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AIIIC ■pURsrEL) HIS STUIiJtS" L^Ni^ER THE GL^inANCK OF

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The Story of
Young Abraham Lincoln

By -
i WAYNE WHIPPLE

; *

' Author of The Story of the Americftn Flag, The Story of the
liberty Bell, The Story of the White HoiiBe, The Story
of Young Oeorge Washingtoo, the Btoiy of
I Young Beujamui Franklin, etc

Illustrated

PHILADELPHIA

HENRY ALTEMT7S COMPANY

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CONa?ENTS

CSAFTER PlSI

IsTBOimanas 9

I, AHBJTTtif hrSOOLS'B Foat3ATKEB8 15

n. AnpiTTi-if LnrcOLN's Father akd Uoth^ 20

m. The Bot Lihcolk's Bbst Teacher 29

IV. LKAmriNQ TO Wore: 34

V. Loauro His Uothcr 46

TI. ScHOoii Days Now and Then 64

Vn. Abe and the NsioHBCns 69

ym. ICoviNa TO iLLmois 8G

IX. Bruama Our tor Hihselt 94

S. Clerking and Woreino 107

XI. PoLincB, War, Store Keeping and Studying Law. .118

Xn. BUTINO and KXEPISQ A Store 132

Xm. The Yodno Legislator in Lovb 139

XIY. UOVINO TO SPRIHGriKLD 154

XY. Lincoln & Herndon 176

XVI. Hia Kindness op Heart 186

XVn. WoAT Kade ihe Diitebence Between Abrahau

Linooln AND His Stepbrother 198

XVllI. "No End of a Bot" 204

XIX. LzxDTXKANT Tad Linoolk, Patriot 216

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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Abb "PnBsmED His Smsaft" tTNDKB the Guidano

OF His Kcfher FrontispieM

His Stock op Books Was Suali^ Bdt Thky Webb

THX Bioar Kini> Facing 63

THsFntsrWORK Abe Did m That KEiaEBOREoOD., " OS
"Lancohtt," Said He, "You Havx Throwtj- Me Twice,

But Tor Can't Whip Me" " 108

"TotT ShawI Hubt This Pooe Old Inman" " 130

He Took the Cradijs and Led All the Wat Bound " 146
One of His Speeches Was Delivered Fboh the

Dooa OP A Hakness Shop " 173

He Used to Cabby tss Boy "Pigk-a-Baok," *' 206

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INTRODUCTION

Lincoln From New and Untsual Sottbcbs

The boy or girl who reads to-day may know
more about the real Lincoln than his own chil-
dren knew. The greatest President's son, Rob-
ert Lincobi, discussing a certain incident in their
life in the White House, remarked to the writer,
with a smile full of meaning:

"I believe you know more about out family
matters than I dol"

This is because "all the world loves a lover" —
and Abraham Lincoln loved everybody. Witii
aU his brain and brawn, his real greatness was
in his heart He has been called "the Great-
Heart of the White House," and there is little
doubt that more people have hetu'd about him
than there are who have read of the original
"Great-Heart" in "The Pilgrim's Progress."

Indeed, it is safe to say that more millions in

the modem world are acquainted with the story

of the rise of Abraham Lincoln from a poorly

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Introduction

built log calon to the highest place amoi^ "the
seats of the ndghtf," than are fanuliar with the
Bible story of Joseph who arose and stood next
to the throne of the Pharaohs.

Nearly every year, especially since the Ian-
coin GentemuEil, 1909, something new has been
added to the uniyersal knowledge of one of the
greatest, if not the greatest man who ever lived
his life in the world. Not only those who "knew
Lincoln, ' ' but many who only * ' saw bim once ' * or
shook hands with him, have been called upon to
tell what they saw bim do or heard him say. So
hearty was his kindness toward everybody that
the most casual remark of his seems to be
charged with deep human affection — f* ttie touch
of Nature" which has made "the whole world
kin" to bim.

He knew just how to sympathize with every
one. The people felt this, without knowing why,
and recognized it in every deed or word or touch,
so that those who have once felt the grasp of his
great warm hand seem to have been drawn into
the strong circuit of "Lincoln fellowship," and
were enabled, as if by "the laying on of hands,"
to speak of him ever after with a deep and ten-
der feeling.

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Introduction

There are many such people who did not rush
into print with their observations and experi-
ences. Their Lincohi memories seemed too sa-
cred to scatter far and wide. Some of them have
yielded, with real reluctance, in relating all for
publication in The Story of Young Abraham
LnfcOLH only because they wished their recol-
lections to b^iefit the rising generation.

Several of these modest folk have shed true
light on important phases and events in Lin-
coln's life history. For instance, there has been
much discussion concerning Lincoln's Gettys-
burg Address — ^where was it written, and did he
deliver it from notes!

Now, fifty years after that great occasion,
comes a distinguished college professor who un-
consciously settles tiie whole dispute, whether
Lincoln held his notes in his right hand or his
left — if he used them at all I — ^whUe making his
immortal "little speech." To a group of vet-
erans of the Grand Army of the Republic he re-
lated, casually, what he saw while a college stu-
dent at Gettysburg, after working his way
through the crowd of fifteen tiiousand people to
the front of the platform on that memorable
day. From this point of vantage he saw and
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Iiitroduciion

heard everything, and there is no gainsaying the
vivid memories of his first impressions — how the
President held the little pages in both h^ids
straight down before him, swinging his taU form
to right, to left and to the front again as he em-
phasized the now familiar closing words, "of the
people — hy the people — for the people — shall not
perish from the earth."

Such data have been gathered from various
sources and are here given for the first time in a
connected life-story. Several corrections of
stories giving rise to popular misconceptions
have been supplied by Eobert, Lineoln's only liv-
ing son. One of these is the true version of
"Bob's" losing the only copy of his father's first
inaugural address. Others were furnished by
two aged Illinois friends who were acquainted
with "Abe" before he became famous. One of
these explained, without knowing it, a question
which has puzzled several biographers— how a
young man of Lincoln's shrewd intelligence
could have been guiWy of such a misdemeanor,
as captain in the Black Hawk War, as to make it
necessary for his superior officer to deprive him
of his sword for a single day.

A new story is told by a dear old lady, who did
12

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Introduction

not wish her name given, about herself vihen she
was a little girl, when a "drove of lawyers riding
the old Eighth Judicial District of Ulinois,"
came to drink from a famous cold spring on her
father's premises. She described the uncouth
dress of a tall young man, asking her father who
he was, and he replied with a laugh, "Oh, that's
Abe Lincoln."

One day in their rounds, as the lawyers came
through the front gate, a certain judge, whose
name the narrator refused to divulge, knocked
down with his cane her pet doll, which was lean-
ing against the fence. The little girl cried over
this contemptuous treatment of her "child."

Toung Lawyer Lincoln, seeing it all, sprang in
and quickly picked up the fallen dolL Brusldng
ofE the dust with his great awkward hand he
said, soothingly, to the wounded little mother-
heart:

"There now, little Black Eyes, don't cry.
Tour baby's alive. See, she isn't hurt a bit I"

That tall young man never looked uncouth to
her after that. It was this same old lady who
told the writer that Lawyer Lincoln wore a new
suit of clothes for the first time on the very day
that he performed the oft-described feat of rea-
13

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Introduction

cuing a helpless hog from a great deep hole in
the road, and plastered his new clothes with mud
to the great merriment of his legal friends. This
well-known incident occurred not far from her
father's place near Paris, HL

These and many other new and corrected inci-
dents are now collected for The Story op
TouxG A BR ATT AM LINCOLN, in addition to the
best of everything suitable that was known be-
fore — as the highest patriotic service which the
writer can render to the young people of the
United States of America.

Wayne Whipple.

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THE STORY OF
TOTING ABRAHAM LINCOLN

CHAPTER I

Abraham Lincoln ^s Forefathers

Lincoln's grandfather, for whom he was
named Abraham, was a distant cousin to Daniel
Boone. The Boones and the Lincohis had inter-
married for generations. The Lincohis were of
good old English stock. When he was Presi-
dent, Abraham Lincoln^ who had never given
much attention to the family pedigree, said that
the history of his family was well described by
a single line in Gray's "Elegy":
"The short and simple annals of the poor."
Yet Grandfather Abraham was wealthy for
his day. He accompanied Boone from Virginia
to Kentucky and lost his life there. He had sac-
rificed part of his property to the pioneer spirit
within him, and, with the killing of their father,
his family lost the rest They were "land poor"
15

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The Story of Toung

in the wilderness of the "Dark Bloody Ground"
— the meaning of the Indian name, Kentucky.

Grandfather Lincoln had cleared a little farm
in the woods and built a substantial cabin of
logs. One day he was out with his three sons,
working in the edge of the clearing, not far from
the house, when some Indians crept near and
shot him down, without the least warning, from
the underbrush. The three boys scattered in-
stinctively as a brood of young turkeys -^en'
their motiier is shot Mordecai, the eldest,
rushed into the house for a gun, Josiah, the next
in age, ran off to a neighboring stockade for
help to defend the little home, and Thomas was
left, dazed and helpless, beside the dead bo^ of
his father.

As soon as Mordecai Lincoln got the gun, he
peeped out through a chink left for the purpose
and saw an Indian picking up his little brother
as if to make oS with him. Thrusting the rifle
through the primitiye porthole, he took aim and
flred at a silver ornament on the breast of the
savage. It was a good diot. The Indian fell to
the ground and the little boy, astonished at be-
ing suddenly released, ran toward the house as
fast as his Uttle legs could carry him.
16

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Abraham Lincoln

Other Indians appeared from the thicket and,
with yells of rage, ran after the frightened
child. Mordecai waa equal to the occasion; fir-
ing from his point of vantage, he shot the fore-
most Indians before they coiild seize his small
brother, and kept the others at bay until poor
little Tom had come in safe, and Josiah had
brought men to their relief from the fort.

But Mordecai Lincoln was not satisfied with
killing a few Indians at the time of his father's
death. Vowing vengeance on the whole race of
red men, he became an Indian stalker, shooting
down Kentucky savages wherever he found
them, without so much as waiting to see whether
they were friends or foes. In this he was as un-
reasoning and cruel as the Indians who had shot
his father without cause. Mordecai shared the
pioneer belief that "The only good Indian is a
dead Indian."

Because of his bitter hatred for Indians and
his excellent marksmanship, Mordecai became
sheriff of the county and came to be greatly re-
spected in the community, which elected him to
the State Legislature. According to the English
custom of leaving the property to the eldest son,
vihiciL still prevailed in Yirgioia, Mordecai got
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The Storjr of Young

his father*s timber lands and meager improve-
ments. This seemed right enough, for he alone
was old enough to take care of it.

Anna Lincoln, the widow of Abraham, the
pioneer, left their cabin home in JefEerson
Comity, and moved to the adjoining county of
Washington. Very little is known of her or of
her second son, Josiah. Little Tom, who, at six
years of age, had seen his father shot down by
the Indians, is known all over the world because
he became the father of Abraham Lincoln, the
sixteenth President of the TTnited States.

When only ten years old, Thomas Lincoln
was "a wandering laboring boy," who worked
as a farm helper or "hand," and learned the
trade of "carpenter and joiner." He grew to
be good-natured, rather taU, with a powerful
frame, and acquired a reputation as a wrestler.

Mordecai Lincoln was a pioneer joker and
humorist. One of his acquaintances described
him thus:

"He was a man of great drollery and it would
almost make you laugh to look at him. I never
saw but one other man whose quiet, droll look
excited in me the disposition to lau^ and that
was 'Artemua Ward.'

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Abraham Lincoln

"Mordecai was quite a stoiy-teller, and in
this Abe resembled his 'Uncle Mord,' as we
called him, He was an honest man, as tender-
hearted as a woman, and to the last degree char-
itable and benevolent.

"Abe Lincoln had a very high opinion of his
miele. Mid on one occasion remarked, *I have
often said that Uncle Mord had run off with all
the talents of the family.' '*

In a letter about his family history, just be-
fore he was nominated for the president^, Abra-
ham Lincoln wrote :

*'My parents were both bom in Virginia, of
undistii^uished families — second families, per-
haps I should say. My mother was of a family
of the name of Hanks. My paternal grand-
father, Abraham Lincoln, emigrated from Rock-
ingham Counly, Virginia, to Kentucky about
1781 or 2, where, a year or two later, he was
killed by Lidians — ^uot in battle, but by stealth,
when he was laboring to open a farm in the
forest. His ancestors, who were Quakers, went
to Virginia from Berks Coimty, Pennsylvania.
An effort to identify them with the New Eng-
land family of the same name ended in nothing
more definite than a similarity of Ghristiau
19

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The Story of Young

names inbotti families, such as Enoch, Levi,
Mordecai, Solomon, Abraham, and the like.

"My father, at the death of his father, was but
six years of age ; and he grew up, literally with-
out education.**

CHAPTER n

Ahbaham Lincoln's Father and MorsoESt

"While Thomas Lincoln was living with a
farmer and doing odd jobs of carpentering, he
met Nancy Hanks, a tall, slender woman, witii
dark skin, dark brown hair and small, deep-set
gray eyes. She had a full forehead, a sharp,
angular face and a sad expression. Tet her dis-
position was generally cheerful. For her back-
woods advantages she was considered well edu-
cated. She read weU and could write, too. It is
stated that Nancy Hanks taught Thomas Lin-
coln to write his own name. Thomas was twenty-
five and Nancy twenty-three when their wed-
ding day came. Christopher Columbus Graham,
when almost one hundred years old, gave the

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Abraham Lincoln

following description of the marriage feast of
the Lincoln bride and groom:

"I am one of the two living men who can
prove that Abraham Lincoln, or Linkhom, as
the family was miscalled, was bom in lawful
wedlock, for I saw Thomas Lincoln marry
Kancy Hanks on the 12th day of June, 1806. I
was hunting roots for my medicine and just went
to the wedding to get a good supper and got it.

"Tom Lincoln was a carpenter, and a good
one for those days, when a cabin was built
maiidy with the ax, and not a nail or a bolt or
hinge in it, only leathers and pins to the doors,
and no glass, except in watches and spectacles
and bottles. Tom had the best set of tools in
what was then and is now Washington County.

"Jesse Head, the good Methodist minister
that married them, was also a carpenter or cabi-
net maker by trade, and as he was then a neigh-
bor, they were good friends.

"While you pin me down to facts, I will say
that I saw Nancy Hanks Lincoln at her wedding,
a fresh-looking girl, I should say over twenty.
Tom was a respectable mechanic and could
choose, and she vraa treated with respect.

"I was at the infare, too, given by John H.
21

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The Story of Young

Parrott, her guardian, and only girls with
money had guardians appointed by the court.
We had bear meat; venison; wild turkey and
ducks' e^:s, wild and tame — bo common that
you could buy them at two bits a bushel; maple
sugar, swung on a string, to bite ofE for coffee;
syrup in big gourds, peach and honey; a sheep
that the two families barbecued whole over coals
of wood burned in a pit, and covered with green
boughs to keep the juices in. Our table was of
the puncheons cut from solid logs, and the next
day they were the floor of the new cabin."

Thomas Lincoln took his bride to live in a
little log cabin in a Kentucky settlement — ^not a
village or hardly a hamlet — called Elizabetii-
town. He evidently thought this place would be
less lonesome for his wife, while he was away
hunting and carpentering, than the lonely farm
he had purchased in Hardin County, about four-
teen miles away. There was so little carpenter-
ing or cabinet making to do that he could make
a better living by farming or hunting. Thomas
was very fond of shooting and as he was a fine
marksman he could provide game for the table,
and other things which are considered luxuries
to-day, such as furs and skins needed for the

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Abraham Lincoln

primitive wearing apparel of the pioneers. A
daughter was bom to the young couple at Eliza-
bethtown,'whom they named Sarah.

Dennis Hanks, a eousin of Nancy, lived near
the Lincolns in the early days of their married
life, and gave Mrs. Eleanor Atkinson this de-
scription of their early life together :

"Looks didn't count them days, nohow. It
was strength an' work an' daredevil. A lazy
man or a coward was jist pizen, an' a spindlin'
feller had to stay in the settleniints. The
clearin's hadn't no use fur him. Tom was
strong, an' he wasn't lazy nor afeer'd o' nothin',
but he was kind o* shif less — couldn't git nothin'
ahead, an' didn't keer putiekalar. Lots o' them
kind o' fellers in 'arly days, 'druther hunt and
fish, an' I reckon they had their use. They
killed off the varmints an' made it safe fur other
fellers to go into the woods with an ax.

"When Nancy married Tom he was workin'
in a carpenter shop. It wasn't Tom's fault he
couldn't make a livin' by his trade. Thar was
sca'cely any money in that kentry. Every man
had to do his own tinkerin', an' keep everlast-
inly at work to git enough to eat So Tom tuk
up some laud. It was mighty ornery land, but it

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The Story of Young

was the best Tom could git, when he hadn't
much to trade fur it.

"Pore? We was all pore, them days, but the
Lincolns was p&rer than anybody. Choppin'
trees an' grubbin' roots an' splittin* raUa an'
huntin' an' trappin' didn't leave Tom no time.
It was all he could do to git his f ambly enough
to eat and to kiver *em. Nancy was turrible
ashamed o' the way they lived, but she knowed
Tom was doin' his best, an' she wa'n't the pes-
terin'kind. She waspurtyasapietur'an'smart
as you'd find 'em anjrwhere. She could read an'
write. The Hankses was some smarter'n the
Lincolns. Tom thought a heap o* Nancy, an' he
was as good to her as he knowed how. He didn't
drink or swear or play cyards or fight, an' them
was drinkin', cussin', quarrelsome days. Tom
was popylar, an' he coidd lick a bully if he had
to. He jist couldn't git ahead, somehow."

"kanct's bot baby"

Evidently Elizabethtown faUed to furnish
Thomas Lincoln a living wage from carpenter-
ing, for he moved with his young wife and his
baby girl to a farm on Nolen Creek, fourteen
miles away. The chief attraction of the so-called

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Abraham Lineoln

farm was a fine spring of water bubbling up in
the shade of a small grove. From this spring
the place came to be known as "Bock Spring
Farm." It was a barren spot and the cabin on
it was a rude and primitive sort of home for a
carpenter and joiner to occupy. It contained
but a single room, with only one window and
one door. There was a wide fireplace in the big
chimney which was built outside. But that rude
hut became the home of "the greatest Ameri-
can."

Abraham Lincoln was bom to poverty and
privation, but he was never a pauper. His hard-
ships were those of many other pioneers, the
wealthiest of whom suffered greater privations
than the poorest laboring man h^ to endure to-
day.

After his nomination to the presidency, Mr.
Lincoln gave to Mr. Hicks, a portrait painter,
this memorandum of his birtii :

"I was bom February 12, 1809, in
then Hardin County, Kentucky, at a
point within the now county of Larue, a
mile or a mile and a half from where
Hodgen's mill now is. My parents being
dead, and my memory not serving, I
25

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The Story; of Young

know no means of identifying the pre-
cise locality. It was on Nolen Creek.

"A. LiKGOLN.

"June 14, 1860."

The exact spot was identified after Ms death,
and the house was found standing many years
later. The lo^ were removed to Chicago, for
the World's Columbian Exposition, in 1893, and
the cabin was reconstructed and exhibited there
and elsewhere in the United States. The ma-
terials were taken back to their original site,
and a fine marble structure now encloses the
precious relics of the birthplace of "the first
American," as Lowell calls Lincoln in his great
"Commemoration Ode."

Cousin Dennis Hanks gives the following
quaint description of "Nancy's boy baby," as
reported by Mrs. Eleanor Atkinson in her little
book on "Lincoln's Boyhood.'*

"Tom an' Nancy lived on a farm about two
miles from us, when Abe was bom. I ricoUect
Tom comin' over to our house one cold momin*
in Feb'uary an' sayin' kind o' slow, 'Nancy's
got a boy baby.'

"Mother got flustered an* hurried up 'er work

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Abraham Liiicoln

to go over to look after the little feller, but I
didn't have nothin' to wait fur, so I cut an' run
the hull two mile to see my new cousin.

"You bet I was tickled to death. Babies
wasn't as common as blackberries in the woods
o'Kaintucky. Mother come over an* washed him
an' put a yaller flannel petticoat on hTm, an'
cooked some dried berries with wild honey fur
Nancy, an' slicked things up an' went home.
An' that's all the nuss'n either of 'em got.

"I rolled up in a b'ar skin an' slep' by the fire-
place that night, so's I could see the little feller
when he cried an' Tom had to get up an' tend
to him. Nancy let me hold him purty soon.
Folks often ask me if Abe was a good lookin'
baby. Well, now, he looked just like any other
baby, at fust — ^like red cherry pulp squeezed dry.
An' he didn't improve none as he growed older.
Abe never was much fur looks. I ricollect how
Tom joked about Abe's long legs when he was
toddlin' round the cabin. He growed out o' his
clothes faster 'n Nancy could make 'em.

"But he was mighty good comp'ny, solemn as

a papoose, but interested in everything. An' he

always did have fits o' cuttin' up. I've seen him

when he was a little feller, settiu' on a stool,

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The Story of Young

Btarin' at a visitor. AH of a sudden he'd bu'st
out laughin* fit to kill. If he told us what he
was laughin' at, half the time we couldn't see no
joke.

"Abe never give Nancy no trouble after he
could walk excep' to keep him in clothes. Most
o' the time he went bar 'foot. Ever wear a wet
buckskin glove? Them moccasins wasn't no
putectionag'instthe wet Birch bark with hick-
-ory bark soles, strapped on over yam socks,
beat buckskin all holler, fur snow. Abe'n me
got purty handy contrivin' things that way. An*
Abe was right out in the woods about as soon's
he was weaned, £shin' in the creek, settin' traps
fur rabbits an' muskrats, goia' on coon-hunts
with Tom an* me an' the dogs, follerin' up bees
to find bee-trees, an' drappin' com fur his
pappy. Mighty interestin' life fur a boy, but
thar was a good many chances he wouldn't live
to grow up."

When little Abe was f oiu: years old Ms fattier
and mother moved from Rock Spring !Farm to
a better place on Knob Creek, fifteen miles to
the northeast of the farm where he was bom.

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Abraham Lincoln

CHAPTER in

The Boy Lincoln's Best Teacheb

At Knob Creee: the boy began to go to an
"A B C" school His first teacher was Zacha-
riah Riney. Of course, there were no regular
schools in the backwoods then. When a man
who "knew enough" happened to come along,
especially if he had nothing else to do, he tried
to teach the children of the pioneers in a poor
log sehoolhouse. It is not likely that little Abe
went to school more than a few weeks at this
time, for he never had a year's schooling in his
life. There was another teacher afterward at
Knob Creek— a man named Caleb Hazel. Little
is known of either of these teachers except that
he taught little Abe Lincoln. If their pupil had
not become famous the men and their schools
would never have been mentioned in history.

