AUSTIN, Texas -- After about 45 minutes of relatively polite debate and some prodding from the moderators, the two Democratic candidates for president last night finally lobbed a few zingers at each other on Iraq, health care, readiness to be president and plagiarism -- before ending on a note of mutual respect.

The 90-minute session between Sens. Hillary Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois, sponsored by CNN, Univision and the Texas Democratic Party, was occasionally contentious but mostly civil, with Mr. Obama -- who was battling a cold but celebrating his 11th straight primary or caucus victory -- stressing that he'd be better equipped to lead the country than would Mrs. Clinton and her more polarizing brand of politics.

"If we don't bring the country together, stop the endless bickering, actually focus on solutions and reduce the special interests that have dominated Washington, we will not get anything done," he said.

While some political observers had expected Mrs. Clinton -- who is running neck-and-neck with Mr. Obama in this state, according to polls released yesterday -- to sharpen her attacks on her opponent, she did not significantly ramp up her rhetoric beyond what she's been saying on the campaign trail.

Instead, during much of the debate, Mrs. Clinton seemed to be working hard to connect with her audience, both in the hall and across the country, displaying a warmth that was almost valedictory in tone, perhaps in a tacit recognition that her campaign is not going well.

"I am honored to be here with Barack Obama, I am absolutely honored," she said in the campaign's final moment, to loud applause and cheers from the audience. "Whatever happens, we will be fine."

One effort to go on the offensive did appear to fall flat, when she criticized Mr. Obama for failing to credit Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick for several lines he used in one of his speeches. "If your candidacy is going to be about words, they should be about your own words," she said. "And you know, lifting whole passages from someone else's speeches is not change you can believe in, it's change you can Xerox."

"Come on," responded Mr. Obama, as some in the audience jeered.

Mr. Obama also bristled when Mrs. Clinton suggested, as she has throughout her campaign, that hers is the more substantive legislative record. She noted that she was "somewhat amused the other night when, on one of the TV shows, one of Senator Obama's supporters was asked to name one accomplishment of Senator Obama, and he couldn't."

Mr. Obama countered that his 20 years of public service have yielded plenty of accomplishments, from health care for those who didn't have it, to tax breaks for families that needed it, criminal justice reform and aid to the "wounded warriors at Walter Reed [Army Hospital] who, prior to me getting to the Senate, were having to pay for their meals and pay for their phone calls to their family while ... recovering from amputations. I think they've said I've engaged not just in talk, but in action."

The two also engaged in an extended debate over health care, with Mr. Obama disputing Mrs. Clinton's assertion that their campaign's proposals differ substantially. She supports universal health care that requires all Americans to buy insurance; his plan lacks that mandate.

"The notion that I am 'leaving 15 million people out' [as Mrs. Clinton contends] somehow implies that we are different in our goals of providing coverage to all Americans, and that is simply not true," Mr. Obama said. "We think that there's going to be a different way of getting there."

Mrs. Clinton refused to concede the point, despite a moderator's effort to move on. Participation in Social Security and Medicare is also involuntary, which is why they worked, she said. "I just know that if we don't go and require everyone to have health insurance, the health insurance industry will still game the system."

Mr. Obama directly addressed one of Mrs. Clinton's favorite campaign mantras of late, suggesting that his supporters needed to "get real" and recognize that she was offering substantive solutions, rather than just lofty speeches. "Senator Clinton of late has said: Let's get real. The implication is that the people who've been voting for me or involved in my campaign are somehow delusional," he said, drawing laughter from the audience.

"You know, the thinking is that somehow, they're being duped, and eventually they're going to see the reality of things. Well, I think they perceive the reality of what's going on in Washington very clearly."

Texas, along with Ohio, holds its primary March 4, and both are states that Mrs. Clinton must win if she is to prevail over Mr. Obama, who currently leads in delegate votes by a slight margin, although neither has the 2,025 needed to assure nomination at their party's August national convention in Denver.

Texas, with its 228 delegates, is a particularly rich prize.

This is the 19th time the two have appeared in a debate together, and for Mrs. Clinton, it's almost the last time she will be able to confront her rival publicly before a national audience ahead of the March 4 contests; their final debate is next Tuesday on MSNBC.

While Mr. Obama has been consistently drawing Texas crowds in the tens of thousands, Mrs. Clinton's have been far smaller, and the New York senator, who has spent four days in the state in the past week, is battling some fierce political headwinds.

A pair of new polls released yesterday showed her slightly leading in Ohio and in a statistical dead heat with Sen. Obama in Texas, even as excitement is building about the Lone Star state's high-profile role in this year's election. A record number of Texas' 12.6 million registered voters headed to the polls already, since its residents are allowed to vote early.

Last night's debate was the first face-to-face encounter since Jan. 31 in Hollywood, where the two avoided personal attacks and Mr. Obama -- who declared that the two were friends and would be so even after the election is over -- even graciously pulled out Mrs. Clinton's chair for her.

The Texas debate followed a day of posturing and pre-game psyching out by both candidates. At a Dallas rally attended by 16,000 people, Mr. Obama charged that Mrs. Clinton represented the politics of "division and distraction," while she, appearing in Laredo in South Texas, repeated her claim that she was better prepared to be president.

The debate, which started at 8 pm EST, was shown live on CNN and aired in Spanish at 11:30 pm EST. Today, Mrs. Clinton returns to Ohio, while Mr. Obama has scheduled a rally tonight in front of the Texas capitol in Austin.