Sketch of the life of Abraham Lincoln Author:Isaac Newton Arnold Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: FONDNESS FOB POETRY. 59 scenery and old Norse legends. In reply to the expression of their delight, he said that he had read and admired the poem several year... more »s before, and it had entirely gone from him, but seeing them recalled it. The two books which he read most were the Bible and Shakespeare. With these he was very familiar, reading and studying them habitually and constantly. He had great fondness for poetry, and eloquence, and his taste and judgment in each was exquisite. Shakespeare was his favorite, poet; Burns stood next. I know of a speech of his at a Burns festival, in which he spoke at length of Burns's poems; illustrating what he said by many quotations, showing perfect familiarity with and full appreciation of the peasant poet of Scotland. He was extremely fond of ballads, and of simple, sad, and plaintive music. He was a most admirable reader. He read and repeated passages from the Bible and Shakespeare with great simplicity but remarkable expression and effect. Often when going to and from the army, on steamers and in his carriage, he took a copy of Shakespeare with him, and not unfrequently read, aloud to his associates. After conversing upon public affairs, he would take up his Shakespeare, and addressing his companions, remark, " What do you say now to a scene from Macbeth, or Hamlet, or Julius Caesar," and then he would read aloud, scene after scene, never seeming to tire of the enjoyment. On the last Sunday of his life, as he was coming up the Potomac, from his visit to City Point and Richmond, he read aloud many extracts from Shakespeare. Among others, he read, with an accent and feeling which no one who heard him will ever forget, extracts from Macbeth, and among others the following:— " Duncan is in his grave; After life's fitful fever, he sle...« less