An old man, named Austin 0oUaher, used to
like to teU of the days when he and little Abe
went to school together. He said:

"Abe was an unusually bright boy; at school,

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The Storjr of Toimg

and made splendid progress in his studies. In-
deed, he learned faster than any of his school-
mates. Though so young, he studied very hard.
He would get spicewood bushes, hack them up
on a log, and bum them, two or three together,
for the purpose of giving light by which he
mig^t pursue his studies."

It is likely that Abe "pursued his studies"
under the guidance of his mother, who had
taught his father to write his own name. Mrs.
Nancy Lincoln must have taken great pains to
instruct her little girl and boy, especially as Abe
began so early to show a real thirst for knowl-
edge. She told the children Bible stories, and
sudi other tales as she had been able to learn in
her limited backwoods life, by the light of the
open fire of spicewood boughs. After the boy
became a great and famous man, he remembered
with deep tenderness those quiet evenings when
his mother told stories by tiie firelight. The fact
that he had cut the spicewood boughs to add to
his mother's pleasure must have added a pleas-
ant fragrance to his own memories of her and
their happy days together on Knob Creek Farm.

Austin GoUaher was still living in his old log
cabin near the Lincoln house nearly twenty years
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Abraham lincoln

after Lincoln's assassination, and gave the fol-
lowing account of an adventure he had with the
little liineoln boy :

"I once saved Lincoln's life. We had been
goii^ to school together one year; but the next
year we had no school, because there were so few
scholars to attend, there being only about twenty
in the school the year before.

' ' Consequently Abe and I had not much to do ;
but, as we did not go to school and our mothers
were strict with us, we did not get to see each
other very often. One Sunday morning my
mother waked me up early, saying she was going
to see Mrs. Lincoln, and that I could go along.
CHad of the chance, I was soon dressed and ready
to go. After my mother and I got there, Abe and
I played all through the day.

"While we were wandering up and down the
little stream called Knob Creek, Abe said : 'Right
up there* — pointing to the east — *we saw a covey
of partridges yesterday. Let's go over.* The
stream was too wide for us to jump across.
Finally we saw a foot-log, and decided to try it.
It was narrow, but Abe said, 'Let's coon it'

"I went first and reached the other side all
right Abe went about half way across, when
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He got scared and began trembling. I hollered
to him, 'Don't look down nor up nor sideways,
but look right at me and hold on tight I' But he
fell off into the creek, and, as the water was about
seven or eight feet deep (I could not swim, and
neither could Abe), I knew it would do no good
for me to go in after him.

"So I got a stick — a long water sprout — and
held it out to him. He came up, grabbing with
both hands, and I put the stick into his hEinds.
He clung to it, and I pulled him out on the bank,
almost dead. I got him by the arms and shook
him well, and then I rolled him on the ground,
when the water poured out of his mouth.

"He was all right very soon. We promised
each other that we would never tell anybody
about it, and never did for years. I never told
any one of it till after Lincoln was killed. "

Abraham Lincoln's parents were religious in
their simple way. The boy was brought up to
believe in the care of the Father in Heaven over
the affairs of this life. The family attended
camp meetings and preaching services, which
were great events, because few and far between,
in those primitive days. Abe used afterward to
get his playmates together and preach to them

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Abraham Lincoln

in a way that sometimes frightened them and
made them cry.

No doubt young Lincoln learned more that was
useful to him in after life from the wandering
preachers of his day than he did of his teachers
during the few months that he was permitted to
go to school. But his best teacher was his
mother. She would have been proud to have her
boy grow up to be a traveling minister or ex-
horter, like Peter Cartwright, "the backwoods
preacher."

Nancy Hanks Lincoln "builded better than
she knew." She would have been satisfied with
a cabin life for her son. She little knew that by
her own life and teaching she was raising up the
greatest man of his age, and one of the grandest
men in all history, to become the ruler of the
greatest nation that the world has ever seen. She
did her duty by her little boy and he honored her
always during her life and afterward. No won-
der he once exclaimed when he thought of her :

"All I am or hope to be I owe to my sainted
mother."

And out of her poor, humble life, that devoted
woman

"Gave us Lincoln and never knew I'*

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The Storjr of Young

CHAPTER IV

LEABNINQ TO WOBS

The little Lincoln boy learned to help his
father and mother as soon as he could, picking
berries, dropping seeds and carrying water for
the men to drink. The farm at Knob Greek
seems to have been a little more fertile than the
other two places on which his fattier had chosen
to live.

Once while living in the White House, Presi-
dent Lincoln was asked if he could remember his
"old Kentucky home.'* He replied with consid-
erable feeling:

"I remember that old home very welL Our
farm was composed of three fields. It lay in the
valley, surrounded by high hills and deep gorges.
Sometimes, when there came a big rain in the
hills, the water would come down through the
gorges and spread all over the farm. The last
thing I remember of doing there was one Satur-
day afternoon; the other boys planted the com
in what we called the big field— it contained
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Abraham Lincoln

seven acres — and I dropi>ed the pumpkin seed.
I dropped two seeds in every other row and every
other MIL The next Sunday morning there
came a big rain in the hills — ^it did not rain a
drop in the valley, but the water, coming through
the gorges, washed the ground, com, pumpMn
seeds and all, clear off the field!"

Although this was the last thing Lincoln could
remember doing on that farm, it is not at aU
likely that it was the last thing he did there, for
Thomas Lincoln was not the man to plant com
in a field he was about to leave. (The Lincolns
moved away in the falL)

Another baby boy was bom at Knob Oreek
farm; a puny, pathetic little stranger. When
this baby was about three years old, the father
had to use his skill as a cabinet maker in making
a tiny coflHn, and the Lincoln family wept over a
lonely little grave in the wilderness.

About this time Abe begim to leam lessons in
practical patriotism. Once when Mr. Lincoln
was asked what he could remember of the War
of 1812, he replied:

"Nothing but this : I had been fishing one day
and caught a little fish which I was taking home.
I met a soldier on the road, and, having been told
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The Stoiy of Young

at home that we must be good to Hie soldiers, I
gave him my fish."

An old man, Major Alexander Symi>son, who
lived not far from the Lincolns at this period,
left this description of "a mere spindle of a
boy," in one of his earliest attempts to defend
himself against odds, while waiting at the neigh-
boring mill while a grist was being ground.

"He was the shyest, most reticent, most un-
couth and awkward-apptoring, homeliest and
worst-dressed of any in the crowd. So superla-
tively wretched a butt could not hope to look on
long unmolested. He was attacked one day as he
stood near a tree by a larger boy with others at
his back. But the crowd was greatly astonished
when little Lincoln soundly thrashed the first,
the second, and third boy in succession ; and then,
placing his back against the tree, he defied the
whole crowd, and told them they were a lot of
cowards."

Evidently Father Tom, who enjoyed quite a
reputation as a wrestler, had give the small boy
a few lessons in "the manly art of self-defense."

Meanwhile the little brother and sister were

learning still better things at their mother's

knee, alternately hearing and reading stories

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Abraham Lincoln

from the Bible, "The Pilgrim's Progress,"
* *^sop 's Fables, " " Robinson Crusoe, * ' and
other books, common now, but rare enough in the
backwoods in those days.

There were hard times, even in the wilderness
of Kentucky, after the War of 1812. Slavery
was spreading, and Thomas and Nancy Lincoln
heartily hated that "relic of barbarism." To
avoid witnessing its wrongs which made it
harder for self-respecting white men to rise
above the class referred to with contempt in the
South as "poor white trash," Tom Lincoln de-
termined to move farther north and west — and
deeper into the wilds.

It is sometimes stated that Abraham Lincoln
belonged to the indolent class known as "poor
whites," but this is not true. Shiftless and im-
provident though his father was, he had no use
for that class of white slaves, who seemed to fall
even lower tiian the blacks.

There was trouble, too, about the title to much
of the land in Keutuc^, while Lidiana offered
special inducements to settlers in that new terri-
tory.

In his carpenter work, Thomas Lincoln had

learned how to bmld a flatboat, and had made at

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The Story of Toimg

least one trip to New Orleans on a craft which
he himself had put together. So, when he finally
decided in the fall of 1816 to emigrate to Indiana,
he at once began to build another boat, which he
launched on the Rolling Fork, at the mouth of
Knob Creek, about half a mile from his own
cabin. He traded his farm for what movable
property he could get, and loaded his raft with
that and his carpenter tools. Waving good-bye
to his wife and two children, he floated down the
Rolling Fork, Salt River, and out into the Ohio
River, which proved too rough for his shaky
craft, and it soon went to pieces.

After fishing up the carpenter tools and most
of his other effects, he put together a crazy raft
which held till he landed at Thompson's Ferry,
Perry County, in Southern Indiana. Here he
unloaded his raft, left his valuables in the care of
a settler named Posey and journeyed on foot
through the woods to find a good location. After
trudging about sixteen miles, blazing a trail, he
found a situation which suited him well enough,
he thought. Then he walked all the way back to
the Kentucky home they were about to leave.

He found his wife, with Sarah, aged nine, and
Abraham, aged seven, ready to migrate with him

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Abraham Lincoln

to a newer wilderness. The last thing Nancy
Lincoln had done before leaving their old home
was to take the brother and sister for a farewell
visit to the grave of "the little boy that died."

OVER IN INDIANA

The place the father had selected for their
home was a beautiful spot. They could build
their cabin on a little hill, sloping gently down
on aU sides. The soil was excellent, but there
was one serious drawback — ^there was no water
fit to drink within a mile t Thomas Lincoln had
neglected to observe this most important point
while he was prospecting. His wife, or even little
Abe, would have had more common sense. That
was one reason why Thomas Lincoln, though a
good man, who tried hard enough at times, was
always poor and looked down upon by his thrifty
neighbors.

Listead of taking hia wife and children down
the three streams by boat, as he had gone, the
father borrowed two horses of a neighbor and
"packed through to Posey's," where he had left
his carpenter tools and the other property he
had saved from the wreck of his raft. Abe and
Sarah must have enjoyed the journey, especially

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The Story of Young

camping out every ni^t on the way. The
father's skill as a marksman furnished them
with tempting suppers and breakfasts of wild
game.

On the horses they packed their bedding and
the cooking utensils they needed while on the
journey, and for use after their arrival at the
new home. This stock was not large, for it con-
sisted only of "one oven and lid, one skillet and
lid, and some tinware."

After they came to Posey's, Thomas Lincoln
hired a wagon and loaded it with the effects he
had left there, as well as the bedding and the
cooking things they had brought with tiiem on
the two horses. It was a rough wagon ride, jolt-
. ing over stumps, logs, and roots of trees. An
earlier settler had cut out a patb for a few miles,
but the rest of the way required many days, for
the father had to cut down trees to make a rough
road wide enough for the wagon to pass. It is
not likely that Abe and Sarah minded the delays,
for children generally enjoy new experiences of
that sort As for their motiier, she was accus-
tomed to all such hardships ; she had learned to
take life as it came and make the best of it

Nancy Lincoln needed aU her Christian forti-
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Abraham Lincoln

tude in that Indiana home — if such a place could
be called a home. At last they reached the
chosen place, in the "fork" made by Little
Pigeon Creek emptying into Big Pigeon Creek,
about a mile and a half from a settlement which
was afterward called Gentryville.

As it was late in the fall, Thomas Lincoln de-
cided not to wait to cut down big trees and hew
logs for a cabin, so he built a "half-faced camp,"
or shed enclosed on three sides, for his family to
live in that winter. As this shed was made of
saplings and poles, he put an ax in Abe's hands,
and the seven-year-old boy helped his father
build their first "home" in Indiana. It was
Abe's first experience in the work that afterward
made him famous as "the rail splitter." It was
with the ax, as it were, tiiat he hewed his way to
the White House and became President of the
United States.

Of course, little Abe Lincoln had no idea of the
White House then. He may never have heard of
"the President's Palace," as it used to be called
— ^for the White House was then a gruesome,
blackened ruin, burned by the British in the War
of 1812. President Madison was living in a
rented house nearby, while the Executive Man-
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The Story of Young

Bion was being restored. The blackened stone
walls, left standing after the fire, were painted
white, and on that account the President's man-
sion came to be known as "the White House."

Little Abe, without a thought of his great fu-
ture, was getting ready for it by hacking away
at poles and little trees and helping his father in
the very best way he knew. It was not long, then,
before the "half -faced camp" was ready for his
mother and sister to move into.

Then there was the water question. Dennis
Hanks afterward said : "Tom Lincoln riddled his
land like a honeycomb" trying to find good
water. In the fall and winter they caught rain-
water or melted snow and strained it, but that
was not very healthful at best. So Abe and Sarah
had to go a mile to a spring and carry all the
water they needed to drink, and, when ttiere had
been no rain for a long time, all the water they
used for cooking and washing had to be brought
from there, too.

When warmer weather came, after their ' 'long
and dreary winter" of shivering in that poor
shed, the "camp" did not seem so bad. Thomas
Lincoln soon set about building a warmer and
more substantial cabin. Abe was now eight
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Abraham Lincoln

years old, and had had some jiraetice in the use
of the ax, so he was able to help his father still
more by cutting and hewing larger logs for the
new cabin. They got it ready for the family to
move into before cold weather set in again.

They had to make their own furniture also.
The table and chairs were made of "puncheon,"
or slabs of wood, with holes bored under each
comer to stick the legs in. Their bedsteads were
poles fitted into holes bored in logs in Ihe walls
of the cabin, and the protruding ends supported
by poles or stakes driven into the ground, for
Tom Lincoln had not yet laid the pimcheon floor
of their cabin. Abe's bed was a pile of dry
leaves laid in one comer of the loft to which he
climbed by means of a ladder of pegs driven into
the wall, instead of stairs.

Their surroundings were such as to delight
the heart of a couple of care-free children. The
forest was filled with oaks, beeches, walnuts and
sugar-maple trees, growing close together and
free from underbrush. Now and then there was
an open glade called a prairie or "lick," where
the wild animals came to drink and disport
themselves. Game was plentiful — deer, bears,
pheasants, wild turkeys, ducks and birds of all

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The Story of Young

kinds. This, with Tom Llncohi's passion for
hunting, promised good things for the family to
eat, as well as bearskin rugs for the bare earth
floor, and deerskin curtains for the still open
door and window. There were fish in the
streams and wild fruits and nuts of many kinds
to be found in the woods during the summer and
fall. For a long time the com for the "corn-
dodgers" which they baked in the ashes, had to
be ground by pounding, or in primitive hand-
mills. Potatoes were about the only vegetable
raised in large quantities, and pioneer families
often made the whole meal of roasted potatoes.
Onee when his father had "asked the blessing"
over an ashy heap of this staple, Abe remarked
that they were "mighty poor blessings!"

But there were few complaints. They were
all accustomed to that way of living, and they
enjoyed the free and easy life of the forest
Their only reason for complaint was because
they had been compelled to live in an open shed
all winter, and because there was no floor to
cover the damp groimd in their new cabin — ^no
oiled paper for their one window, and no door
swinging in the single doorway — ^yet the father
was carpenter and cabinet maker I There is no
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Abraham Lincoln

record that Nancy Lincoln, weak and ailing
though she was, demurred even at such needless
privations.

About the only reference to this period of
their life that has been preserved for us was in
an odd little sketch in which Mr. Lincoln wrote
of himself as "he."

"A few days before the completion of his
eighth year, in the absence of his father, a flock
of wild turkeys approached the new log cabin,
and Abraham, with a rifle gun, standing inside,
shot through a crack and killed one of them. He
has never since pulled a trigger on any larger
game."

Though shooting ^as the principal sport of
the youth and their fathers in Lincoln's younger
days, Abe was too kind to inflict needless sufEer-
ing upon any of God's creatures. He had real
religion in his loving heart. Even as a boy he
seemed to know that

"He prayeth best who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God that loveth us,
He made and loveth all."

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The Story of Young

CHAPTER V ,

Losmo His Motkeb

In the fall of 1817, when the lincoln family
had moved from the shed into flie rough log
cabin, Thomas and Betsy Sparrow came and oc-
cupied the "darned little half-faced camp," as
Dennis Hanks called it. Betsy Sparrow was
the aunt who had brought up Kancy Hanks, and
she was now a foster-mother to Dennis, her
nephew. Dennis became the constant com-
panion of ihe two Lincoln children. He has told
most of the stories that are known of this sad
time in the Lincoln boy's life.

The two families had lived there for nearly a
year when Thomas and Betsy Sparrow were
both seized with a terrible disease known to the
settlers as the "milk-sick" because it attacked
the cattle. The stricken uncle and aunt died,
early in October, within a few d&ys of each
other. While his wife was ill with the same dread
disease, Thomas Lincoln was at work, cutting
down trees and ripping boards out of the logs

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AtiraHam liacoln

vrith a long wMpsaw with a handle at each end,
which little Abe had to help him use. It was a
sorrowful task for the young lad, for Abe must
have known that he would soon be helping his
father make his mother's cofiQn. They buried the
Sparrows under the trees "without benefit of
clergy," for ministers came seldom to that re-
mote region.

Nancy lincoln did not long survive the de-
voted aunt and uncle. She had suffered too
much from exposure and privation to recover
her strength when she was seized by the strai^e
malady. One who was near her during her last
illness wrote, long afterward:

"She struggled on, day by day, like the pa-
tient Christian woman she was. Abe and his
sister Sarah waited on their mother, and did the
little jobs and errands required of them. There
was no physician nearer than thirty-five nules.

"The mother knew that she was going to die,
and called the children to her bedside. She was
very weak and the boy and girl leaned over her
while she gave them her dying message. Plac-
ing her feeble hand on little Abe's head, she told
him to be kind and good to his father and sister.

" *Be good to one another,* she said to them
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The Story of Young

both. While expr^sing her hope that they
might live, as she had tatight them to live, in the
love of their kindred and the service of God,
Nancy Hanks Lincoln passed from the miser-
able surroundings of her poor life on earth to
the brightness of the Beyond, on the seventh day
after she was taken sick."

To the motherless boy the thought of his
blessed mother being buried without any re-
ligious service whatever added a keen pang to
the bitterness of his lot. Dennis Hanks once
told how eagerly Abe learned to write :

"Sometimes he would write with a piece of
charcoal, or the p'int of a burnt stick, on the
fence or floor. We got a little paper at the
country town, and I made ink out of blackberry
juice, briar root and a little copperas in it. It
was black, but the copperas would eat the paper
after a while. I made his first pen out of a tur-
key-buzzard feather. We hadn't no geese them
days — to make good pens of goose quills."

As soon as he was able Abe Lincoln wrote his
hist letter. It was addressed to Parson Elkin,
the Baptist preacher, who had sometimes stayed
over night with the family when they lived in
KentucI^, to ask that elder to come and preach
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Abraham Lincoln

a funeral sermon over his mother's grave. It
was no small favor to ask, but the good minister
wrote back to the boy that he would come the
very next time his circuit work brought him
near the Indiana line.

Early in the following summer, when the trees
of the forest were green, and some of them in
bloom, tiie dear old parson came on his errand
of kindness in answer to the heart-broken plea
of a little boy. The arrival of a minister of the
Gospel was a glad event which the whole neigh-
borhood should enjoy. "Word was sent to all the
region round about Prairie Fork, aa their little
settlement came to be called, and the people
came from all directions the following Sunday
morning. There were two hundred of them, all
told — a large congregation for a sparsely settled
coxmtry. Forest rangers came on foot, the
farmers brought their whole families in great
ox-carts, droves of men and women arrived on
horseback, and joined the groups already there,
sitting and lying "on the green grass," as at the
feeding of the multitudes in the time of the
. Christ. Others sat on fallen trees, logs and
wagon tongues, waiting for the coming of the
little procession, for, though Nancy Lincoln had
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The Story; of Young

been buried the year before, pioneer etiquette
required all the formalities of a funeral.

It was the event of the season — that sermon
over the grave of the mother of the boy who had
written his first letter nearly nine months before
to bring about this service which now yielded
him such solemn satisfaction. Parson EUdn
himself led the family forth from their eabiu.
He was followed by the widowed husband, youi^
Abraham Lincoln and his sister Sarah — and
poor Dennis Hanks, bereaved even of his foster-
parents, and now a member of the Lincoln
family.

There were tender hearts behind those hard-
ened faces, and tears brightened the sun-tanned
cheeks of many in that motley assemblage of
eager listeners, as the good elder paid the last
tribute of earth to the sweet and patient mem-
ory of departed womanhood.

To young Abraham Lincoln it was a memo-
rable occasion. He took a solemn pride in the
pious exhortation of the preadier, and tile event
filled his soul with sad complacency. It was aU
for her sake, and she was of all women worthy
of this sacred respect to noble motherhood.
"God bless my angel mother I" burst from his
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Abraham lancoln

lonely lipa — "how glad I am I've learned to
write I"

THE COMINa OF ANOTHER MOTHEB

All that a young girl of twelve could do, as-
sisted by a willing brother of ten, was done by
Sarah and Abraham Lincoln to make that deso-
late cabin a home for their lonesome father, and
for cousin Dennis Hanks, whose yoimg life had
been twice darkened by a double bereavement.
But "what is home without a motherl**
Thomas Lincoln, missing the balance and in-
spiration of a patient wife, became more and
more restless, and, after a year, wandered back
again to his former homes and haunts in Ken-
tucky.

While visiting Elizabethtown he saw a former
sweetheart, the Sally Bush of yoimger days,
now Mrs. Daniel Johnston, widow of the county
jailer who had recently died, leaving three chil-
dren and considerable property, for that time
and place. Thomas renewed his suit and won
the pitying heart of Sarah Johnston, and ac-
cording to the story of the county clerk :

"The next morning, December 2, 1819, I is-
sued the license, and the same day they were
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The Story of Young

married, bundled up, and started for home."
Imagine the glad surprise of the three chil-
dren -who had been left at home for weeks, when
they saw a smart, covered wagon, drawn by four
horses, driven up before the cabin door one
bright winter day, and their father, active and
alert, spring out and assist a pleasant-looking
woman and three children to alight 1 Then
they were told that this woman was to be their
mother and they had two more sisters and an-
other brother I

To tiie poor forlorn Lincoln children and their
still more desolate cousin, it seemed too good to
be true. They quickly learned the names of
their new brother and sisters. The Johnston
children were called John, Sarah and MatUda,
so Sarah Lincoln's name was promptly changed
to Nancy for her dead mother, as there were two
Sarahs already in the combined family.

Krs. Sarah Bush Johnston Lincoln lost no
time in taking poor Abe and Nancy Lincoln to
her great motherly heart, as if they were her
own. They were dirty, for they had been
neglected, ill-used and deserted. She washed
their wasted bodies clean and dressed them in
nice warm clothing provided for her own ehil-
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dren, till she, as she expressed it, "made them
look more human."

