's fifty-ninth birthday. Howfitting! He was positive that he would receive the nomination asa birthday present. He was so confident of it that he said good-byto his colleagues in the United States Senate and invited hisintimate friends to attend a great feast of celebration at his homein Auburn, New York; and a cannon was rented, hauled into hisfront yard, loaded, and cocked up in the air, ready to boomthe joyous news to the town.If the convention had started balloting on Thursday night,that cannon would have been fired, and the story of a nationwould have been changed; but the voting could not begin until108