Lyndon Baines Johnson stared out triumphantly over the largest crowd ever assembled in Portland, Maine, as it roared its welcome. After a few minutes listening to the pandemonium, he looked down quizzically and shouted, "Now do you want me to listen to you or do you want to listen to me?" The answer was prompt and obvious, and the enraptured audience swallowed his every word.

This was the reaction at all six stops in New England last week, as the President received a hero's welcome in a section of the country reported in the polls to be favoring him over Sen. Barry Goldwater by about 60 to 40.

On the campaign trail, President Johnson is all things to all people. Whether discussing education in the humanities at Brown University, the need for a reasonable international stance in Manchester, New Hampshire, or the contributions of Vermont's Republican Senators to a bi-partisan foreign policy, he seemed to touch on the point of most concern to each group. With his web of homespun philosophy, face-to-face political common sense talk, and emotion-charged pleading, he is the embodiment of the great American ethic of the boy-who-grows-up-to-be-President. By the end of the day in New England, there was little evidence that the region had ever been a Republican stronghold.

At each stop in the tour, the President used basically the same technique: a prepared speech putting forward one of his major campaign themes (responsibility in government, the capture of the Republican Party by extremists); a lavish dose of praise for the particular state he was visiting; and a standard ending about "the faces I saw on my way into town from the airport this afternoon" and "the problems I must consider when I return to my big desk in that lonely room in the White House tonight."

Typical of his good will for the New England states were these hosannahs:

* "In all this lovable, prosperous, progressive land of the United States, the State of Connecticut is the most prosperous State."

* "Nature has blessed Maine with a beauty unmatched in all the world. But the Lord's greatest gift to Maine is the quality of its people."

* "Vermont was the first State admitted to the Union after the original thirteen . . . Vermont drafted the first State consitution to forbid slavery."

The President remained happy throughout his tour, as he discovered the spectacular crowds mobilized by each group of local leaders. He showed his appreciation for their work by devoting more than a fair share of attention to the local workers at every stop. The welcomes were carefully planned and well-executed by his advance men; for example, instead of landing at the major Hartford airport, the mammoth United Aircraft plant in East Hartford, where he would have an automatic greeting from its several thousand employees.

PRESIDENT JOHNSON enjoys nothing more than making a speech and mingling with the crowds on a campaign trip. Before it is time for him to speak--while the audience sings the Star Spangled Banner, or local dignitaries deliver their greetings--the President is silent and deep in thought, often chewing gum as he awaits his turn to speak. He begins slowly and softly, with a serene look on his face. As he goes farther into the speech, his drawl becomes more obvious and his words more forceful; he induces a given response from the crowd with his own facial expressions--sometimes an angry scowl--and his multiple hand gestures. As the day wears on and he becomes increasingly tired, he pushes himself harder, and this is often noticeable in his more sluggish rate of speach.

At all times and at all costs the President directs as much attention as possible to his wife. Lady Bird's compliments to the host city--as obviously overzealous as the President's--always delight the audience. As she walks along a fence shaking hands, she is often complimented upon her appearance by the delighted spectators. The President seems to use Lady Bird's speaking ability to give him an opportunity to rest before a major address. Once he has introduced her, the crowd pleads that she say a few words, and this gives him time to hastily review the talk he will give. Unlike her husband she never seems to show the strain of the day's hard campaigning.

President Johnson is particularly successful when he borrows Sen. Humphrey's technique of putting questions to the audience, to which they will respond with an obvious answer. Once he has built the crowd up to a feverish pitch, he will let loose with a battery of these challenges--including obvious questions about the people's support of a number of measures that Sen. Goldwater has opposed.

Despite the huge time lag which may develop--he was three hours late by the end of his New England tour--the President insists upon stopping wherever there is a substantial number of people to shake hands. He reaches one hand over the other in order to shake the largest number possible. By the end of his New England trip, both the President's hands were bleeding--and they had been treated several times during the day. The unbounded enthusiasm of the crowd means that they will even claw the President's hand, if only they can get close enough to do it.

The President's concern over his lateness--for which he continually apologized--was more than compensated for by the response he received everywhere. As Presidential Press Secretary George Reedy commented in Hartford, "It's worth it to be late for crowds like this. I've never seen anything like it."

At several stops on the New England tour, the Presidential party was astonished by a recurrence of the "jumpers" of President Kennedy's 1960 campaign. The squeals of delight from teenage girls often sounded as if it were The Beatles and not the President who had arrived in town. The mobs greeting the Presidential plane were so enthusiastic that they were often satisfied merely to shake the hand of the driver of the press bus--as long as it was someone "with" the President.