Demais Hanks told afterward of the great
difference the stepmother made in their young
lives:

*'In fact, in a few weeks all had changed ; and
where everylhing had been wanting, all was
snug and comfortable. She was a woman of
great energy, of remarkable good sense, very in-
dustrious and saving, also very neat and tidy in
her person and manners. She took an especial
liking for young Abe. Her love for him was
warmly returned, and continued to the day of
his death. But few childfen love their parents
as he loved his stepmother. She dressed him up
in entire new eloliiea, and &om that time on he
appeared to lead a new life. He was encouraged
by her to study, and a wish on his part was
gratified when it could be done. The two sets of
children got along finely together, as if they all
had been the children of the same parents."

Dennis also referred to the "large supply of
household goods" the new mother brought with
her:

"One fine bureau (worth $40), one table, one

set of diairs, one large clothes chest, cooking

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The Story of Young

utensilB, knives, forks, bedding and other
articles."

It must have been a glorious day when audi a
splendid array of household furniture was car-
ried into the rude cabin of Thomas Lincoln.
But best of all, the new wife had sufficient tact
and force of will to induce her good-hearted but
shiftless husband to lay a floor, put in a window,
and hang a door to protect his doubled family
from the cold. It was about Christmas time,
and the Lincoln children, as they nestled in
warm beds for the first time in their lives, must
have thanked their second mother from the bot-
toms of their grateful hearts.

CHAPTER VI

School Bats Now and Thbot

LmooLN' once wrote, in a letter to a friend,
about his early teachers in. Indiana :

"He (father) removed from Kentucky to what
is now Spencer County, Indiana, in my eighth
year. We reached our new home about tiie time
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Abraham Lincobi

the State came into the Union. It was a wild
region with many bears and other wild animals
still in the woods. There I grew up. There
were some schools, so-called; but no qualifica-
tion was ever required of a teacher beside
readin', writin', and cipherin' to the Rule of
Ihxee (simple proportion). If a straggler sup-
posed to imderstand Latin happened to sojourn
in the neighborhood, he was looked upon as a
wizard. There was absolutely nothing to excite
ambition for education."

Abe's first teacher in Indiana, however, was
Hazel Dorsey. The school house was bmlt of
rough, round logs. The chimney was made of
poles well covered with clay. The windows were
spaces cut in the logs, and covered with greased
paper. But Abe was determined to learn. He
and his sister thought nothing of walking four
nules a day through snow, rain and mud. ' ' Nat * '
Grigsby, who afterward married the sister,
spoke in glowing terms of Abe*s few school
days:

"He was always at school early, and attended

to his studies. He lost no time at home, and

when not at work was at his books. He kept up

his studies on Sunday, and carried his books

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The Story of Young

-with him to work, so that he might read when
he rested from labor."

Thomas Lineohi had no use for "eddieation,"
as he called it. "It will spUe the boy," he kept
saying. He — the father— had got along better
without going to school, and why should Abe
have a better education than his father. He
thoi^ht Abe's studious habits were due to "pure
laziness, jest to git shet o' workin'." So, when-
ever there was the slightest excuse, he took Abe
out of school and set him to work at home or for
one of the neighbors, while he himself went
hunting or loafed about the house.

This must have been very tryir^ to a boy as
hungry to leam as Abe Lincoln was. His new
mother saw and sympathized with him, and in
her quiet way, managed to get the boy started
to school, for a few weeks at most. For some
reason Hazel Dorsey stopped "keeping" the
school, and there was a long "vacation" for all
the children. But a new man, Andrew Craw-
ford, came and settled near Gentryville. Hav-
ing nothing better to do at first, he was urged to
reopen the school.

One evening Abe came in from his work and
his stepmother greeted him with :
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Abraham Lincoln

"Another chance for you to go to sdiooL"

"Where!"

"That man Crawford tiiat moved in a while

ago is to begin school next week, and two miles
and back every day will be just about enough
for you to walk to keep your legs Umber."

The tactful wife accomplished it somehow and
Abe started off to school with Nancy, and a light
heart. A neighbor described ^irn as he ap-
peared in Crawford's school, as "long, wiry and
strong, while bis big feet and hands, and the
length of his legs and arms, were out of all pro-
portion to his small trunk and head. His com-
plexion was swarthy, and his skin shriveled and
yellow even then. He wore low shoes, buckskin
breeches, linsey-woolsey shirt, and a coonakin
cap. The breeches hung close to his legs, but
were far from meeting the tops of his shoes,
exposing 'twelve inches of shinbone, i^rp, blue
and narrow.' "

"Yet," said Nat Grigsby, "he was always in
good health, never sick, and had an excellent con-
stitution."

HELFINQ EATE ROBT SPELL

Andrew Crawford must have been an unusual
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The Story of Young

I
man, for he tried to teach "manners" in his
backwoods school! Spelling was considered a
great accomplishment. Abe shone as a speller
in school and at the spelling-matches. One day,
evidently during a period when young Lincoln
was kept from school to do some outside work
for his father, he appeared at the window when
the class in spelling was on the floor. The word
"defied" was given out and several pupils had
misspelled it. Kate Roby, the pretty girl of the
village, was stammering over it. "B-e-f," said
Kate, then she hesitated over the next letter.
Abe {winted to his eye and winked significantly.
The girl took the hint and went on glibly
"i-e-d," and "went up head."

"l DID ITl"

There was a buck's head nailed over the
school bouse door. It proved a temptation to
young Lincoln, who was tall enough to reach it
easily. One day the schoolmaster discovered
that one horn was broken and he demanded to
know who had done the damage. There was
silence and a general denial till Abe spoke up
sturdily:

"I did it I did not mean to do it, but I hung
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Abraham Lmcobi

on it — and it broke I" The other boys thought
Abe was foolish to "own up" till he had to — ^but
that was his way.

It is doubtful if Abe Lincoln owned an arith-
metic. He had a copybook, made by himself, in
which he entered tables of weights and meas-
ures and "sxmis" he had to do. Among these
was a specimen of schoolboy doggerel t

"Abraham Lincoln,
His hand and pen,
He will be good —
But God knows wheni'*

In another place he wrote some solemn reflec-
tions on the value of time :

"Time, what an empty vapor 'tis.

And dajB, how swift they are I
Swift as an Indian arrow —

Fly on like a shooting star.
The present moment, just, is here,

Then slides away in haste.
That we can never say they're ours,

But only say they're past."

As he grew older his handwriting improved
and he was often asked to "set copies" for other

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The Stoiy of Young

boya to follow. In the book of a boy named
Bichardson, he wrote this prophetic couplet :

"Good boys who to their books appty;
Will all be great men by and by.'*

A "MOTHEB'S BOT" — HIS POOD AND CLOTHING

Dennis Hanks related of his young com-
panion: "As far as food and clothing were con-
cerned, the boy had plenty — such as it was —
'corndodgers,' bacon and game, some fish and
wild fruits. We had very little wheat flour.
The nearest mill was eighteen miles. A boss
mill it was, with a plug (old horse) pullin' a
beam around; and Abe used to say his dog could
stand and eat the flour as fast as it was made,
and then he ready for supper!

**Por clothing he had jeans. He was grown
before he wore all-wool pants. It was a new
coimtry, and he was a raw boy, rather a bright
and likely lad; but the big world seemed far
ahead of him. We were all slow-goin' folks.
But he had the stuff of greatness in him. He
got his rare sense and sterling principles from
both parents. But Abe*s kindliness, humor,
lore of humanity, hatred of slavery, all came

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Abraham Lincoln

from his mother. I am free to say Abe was a
'mother's hoy.' "

Demiis used to like to tell of Abe's earliest
ventures in the fields of literature: "His first
readin' book was Webster's speller. Then he
got hold of a book — I can't rickilect the name.
It told about a feller, a nigger or suthin', that
sailed a flatboat up to a rock, and the rock was
magnetized and drawed the nails out of his boat,
an' he got a duckin', or drownded, or suthin', I
forget now. (This book, of course, was 'The
Arabian Nights.') Abe would lay on the floor
with a chair under his head, and laugh over
them stories by the hour. I told him they was
likely lies from end to end; but he learned to
read right well in them."

His stock of books was small, but they were
the right kind— the Bible, "The Pilgrim's Prog-
ress," .^op's Fables, "Robinson Crusoe," a
history of the United States, and the Statutes
of Indiana. This last was a strange book for a
boy to read, but Abe pored over it as eagerly as
a lad to-day might read "The Three Guards-
men," or "The Hoxmd of the Baskervilles."
He made notes of what he read with his turkey-
buzzard pen and brier-root ink. If be did not
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have these handy, he would write with a piece of
charcoal or the charred end of a stick, on a
board, or on the under side of a chair or bench.
He used the wooden fire shovel for a slate, shav-
ing it off clean when both sides were full of fig-
ures. When he got hold of paper enough to
make a copy-book he would go about transfer-
ring his notes from boards, beams, under sides
of the chairs and the table, and from all the
queer places he had put them down, on the spur
of the momenl

Besides the books he had at hand, he borrowed
all he could get, often walkii^ many miles for
a book, until, as he once told a friend, he "read
through every book he had ever heard of in that
country, for a circuit of fifty miles" — quite a
circulating library I

"the BEoiNNma OF love"

"The thoughts of youth are long, long
thoughts." It must have been about this time
that the lad had the following experience, which
he himself related to a legal friend, with his
chair tilted back and his knees "cocked
up" in the manner described by Cousin John
Hanks;

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Abraham Lincoln

"Did you ever write out a story in your mindf
1 did when I was little codger. One day a wagon
with a lady and two girls and a man broke down
near us, and while they were fixing up, they
cooked in our kitchen. The woman had books
and read us stories, and they were the first of
the kind I ever heard. I took a great fancy to
one of the girls; and when they were gone I
thought of her a good deal, and one day, when
I was sitting out in the sun by the house, I wrote
out a story in my mind.

"I thought I took my father's horse and fol-
lowed the wagon, and finally I found it, and
they were surprised to see me.

"I talked with the girl and persuaded her to
elope with me ; and that night I put her on my
horse and we started off across the prairie.
After several hours we came to a camp; and
when we rode up we found it was one we had
left a few hours before and went in.

"The next night we tried again, and the same
thing happened — ^the horse came back to the
same place; and then we concluded we ought not
to elope. I stayed until I had persuaded her
father that he ought to give her to me.

"I always meant to write that story out and

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The Story of Young

publish it, and I began once; but I concluded it
was not much of a story.
"But I think that was the beginning of love

with me.'*

how abe came to own weems's "ufe of
wabhinotok"

Abe's chief delight, if permitted to do so, was
to lie in the shade of some inviting tree and -
read. He liked to lie on his stomach before the
fire at night, and often read as long as this flick-
ering light lasted. He sometimes took a book
to bed to read as soon as the morning light began
to come through the chinks between the logs be-
side his bed. He once placed a book between
the logs to have it handy in the morning, and a
storm came up and soaked it with dirty water
from the "mud-daubed" mortar, plastered be-
tween the logs of the cabin.

The book happened to be Weems's "Life of
Washington." Abe was in a sad dilemma.
What could he say to the owner of the book,
which he had borrowed from the meanest man
in the nei^borhood, Josiah Crawford, who was
so unpopular that he went by the nickname of
"Old Blue Nose"?

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Abraham Lincoln

The only course was to show the angiy owner
his precious volume, warped and stained as it
was, and offer to do anything he could to repay
him.

"Abe," said "Old Blue Nose," with blood-
curdling friendliness, "bein' as it's you, Abe, I
won't be hard on you- You jest come over and
pull fodder for me, and the book is yours."

"All right," said Abe, his deep-set eyes twink-
ling in spite of himself at the thought of own-
ing the story of the life of the greatest of heroes,
"how much fodder?"

"Wal," said old Josiah, "that book's worth
seventy-five cents, at least. You kin earn twenty-
five cents a day— that will make three days.
You come and pull all you can in three days and
you may have the book."

That was an exorbitant price, even if the book
were new, but Abe was at the old man's mercy.
He realized this, and made the best of a bad bar-
gain. He cheerfully did the work for a man who
was mean enough to take advantage of his mis-
fortune. He comforted himself with the
thought that he would be the owner of the
precious "Life of Washington." Long after-
ward, in a speedi before the New Jersey Legis-
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The Stray of Young

lature, on his way to Washington to be inaugu-
rated, like Washington, as President of the
United States, he referred to this strange book.

"the whole tbtjth and nothdtg but the

tbtjth"

One morning, on his way to work, with an az
on his shoulder, his stepsister, Matilda Johns-
ton, though forbidden by her mother to follow
Abe, crept after him, and with a cat-like spring
landed between his shoulders and pressed her
sharp knees into the small of his back.

Taken unawares, Abe staggered backward
and ax and girl fell to the ground together. The
sharp implement cut her ankle badly, and mis-
duevous Matilda shrieked with :^ght and pain
when she saw the blood gushing from the wound.
Young Lincoln tore a sleeve from his shirt to
bandage the gash and bound up the ankle as
well as he could. Then he tried to teach the still
sobbing girl a lesson.

*' 'Tilda," he said gently, "I'm surprised.
Why did you disobey mother'!"

Matilda only wept silently, and the lad went
on, ''What are you going to teU mother about
it?"

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Abraham Lincoln

*'Tell her I did it with the ax," sobbed the
young girL "That ■will be the truth, too."

"Yes," said Abe severely, "that's the truth,
but not all the truth. Tou just tell the whole
truth, 'Tilda, and trust mother for the rest."

Matilda went limping home and told her
motiier the whole story, and the good woman was
so sorry for her that, as the girl told Abe that
evening, "she didn't even scold me."

"bounding a thought— north, south, east and
west"

Abe sometimes heard things in the simple
conversation of friends that disturbed him be-
cause they seemed beyond his comprehension.
He said of this :

"I remember how, when a child, I used to get
irritated when any one talked to me in a way I
couldn't understand.

"I do not think I ever got angry with any-
thing else in my life ; but that always disturbed
my temper — and has ever since.

"I can remember going to my little bedroom,

after hearing the neighbors talk of an evening

with my father, and spending no small part of

the night walking up and down, trying to make

f—UnctlK.

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The Story; of Young

out what was the exact meaniug of some of
their, to me, dark sayings.

"I could not sleep, altiioi^h I tried to, when
I got on such a hunt for an idea; and when I
thought I had got it, I was not satisfied until I
had repeated it over and over, and had put in
language plain enough, as I thought, for any
bo7 I "knew to comprehend.

"This was a kind of a passion with me, and
it has stuck hj me; for I am never easy now
when I am bounding a thought, till I have
bounded it east, and boimded it west, and
bounded it north, and bounded it south.'*

HIGH PRAISE FROM HIS STEPMOTHER

Not long before her death, Mr. Hemdon, Lin-
eohi's law partner, called upon Mrs. Sarah Lin-
coln to collect material for a "Life of Lincoln'*
he was preparing to write. This was the best of
all the things she related of her illustrious step-
son:

"I can say what scarcely one mother in a
thousand can say, Abe never gave me a cross
word or look, and never refused, in fact or ap-
pearance, to do anything I asked him. His
mind and mine seemed to run together.
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Abraham liiiicolii

"I liad a son, John, who was raised with Abe.
Both were good boys, but I must say, both now
being dead, that Abe was the best boy I ever saw
or expect to see."

"Charity begins at home" — and so do truth
and honesly. Abraham Lincoln could not have
become so popular all over the world on account
of bis honest kindheartedness if he had not been
loyal, obedient and loving toward those at home.
Popularity, also, "begins at home." A mean,
disagreeable, dishonest boy may become a king,
because he was "to the manner bom." But only
a good, kind, honest man, considerate of others,
can be elected President of the United States.

CHAPTER VII

Abe auto the Neiohbobs

"PREACHIlfG" AGAINST CRUELTY TO ANTMAM

Nat Grigsbt stated once that writing compo-
sitions was not required by Schoolmaster Craw-
ford, but "Abe took it up on his own account,"

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The Story; of Young

and his first essay was against cruelty to ani-
mals.

The boys of the neighborhood made a practice
of catching terrapins and laying live coals on
their backs. Abe caught a group of them at this
cruel sport one day, and rushed to the relief of
the helpless turtle. Snatching the shingle that
one of the boys was using to handle the coals, he
brushed them off the turtle's shell, and with
angry tears in his eyes, proceeded to use it on
one of the offenders, while he called the rest a
lot of cowards.

One day his stepbrother, John Johnston, ac-
cording to his sister MatUda, "caught a terra-
pin, brought it to the place where Abe was
'preaching,' threw it against a tree and crushed
its shell Abe then preached against cruelty to
animals, contending that "an ant's life is as
sweet to it as ours is to us,"

EOTJGHLT DISCIPUNED FOR BEING "POEWABD"

Abe was compelled to leave school on the
slightest pretext to work for the neighbors. He
was so big and strong — attaining his full height
at seventeen — ^that his services were more in de-
mand than those of his stepbrother, John Johns-
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Abraham Lincoln

ton, or of Cousin Dennis. Abe was called lazy
because the neighbors shared the idea of
Thomas Lincoln, that his reading and studying
were only a pretext for shirking. Tet he was
never so idle as either Dennis Hanks or John
Johnston, who were permitted to go hunting or
fishing with Tom Lincoln, while Abe stayed out
of school to do the work that one of the three
older men should have done.

Abe's father was kinder in many ways to his
stepchildren than he was to his own son. This
may have been due to the fact that he did not
wish to be thought "partial" to his own child.
Ko doubt Abe was "forward." He liked to
take part in any discussion, and sometimes he
broke into the conversation when his opinion
had not been asked. Besides, he got into argu-
ments with his fellow-laborera, and wasted the
time belonging to his employer.

One day, according to Dennis, they were all
working together in the field, when a man rode
up on horseback and asked a question. Abe was
the first to mount the fence to answer the
stranger and engage him in conversation. To
teach his son better "manners" in the presence
of bis "superiors," Thomas Lincoln struck Abe

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The Story of Young

a heavy blow which knocked ^^^n backward off
the fence, and silenced him for a time.

Of course, every one present laughed at Abe*s
discomfiture, and the neighbors approved of
Thomas Lincoln's rude act as a matter of dia-
cipline. In their opinion Abe Lincoln was get-
ting altogether too smart "While they enjoyed
his homely wit and good nature, they did not
like to admit that he was in any way their su-
perior. A visitor to Springfield, HL, will
even now find some of Lincoln's old neighbors
eager to say "there were a dozen smarter men
in this city than Lincoln" when he "happened
to get nominated for the piresldencyl"

SPOBTS Ain> PASmiES

Abe was "hail fellow, well met" everywhere.
The women comprehended his true greatness
before the men did so. There was a rough gal-
lantry about him, which, though lacking in
"polish," was true, "heart-of-oak" politeness.
He wished every one well. His whole life x>assed
with "malice toward none, with charity for
all."-

"When he "went out evenings" Abe Lincoln

took the greatest paias to make everybody com-

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Abrftham Uncolii

fortable and happy. He was sure to bring in the
biggest backlog and make the brightest fire. He
read "the funniest fortunes" for the young
people from the sparks as they flew up the chim-
ney. He was the best helper in parity the
apples, shelling ihe com and cracking the nuts
for the evening's refreshments.

When he went to spelling school, after the first
few times, he was not allowed to take part in the
spelling match because everybody knew that the
side that "diose first" would get Abe Lincoln
and he always "spelled down." But he went
just the same and had a good time himself if he
could add to the enjoyment of the rest.

He went swimming, warm evenings, with the
boys, and ran races, jumped and wrestled at
noon-times, which was supposed to be given up
to eating and resting. He was "the life" of the
husking-bee and bam raising, and was always
present, often as a judge because of his humor,
fairness and tact, at horse races. He engaged
heartily in every kind of "manly sport" which
did not entail unnecessary suffering upon help-
less animals.

Coon hunting, however, was an exception.

The coon was a pest and a plague to the farmer,

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The Story of Young

80 it should be got rid ol He once told the fol-
lowing story :

THE UTTLE TEIiOW "CXWN DOO"

"My father had a little yellow house dog
which invariably gave the alarm if we boys un-
dertook to slip away unobserved after night had
set in — as we sometimes did-^to go coon hunt-
ing. One night my brother, John Johnston, and
I, with tiie usual complement of boys required
for a successfiil coon hunt, took the insignificant
little cur with us.

"We located the coveted coon, killed him, and
then in a sporting vela, sewed the coon skin on
the little dog.

"It struggled vigorously during the operation
of sewing on, and when released made a bee-line
for home. Some larger dogs on the way, scent-
ing coon, tracked the little animal home and ap-
parently mistaking him for a real coon, speedily
demolished bim. The next morning, father
found, lying in his yard, the lifeless remains of
yellow *Joe,' with strong circumstantial evi-
dence, in the form of fragments of coon skin,
against us.

"Father was much incensed at his death, but
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Abraham Lincoln

as John and I, scantily protected from tiie morn-
ing wind, stood shivering in the doorway, we
felt assured that little yellow Joe would never
again be able to sound tile alarm of another
coon hunt"

THE "chin FLT" as AN INCENTIVE TO WORK

While he was President, Mr. Lincoln told
Henry J. Raymond, the founder of the New
York TimeSf the following story of an experi-
ence he had about this time, while working with
his stepbrother in a cornfield:

"Eaymond," said he, "you were brought up
on a farm, were you not 1 Then you know what
a *chin fly' is. My brother and I were plowing
com once, I driving the horse and he holding
the plow. The horse was lazy, but on one occa-
sion he rushed across the field so that I, with my
long legs, could scarcely keep pace with him.
On reaching the end of the furrow I found an
enormous chin fly fastened upon the horse and
I knocked it off. My brother asked me what I
did that for. I told him I didn't ^rant the old
horse bitten in that way.

" 'Why,' said my brother, *that's all that
made bi'm go.* **

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The Stoiy of Young

"Now if Mr. Chase (the Secretary of the
Treasury) has a presidential 'chin fly' biting
him, I'm not goi:^ to knock it off, if It mil only
make his department go.*'

"old BLT7E nose's" HIRED MAN

It seemed to be the "irony of fate" that Abe
should have to work for "Old Blue Nose" as a
farm hand. But the lad liked Mrs. Crawford,
and Lincoln's sister Nancy lived there, at the
same time, as maid-of -all-work. Another attrac-
tion, the Crawford family was rich, in Abe's
eyes, in possessing several books, which he was
glad of the chance to read.

Mrs. Crawford told many things about young
Lincoln that might otherwise have been lost.
She said "Abe was very polite, in his awkward
way, taking ofE his hat to me and bowing. He
was a sensitive lad, never coming where he was
not wanted. He was tender and kind — Uke his
sister.

"He liked to hang aroimd and gossip and joke
with the women. After he had wasted too much
time this way, he would exclaim:

" 'Well, this won't buy the chUd a coat,*

and the long-legged hired boy would stride

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Abraham linooln

away and catch up with the others."

