That the book was once owned by Lincoln would appear certain. His signature on the flyleaf is in his firm, mature hand, written as he was accustomed to write it until some time after he became President, "A. Lincoln." The ownership would appear to be still further attested by an inscription on the inside of the front cover, "Compliments to Master Abe Lincoln, and good success, truly yours, Charles Anthon, Columbia College." But this inscription raises more questions than it answers. I am not familiar with the handwriting of Professor Anthon, but I am disposed to question the genuineness of this inscription. That it has been received as genuine by previous owners of the book is attested by the fact that another hand has written before "Columbia College" the words "A Prof." evidently that Professor Anthon might be properly introduced to persons who did not know him. Professor Anthon was a noted classical scholar, but I cannot help wondering at what period of his career he could have come into personal touch with Abraham Lincoln. Not, certainly, in 1825, when the book was published, and when Lincoln was sixteen years old. And at what later period would Professor Anthon have addressed him as "Master Abe Lincoln"? If Anthon came to know Lincoln personally so as to care to present him with one of his books, it would seem as if he would have given him a book of which he was the sole or chief author, and not one in which his part was confined to the appendix. Anthon's interest in the Greek was primarily classical, and that of the author of this work was primarily Biblical. If Anthon came to know Lincoln it would probably have been after Lincoln had become a national figure, say in 1848 or some later year, by which time a book issued in 1825 would have become an old story to an author engaged in publishing new books. Let me, then, in the absence of direct evidence, venture the hypothesis that the book was really owned by Lincoln; that it came into his possession not earlier than the time when, having mastered Kirkham's Grammar, he welcomed the ownership of a book which suggested the possible knowledge of a classical tongue. That he bought the book is hardly probable; that it was the gift of Professor Anthon is improbable, because there would appear to have been no contact between the two at a period when such a gift would have been appropriate: let us assume, then, that someone else gave him the book, and that the attribution to Professor Anthon is the conjectural record of a later owner.[47]