<hie day when he was asked to kill a hog, Abe
answered promptly that he had never done that,
"but if youTl risk the hog, 111 risk myself I"

Mrs. Crawford told also about "goii^ to meet-
ii^" in those primitive days:

"At that time we thought it nothing to go
eight or ten miles. The ladies did not stop for
the want of a shawl or riding dress, or horses.
In the winter time they would put on their hus-
bands' old overcoats, wrap up their little ones,
and take two or three of them on their beasts,
while their husbands would walk.

"Li winter time they would hold church in
some of the neighbors' houses. At such times
they were always treated with the utmost kind-
ness; a basket of apples, or turnips — apples
were scarce in those days — ^was set out. Some-
times potatoes were used for a *treat,' In old
Mr. Linkhom's (Lincoln's) house a plate of po-
tatoes, washed and pared nicely, was handed
around."

FEATS OP STRENGTH

Meanwhile the boy was growing to tall man-
hood, both in body and in mind. The neighbors,
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The Stoiy of Young

who failed to mark his mental growth, were
greatly impressed with his physical strength.
The Richardson family, with whom Abe seemed
to have lived as hired man, used to tell marvel-
ous tales of his prowess, some of which may
have grown somewhat in the telling. Mr. Rich-
ardson declared that the young man could carry
as heavy a load as "three ordinary men." He
saw Abe pick up and walk away with "a chicken
house, made up of poles pinned together, and
covered, that weighed at least ax himdred if not
much more."

When the Richardsons were building their
com-crib, Abe saw three or four men getting
ready to carry several hu^ posts or timbers on
"sticks" between them. "Watching his chance,
he coolly stepped in, shouldered all the timbers
at once and walked off alone with them, carry-
ing them to the place desired Probably at this
time young Lincoln wrote for Joseph Richard-
son these lines for a copy :

"Good boys, who to their books apply,
Will all be great men by and by."

Another neighbor, "old Mr. Wood," said of
Abe: "He could strike, with a maul, a heavier
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Abraham Lincoln

blow than any other man. He could sink an ax
deeper into wood than any man I ever saw."

Dennis Hanks used to tell that if you heard
Abe working in the woods alone, felling trees,
you would think three men, at least, were at
work there — ^the trees came crashing down bo
fasi

On one occasion afer he had been threshing
wheat for MJr, Tumham, the farmer-constable
whose "Revised Statutes of Indiana*' Abe had
devoured, Lincoln was walking back, late at
night from Gentryville, where he and a number
of cronies had spent the evening. As the youtiis
were picking their way along the frozen road,
they saw a dark object on the ground by the
roadside. They found it to be an old sot they
knew too well lying there, dead drunk. Lincoln
stopped, and the rest, knowing the tenderness of
his heart, exclaimed :

"Aw, let him alone, Abe. 'Twon't do him no
good. He's made his bed, let hiTn lay in it I"

The rest laughed — for the "bed" was freezii^
mud. But Abe could see no humor in the situa-
tion. The man might be run over, or freeze to
death. To abandon any human being in such a
plight seemed too monstrous to him. The other
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your^ men hurried on in the cold, shn^ging
their shoulders and shaking their heads — "Poor
Abel — ^he's a hopeless ease," and left Lincoln
to do the work of a Good Samaritan alone. He
had no beast on which to carry the dead we^t
of the drunken man, whom he vainly tried,
again and again, to arouse to a sense of the
predicament he was in. At last the young man
took up the apparently lifeless bo^ of the mud-
eovered man in his strong arms, and carried him
a quarter of a mile to a deserted cabin, where
he made up a fire and warmed and nursed the
old drunkard the rest of that night. Then Abe
gave bim "a good talking to," and the unfortu-
nate man is said to have been so deeply im-
pressed by the young man's kindness that he
heeded the temperance lecture and never again
risked his life as he had done that night. When
the old man told John Hanks of Abe's Hercu-
lean effort to save him, he added :

"It was mighty clever in Abe Lincoln to tote
me to a warm fire that cold night."

m JOITES' STORE

"While Abe was working for the farmers round

about his father's farm he spent many of his

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Abraham Lincoln

evenings in Jones' grocery "talking politics"
and other tilings with the men, who also gath-
ered there. Mr. Jones took a Louisville paper,
which young Lincoln read eagerly. Slavery was
a live political topic then, and Abe soon acquired
quite a reputation as a stump orator.

As he read the "Lidiana Statutes" he was
supposed to "know more law than the con-
stable." In fact, his taste for the law was so
pronounced at that early age that he went, some-
times, fifteen miles to Boonville, as a spectator
in the county court Once he heard a lawyer of
ability, named Breckinridge, defend an accused
murderer there. It was a great plea; the tall
country boy knew it and, pushing through the
crowd, reached out his long, coatless arm to con-
gi-atulate the lawyer, who looked at the awk-
ward youth in amazement and passed on with-
out acknowledging Abe's compliment. The two
men met again in Washington, more than thirty
years later, under very different circumstances.

But there were things other than irolitics dis-
cussed at the country store, and Abe Lincoln
often raised a laugh at the expense of some
braggart or bully. There was "TTncle Jimmy"
Larkins, who posed as the hero of his own
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stories. In aekuowled|;ment of Abe's authority
as a judge of horse flesh, "Uncle Jimmy" was
boasting of his horse's superiority in a recent
fox chase. But young Lincohi seemed to pay
no heed. Larldns repeated:

"Abe, I've got the best horse in the world;
he won the race and never drew a long breath."

Toung Lincoln still appeared not to be pay-
ing attention. "Uncle Jimmy" persisted. He
was bound to make Abe hear. He reiterated :

"I say, Abe, I have got the best horse in the
world; after all that nmning he never drew a
long breath."

"Well, Larldns," drawled young Lincoln,
"why don't you tell us how many short breaths
he drew." The laugh was on the boastful and
discomfited Larkins.

rBTnra to teach astbonomt to a Toima girl

Abe's efforts were not always so well received,
for he was sometimes misimderstood. The
neighbors used to think the Lincoln boy was se-
cretly in love with Kate Roby, the pretty girl he
had helped out of a dilemma in the spelling class.
Several years after that episode, Abe and Kate
were sitting on a log, about sunset, talking:

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Abraluun Lincoln

"Abe," said Kate, "the sun's goin* down."

"Reckon not," Abe answered, "we're coming
up, that's all."

"Don't jou s'poae I got eyes?"

* 'Yes, I know you have ; but it's the earth that
goes round. The sun stands as still as a tree.
"When we're swung round so we can't see it any
more, the light's cut off and we call it night."

""What a fool you are, Abe Lincoln!" ex-
claimed Kate, who was not to blame for her igno-
rance, for astronomy had never been taught in
Crawford's school.

TEE MBLT DKATH Or BISTER KANCY

While brother and sister were worldj^ for
"Old Blue Nose," Aaron Grigsby, "Nat's"
brother, was "paying attention" to Nancy Lin-
coln. They were soon married. Nancy was only
eighteen. "When she was nineteen Mrs. Aaron
Grigsby died. Her love for Abe had almost
amounted to idolatry. In some ways she re-
sembled him. He, in turn, was deeply devoted
to his only sister.

The family did not stay long at Pigeon Creek
after the loss of Nancy, who was buried, not be-
side her mother, but with the Grigsbys in the
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cHurchyard of the old Pigeon Creek meeting-
house.

EiBNINQ HH FmST DOI1.AB

Much as Abraham Lincoln had "worked out"
as a hired man, his father kept the money, as he
had a legal right to do, not giving the boy any of
the results of his hard labor, for, strong as he
was, his pay was only twenty-five or thirty cents
a day. Ahe accepted this as right and proper.
He never complained of it

After he became President, Lincoln told his
Secretary of State the followii^ story of the
first doUar he ever had for his own :

"Seward," he said, "did you ever hear how I
earned my first dollar ? " " No, ' * replied Seward.
"Well," said he, "I was about eighteen years of
age . k . and had constructed a flatboat. . . .
A steamer was going down the river. We have,
you know, no wharves on the western streams,
and the custom was, if passengers were at any
of the landings they had to go out iu a boat, the
steamer stopping and- taking them on board. I
was contemplating my new boat, and wondering
whether I could make it stronger or improve it
in any part, when two men with trunks came
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Abraham Liiicoln

down to the shore in carriages, and looking at
the differ«it boats, singled out mine, and asked :

*"Who owns this?'

"I answered modestly, *I do.'

** *Will you,* said one of them, *take us and
our trunks out to the steamer?'

" 'Certainly,* said I. I was very glad to have
a chance of earning something, and supposed
that theywould give me a couple of 'bits.' The
trunks were put in my boat, the passengers
seated themselv^ on them, and I sculled them
out to the steamer. They got on board, and I
lifted the trunks and put them on deck. The
steamer was moving away when I called out:
" *Tou have forgotten to pay me.*

"Each of tliem took from his pocket a silver
half-dollar and threw it on the bottom of my
boat I could scarcely believe my eyes as I
picked up the money. You may think it was a
very little thing, and in these days it seems to
me like a trifle, but it was a most important inci-
dent in my life. I could scarcely credit that I, a
poor boy, had earned a dollar in less than a day
— ^that by honest work I had earned a dollar. I
was a more hopeful and thoughtful boy from
that time.'*

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The Story of Young

CHAPTER Vm

Mavma to Illinois

"POLLOWINa THE MVEB"

Thomas Lincoln had become restless again.
Fourteen years was a long time for ^iJTn to live
in one place. Abe was seven years old when
they came over from Kentuclg^, and he was now
nearly twenty-one. During that time Thomas
had lost his wife, Nancy, and his only daughter,
who bore her mother's name. While the land he
had chosen was fertile enough, the want of water
had always been a sad drawback. The desire to
try his fortimes in a newer country had taken
possession of him.

John Hanks had gone to Illinois, and had
written back that everything was more favor-
able there for making a living. Thomas Lin-
coln had not been successful in Indiana. His
children's prospects seemed to be against them.
After working as a hired hand on the surround-
ing farms, Abe had served for a time as a ferry-
man, and, working by the river, had learned to

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Abraham Lincoln

build the boat with which he had earned his first
dollar.

As George "Washington longed to go to sea,
Abraham Lincoln seems to have yearned to
"follow the river." He tried to hire out as
deck hand, but his age was against him. He
soon had a chance to go "down river" to New
Orleans, with his friend, Allen Gentry, the son
of the man for whom Gentryville was named.
Allen afterward married Kate Roby. A flatboat
belonging to Allen's father was loaded with
bacon and other farm merchandise for the
southern market. Allen went in charge of the
expedition, and young Lincoln was engaged as
"bow hand." They started in Apiil, 1828.
There was nothing to do but steer the unwieldy
craft with the current. The flatboat was made
to float down stream only. It was to be broken
up at New Orleans and sold for lumber.

The two young men from Indiana made the
trip without incident until they came to the
plantation of Madame Duchesne, six miles from
Baton Rouge, where they moored their raft for
the night. There they heard the stealthy foot-
steps of midnight marauders on board.

Youi^ Gentry was first aroused. He sprang
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The Story of Young

up and found a gang of lawless negroes on deck,
evidentlj looking for plunder, and thinking so
many of them could easily cow or handle the two
white men.

"Bring the guns, Abe!" shouted Allen.
"Shoot them I'* Abraham Lincoln was among
them, brandishing a club — ^they had no guns.
The negroes were frightened not only by the
fierce, commanding form of their tall adversary,
but also by his giant strength. The two white
men routed the whole black crew, but Abraham
Lincoln received a wound in the encounter, and
bore the scar of it to his dying day.

The trip required about three months, going
and returning, and the two adventurers from
Glentryville came back in June, with good
stories of their experiences to tell in Jones*
store.

Not long after this Thomas Lincoln, in re-
sponse to an urgent invitation from John
Hanks, decided to move to Illinois. It took a
long time, after gathering in the fall crops, for
Thomas Lincoln to have a "vandoo" and sell his
com and hogs. As for selling his farm, it had
never really belonged to him. He simply turned
it over to Mr. Gentry, who held a mortgage on it.

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Abraham Lincoln

It was February, 1830, before tiie pioneer wagon
got under way. The emigrant family consisted
of Thomas Lincoln and Sarah, his wife, Abra-
ham, and John Johnston; Sarah and Matilda
Johnston were both married, and, with their
husbands, a young man named Hall and Demiis
Hanks, formed the rest of the party. The
women rode with their household goods in a
great covered cart drawn by two yoke of oxen.

A TBATELINO FEDDLER

Merchant Jones, for whom Abe had worked
that fall and winter, after his return from New
Orleans, sold the young man a pack of "no-
tions'* to peddle along the road to Illinois. "A
set of knives and forks," related Mr. Jones'
son afterward, "was the largest item on the bill.
The other items were needles, pins, thread, but-
tons, and other little domestic necessities. When
the Lincolns reached their new home, Abraham
wrote back to my father stating that he had
doubled his money on his purdiases by selling
them along the road. Unfortunately we did not
keep that letter, not thinking how hi^y we
would prize it afterward."

In the early days of his presidency, an inter-

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The Story; of Young

national problem came before the cabinet which
reminded Mr. Lincohi of an experience he had
on this journey, so he told the several secretaries
this story:

"The situation just now reminds me of a fix
I got into some thirty years ago when I was
peddling 'notions' on the way from Indiana to
Illinois. I didn't have a large stock, but I
charged large prices and I made money. Per-
haps you don't see what I am driving at.

"Just before we left Indiana and were cross-
ing into Illinois we came across a small farm-
house full of children. These ranged in age
from seventeen years to seventeen months, and
were all in tears. The mother of the family was
red-headed and red-faced, and the whip she held
in her right hand led to the inference that she
had been chastising her brood. The father of
the family, a meek-looking, mild-mannered, tow-
headed chap, was standing at the front door —
to all appearances waiting his turn I

"I thought there wasn't much use in asking
the head of that house if she wanted any 'no-
tions.' She was too busy. It was evident that
an insurrection had been in progrras, but it was
pretty well quelled when I got there. She saw
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Abraham Lincoln

me when I came up, and from her look I thought
she surmised that I intended to interfere. Ad-
vancing to the doorway — ^roughly pushing her
husband aside — she demanded my business.

" 'Nothing, ma'am,* I answered as gently as
possible. 'I merely dropped in, as I came along,
to see how things were going.'

" 'Well, you needn't wait,' she said in an irri-
tated way; 'there's trouble here, and lots of it,
too, but I Mn manage my own affairs without
the help of outsiders. This is jeat a family row,
but 111 teach these brats their places if I hev to
lick the hide off every one of them. I don't do
much talking, but I run this house, an' I don't
want no one sneakin' roxmd tryin' to find out
howl doit either.*

"That's the ease here with us. We must let
the other nations know that we propose to settle
our family row in our own way, an' teach these
brats (the seceding States) their places, and,
like the old woman, we don't want any 'sneakin'
round' by other countries, that would like to find
out how we are going to do it either."

"wiNNiNa A dog's gratitude"

Abe strode along in the mud, driving the four
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The Story of Young

oxen much of the tune, for the houses he could
visit with his peddler's pack were few and far
between. A dog belonging to one of the family
— an insignificant little cur — fell behind. After
the oxen had floimdered through the mud, snow
and ice of a prairie stream, they discovered that
the animal was missing. The other men of the
party thought they could now get rid of the
little nuisance, and even the women were
anxious, as the hour was late, to go on and find a
place to camp for the night. To turn back with
the clumsy ox-team and lumbering emigrant
wagon was out of the question.

Abraham gave the whip to one of the other
men and turned back to see if be could discern
the dog anywhere. He discovered it running up
and down on the other bank of the river, in
great distress, for the swift current was filled
with floating ice and the poor little creature was
afraid to make the attempt to swim across.
After whistling in vain to encourage the dog to
try if it would, the tender-hearted youth went
to its rescue. Referring to the incident himself
afterward, he said:

"I could not endure the idea of abandoning
even a dog. Pulling off shoes and socks, I waded

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Abraham Lincoln

across the stream and triumphantly returned
with the shivering animal under my arm. His
frantic leaps of joy and other evidences of a
dog's gratitude amply repaid ms for all the ex-
posure I had undergone."

SFLITTINO THE HISTORIC RAHS

After two weary weeks of floundering through
muddy prairies and jolting over rough forest
roads, now and then fording swollen and dan-
gerous stireams, the Lincolns were met near De-
catur, Illinois, by Cousin John Sanks, and
given a hearty welcome. John had chosen a
spot not far from his own home, and had the
logs all ready to build a cabin for the new-
comers. Besides young Abe, with the strength
of three, there were five men in the party, so
they were able to erect their firat home in Illinois
without asking the help of the neighbors, as was
. customary for a "raising" of that kind.

Nicolay and Hay, President Lincoln's private
secretaries, in their great life of their chief, gave
the following accoimt of the splitting of the rails
which afterward became the talk of the civilized
•world:

"Without the assistance of John Hanks he

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The Storjr of Young

plowed fifteen acres, and split, from the tall
walnut trees of the primeval forest, enough rails
to surround tiiem with a fence. Little did
either dream, while engaged in this work, that
the day would come when the appearance of
John Hanks in a public meeting with two of
these rails on his shoulder, would electrify a
State convention, and kindle throughout the
country a contagious and passionate enthusiasm
whose results would reatdi to endless genera-
tions. "-

"CHAPTER IX

STABima Ottt fob Himself

HIS FATHER AND HIS "FKEEDOM SinT"

According to his own account, Abe had made
about thirty dollars as a peddler, besides bear-
ing the brunt of the labor of the journey, though
there were four grown men in the combined
family. As he had passed his twenty-first birth-
day on the road, he really had the right to claim
these profits as his own. His father, who had,
for ten years, exacted Abraham's meager, hard-
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Abraham Lincoln

earned wages, should at least have given the boy
a part of that thirty dollars for a "freedom suit"
of clothes, as was the custom then.

Sut neither Thomas Lincoln nor his son seems
to have thought of such a thing. Instead of en-
tertaining resentment, Abraham stayed by, do-
ing all he could to make his father and step-
mother comfortable before he left them alto-
gether. Mrs. Lincoln had two daughters and
sons-in-law, besides John Johnston, so Abe
might easily have excused himself from looking
after the welfare of his parentsi Though his
fatiier had seemed to favor his stepdiildren in
preference to his own son, Mrs. Lincoln had
been "like an own mother to him," and he never
ceased to show his gratitude by being "like an
own son to her."

The first work Abe did in that neighborhood
was to split a thousand rails for a pair of trou-
sers, at the rate of four hundred rails per yard
of "brown jeans dyed with walnut bark." The
young man's breeches cost him about four hun-
dred rails more than they would if he had been
a man of ordinary height.

But Abraham hovered about, helping clear a
little farm, and maMng the cabin comfortable
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while he was earning his own "freedom suit"
He saw the spring planting done and that a
garden was made for his stepmother before he
■ went out of ready reach of the old people^

One sx>eeial reason Thomas Iiincoln had for
leaving Indiana was to get away from "the
milkaick." But the fall of 1830 was a very bad
season in Illinois for ehiUs and fever. The
father and, in fact, nearly tiie whole family left
at home suffered so much from malaria that they
were thoroughly discouraged. The interior of
their little cabin was a sorry sight — ^Thomas and
his wife were both afBieted at once, and one mar-
ried daughter was almost as ill. They were all so
sick that Thomas Lincoln registered a sha^ but
vehement resolve that as soon as tiiey could
travel they would "git out o* tharl" He had
been so determined to move to Illinois that no
persuasion could induce tn'm to give up the pro-
ject, therefore his disappointment was the more
keen and bitter.

The first winter the Lincolns spent in Illinois
was memorable for its severity. It is still
spoken of in that region as "the winter of the
big snow." Cattle and sheep froze to death or
died of exposure and starvation.
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THE FIRST WORK AJii; HID IN THAT NEICIIBORHOOD.

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Abraham Lmcoln

BTTTLDIHO THE FLATBOAT

Early in the spring after "the big snow,"
John Hanks, Lincohi and John Johnston met
Denton OfEutt, a man who was to wield an influ-
ence on the life of yoxmg Lincoln. OfEutt en-
gaged the three to take a load of produce and
other merchandise to New Orleans to sell. John
Hanks, the most reliable member of the Hanks
family, gave the following account of the way
he managed to bring Abe and his stepbrother
into the transaction: "He wanted me to go badly
but I waited before answering. I hunted up
Abe, and I introduced In'm and John Johnston,
his stepbrother, to Offutt. After some talk we
at last made an engagement with OfEutt at fifty
cents a day and sixty dollars to make the trip to
Kew Orleans. Abe and I came down the Sanga-
mon River in a canoe in March, 1831, and landed
at what is now called Jamestown, five miles east
of Springfield."

Denton Offutt spent so much time drinldng
in a tavern at the village of Springfield that the
flatboat was not ready when the trio arrived to
take it and its cargo down the river. Their em-
ployer met them on their arrival with profuse
apologies, and the three men were engaged to
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The Story; of Young

build the boat and load it up for tiie journey.

Buring the four weeks required to build the
raft, the men of that neighborhood became ac-
quainted with young Lincoln. A man named
John Roll has given this description of Abe's
appearance at that time :

"He was a tall, gaunt young man, dressed in
a suit of blue homespun, consisting of a round-
about jacket, waistcoat, and breeches which
came to within about three inches of his feet.
The latter were encased in rawhide boots, into
the tops of which, most of the time, his panta-
loons were stuffed. He wore a soft felt hat
which had once been black, but now, as its owner
dryly remarked, 'was sunburned until it was a
combine of colors.' "

There was a sawmill in Sangamontown, and
it was the custom for the "men folks" of the
neighborhood to assemble near it at noon and in
the evening, and sit on a peeled log which had
been rolled out for the purpose. Toimg Lin-
coln soon joined this group and at once became
a great favorite because of his stories and jokes.
His stories were so funny that "whenever he'd
end 'em up in his unexpected way the boyB on.
the log would whoop and roll off." In this way

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Abraham Xancoln

the log was polished smooth as glass, and came
to be known in the ne^hborhood as "Abe's
log."

A traTeling juggler came one day while the
boat was building and gave an exhibition in the
house of one of the neighbors. This magician
asked for Abe's hat to cook eggs in. Lincoln
hesitated, but gave this ezplanatioQ for his de-
lay: "It was out of respect for the eggs— not
care for my hat I"

ABE UXCOLN SATES THREE UTES

While they were at work on the flatboat Ihe
humorous young stranger from Indiana became
the hero of a thrilling adventure, described as
follows by John EoU, who was an eye witness
to the whole scene :

"It was the spring following 'the winter of
the deep snow.' Walter Carman, John Seamen,
myself, and at times others of the Carman boys,
had helped Abe in building the boat, and when
we had finished we went to work to make a dug-
out, or canoe, to be used as a smfiU boat with the
flat We foimd a suitable log about an eighth
of a mile up the river, and with our axes went to
work under Lincoln's direction. The river was
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TKe Story of Young

very high, fairly 'booming.* After the dug-out
was ready to launch we took it to the edge of the
water, and made ready to *let her go,' when
Walter Carman and John Seamon jumped in as
the boat struck the water, each one anxious to
be the first to get a ride. As they shot out from
the shore they found they were unable to make
any headway against the strong current. Car-
man had the paddle, and Seamon was in the
stem of the boat. Lincoln shouted to them to
head up-stream and 'work back to shore,' but
they found themselves powerless against the
stream. At last they began to pull for the wreck
of an old fiatboat, the first ever built on the San-
gamon, which had sunk and gone to pieces, leav-
ing one of the stanchions sticking above the
water. Just as they reached it Seamon made a
grab, and caught hold of the stanchion, when the
canoe capsized, leavii^ Seamon clinging to the
old timber and throwing Carman into the
stream. It carried him down with the speed of
a mill-race. Lincoln raised his voice above the
roar of the flood, and yelled to Carman to swim
for an elm tree which stood almost in the dian-
nel, which the action of the water had changed.
"Carman, being a good swimmer, succeeded
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Abraham 'Lincoln

in catching a branch, and ptilled himself up out
of the water, which was very cold, and had al-
most chilled him to death j and there he sat, shivr
ering and chattering in the tree.

"Lincoln, seeing Carman safe, called out to
Seamon to let go the stanchion and swim for the
tree. With some hesitation he obeyed, and
struck out, while Lincoln cheered and directed
him from the bank. As Seamon neared the tree
he made one grab for a branch, and, missing it,
went imder the water. Another desperate lunge
was successful, and he climbed up beside Car-
man.

"Things were pretty exciting now, for there
were two men in the tree, and the boat gone. It
was a cold, raw Apnl day, and there was great
danger of the men becoming benumbed and fall-
ing back into the water. Lincoln called out to
them to keep their spirits up and he would save
them.

"The village had been alarmed by this time,
and many people had come down to the bank.
Lincoln procured a rope and tied it to a log. He
called all hands to come and help roll the log into
the water, and, after this had been done, he, with
the assistance of several others, towed it some
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distance up the stream. A daring young fellow
by the name of 'Jim* Dorell then took his seat on
the end of the log, and it was pushed out into the
current, with the expectation that it would be
carried down stream against the tree where Sea-
mon and Carman were.

"The log was well directed, and went straight
to the tree; but Jim, in his impatience to help
his friends, fell a victim to bis good intentions.
Making a frantic grab at a branch, he raised
himself off the log, which was swept from under
him by the raging waters and he soon joined the
other victims upon their forlorn perch.

"The excitement on the shore increased, and
almost the whole population of the village gath-
ered on the river bank. Liaeoln had the log
pulled up the stream, and, securing another
piece of rope, called to the men in the tree to
catch it if they could when he should reach the
tree. He then straddled the log himself, and
gave the word to push out into the stream.
When he dashed into the tree he threw the rope
over the stump of a broken limb, and let it play
until he broke the speed of the log, and gradu-
ally drew it back to the tree, holding it there
until the three now nearly^ frozen men had
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climbed down and seated tbemselv^ astride.
He then gave orders to the people on shore to
hold fast to the end of the rope which was tied
to the log, and leaving his rope in the tree he
turned the log adrift. The force of the current,
acting against the taat rope, swtmg the log
around against the bank and all 'on board' were
saved.

"The excited people who had watched the
dangerous expedition with alternate hope and
fear, now broke into cheers for Abe Lincoln,
and praises for his brave act. This adventure
made quite a hero of him along the Sangamon,
and the people never tired of telling of the ex-
ploit."

"down the river"

The launching of that flatboat was made a
feast-day in the neighborhood. Denton OfEutt,
its proprietor, was invited to break away from
the "Buckhom" tavern at Springfield to wit-
ness the ceremonies, which, of course, took a po-
litical turn. There was much speech-making,
but Andrew Jackson and the Whig leaders were
equally praised.

The boat had been loaded with pork in barrels,

com, and hogs, and it slid into the Sangamon

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River, tiien overflowing with the spring "freah,"
with a big splash.

The three sturdy navigators, accompanied by
OfEutt himself, floated away in triumph from
the waving crowd on the bank.

The first incident in the voyi^ occurred the
19th of April, at Rutlei^e's mill dam at New
Salem, where the boat stranded and "hung"
there a day and a night

HOW ABE GOT THE FLATBOAT OVEE THE DAM

New Salem was destined to fill an important
place in the life of Abraham Lincoln. One who
became well acquainted with bim described bim
as the New Salemites first saw him, "wading
roimd on Rutledge*s dam with his trousers
rolled up nine feet, more or less.'*

One of the crew gave this account of ttielr
mode of operations to get the stranded raft over
the dam:

"We unloaded the boat — ^that is, we trans-
ferred the goods from our boat to a borrowed
one. We tiien rolled the barrels forward ; Lin-
coln bored a hole in the end (projectii^) over
the dam; the water which had leaked in ran out
then and we slid over. "

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Abraham Lineoln

Offutt's enthusiasm over Abe's simple method
of surmounting this great obstacle was bound-
less. A crowd had gathered on a hillside to
watch Lincoln's operations,

AN IMPROBABLE PROPHECY

For the novelty of the thing, John Hanks
claimed to have taken young Lincoln to a
"voodoo" negress. She is said to have become
excited in reading the future of the tall, thin
young man, saying to him, "Tou will be Presi-
dent, and aU the negroes wiU be free." This
story probably originated long afterward, when
the strange prophecy had already come true —
though fortune tellers often inform young men
who come to them that they will be Presidents
some day. That such a woman could read the
Emancipation Proclamation in that young
man's future is not at all likely.

Another story is told of Abraham Lincoln's
second visit to New Orleans that is more prob-
able, but even this is not certain to have hap-
pened exactly as related. The young northerner
doubtless saw negroes in-chains, and his spirit,
like that of his father and mother, rebelled
against this inhumanity. There is little doubt
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that in such sights, as one of his companions re-
lated, "Slavery ran the iron into him then and
there."

"l^HTCrrHABDl"

But l^e story goes that the ttaee young fellows
— ^Hanks, Johnston and Lincoln — ^went wander-
ing about the city, and passed a slave market,
•where a comely young mulatto girl was offered to
the highest bidder. They saw prospective pur-
chasers examine the weeping girl's teeth, pinch
her flesh and pull her about as they would a cow
or a horse. The whole scene was so revolting that
lincoln recoiled from it with horror and hatred,
saying to his two companions, "Boys, let's get
away from this. If ever I get a chance to hit that
thing" — meaning slavery — **ru hit it hard!"

In June tlie four men took passage up the river
on a steamboat for the return trip. At St Louis,
Offutt got off to purchase stock for a store he
proposed to open in New Salem, where he
planned to place young lincoln in ^large.

WEESTLHra WITH THE COTJNTY CHAMPIOBT

The other three started on foot to reach their
several homes in Illinois. Abe improved the op-
portunity to visit his father's family in Coles
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Abraham Lincoln

Coimlrp', where Thomas Lineoln had removed as
soon as he was able to leave their first Tllinois
home near Decatur.

Abe's reputation as a wrestler had preceded
him and the Coles County Champion, Daniel
Needham, came and challenged the tall visitor
to a friendly contest. Young Lincoln laugh-
ingly accepted and threw Needham twice. The
crestfallen wrestler's pride vas deeply hurt, and
he found it hard to give up beaten.

"Lincoln," said he, "you have thrown me
twice, but you can't whip me."

Abe laughed again and replied:

"Needham, are you satisfied that I can throw
yout If you are not, and must be convinced
throu^ a thrashing, I will do that, too — for
your sake!**

CHAPTER X

CUEBEINa ABD WOREINO
HE COULD "make A FEW RABBIT TRACKS"

It was in August, 1831, that Abraham Lin-
coln appeared in the village of New Salem, Dli-
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nois. Neither Denton Offutt nor his merchan-
dise had arrived as promised. While paying
the penalty of the punctual man— by waiting for
the tardy one — ^he seemed to the villagers to be
loafing. But Abraham Lincoln was no loafer.
He always fomid something useful and helpful
to do. This time there was a local election, and
one of the clerks had not appeared to perform
Ms duties. A New Salem woman wrote of Lin-
coln's first act in the village :

"My father, Mentor Graham, was on that day,
as usual, ap{>ointed to be a clerk, and Mr. Mc-
Namee, who was to be the other, was sick and
failed to come. They were looking aroimd for
a man to fill his place when my father noticed
Mr. Lincoln and asked if he could write. He
answered that he could 'make a few rabbit
tracks.* "

FILOTTNQ A FAMILT FLATBOAT

A few days after the election the young
stranger, who had become known by this time
as the hero of the flatboat on Eutledge's dam
four months before, found employment as a
pilot A citizen. Dr. Nelson, wsa about to emi-
grate to Texas. The easiest and b^ mode of
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Abraham Lincoln

travel in those days was by flatboat down the
river. He had loaded all his household goods
and movable property on his "private convey-
ance" and was looking about for a "driver."
Young Lincoln, still waiting, unemployed, of-
fered his services and took the Nelson family
down the Sangamon Biver— a. more dif&cult
task in August than in April, when the water
was high on account of the spring rains. But
the young pilot proceeded cautiously down the
shallow stream, and reached Beardstown, on the
Illinois River, where he was "discharged" and
walked back over the hills to New Salem.

AXNOYED BT THE HIOK PRAISES OF HIS EMFLOTBB

Denton Offutt and his stock for the store ar-
rived at last, and Lincoln soon had a little store
opened for business. A coimtry store seemed
too small for a clerk of such astoundii^ abilities,
so the too enthusiastic employer bought Cam-
eron's mill with the dam on which Lincoln had
already distinguished himself, and made the
clerk manager of the whole business.

This was not enough. OfEutt sounded the
praises of the new clerk to aU comers. He
claimed that Abraham Lincoln "knew more than
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any man in the United States/' As Mr. Offutt
had never shown that he knew enough himself
to prove this statement, the neighbors began to
resent such rash claims. In addition, OfEutt
boasted that Abe could "beat the counly" run-
fiing, jumping and wrestling. Here was some-
thing the new clerk could prove, if true, so his
employer's statement was promptly challenged.

When a strange man came to the village to
live, even though no one boasted of his prowess,
he was likely to suffer at the hands of the
rougher element of the place. It was a sort of
rude initiation into their society. These cere-
monies were conducted with a savage sense of
himior by a gang of rowdies known as the
"Clary's Grove Boys,** of whom the "best
fighter" was Jack Armstrong.

Sometimes "the Boys" nailed up a stranger
in a hogshead and it was rolled down hill. Some-
times he was ingeniously insulted, or made to
fight in self-defense, and beaten black and blue
by the whole gang. They seemed not to be
hampered by delicate notions of fair play in
their actions toward a stranger. They "picked
on him," as chickens, dogs and wolves do upon a
newcomer among them.
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So when young Lincoln heard his employer
bracing about his brain and brawn he was suf-
ficiently acquainted with backwoods nature to
know that it boded no good to him. Even then
* ' he knew how to bide his time, ' ' and turned it to
good account, for he had a good chance, shortly
to show the metal that was in him.

"The Boys" called and began to banter with
the long-legged clerk in the new store. This led
to a challenge and comparison of strength and
prowess between young Lincoln and Jack Arm-
strong. Abe accepted the gaxmtlet with an alac-
rity that pleased the crowd, especially the chief
of the bully "Boys," who expected an easy vic-
tory. But Jack was surprised to find that the
stranger was his match — ^yes, more than his
matdL Others of "the Boje" saw this, also, and
began to interfere 1^ tripping Abe and trying to
help their champion by unfair means.

This made young Lincoln angry. Putting
forth all his strength, he seized Armstrong by
the Ihroat and "nearly choked the exuberant
life out of him." When "the Boys" saw the
stranger shaking their "best fighter" as if he
were a mere child, their enmity gave place to
admiration; and when Abe had thrown JTack
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Armstrong upon the ground, in Ma wrath, as a
lion would throw a dog that had been set upon
him, and while the strong stranger stood there,
with his back to the wall, challenging the whole
gang, with deep-set eyes blazing with indigna-
tion, they acknowledged him as tiieir conqueror,
and declared that "Abe Lincoln is the cleverest
fellow that ever broke into the settlement."

The initiation was over, and young Lincohi's
triumph complete. From that day "the Clary's
Grove Boys" were his staunch supporters and
defenders, and his employer was allowed to go
on bragging about his wonderful clerk without
hindrance.

OIVtNG ANOTHER BTJLLT "a DOSE OP SMAETWEED"

A bumptious stranger came into the store one
day and tried to pick a quarrel with the tall
clerk. To this end he used language offensive to
several women who were there trading. Lin-
coln quietly aaked the fellow to desist as there
were "ladies present" The bully considered
this an admission that the clerk was afraid of
him, so he began to swear and use more offensive
language than before. As this was too much for
Abraham's patience, he whispered to the fellow
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Abraham Lincoln

that if he would keep quiet till the ladies went
out, he (Lincoln) would go and "have it out."

After the women went, the man became vio-
lently abusive. Toimg Lincoln calmly went out-
side with him, saying: **I see you must be
whipped and I suppose I will have to do it."
With this he seized the insolent fellow and made
short work of h\m. Throwing the man on the
ground, Lincoln sat on him, and, with his long
arms, gathered a handful of "smartweed" which
grew around them. He then rubbed it into the
buUy's eyes until he roared witii pain. An ob-
server of this incident said afterward:

"Lincoln did all this without a particle of
anger, and when the job was finished he went
immediately for water, washed his victim's face
and did everything he could to alleviate the
man's distress. The upshot of the matter was
that the fellow became his life-long friend, and
was a better man from that day."

HOW HE MADE HIS FELLOW CLEBE OtVE UP
OAMBLZHG

Lincoln's morals were unusually good for that
time and place. Smoking, chewii^, drinking,
swearing and gambling were almost universal
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The Stoiy of Young

among his associates. 0€utt hired a young
man, William Q. Greene, after the purchase of
the mill. This assistant first told many of the
stories, now so well known, concerning Abe at
this period of his career:

Young Greene was, like most of the young
men in New Salem, addicted to i)etty gambling.
He once related how Lincoln induced him to quit
the habit. Abe said to him one day :

"Billy, you ought to stop gambling with
Estep." Billy made a lame excuse:

"I'm ninety cents behind, and I can't quit
until I win it back."

"Ill help you get that back," ui^ed Lincoln,
"if youTl promise me you won't gamble any
more."

The youth reflected a moment and made the
required promise. Lincoln continued:

"Here are some good hats, and you need a
new one. Now, when Estep comes again, you
draw him on by degrees, and finally bet him one
of these hats that I can lift a forty-gallon barrel
of whisky and take a drink out of the bung-
hole."

Billy agreed, and the two clerks chuckled as
they fixed the barrel so that the buughole would

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Abraham Lincoln

come in the right place to win the bet, though
the thing seemed impossible to Greene himself.
Estep appeared in due time, and after long par-
leying and bantering the wager was laid. Lin-
coln then squatted before the barrel, lifted one
end up on one knee, then raised the other end
on to the other knee, bent over, and by a Hercu-
lean effort, actually succeeded in taking a drink
from the bunghole — ^though he sjrat it out imme-
diately. "That was the only time," said G-reene
long afterward, "that I ever saw Abraham Lin-
coln take a drink of liquor of any kind." This
was tiie more remarkable, as whisky was served
on all occasions— even passed around with re-
freshments at religious meetings, according to
Mrs. Josiah Crawford, the woman for whom Abe
and Nancy had worked as hired help. Much as
Abe disapproved of drinking, he considered that
"the end justified the means" employed to break
his fellow clerk of the gambling habit.

HOW HE WON THE 17AHE OF "honest abb' ' ,

Abe Lincoln could not endure the thought of
cheating any one, even though it had been done
unintentionally. One day a woman bought a
bill of goods in Offutt's store amounting to some-
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thing over two dollars. She paid Ahe the money
and went away satisfied. That night, on goin^
over the sales of the day, Abe found that he had
charged the woman six and one-fourth cents too
much. After closing the store, though it was
late, he could not go home to supper or to bed
till he had restored that sixpence to its proper
owner. She lived more than two miles away, but
that did not matter to Abe Lincoln. When he
had returned the money to the astonished woman
he walked back to the village with a long
step and a light heart, content with doii^ his
duty.

Another evening, as he was closing the store, a
woman came in for a half-pound of tea. He
weighed it out for her and took the pay. But
early next morning, when he came to "open up,"
he found the four-ounce weight instead of the
eight-ounce on the scales, and inferred that he
had given that woman only half as much tea as
he had taken the money for. Of course, the
woman would never know the difference, and it
meant walkii^ several miles and back, but the
honest clerk weighed out another quarter pound
of tea, locked the store and took that long walk
before breakfast As a "constituti(inal" it must
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Abraham Lincoln

have been a benefit to his health, for it satisfied
his sensitive conscience and soothed his tender
heart to "make good" in that way.

Bnnk and misdirected enthusiasm interfered
■with Benton OfEutt's success. After about a
year in New Salem he "busted up," as the neigh-
bors expressed it, and left his creditors in the
lurch. Among them was the clerk he had
boasted so much about. For a short time Abe
Lincoln needed a home, and found a hearty wel-
come with Jack Armstrong, tiie best fighter of
Clary's Grovel

J. G. Holland wrote, in his "Life of Abraham
Lincoln," of the young man's progress during
his first year in New Salem:

* * The year that Lincoln was in Denton Off utt 's
store was one of great advance. He had made
new and valuable acquaintances, read mimy
books, won multitudes of friends, and become
ready for a step further in advance. Those who
could appreciate brains respected him, and those
whose ideas of a man related to his muscles were
devoted to him. It was while he was performing
the work of the store that he acquired the nick-
name, 'Honest Abe' — a characterization that he
never dishonored, an abbreviation that he never

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The Story; of Young

outgrew. He waa everybody's friend, the best-
natured, the most sensible, the best-informed, the
most modest and unassuming, the kindest,
gentlest, roughest, strongest, best fellow in all
27ew Salem and the region round about"

CHAPTER XI

Politics, Wab, Store Keeping and Studying
Law

8TTTDTING ORAMMAB FIRST

By "a step still further in advance" Dr. Hol-
land must have meant the young clerk's goii^
into politics. He had made many friends in New
Salem, and they reflected back his good-will by
urging him to nm for the State Ijegislature.
Before doing this he consulted Mentor Graham,
the village schoolmaster, with whom he had
worked as election clerk when he first came to
the place. Abe could read, write and cipher,
but he felt that if he should succeed in poli-
tics, he would disgrace his office and himself

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Abraham Lmcoln

by not speakmg and writing English correctly.

The schoolmaster adTised: "If .you expect to
go before the public in any capacity, I tbinV the
best thing you can do is to study English gram-
mar."

* 'If I had a grammar I would commence now, "
sighed Abe.

Mr. Graham thought one could be found at
Vaner's, only six miles away. So Abe got up
and started for it as fast aa he could stride. In
an incredibly sort time he returned with a copy
of Kirkham's Grammar, and set to work upon it
at once. Sometimes he would steal away into
the woods, where he could study * ' out loud " if he
desired. He kept up his old habit of sitting up
nights to read, and as lights were expensive, the
village cooper allowed him to stay in his shop,
where he burned the shavings and studied by the
blaze as he had done in Indiana, after every one
else had gone to bed. So it was not long before
yoimg Lincoln, with the aid of Schoolmaster
Graham, had mastered the principles of English
grammar, and felt himself better equipped to
enter polities and public life. Some of his rivals,
however, did not trouble themselves about speak-
ing and writing correctly.
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OOINQ INTO POLITICS

James Butledge, a "substantial" citizen^ and
the former owner of Eutledge's mill and dam,
was the president of the New Salem debating
club. Young Lincoln joined this society, and
when he first rose to speak, everybody began to
smile in anticipation of a fimny story, but Abe
proceeded to discuss the question before the
house in very good form. He was awkward in Ms
movements and gestures at first, and amused
those present by thrusting his unwieldy hands
deep into his pockets, but his arguments were so
well-put and forcible that all who heard him were
astonished.

Mr. Rutledge, that night after Abe's maiden
effort at the lycemn, told his wife :

"There is more in Abe Lincoln's head than
mere wit and fun. He is already a fine speaker.
All he needs is culture to fit him for a high posi-
tion in public life."

But there were occasions enough where some-
thing besides culture was required. A man
who was present and heard Lincoln's first real
stump speech describes his appearance and ac-
tions in the following picturesque language:

"He wore a mixed jean coat, clawhammer
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Abraham Lmcoln

style, short in the sleeves and bob-tail — ^in fact,
it was so short in the tail that he could not sit
upon it — ^flax and tow linen pantaloons, and a
straw hat. I think he wore a vest, but do not re-
member how it looked. He wore pot metal (top)
boots.

"His maiden effort on the stump was a speech
on the occasion of a public sale at Pappj^rille, a
village eleven miles from Springfield. After the
sale was over and speechmaking had begun, a
fight — a 'general fight' as one of the bystand-
ers relates — ensued, and Lincoln, noticing one
of his friends about to succumb to the attack of
an infuriated rufBan, interposed to prevent it.
He did 80 most effectually. Hastily descending
from the rude platform, he edged his way
through the crowd, and seizing the buUy by the
neck and the seat of his trousers, threw him by
means of his great strength and long arms, as
one witne^ stoutly insists, 'twelve feet away.*
Returning to the stand, and throwing aside his
hat, he inaugurated his campaign with the fol-
lowing brief and juiey declaration:

"'Fellow-Citizens: I presume you all know
who I am. I am humble Abraham Lincoln. I
have been solicited by many friends to become a
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candidate for the Legislature. My politics aie
"short and sweet" like the old woman's dance.
I am in favor of national bank. I am in favor
of the internal improvement system, and a high
protective tariff. These are my sentiments and
political principles. If elected, I shall be thank-
ful; if not, it will be all the same.' *'

The only requirement for a candidate for the
Illinois Legislature in 1832 was that he should
announce his "sentiments." This Lincoln did,
accordii^ to custom, in a circular of about two
thousand words, rehearsing his experiences on
the Sangamon Biver and in the community of
New Salem. For a youth who had just turned
twenty-three, who had never been to school a
year in his life, who had no political training,
and had never made a political speedi, it was a
bold and dignified document, closing as follows:

"Consideru^ the great degree of modesty
which should always attend youth, it is probable
I have already been presuming more than be-
comes me. However, upon the subjects of which
I have treated, I have spoken as I have though!
I may be wrong in regard to any or all of them,
but, holding it a sound maxim that it is better
only sometimes to be right than at all times to be
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wrong, so soon as I discover m7 opinions to be
erroneous, I shall be ready to renounce them.

"Every man is said to have his peculiar ambi-
tion. "Whether this is true or not, I can say for
one, that I have no other so great as that of being
truly esteemed of my feUow-men by rendering
myself worthy of their esteem. How far I shall
succeed in gratifying this ambition is yet to be
developed. I am young and unknown to mai^
of you. I was bom, and have ever remained in
the most humble walks of hf e. I have no wealthy
or popular relations or friends to recommend
me. My case is thrown exclusively upon the in-
dependent voters of the country; and, if elected,
they will have conferred a favor on me for which
I shall be unremitting in my labors to compen-
sate. But if the good people in their wisdom
shall see fit to keep me in the background, I have
been too familiar with disappointments to be
very much chagrined."

"CAPTADT LINCOLN"

Lincoln had hardly launched in his first po-
litical venture when, in April, 1832, a messenger
arrived in New Salem with the announcement
from Governor Reynolds, of Illinois, that the
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Sacs and other hostile tribes, led by Black Hawk,
had invaded the northern part of the State,
spreadii^ terror among the white settlers in that
region. The governor called upon those who
were willing to help in driving back the Indians
to report at Beardstown, on the Illinois Biver,
within a week.

Lincoln and other Sangamon County men
went at once to Richmond where a company was
formed. The principal candidate for captain
was a man named Kirkpatrick, who had treated
Lincoln shabbily when Abe, in one of the odd
jobs he had done ia that region, worked in Kirk-
patrick's sawmill. The employer had agreed to
buy his hired man a cant-hook for handling the
heavy logs. As there was a delay in doing this,
Lincoln told him he would handle the logs with-
out the cant-hook if Kirkpatrick would pay him
the two dollars that implement would cost. The
employer promised to do this, but never gave him
the money.

So when Lincoln saw that Kirkpatrick was a
candidate for the captaincy, he said to Greene,
who had worked with him in Offutt's store:

"Bill, I believe I can make Kirkpatrick pay

me that two dollars he owes me on the cant-hook

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Abraham Lincohi

now. I ^ess 111 run against >iiTn for captain."
Therefore Abe Lincoln announced himself as
a candidate. The vote was taken in an odd way.
It was announced that when the men heard the
command to march, each should go and stand by
the man he wished to have for captain. The com-
mand was given. At the word, "March," three-
fourths of the company rallied round Abe Lin-
coln. More than twenty-five years afterward,
when Lincoln was a candidate for the presidency
of the United States, he referred to hinaelf in
the third i>eraon in describing this incident, say-
ing that he was elected "to his own surprise,"
and "he says he has not since had any success in
life which gave him so much satisfaction."

IGNOEANCB OF MHJTABT TACTICS

But Lincoln was a "raw hand" at military
tactics. He used to enjoy telling of his igno-
rance and the expedients adopted in giving his
commands to the company. Once when he was
marching, twenty men abreast, across a field it
became necessary to pass through a narrow gate-
way into the next field. He said:

**I could not, for the life of me, remember the
word for gettii^ the company endwise so that it
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The Story of Young

could go through the gate; bo, as we came near
the gate, I shouted, *This company is dismissed
for two minutes, when it will fall in. again on the
other side of the f«iee.* "

A HISrORIO MYSTERY EXFLAINXD

Captain Lincoln had his sword taken from
biTn for shooting within limits. Many have won-
dered that a man of Lincoln's intelligence should
have been guilty of this stupid infraction of ordi-
nary army regulations. Biographers of Lincoln
puzzled over this until the secret was explained
by "William Turley Baker, of Bolivia, HL, at the
Lincoln Centenary in Springfield. All uncon-
scious of solving a historic mystery, "Uncle
Billy" Baker related the following story which
explains that the shooting was purely acci-
dental :

"My father was roadmaster general in the
Black Hawk War. Lincoln used to come often
to our house and talk it all over with father,
when I was a boy, and I've heard them laugh
over their experiences in that war. The best
joke of all was this : Father received orders one
day to throw log bridges over a certain stream
the army had to cross. He felled some tall, slim
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black wabiuts — ihe only ones he could find there
— and the logs were so smooth and round that
they were hard to walk on any time. This day it
rained and made them very slippery. Half of
the soldiera fell into the stream and got a good
ducking. Captain Lincoln was one of those that
tumbled in. He just laughed and scrambled out
as quick as he could. He always made the best
of everything like ttiat.

''Well, that evening when the company camo
to camp, some of them had dog tents — jxist a big
canv£^ sheet — and the boys laughed to see Lin-
coln crawl imder one of them little tents. He was
so long that his head and hands and feet stuck
out on all sides. The boys said he looked just
like a big terrapin. After he had got himself
stowed away for the night, he remembered that
he hadn't deaned his pistol, after he fell into
the creek.

"So he backed out from under his canvas
shell and started to clean it out. It was what
was called a bulldog pistol, because it had a
blunt, short muzzle. Abe*8 forefinger was long
enough to use as a ramrod for it. But before he
began operations he snapped the trigger and, to
his astoniahmeut, the thing went off I
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The Sto^ of Young

"Pretty soon an orderly came along in great
haste, yeUin*, 'Who did that?— Who fired that
shot?' Some of the men tried to send the or-
derly along about his business, making believe
the report was heard filrther on, but Lincoln he
wouldn't stand for no such deception, spoken
or unspoken. *I did it,' says he, beginning to
explain how it happened.

"You see, his legs was so blamed long, and
he must have landed on his feet, in the creek, and
got out of the water without his pistol getting
wet, 'way up there in his weskiti

"But he had to pay the penalty just the same,
for they took his sword away from h\m for sev-
eral days. You see, he was a captain and ought
to 'a' set a good example in military discipline.*'

HOW GAFTAIN LINCOLIT SATED AN INDIAN'S UFE

One day an old "friendly Indian" came into
camp with a "talking paper" or pass from the
"big white war chief." The men, with the
pioneer idea that "the only good Indian is a
dead Indian," were for stringing him up. The
poor old red man protested and held the gen-
eral's letter before their eyes.

"Me good Injun," he kept sayii^, "iriute war
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Abraham Ldncoln

chief say me good Injun. Look — talking paper
— seel"

"Get out 1 It's a forgery I Shoot him! String
him up I" shouted the soldiers angrily.

This noise brought Captain Lincoln out of his
tent. At a glance he saw what they were about
to do. He jumped in among them, shouting in-
dignantly;

'* Stand back, all of you I For shame t 111
fight you all, one after the other, just as you
come. Take it out on me if you can, but you
shan't hurt this poor old Indian. When a man
comes to me for help, he's going to get it, if I
have to lick all Sangamon Counly to give it to
him."

The three months for which the men were en-
listed soon expired, and Lincoln's captaincy also
ended. But he re-enlisted as a priTate, and re-
mained in the ranks until the end of the war,
which found him in Wisconsin, hundreds of
miles from New Salem. He and a few com-
panions walked home, as there were not many
horses to be had. Lincoln enlivened the long
tramp with his fund of stories and jokes.

It is sometimes asserted that Abraham Lin-
coln and Jefferson Davis met at this early day,
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The Stoiy of Young

as officers in the Black Hawk War, but this
statement is not foimded on fact, for joung
Lieutenant DaTls was absent on a furlough and
could not have encountered the tall captain from
the Sangamon then, as maiiy would like to be-
lieve.

Lincoln always referred to the Black Hawk
War as a hiunorous adventure. He made a
fimny speech in Congress describing some of his
experiences in this campaign in which he did
not take part in a battle, nor did he even catch
sight of a hostile Indian.

AGAIN A RIVER PILOT

Abe was still out of work. Just before he en-
listed he piloted the Talisman, a steamboat
which had come up the Sangamon on a trial
trip, in which the speed of the boat averaged
four miles an hour. At that time the wildest ex-
citement prevailed. The coming of the Talis-
man up their little river was hailed with grand
demonstrations and much speech-making.
Every one expected the Government to spend
millions of dollars to make the Sangamon navi-
gable, and even New Salem (which is not now to
be found on the map) was to become a flourish-
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•VOU SHAN'T HURT THIS POOR OLD INDIAN."

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Abraham Lincoln

ing city, in the hopeful imaginings of its few
inhabitants. Lincoln, being a candidate, natu-
rally "took the fever," and shared the delirixun
that prevailed. He could hardly have done
otherwise, even if he had been so disposed. This
was before Ihe days of railroads, and the com-
merce and prosperity of the country depended
on making the smaller streams navigable. Lin-
coln received forty dollars, however, for his serv-
ices as pilot. The Talisman, instead of estab-
lishing a river connection with the Mssissippi
Biver cities, never came back. She was burned
at the wharf in St. Louis, and the navigation of
the poor little Sangamon, which was only a shal-
low creek, was soon forgotten.

uncoln's only defeat bt a direct vote

When Abe returned from the war he had no
steady employment. On this account, espe-
cially, he must have been deeply disappointed to
be defeated in the election which took place
within two weeks after his arrival. His patriot-
ism had been stroi^er than his political sagac-
ity. If he had stayed at home to help himself to
the Legislature he might have been elected,
though he was then a comparative stranger in
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The Story of Young

the county. One of the four representatives
chosen was Peter Cartwright, the backwoods
preacher.

Lincohi afterward mentioned that this was
the only time he was ever defeated by a direct
vote of the people.

CHAPTER Xn

BiTTOTo AND Keeping a Stoee

!&PTEB making what he considered a bad be-
ginning politically, youi^ Lincoln was on the
lookout for a "business chance." One came to
him in a peculiar way. A man named Radford
had opened a store in New Salem. Possessing
neither the strength nor the sagacity and tact of
Abe Lincoln, he was driven out of business by
the Clary's Grove Boys, who broke Ms store fix-
tures and drank his liquors. In his fright
Radford was willing to sell out at almost any
price and take most of his pay in promissory
notes. He was quickly accommodated. Through
William G. Greene a transfer was made at once
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Abraham Lincoln

from Reuben Radford to William Beny and
Abraham Lincoln. Berry had $250 in cash and
made the first payment. In a few hours after a
violent visit from those ruf&ans from Clary's
Grove Berry and Lincoln had formed a partner-
ship and were the nominal owners of a country
store.

The new fimn soon absorbed the stock and
business of another firm, James and Rowan
Hemdon, who had previously acquired the stock
and debts of the predecessors in their business,
and all these obligations were passed on with the
goods of both the Radford and Hemdon stores
to "Honest Abe."

The senior partner of the firm of Berry &
Lincoln was devoted to the whisky which was
found in the inventory of the Radford stock,
and the jxmior partner was given over to tiie
study of a set of "Blackstone's Commentaries,"
text-books which all lawyers have to study, that
came into his possession in a peculiar way, as
Candidate Lincoln told an artist who was paint-
ing his portrait in 1860 :

"One day a man who was migrating to the

West drove up in front of my store with a

wagon which contained his family and house-

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The Stoiy of Young

hold plunder. He asked me if I would buy an
old barrel for which he had no room in his
wagon, and which contained notiiing of special
value. I did not want it, but to oblige him I
bought it, and paid him, I think, half a dollar
for it Without further examination I put it
away in the store and forgot all about it.

"Some time after, in overhauling things, I
came upon the barrel, and emptying it on the
floor to see what it contained, I found at the bot-
tom of the rubbish a complete set of 'Black-
stone's Oommentaries. ' I began to read those
famous works. I had plenty of time ; for during
the long summer days, when the farmers were
busy with their crops, my customers were few
and far between. The more I read the more in-
tensely interested I became. Never in my whole
life was my mind so thoroughly absorbed. I
read until I devoured them."

"With one partner drinking whisky and the
other devouring "Blackstone," it was not sur-
prising that the business "winked out," as Lin-
coln whimsically expressed it, leaving the con-
scientious junior partner saddled with the obli-
gations of the former owners of two country
stores, and owing an amoimt so large that Liu*
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Abraham Lincoln

com often referred to it as "the national debt."
"William Berry, the senior partner, who was
equally responsible, "drank himself to death,"
leaving Lincoln alone to pay all the debts.

According to the custom and conscience of the
time, the insolvent young merchant was under
no obligation whatever to pay Liabilities con-
tracted by the other men, but Lincoln could
never be induced even to compromise any of tiie
accounts the othei^ had gone off and left liim to
settle. "Honest Abe" paid the last cent of his
"national debt" nearly twenty years later, after
much toU, self-denial and hardship.

POSTMASTER LINCOLN AND JACK AEMSTTBONa^S
PAMILT

Again out of employment, Abe was forced to
accept the hospitality of his friends of whom he
now had a large number. "While in business
witii Berry he received the appointment as post-
master. The pay of the New Salem post office
was not large, but Lincoln, always longing for
news and knowledge, had the privilege of read-
ing the newspapers which passed through his
hands. He took so much pains in delivering the
letters and papers that came into his eharge as
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The Story of Young

postmaster tiiat he anticipated tiie "special de-
livery" and "rural free delivery" features of
the postal service of the present day.

"a. ukooln, deputy subtetor"

Later John Calhoun, the county surveyor,
sent word to Lincoln that he would appoint him
deputy surveyor of the counly if he would ac-
cept the position. The young man, greatly as-
tonished, went to Springfield to call on Calhoun
and see if the story could be true. Calhoun knew
that Lincoln was utterly ignorant of surveying,
but told him he might take time to study up. As
soon as Lincoln was assured that the appoints
ment did not involve any political obligation —
for Calhoxm was a Jackson Democrat, and Lin-
coln was already a staunch "Whig — ^he procured
a copy of Flint and Gibson's "Surveying" and
went to work with a will. With the aid of Men-
tor Graham, and studying day and night, he
mastered the subject and reported to Calhoun in
six weeks. The county surveyor was astounded,
but when Lincoln gave ample proofs of his abil-
ity to do field work, the chief surveyor appointed
him a deputy and assigned him to the northern
part of Sangamon County.
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Abraham Liucoln

Deputy Surveyor Lincoln had to run deeper
in debt for a horse and surveying instruments in
order to do this new work. Although he made
three dollars a day at it — a large salary for that
time — and board and expenses were cheap, he
was unable to make money fast enough to satisfy
one creditor who was pushing Tn'm to pay one of
the old debts left by the failure of Berry & Un-
coln. This man sued Lincoln and, getting judg-
ment, seized the deputy's horse and instruments.
This was like "killing the goose that laid the
golden egg." Lincoln was in despair. But a
friend, as a surprise, bought in the horse and
instruments for one hundred and twenty dollars
and presented them to the struggling surveyor.

President Lincoln, many years afterward,
generously repaid this man, "Uncle Jimmy"
Short, for his friendly act in that hour of need.

Lincoln's reputation as a story teller and
wrestler had spread so that when it became
known that he was to survey a tract in a certain
district the whole neighborhood turned out and
held a sort of picnic. Men and boys stood ready
to "carry chain," drive stakes, blaze trees, or
work for the popular deputy in any capacity —
just to hear his funny stories and odd jokes.
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The Story of Young

They had foot races, wrestling matches and other
athletic sports, in which the surveyor sometimes
took part

But Lincoln's honesty was as manifest in
"running his lines" as in his weights and meas-
ures while he was a clerk and storekeeper. In
whatever he attempted he did his best. He had
tiiat true genius, which is defined as "the ability
to take pains. ' ' With all his j okes and fun Abra-
ham Lincoln was deeply in earnest. Careless
work in making surveys involved the landhold-
ers of that part of the country in endless dis-
putes and going to law about boundaries. But
Lincoln's surveys were recognized as correct al-
ways, so that, although he had mastered the sci-
ence in six weeks, lawyers and courts had such
confidence in his skill, as well as his honesty,
that his record as to a certain comer or line was
accepted as the true verdict and that ended the
dispute.

ELECTED TO T HK LEGMLATtlRB

Hampered though he was by unjust debts and
unreasonable creditors, Postmaster and Sur-
veyor Lincoln gained an honorable reputation
throughout the couniy, so that when he ran for
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Abraham Lincoln

the State Legislature, in 1834, he was elected by
a creditable majority.

CHAPTER Xin

The Yoxtno Leoislatob m Lote

shoot's EESPONSmnJlT

PAYmo his debts had kept Lincoln so poor
that, though he had been elected to the I^egisla-
ture, he was not properly clothed or equipped
to make himself presentable as the people's rep-
resentative at the State capital, then located at
Vandalia. One day he went with a friend to
call on an older acquaintance, named Smoot,
who was almost as dry a joker as himself, but
Smoot had more of this world's goods than the
young legislator-elect. Lincoln began at once to
chaff his friend.

"Smoot," said he, "did you vote for me?"

"I did that very thing,'* answered Smoot.

"Well," said Lincoln with a wink, "that
makes you responsible. You must lend me the
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The Story of Young

money to buy suitable clothing, for I want to
make a decent appearance in fhe Legislature."
"How much do you want?" asked Smoot.
"About two hundred dollars, I reckon."
For friendship's sake and for the honor of
Sangamon County the young representative re-
ceived the money at once.

ANN RUTLEDGB— "loved AND LOST"

Abe Lincoln's new suit of clothes made him
look still more handsome in the eyes of A-nn, the
daughter of the proprietor of Rutledge's Tav-
ern, where Abe was boarding at that time. She
was a beautiful girl who had been betrothed to
a young man named McNamar, who was said to
have returned to New York State to care for his
dying father and look after the family estate.
It began to leak out that tiiis young man was
going about under an assumed name and certain
suspicious circumstances came to light. But
Ann, though she loved the yoimg legislator, still
clung to her promise and the man who had
proved false to her. As time went on, though
she was supposed to be betrothed to Mr. Lincoln,
the treatment she had received from the recre-
ant lover preyed upon her mind so that she fell
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Abraham LincolB.

into a decline in the sununer of 1835, about a
year after her true lover's election to the Legis-
lature.

William O. Stoddard, one of the President's
private secretaries, has best told the story of the
young lover's despair over the loss of his first
love:

"It is not' known precisely when Ann Rut-
ledge told her suitor that her heart was his, but
early in 1835 it was publicly known that they
were solenmly betrothed. Even then the scrupu-
lous maiden waited for the return of the absent
McNamar, that she might be formally released
from the obligation to him which he had so reck-
lessly forfeited. Her friends argued with her
that she was carrying her scruples too far, and
at last, as neither man nor letter came, she per-
mitted it to be understood that she would marry
Abraham Lincoln as soon as his legal studies
should be completed.

"That was a glorious summer for him; the
brightest, sweetest, most hopeful he yet had
known. It was also the fairest time he was ever
to see; for even now, as the golden days came
and went, they brought an increasing diadow on
their wings. It was a shadow that was not to
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The Story; of Young

pass away. Little by little came iadications that
the health of Ann Butledge had sufEered under
the prolonged strain to which she had been sub-
jected. Her sensitive nature had been strung
to too high a tension an^. the chords of her life
were beginning to give way.

"There were those of her friends who said
that she died of a broken heart, but the doctors
called it 'brain fever.'

"On the 25th of August, 1835, just before the
summer died, she passed away from earth. But
she never faded from the heart of Abraham Lin-
coln. ... In her early grave was buried the
best hope he ever knew, and the shadow of that
great darkness was never entirely lifted from

him.

"A few days before Ann's death a message
from her brought her betrothed to her bedside,
and they were left alone. No one ever knew
what passed between them in the endless mo-
ments of that last sad farewell ; but Lincoln left
the house with inexpressible agony written upon
his face. He had been to that hour a man of
marvelous poise and self-control, but the pain he
now struggled with grew deeper and more deep,
until, when they came and told him she was
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Abraham Lincoln

dead, his heart and will, and even his brain itself
gave way. He was utterly without help or the
knowledge of possible help in this world or
beyond It. He was frantic for a time, seeming
even to lose the sense of his own identity, and aU
!N'ew Salem said that he was insane. He pite-
ously moaned and raved:

" *I never can be reconciled to have the snow,
rain, and storms beat upon her grave.'

"His best friends seemed to have lost their
infiuence over him, ... all but one; for
Bowling Green . . . managed to entice the
poor fellow to his own home, a ^ort distance
from the village, there to keep watch and ward
over him until the fury of his sorrow should
wear away. There were well-grounded feara
lest he might do himself some injury, and the
watch was vigilantly kept.

"In a few weeks reason again obtained the
mastery, and it was safe to let him return to his
studies and his work. He could indeed work
again, and he could once more study law, for
there was a kind of relief in steady occupation
and absorbing toil, but he was not, could not ever
be the same man. . . .

"Lincoln had been fond of poetry from boy-
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The Story of Young

hood, and had gradually made himself familiar
with large parts of Shakespeare's plays and the
works of other great writers. He now discov-
ered, in a strange collection of verses, the one
poem which seemed best to express the morbid,
troubled, sore condition of his mind, . . . the
lines by William Knox, beginning:

" *0h, why should the spirit of mortal be
proud?

Like a swift fleeting meteor, a fast fly-
ing cloud,

A flash of th£ lightning, a break of the
wave,

He passeth from life to his rest in the
grave:' "

"the long nine" and the removal to
spbingpield

Two years was the term for which Lincoln was
elected to the Legislature. The year following
the death of Apn Butledge be threw himself into
a vigorous campaign for re-election. He had
found much to do at Vandalia. The greatest
thing was the proposed removal of the State
capital to Springfield. In this enterprise he had
the co-operation of a group of tall men, known
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Abraham Lmcoln

as "the Long Kine," of whom he was the tallest
and came to be the leader.

Lincoln announced his second candidacy in
this brief, informal letter in the county paper :

"New Sai;em, June 13, 1836.

"To THE EdITOB op THE JOUHNAL:

"In your paper of last Saturday I
see a communication over the signature
of 'Many Voters' in which the candi-
dates who are announced in the Journal
are called upon to 'show their hands.'

* * Agreed. Here 's mine :

"I go in for all sharing the privi-
leges of the government who assist in
bearing its burdens. Consequently, I
go for admitting all whites to the right
of suffrage who pay taxes or bear arms
(by no means excluding females).

"If elected, I shall consider the
whole people of Sangamon my con-
stituents, as well those that oppose as
those that support me.

"While acting as their Representa-
tive, I shall be governed by their will
on all subjects upon which I have the
means of knowing what their will is;
and upon all others I shall do what my
own judgment teaches me will best ad-
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The Storjr of Young

vance their interests. Whether elected
or not, I go for distributing the pro-
ceeds of public lands to the several
States to enable our State, in common
with others, to dig canals and construct
railroads without borrowing and pay-
ing interest on it.

"li alive on the first Monday in No-
vember, I shall vote for Hugh L.
White for President.

"Very respectfully,

"A. Lincoln."

The earliest railroads in the United States
had been built during the five years just preced-
ing this announcement, the first one of all, only
thirteen miles long, near Baltimore, in 1831. It
is interesting to observe the enthusiasm with
which the young frontier politician caught the
progressive idea, and how quickly the minds of
the people turned from impossible river "im-
provements" to the grand possibilities of rail-
way transportation.

Many are the stories of the remarkable San-
gamon campaign in 1836. Bowan Hemdon,
Abe's fellow pilot and storekeeper, told the fol-
lowing:

146

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HE TOOK THE CRADLi; AXD LED ALL THE WAV ROUND.

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Abraham Lincoln

WINNIlfa VOTES, ■WTELDETa THE "cEADLE" TS A
WHEAT FIELD

"Abraham came to my house, near Island
Grove, during harvest. There were some thirty
men in the field. He got his dinner and went out
into the field, where the men were at work. I
gave him an introduction, and the boys said that
they could not vote for a man unless he could
take a hand.

" 'Well, boys,* said he, 'if that is all, I am sure
of your votes ' He took the 'cradle' and led all
the way round with perfect ease. The boys vrere
satisfied, and I don't think he lost a vote in the
crowd.

"The next day there was speaking at Berlin.
He went from my house with Dr. Bamett, who
had asked me who this man Lincoln was. I told
him that he was a candidate for the Legi^ature.
He laughed and said:

" 'Can't the party raise any better material
than that I*

"I said, 'Go to-morrow and hear him before
you pronounce judgment.'

"When he came back I said, 'Doctor, what do
you say now?'

'* 'Why, sir,' said he, 'he is a perfect "take-
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The Story of Yoimg

in." He knows more than all of them put to-
gether.* "

TALKED TO A WOMAN W TTTl.Ti HIS BITAL MILKED

Young Lincoln happened to call to speak to a
leading farmer in the district, and found his
rival, a Democratic candidate, there on the same
errand. The farmer was away from home, so
each of the candidates did his best to gain the
good-will of the farmer's "better half," who was
on her way to milk the cow. The Democrat
seized the pail and insisted on doing the work
for her. Lincoln did not make the slightest ob-
jection, but improved the opportunity thus given
to chat with their hostess. This he did so suc-
cessfully that when his rival had finished the
unpleasant task, the only acknowledgment he
received was a profusion of thanks from the
woman for the opportunity he had given her of
having "awcA a pleasant talk mth Mr. Lincoln!'*

HOW THE UGHTNINa STBTJCK FORQUER, IN SPTTE OF
HIS LIOHTNINO-ROD

Abe disinguished himself in his first political
speech at Springfield, the county seat. A lead-
ing citizen there, George Forquer, was accused
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Abraham Lincoln

of changing his political opinions to secure a cer-
tain government position ; he, also had his fine
residence protected by the first lightning-rod
ever seen in that part of the eomitry.

The contest was close and exciting. There
were seven Democratic and seven Whig candi-
dates for the Icwer branch of the Legislature.
Porquer, though not a candidate, asked to be
heard in reply to young Lincoln, whom he pro-
ceeded to attack in a sneering overbearing way,
ridiculing the young man's appearance, dress,
manners and so on. Turning to Lincoln who
then stood within a few feet of him, Forquer an-
nounced his intention in these words: "This
yoimg man must be taken down, and I am truly
sorry that the task devolves upon me."

The "Clary's Grove Boys," who attended the
meeting in a body — or a gang I — could hardly be
restrained from arising in their might and smit-
ing the pompous Forquer, hip and thigh.

But their hero, with pale face and flashing
eyes, smiled as he shook his head at them, and
calmly answered the insulting speech of his op-
ponent. Among other things he said:

"The gentleman commenced his speech by say-
ing 'this young man,' alluding to me, 'must be
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The Story of Young

taken down.* I am not so young in years as I
am in the tricks and trades of a politician, but'*
— ^pointing at Forquer — "live long or die young,
I would rather die now than, like the gentleman,
change my politics, and with the change receive
an office worth three thousand dollars a year,
and then feel obliged to erect a lightning-rod
over my house to protect a guilty conscience
from an offended GodI"

This stroke blasted Forquer's political pros-
pects forever, and satisfied tJie Clary's Grove
Boys that it was even better thaji all the things
they would have done to him.

ABE LINCOLN AS A "BLOATED ABISTOCRAT"

On another occasion Lincoln's wit suddenly
turned the tables on an abusive opponent. One
of the Democratic orators was Colonel Dick
Taylor, a dapper, but bombastic little man, who
rode in his carriage, and dressed richly. But,
politically, he boasted of belonging to the Dem-
ocrats, "the bone and sinew, the hard-fisted yeo-
manry of the land," and sneered at those "rag
barons," those Whig aristocrats, the "silk stock-
ing gentry I " As Abe Lincoln, the leading Whig
present, was dressed in Kentucky jeans, coarse
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Abraham Lincoln

boots, a checkered shirt without a collar or neck-
tie, and an old slouch hat, Colonel Taylor's at-
tack on the "bloated Whig aristocracy" sounded
rather absurd.

Once the colonel made a gesture so violent that
It tore his vest open and exposed his elegant shirt
ruffles, his gold watch-fob, his seals and other
ornaments to the view of all. Before Taylor, in
his embarrassment, could adjust his waistcoat,
Lincoln stepped to the front exclaiming;

"Behold the hard-fisted Democratl Look at
this specimen of 'bone and sinew' — and here,
gentlemen," laying his big work-bronzed hand
on his heart and bowing obsequiously — "here, at
your service, is your ' aristocrat 1' Here is one
of your 'silk stocking gentry I' Then spreading
out his great bony hands he continued, "Here is
your 'rag baron' with his lily-white hands. Yes,
I suppose I am, according to my friend Taylor,
a 'bloated aristocrat!' "

The contrast was so ludicrous, and Abe had
quoted the speaker's stock phrases with such a
marvelous mimicry that the crowd burst into a
roar, and Colonel Dick Taylor's usefulness as a
campaign speaker was at an end.

Small wonder, then, that young Lincoln's wit,

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The Story of Young

wisdom and power of ridicule made h^m known
in that campaign as one of the greatest orators
in the State, or that he was elected by such an
astonishing plurality that the county, "vdiich had
always been strongly Democratic, elected Whig
representatives that year.

After Herculean labors "the Long Nine" suc-
ceeded in having the State capital removed from
Vandalia to Springfield. This move added
greatly to the influence and renown of its "prime
mover," Abraham Lincoln, who was feasted and
"toasted" by the people of Springfield and by
politicians all over the State. After reading
"Blackstone" during his political campaigns,
young Lincoln fell in again with Major John T.
Stuart, whom he had met in the Black Hawk
War, and who gave him helpful advice and lent
him other books that he might "read law."

THE LINCOLN-STONE PROTEST

Although he had no idea of it at the time^
Abraham Lincoln took part in a grander move-
ment than the removal of a State capitaL Reso-
lutions were adopted in the Legislature in favor
of slavery and denouncing the hated "abolition-
ists" — or people who spoke and wrote for the
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Abraham Lincola

abolition of slavery. It required true heroism
for a young man thus to stand out against the
legislators of bis State, but Abe Lincoln seems
to have thought little of that. The hatred of the
people for any one who opposed slavery was very
bitter. Lincoln found one man, named Stone,
who was wiUing to sign a protest against the
resolutions f avorii^ slavery, which read as f ol'
lows:

"Eesolutions upon the subject of do-
mestic slavery having passed both
branches of the General Assembly at
its present session, the undersigned
hereby protest against the passage of
the same.

"They believe that the institution of
slavery is foimded on both injustice
and bad policy. [After several state-
ments of their belief concerning the
powers of Congress, the protest closed
as follows:]

"The difference between their opin-
ions and those contained in the said
resolution is their reason for enterit^
this protest.

"Dax Stone,
"A Lincoln."

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CHAPTER XSV.

Movmo TO Spbincoieu)

New Salem could no longer give jouz^ Lin-
coln scope for his growing power and influence.
"Within a few weeks after the Lincoln-Stone pro-
test, late in March, 1837, after living six years in
the little village which held so much of life and
sorrow for him, Abe sold his surveying compass,
marking-pins, chain and pole, packed all his ef-
fects into his saddle-bags, borrowed a horse of
his good friend "Squire" Bowling Green, and
reluctantly said good-bye to his friends tiiere. It
is a strange fact that New Salem ceased to exist
within a year from the day "Honest Abe" left
it. Even its little post office was discontinued by
the Government.

Henry C. Whitney, who was associated with
liincoln in those early days, describes Abe's mod-
est entry into the future State capital, with all
his possessions in a pair of saddle-bags, and call-
ing at the store of Joshua ¥. Speed, overlookix^
"the square," in the following dialogue:
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Abraham Lincoln

Speed — "Hello, Abe, just from Salem?"

Lincoln — "Howdy, Speed 1 Yes, this is my
first show-up."

Speed — **So you are to be one of uat"

Lincoln — "I reckon so, if you will let me take
pot luck with you."

Speed — "All right, Abe; it's better than
Salem."

Lincoln — "IVe been to Gorman's and got a
single bedstead ; now you figure out what it will
cost for a tick, blankets and so forth."

Speed (after figuring) — ^"Say, seventeen dol-
lars or 80."

Lincoln (countenance paling) — ^"I had no idea
it would cost half that, and I — I can 't pay it ; but
if you can wait on me till Christmas, and I make
anything, 111 pay; if I don't, I can't."

Speed — "I can do better than that; upstairs I
sleep in a bed big enough for two, and you just
come and sleep with me till you can do bet-
ter."

Lincoln (brightening) — "Good, where is it?"

Speed — "Upstairs behind that pile of barrels
— turn to the right when you go up."

Lincoln (returning joyously) — "Well, Speed,
I'vemovedl"

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STXTABT A UNCOhS

Major Stuart had grown so thorougbl7 inter-
ested in Lincoln, approving the diligence with
which the young law student applied himself to
the books which he had lent him, that, after his
signal success in bringing about the removal of
the State capital to Springfield, the older man
invited the younger to go into partnership with
him.

Abe had been admitted to the bar the year be-
fore, and had practiced law in a small way be-
fore Squire Bowling Green in -New Salem.
Greatly fiattered by the offer of such a man, Abe
gladly accepted, and soon after his arrival in
Springfield this sign, which thrilled the junior
partner's whole being, appeared in front of an
office near the square:

STUAET & LINCOLN
Attornets-atvLaw

"l NEVEB USE ANT ONB'S MONET BUT MT OWN"

After a while Lincoln left Speed's friendly
loft and slept on a loui^e in the law office, keep-
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Abraham Lincoln

ing his few effects in the little old-fashioned
trunk pushed out of sight under his couch.

One day an agent of the Post Office Depart-
ment came in and asked if Abraham Lincoln
could be found there. Abe arose and, reaching
out his hand, said that was his name. The agent
then stated his business ; he had come to collect
a balance due the Post Office Department since
the closing of the post office at New Salem.

The young ex-postmaster looked puzzled for
a moment, and a friend, who happened to be
present, hastened to his rescue with, "Lincoln,
if you are in need of money, let us help you."

Abe made no reply, but, pulling out his little
old trunk, he asked the agent how much he owed.
The man stated the amount, and he, opening the
trunk, took out an old cotton cloth containing
coins, which he handed to the official without
counting, and it proved to be the exact sum re-
quired, over seventeen dollars, evidently the
veiy pieces of money Abe had received while
acting as postmaster years before!

After the department agent had receipted for
the money and had gone out, Mr. Lincoln quietly
remarked:

*'I never use any one's money but my own,"
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DROPS THBOtrOH THE GEHASd TO DEMAND FKEE

Stuart & Lincoln's office was, for a time, over
a court room, which, was used evening as a halL
There was a square opening in the ceiling of the
court room, covered by a trap door in the room
overhead where Lineohi slept. One night there
was a promiscuous crowd in the hall, and
Lincoln's friend, B. D. Baker, was deliver-
ing a political harangue. Becoming some-
what excited Baker made an accusation against
a well-known newspaper in Springfield, and
the remark was resented by several in the audi-
ence.

"Pull TiiTTi down I" yelled one of them as they
came up to the platform threatening Baker with
personal violence. There was considerable con-
fusion which might become a riot.

Just at this jxmcture the spectators were
astonished to see a pair of long legs dangling
from the ceiling and Abraham Lincoln dropped
upon the platform. Seizing the water pitcher
he took his stand beside the speaker, and
brandished it, his face ablaze with indignation.

"Gentlemen," he said, when the confusion
had subsided, "let us not disgrace the age and
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Abraham Lincoln

the country in which we live. This ia a land
where freedom of speech is guaranteed. Mr.
Baker has a right to speak, and ought to be per-
mitted to do so. I am here to protect h\m and no
man shall take him from this stand if I can pre-
vent it." Lincoln had opened the trap door in
his room and silently watched the proceedings
until he saw th&t his presence was needed below.
Then he dropped right into the midst of the fray,
and defended his friend and the right of free
speech at the same time.

DEFENDING THE DEFENBELES3

A widow came to Mr. Lincoln and told him
how an attorney had charged her an exorbitant
fee for collecting her pension. Such cases filled
him with righteous wrath- He cared nothing for
"professional etiquette," if it permitted the
swindling of a jwor woman. Going directly to
the greedy lawyer, he forced him to refund to
the widow all that he had charged in excess of a
fair fee for his services, or he would start pro-
ceedings at once to prevent the extortionate at-
torney from practicing law any loi^r at the
Springfield bar.

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The Story of Young

If a negro had been wronged in any way, Law-
yer Lincoln was the only attorney in Spring-
field who dared to appear in his behalf, for he
always did so at great risk to his political stand-
ii^. Sometimes he appeared in defense of fugi-
tive slaves, or negroes who had been freed or had
run away from southern or "slave" States
where slavery prevailed to gain liberty in "free"
States in wMeh slavery was not allowed. Law-
yer Liucoln did all this at the risk of making
himself very unpopular with his fellow-attor-
neys and among the people at large, the greater
part of whom were then in favor of i)ermitting
those who wished to own, buy and sell negroes as
slaves.

Lincoln always sympathized with the poor
and down-trodden. He could not bear to charge
what his fellow-lawyers considered a fair price
for the amount of work and time spent on a
case. He often advised those who came to ^litn
to settle their disputes without going to law.
Once he told a man he woiUd charge him a lai^
fee if he had to try the case, but if the parties in
the dispute settled their difficulty without going
into court he would furnish them all the legal
advice they needed free of charge. Here is some
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Abraham Lincoln

excellent counsel Lawyer Lincoln gave, in later
life, in an address to a class of young attor-
neys :

"Biscourage litigation. Fei^uade your neigh-
bors to compromise whenever you can. Point
out to them how the nominal winner is often the
real loser — ^in fees, expenses and waste of time.
As a peacemaker a lawyer has a superior opx>or-
tmiity of becoming a good man. There will al-
ways be enough business. Never stir up litiga-
tion. A worse man can scarcely be found than
one who does this. Who can be more nearly a
fiend than he who habitually overhauls the
register of deeds in search of defects in titles
whereon to stir up strife and put money in his
pocket. A moral tone ought to be infused into
the profession which should drive such men out
of iV>

TOTTNQ lAWTEB UNGOLN OFFEBS TO FAT HALF TEE
DAHAOES

A wagonmaker in Mechanicsville, near
Springfield, was sued on account of a disputed
bill. The other side had engaged the best lawyer
in the place. The cartwright saw that his own
attorney would be unable to defend the case well.
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The Story of Young

So, when the day of the trial arrived he sent his
son-in-law to Springfield to bring Mr. Lincoln
to save the day for him if possible. He said to
the messenger:

*'Son, you've just got time. Take this letter
to my yoimg friend, Abe Lincoln, and bring him
back in the buggy to appear in the case. Guess
he'll come if he can."

The young man from Mechanicsville found the
lawyer in the street playing "knucks" with a
troop of children and laughing heartUy at the
fxm they were all having. When the note was
handed to ^n'm, Lincoln said :

"All right, wait a minute," and the game soon
ended amid peals of laughter. Then the young
lawyer jimiped into the buggy. On the way
back Mr. Lincoln told his companion such funny
stories that the yoimg man, convulsed with
laughter, was unable to drive. The horse, badly
broken, upset them into a ditch^ smashing the
vehicle.

"You stay behind and look after the buggy,"
said the lawyer. "I'll walk on."

He came, with long strides, into the court
room just in time for the trial and won the case
for the wagonmaker.

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.AJbraham Lincoln

"What am I to pay yonV asked the client de-
lighted.

"I hope you wont think ten or fifteen dollars
too much," said the young attorney, "and 111
pay half the hire of the buggy and half the cost
of repairing it."

LAWTBB UlTOOLN AND HABT OWENS

About the time Mr. Liucoln was admitted to
the bar. Miss Mary Owens, a bright and beauti-
ful young woman from Kentucl^, came to visit
her married sister near New Salem. The sister
had boasted that she was going to "make a
match" between her sister and Lawyer Lincoln.
The newly admitted attorney smiled indulgently
at all this banter until he began to consider him-
self under obligations to marry Miss Owens if
that young lady proved willing.

After he went to live in Springfield, with no
home but his ofi&ce, he wrote ttie young lady a
long, discouraging letter, of which this is a part :

"I am thinking of what we said about
your coming to Uve in Springfield. I
am afraid you would not be satisfied.
There is a great deal of fiourishing
about la carriages here, which it would
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be your doom to see without sharing it
You would have to be poor without the
means of hidii^ your poverty. Do you
believe that you could bear that pa-
tiently 1 "Whatever woman may cast
her lot with mine, should any ever do
80, it is my intention to do all in my
power to make her happy and con-
tented, and there is nothing I can
imagine that could make me more un-
happy than to fail in that effort. I
know I should be much happier with
you than the way I am, provided I saw
no sign of discontent in you.

"I much wish you would t>iinlr seri-
ously before you decide. What I have
said, I will moat positively abide by,
provided you wish it. You have not
been accustomed to hardship, and it
may be more severe than you now
imagine. I know you are capable of
thinking correctly on any subject, and
if you deliberate maturely upon this
before you decide, then I am willing to
abide by your decision.

"Yours, etc,

"Ldscoln."

For a love letter this was nearly as cold and

formal as a legal document Miss Owens could

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Abraham Lincoln

see well enough that Lawyer Lineoln was not
much in love with her, and she let him know, as
kindly as she could, that she was not disposed to
cast her lot for life with an enforced lover, as he
had proved himself to be. She afterward con-
fided to a friend that "Mr. Lineoln was deficient
in those little links which make up the chain of
a woman's happiness."

THE SABLT ETVALET BETWEEN USCGLS AND
DOtTGL&S

Soon after Mr. Lincoln came to Springfield he
met Stephen A. Douglas, a brilliant little man
from Vermont. The two seemed naturally to
take opposing sides of every question. They
were opposite in every way. Lincoln was tall,
angular and awkward. Douglas was small,
round and graceful — ^he came to be known as
"the Little Giant." Douglas was a Democrat
and favored slavery. Lincoln was a Whig, and
strongly opposed that dark institution. Even in
petty discussions in Speed's store, the two men
seemed to gravitate to opposite sides. A little
later they were rivals for the hand of the same
young woman.

One night, in a convivial company, Mr. Doug-
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las's attention was directed to the fact that Mr.
Lincoln neither smoked nor drank. Considering
this a reflection upon his own habits, the little
man sneered :

""What, Mr. Lincoln, are you a temperance
man!'*

"No," replied Lincoln with a smile full of
meaning, "I'm not exactly a temperance man,
but I am temperate in this, to wit: — ^I don't
drinhr

In spite of this remark, Mr. Lincoln was an
ardent temperance man. One ■Washington*s
birthday he delivered a temperance address be-
for the the "Washingtonian Society of Spring-
field, on "Charity in Temperance Reform," in
which he made a strong comparison between the
drink habit and black slavery.

LOGAN & LINCOLN

In 1841 the partnership between Stuart and
Lincoln was dissolved and the younger man be-
came a member of the firm of Logan & Lincoln.
This was considered a long step in advance for
the young lawyer, as Judge Stephen T. Logan
was known as one of the leading lawyers in the
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Abraham Lincoln

State. Prom this senior partner he learned to
make the thorough study of Ms cases that
characterized his work throughout his later
career.

While in partnership with Logan, Mr. Lincoln
was helping a young fellow named "Billy"
Hemdon, a clerk in his friend Speed's store, ad-
vising him in his law studies and promising to
give the youth a place in his own office as soon as
young Hemdon should be fitted to fill it.

WHiT UKCOLN DID WITH HIS FIEST FEVB HnJNDEED
DOLLAR FEE

During the interim between two partnerships,
after he had left Major Stuart, and before he
went into the office with Logan, Mr. Lincoln con-
ducted a case alone. He worked very hard and
made a brilliant success of it, winning the verdict
and a five hundred dollar fee. When an old law-
yer friend called on him, Lincoln had the money
spread out on the table counting it over.

"Look here, judge," said the young lawyer.
"See what a heap of money I've got from that
case. Did you ever see anything like iti Why,
I never in my life had so much money all at
once!"

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The Story; of Young

Then his nuumeT changed, and crossing his
long arms on the table he said :

"I have got just five hundred dollars; if it
were only seven hundred and fifty I would go
and buy a quarter section (160 acres) of land
and give it to my old stepmother."

The friend offered to lend him the two hun-
dred and fifty dollars needed. While drawii^ up
the necessary papers, the old judge gave the
young lawyer this advice :

"Lincoln, I wouldn't do it quite tiiat way.
Tour stepmother ia getting old, and, in all prob-
ability, will not live many years. I would settle
the properly upon her for use during her life-
time, to revert to you upon her death."

"I shaU do no such thing," Lincoln Teplied
with deep feeling. "It is a poor return, at best,
for all the good woman's devotion to me, and
there is not going to be any half-way business
about it."

The dutiful stepson did as he planned. Some
years later he was obliged to write to John
Johnston, his stepmother's son, appealing to
Tiim not to try to induce his mother to sell the
land lest the old woman should lose the support
he had provided for her in her declining years.
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Abraham Lincoln

IN LOTE WITH A BELLE FEIOM LOUISVILLE

Lincoln's popularity in Sangamon Coimty, al-
ways increasing, was greatly strengthened by
the part he had taken in the removal of the cap-
ital to Springfield, which was the county seat as
well as the State capital. So he was returned to
the Legislature, now held in Springfield, time
after time, without further effort on his part.
He was looked upon as a young man with a great
future. "While he was in the ofl&ce with Major
Stuart that gentleman's cousin, Miss Mary
Todd, a witty, accomplished yomig lady from
Louisville, Kentuclg^, came to Springfield to
visit her sister, wife of Ninian W. Edwards, one
of the "Loi^ Nine" in the State ABsembly.

Miss Todd was brilliant and gay, a society girl
— ^in every way the opposite of Mr. Lincoln —
and he was charmed with everything she said
and did. Judge Douglas was one of her numer-
ous admirers, and it is said that the Louisville
belle was so flattered by his attentions that she
was in doubt, for a time, which suitor to accept.
She was an ambitious young woman, having
boasted from girlhood that she would one day be
mistress of the White House.

To all appearances Douglas was the more
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The Story of Young

likely to fulfill Miaa Todd's high ambition. He
was a society man, witty in conTersation, popu-
lar with women as well as with men, and had
been to Congress, so he had a national reputa-
tion, while Lincoln's was only local, or at most
confined to Sangamon County and the Eighth
Judicial Circuit of Illinois.

But Mr. Douglas was already addicted to
drink, and Miss Todd saw doubtless that he
could not go on long at the rapid pace he was
keeping up. It is often said that she was in
favor of slavery, as some of her relatives who
owned slaves, years later, entered the Confed-
erate ranks to fight against the Union. But the
remarkable fact that she finally chose Lincoln
shows that her sympathies were against slavery,
and she thus cut herself off from several mem-
bers of her own family. With a woman's intui-
tion she saw the true worth of Abraham Lincoln,
and before long they were understood to be en-
gaged.

But tlie young lawyer, after his recent experi-
ence with Mary Owens, distrusted his ability to
make any woman happy — much less the belle
from Louisville, so brilliant, vivacious, well edu-
cated and exacting. He seemed to grow mor-
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AbraJdam Lincoln

bidly conscious of his shortcomings, and she was
high-strung. A misunderstanding arose, and,
between such exceptional natures, "the course of
true love never did run smootiL"

Their engagement, if they were actually be-
trothed, was broken, and the lawyer-lover was
plunged in deep melancholy. He wrote long,
morbid letters to his friend Speed, who had re-
turned to Kentuelqr, and had recently married
there. Lincoln even went to Louisville to visit
the Speeds, hoping that the change of scene and
friendly sympathies and counsel would revive
his health and spirits.

In one of his letters Lincoln bemoaned his sad
fate and referred to "the fatal 1st of January,"
probably the date when his engagement or "the
understanding" with Maiy Todd was broken.
From this expression, one of Lincoln's biogra-
phers daborated a damaging fiction, stating that
Lincoln and his afi&anced were to have been mar-
ried that day, that the wedding supper was
ready, that the bride was all dressed for the cere-
mony, the guests assembled — ^but the melandioly
bridegroom failed to come to his own wed-
ding I

If such a thing had happened in a little town
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D„,i.dt,Googlt'

•rs^^'

■---■■1- ^ -;

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The Story of Young

like Springfield in those days, the guests would
have told of it, and everybody would have gos-
siped about it. It would have been a nine days*
wonder, and such a great joker as Lincoln would
"never have heard the last of it"

THE STBANOE EVENTS LEADINO TJF TO UNGOLN'S
MABRIAOE

After lincoln's return from visiting the
Speeds in Louisville, he threw himself into poli-
tics again, not, however, in his own behalf. He
declined to be a candidate again for the State
Legislature, in which he had served four con-
secutive terms, covering a period of eight years.
He engaged enthusiastically in the "Log Cabin"
campaign of 1840, when the country went for
"Tippecanoe and Tyler, too," which means that
(General William Henry Harrison, the hero of
the battle of Tippecanoe, and John Tyler were
elected President and Vice-President of the
United States.

In 1842 the young lawyer had so far recovered
from bodily illness and mental unhappiness as
to write more cheerful letters to his friend
Speed of which two short extracts follow:

"It seems to me that I should have been en-
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Abraham Lincoln

tirely happy but for the never-absent idea that
there is one (Miss Todd) still unhappy whom I
have contributed to make so. That still kills my
souL I cannot but reproach myself for even
wishing to be happy while she is otherwise. She
accompanied a large party on the railroad cars
to Jacksonville last Monday, and at her return
spoke, so I heard of it, of having 'enjoyed the
trip exceedingly.' God be praised for that."

"You will see by the last Sangamon Journal
that I made a temperance speech on the 22d of
February, T^diich I claim ttiat Fanny and you
shall read as an act of charity toward me ; for I
cannot learn that anybody has read it or is likely
to. Fortunately it is not long, and I shall deem
it a sufficient compliance with my request if one
of you listens while the other reads it."

Early the following summer Lincoln wrote for
the Sangtm,on Journal a humorous criticism of
State Auditor Shields, a vain and "touchy"
little man. Tliis was in the form of a story and
signed by "Rebecca of the Lost Townships."
The article created considerable amusement and
might have passed unnoticed by the conceited
little auditor if it had not been followed by an-
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other, less humorouB, but more personal and
satirical, signed in the same way, but the second
communication was written by two mischievous
(if not malicious) girls — Mary Todd and her
friend, Julia Jayae. This stinging attack made
Shields wild with rage, and he demanded the
name of the writer of it. Lincoln told the editor
to give Shields his name as if he had written both
contributions and thus protect the two young
ladies. The auditor then challenged the lawyer
to fight a dueL Lincoln, averse to dueling, chose
absurd weapons, imposed ridiculous conditions
and tried to treat the whole affair as a huge joke.
When the two came face to face, explanations
became possible and the ludicrous duel was
avoided. Lincoln's conduct throughout this hu-
miliating affair plainly showed that, while
Shields would gladly have kiUed him, he had no
intention of injuring the man who had dial-
lenged him.

Mary Todd's heart seems to have softened
toward the young man who was willing to risk
his life for her sake, and the pair, after a long
and miserable misunderstanding on both sides,
were happily married on the 4th of November,
1842. Their wedding ceremony was the first ever
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Abraham Lincoln

performed in Springfield by the use of the Epis-
copal ritual.

"When one of the guests, blufE old Judge Tom
Brown, saw the bridegroom placing the ring on
Miss Todd's finger, and repeating after the min-
istar, "With this ring" — "I thee wed" — "and
with all" — "my worldly goods" — "I thee en-
dow" — ^he exclaimed, in a stage whisper :

"Grace to Goshen, Lincoln, the statute fixes
alltiiati"

In a letter to Speed, not long after this event,
the happy bridegroom wrote :

"We are not keeping house but boarding at
the Globe Tavern, which is very well kept now
by a widow lady of the name of Beck. Our rooms
are the same Dr. Wallace occupied there, and
boarding only costs four dollars a week (for the
two). I most heartily wish you and your family
will not fail to come. Just let us know the time,
a week in advance, and we will have a room pre-
pared for you and well all be merry together for
a while."

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CHAPTER XV

LiKOOLN & HeBNDOIT

TOUNQ HERNDON's STRANGE PASCINATIOS FOB

UJffCOLN

LiNGOLH remained in the ofBce with Judge
Logan about four years, dissolving partnership
in 1845. Meanwhile he was interesting himself
in bdialf of young WiUiam H. Hemdon, who,
after Speed's removal to Kentuel^, had gone to
college at Jacksonville, HI. The yom^ man
seemed to be made of the right kind of metal, was
industrious, and agreeable, and Mr. Lincoln
looked forward to the time when he could have
"BiUy" with him in a business of his own.

Mrs. Lincoln, with that marvelous instinct
which women often possess, opposed her hus-
band's taking Bill Hemdon into partnership.
"While the young man was honest and capable
enough, he was neither brilliant nor steady. He
contracted the habit of drinking, the bane of Lin-
coln's business career. As Mr. Lincoln had not
yet paid off "the national debt" largely due to
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Abraham Lincoln

his first business partner's drunkenness, it seems
rather strange that he did not listen to his wife 's
admonitions. But young Hemdon seems always
to have exercised a strange fascination over his
older friend and partner.

"While yet in partnership with Judge Logan,
Mr. Lincoln went into the national campaign of
1844, making speeches in Illinois and Indiana
for Henry Clay, to whom he was thoroughly de-
voted.

Before this campaign Lincoln had written to
Mr. Speed:

"We had a meeting of the Whigs of the
county here last Monday to appoint delegates to
a district convention; and Baker beat me, and
got the delegation instructed to go for him. The
meeting, in spite of my attempts to decline it,
appointed me one of the delegate, so that in get-
ting Baker the nomination I shall be fixed like a
fellow who is made a groomsman to a fellow
that has cut him out, and is marrying his own
dear'gaL' "

Mr. Lincoln, about this time, was offered the
nomination for Governor of Illinois, and de-
clined the honor. Mrs. Lincoln, who had su-
preme confidence in her husband's ability, tried
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to make him more self-seeking in his political ef-
forts. He visited his old home in Indiana, mak-
ing several speeches in that part of the State. It
was fourteen years after he and all the family
had removed to Illinois. One of his speeches was
delivered from the door of a harness shop near
Gtentryville, and one he made in the "Old Carter
Schoolhouse. " After this address he drove
home with Mr. Joaiah Crawford — ^"Old Blue
Nose" for whom he had "pulled fodder" to pay
an exorbitant price for "Weems 's * ' life of Wash-
ington," and in whose house his sister and he
had lived as hired girl and hired man. He de-
lighted the old friends by asking about every-
body, and being interested in the "old swim-
ming-hole," Jones's grocery where he had often
argued and "held forth," the saw-pit, the old
mill, the blacksmith shop, whose owner, Mr.
Baldwin, had told him some of his best stories,
and where he once started in to leam the black-
smithes trade. He went around and called on all
his former acquaintances who were stDl living in
the neighborhood. His memories were so vivid
and his emotions so keen that he wrote a long
poem about this, from which the following are
three stanzas :

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"My <MIdhood*s home I see again
And sadder with the view;
And still, as memory crowds the brain.
There's pleasure in it, too.

"Ah, Memory 1 thou midway world
'Twixt earth and paradise,
Where things decayed and loved ones lost
In dreamy shadows rise.

"And freed from all that's earthy, vile,
Seems hallowed, pure and bright.
Like scenes in some enchanted isle,
All bathed in liquid light."

TBYING TO SATE BUXT FBOM A BAD HABTF

As Mr. Lincohi spent so much of his time
away from Springfield he felt that he needed a
yoimger assistant to "keep office" and look after
his cases in ttie different coxirts. He should not
have made "Billy" Hemdon an equal partner,
but he did" so, tiiough the young man had neither
the ability nor experience to earn anything like
half the income of the office. If Hemdon had
kept sober and done his best he might have made
some return for all that Mr, Lincoln, who
treated him like a foster-father, was trying to
do for him. But "Billy" did nothing of the
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sort He took advantage of his senior partner's
absences hj going on sprees with several dissi-
pated young men about town.

WHAT LAWXEB lASOOLS DID WITH A FAT FEE

A Springfield gentleman relates ike following
stoiy which shows Lawyer Lincoln's business
methods, his unwillii^ness to charge much for
his legal services; and his great longing to save
his young partner from the dutches of drink :

"My father," said the neighbor, "was in busi-
ness, facing the square, not far from the Court
House. He had an account with a man who
seemed to be doing a good, straight business for
years, but the fellow disappeared one night,
owing father about $1000. Time went on and
father got no trace of the vanished debtor. He
considered the account as good as lost.

"But one day, in connection with other busi-
ness, he told Mr. Lincoln he would give h\m half
of what he could recover of that bad debt. The
tall attorney's deep gray eyes twinkled as he
said, 'One-half of nought is nothing. I*m
neiUier a E^ark nor a shyster, Mr. Man. If I
should collect it, I would accept only my regular
percentage.*

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" 'But I mean it,' father said earnestly. *I
should consider it as good as finding money in
the street.*

" *Aad "the finder will be liberally re-
warded," eh)' said Mr, Lincoln with a laugh.

" *Tes,' my father replied, 'that's about the
size of it; and I'm glad if you understand it.
The members of the bar here grumble because
you charge too little for your professional serv-
ices, and I'm willing to do my share toward ed-
ucating you in the right direction.*

" *"Well, seein' as it's you,' said Mr. Lincoln
with a whimsical smile, 'considering that you're
such an intimate friend, I'd do it for twice as
much as I'd charge a total stranger! Is that
satisfactory?'

" *I should not be satisfied with giving you
less than half the gross amount collected — in
this case,' my father insisted. 'I don't see why
you are so loath to take what is your due, Mr.
Lincoln. You have a family to support and will
have to provide for the future of several boys.
They need money and are as worthy of it as any
other man's wife and sons.'

"Mr. Lincoln put out his big bony hand as if
to ward off a blow, exclaiming in a pained tone :
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" *That isn't it, Mr. Man. That isn't it I
yield to no man in love to my wife and babies,
and I provide enough for them. Most of those
who bring their cases to me need the money more
than I do. Other lawyers rob them. They act
like a pack of wolves. They have no mercy. So
when a needy fellow comes to me in his trouble
— sometimes it's a poor widow — ^I can't take
much from them. I'm not much of a Shyloek.
I always try to get them to settle it without go-
ing into court. I tell them if they will make it
up among themselves I won't charge them any-
thing.'

" 'Well, Mr. Lincoln,' said father with a
laugh, *if they were all like you there would be
no need of lawyers.'

" 'Well,' exclaimed Lawyer Lincoln with a
quizzical inflection which meant much. 'Look
out for the milleTinium, Mr. Man — still, as a
great favor. 111 charge you a fat fee if I ever
find that fellow and can get anything out of h\m.
But that's like promising to give you half of the
first dollar I find floating up the Sai^amon on a
grindstone, isn 't it ? I '11 take a big slice, though,
out of the grindstone itself, if you say so,' and
the tall attorney went out with the peculiar

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laugh that afterward became world-famous.

"Not long afterward, while in Bloomington,
out on the circuit, Mr. Lincoln ran across tiie
man who had disappeared from Springfield 'be-
tween two days,' carrying on an apparently
prosperous business under an assumed name.
Following the man to his ofQce and managing to
talk with him alone, the lawyer, by means of
threats, made the man go right to i^e bank and
draw out the whole thousand then. It meant
payment in full or the penitentiary. The man
underatood it and went white as a sheet. In all
his sympathy for the poor and needy, Mr. Lin-
coln had no pily on the flourishing criminal.
Money could not purchase the favor of Lincoln.

"Well, I hardly know which half of that thou-
sand dollars fattier was gladder to get, but I
honestly believe he was more pleased on Mr.
Lincoln's account than on his own.

" 'Let me give you your five hundred dollars
before I change my mind,' he said to the attor-
ney.

" *One hundred dollars is all 111 take out of
that,' Mr. Lincoln replied emphatically. 'It was
no trouble, and — and I haven't earned even that
much,*

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" 'But Mr. Lincoln,* my father demurred,
'you promised to take half.'

" *Tes, but you got my word under false pre-
tenses, as it were. Neither of us had the least
idea I would coUect the bill even if I ever found
the fellow.'

"As he would not accept more than one hun-
dred dollars that day, father wouldn't give him
any of the money due, for fear the too scrupu-
lous attorney would give him a receipt in full for
collecting. Finally, Mr. Lincoln went away
after yielding enough to say he might accept two
hundred and fifty dollars sometime in a pinch
of some sort.

"The occasion was not long delayed — ^but it
was not because of illness or any special neces-
sity in his own family. His young partner,
'Billy' Hemdon, had been carousing with sev-
eral of his cronies in a saloon around on Fourth
Street, and the gang had broken mirrors, de-
canters and other things in their drunken spree.
The proprietor, tired of such work, had had
them all arrested.

"Mr. Lincoln, always alarmed when Billy
failed to appear at the usual hour in the morn-
ing, went in search of him, and foimd him and
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his partners in distress, locked up in the cala-
boose. The others were helpless, unable to pay
or to promise to pay for any of the damages, so
it devolved on Mr. Lincoln to raise the whole
two himdred and fifty dollars the angry saloon
keeper demanded.

"He came into our office out of breath and
said sheepishly:

" *I reckon I can use that two-fifty now.'

*' *Check or currency?' asked father.

" *C3urreney, if you've got it handy.'

" 'Give Mr. Lincoln two hundred and fifty
dollars,' father called to a clerk in the ofBee.

"There was a moment's pause, during which
my father refrained iCrom asking any questions,
and Mr. Lincoln was in no mood to give informa-
tion. As soon as the money was brought, the tall
attorney seized the bills and stalked out without
counting it or saying an3iihing but 'Thankee,
Mr. Man,' and hurried diagonally across the
square toward the Court House, clutching the
precious banknotes in his bony talons.

"Father saw him cross the street so fast that
the tails of his long coat stood out straight be-
hind ; then go up the Court House steps, two at
a time, and disappear.

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"We learned afterward what he did with tiie
money. Of course, Bill Hemdon was penitent
and promised to mend his ways, and, of course,
l£r. Lincoln believed him. He took the money
very much against his will, eren against his
principle — thinking it might save his junior
partner from the drunkard's grave. But the
heart of Abraham Lincoln was hoping against
hope."

CHAPTEE XVI

His Kindhess of Heabt

PTJTTING TWO TOtJNO BIBDS BACK IN THE NEST

Mb. Lincoln's tender-heartedness was the
subject of mudi amusement among his fellow-
attorneys. One day, while out riding with sev-
eral friends, they missed Lincoln. One of them,
havii^ heard the distressed cries of two young
birds that had fallen from the nest, surmised
that this had something to do with Mr. Lincoln's
disappearance. The man was right. Lincoln
had hitdied his horse and climbed the fence into
the thicket where the fledglings were fluttering
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Abraham Lincoln

on the ground in great fright He caught the
young birds and tenderly carried them about
until he found their nest. Climbing the tree he
put the birdlings back where they belonged.

After an hour Mr. Lincoln caught up vrfth his
companions, who laughed at him for what they
considered mere childishness.

" Gentlemen," he said with great earnestness,
"you may laugh, but I could not have slept well
to-night if I had not saved those birds. Their
cries would have rung in my ears."

EESCUING A PIG BTTTCK m THE MTO

Late one afternoon Mr. Lincoln was riding
along the coimtry road with a group of lawyer
friends who were going together from one town
to another to attend court, when they saw a pig
mired at one side of the way, squealing lustily.
The men all laughed at the ludicrousness of its
plight

"Let's get the pig out of there 1" exclaimed
Lincoln impulsively.

This proposition was received with jeers from
the rest, for they well knew that whoever went
to the pig*8 rescue would only get himself plas-
tered with mud for his pains. Lincoln rode on
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with the others, but that cry of distress kept
ringing in his ears, and he found he could not
go on. He bore it as long as he could, then
lagged behind, till his fellow-travelers had gone
round a bend in the road, then he turned and
rode back as fast as he could to where tlie pig
was still squealing feebly. Dismounting, he took
several rails from the fence, laid them on the
ground beside the pig to use in prying over.
Then he took another rail and stuck the end of
it deep into the mud, under the struggling ani-
mal, and pried up, firmly but gently, until the
pig planted its feet on the firm ground and ran
gnmting away, without showing as much grati-
tude as the little dog did when he saved it from
being left behind, on the way from Indiana to
Illinois many years before.

He knew the other men would lau^ at his
childish sentiment and his muddy clothes, but he
did not care, for he had saved himself from
hearing a suffering animal *s cries of distress
during the long, lonely nights afterward.

CON'GRESSMAN' UNCOLN

In 1846 Abraham Lincoln was elected to Con-
gress, defeating the Rev. Peter Cartwright, the
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Abraham Lincoln

famous backwoods preacher, who was elected to
th^ State Legislature fourteen years before, the
first time Lincoln was a candidate and the only
time he was ever defeated by popular vote.
Cartwright had made a vigorous canvass, telling
the people that Lincoln was "an aristocrat and
an atheist." But, though they had a great re-
spect for Peter Cartwright and his preaching,
the people did not believe all that he said against
Lincoln, and they elected him, Shortly after
this he wrote again to Speed :

"You, no doubt, assign the suspen-
sion of our correspondence to the true
philosophic cause; though it must be
confessed by both of us that this ia a
rather cold reason for allowii^ such a
friendship as ours to die out by de-
grees.

"Being elected to Congress, though I
am very grateful to our friends for
having done it, has not pleased me as
much as I expected."

In the same letter he imparted to his friend
some information which seems to have been
much more interesting to Tiim than being elected
to Congress:

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"We have another boy, bom the 10th
of March (1846). He is very much
such a child as Bob was at his age,
rather of a longer order. Bob is 'short
and low,' and I expect always will be.
He tallcs very plainly, almost as plainly
as anybody. He is quite smart enough.
I sometimes fear he is one of the little
rare-ripe sort that are smarter at five
than ever after.

"Since I began this letter, a messen-
ger came to tell me Bob was lost; but
by ttie time I reached the house his
mother had found him and had him
whipped, and by now very likely he has
run away again!

"As ever yours,

"A. IdlfCOLN."

The new baby mentioned in this letter was
Edward, who died in 1850, before his fourth
birthday. "Bob," or Robert, the eldest of the
Lincoln's four children, was bom in 1843. Will-
iam, bom in 1850, died in the White House. The
youngest was bom in 1853, after the death of
Thomas Lincoln, so he was named for his grand-
father, but he was known only by his nickname,
"Tad." "Little Tad" was his father's constant
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companion during ttie terrible years of the Civil
War,- especially after WiUie's deaUi, in 1862.
"Tad" became "the child of the nation." He
died in Chicago, July 10, 1871, at the age of
eighteen, after retximing from Europe with his
widowed mother and his brother Robert. Rob-
ert has served his country as Secretary of War
and Ambassador to the English court, and is
recognized as a leader in national affairs.

When Lincoln was sent to the national House
of Representatives, Douglas was elected to the
Senate for the first time. Lincoln was the only
Whig from Illinois. This shows his great per-
sonal popularity. Daniel Webster was then liv-
ing in the national capital, and Congressman
Lincoln stopped once at Ashland, Ky., on his
way to Washington to visit the idol of the
Whigs, Henry Clay.

As soon as Lincoln was elected, an editor
wrote to ask him for a biographical sketch of
himself for the "Congressional Directory."
This is all Mr. Lincoln wrote — in a blank form
sent for the purpose :

"Bom February 12, 1809, in Hardin County,
Kentucky.

"Education defective.
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"Profession, lawyer.

"Military service, captain of volunteers in
Black Hawk War.

"Offices held: Postmaster at a veiy small
office ; four times a member of the Illinois Legis-
lature, and elected to the lower House of the
next Congress."

Mr. Lincoln was in Congress while the Mexi-
can "War was in progress, and there was much
discussion over President Polk's action in de-
claring that war.

As Mrs. Lincoln was obliged to stay in Spring-
field to care for her two little boys, Congress-
man Lincoln lived in a Washington boarding-
house. He soon gained the reputation of telling
the best stories at the capital He made a hu-
morous speech on General Cass, comparing the
general's army experiences with his own in the
Black Hawk War. He also drafted a bill to
abolish slavery in the District of Columbia,
which was never brought to a vote. Most of his
care seems to have been for Billy Hemdon, who
wrote complaining letters to him about the "old
men" in Springfield who were always trying to
"keep the young men down.'* Here are two of
Mr. Lincoln's replies:

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"Washington, June 22, 1848.
"Dear William :

"Judge how heart-rending it was to
come to my room and find and read
your discouraging letter of the 15th.
Now, as to the young men, you must not
wait to be brought forward by the older
men. For instance, do you suppose
that I would ever have got into notice if
I had waited to be hunted up and
pushed forward by older men I"

* 'Deab William :

"Your letter was received last night.
The subject of that letter is exceedingly
painful to me; and I cannot but think
that there is some mistake in your im-
pression of the motives of the old men.
Of coursel cannot demonstrate what I
say; but I was young once, and I am
sure I was never ungenerously thrust
back. I hardly know what to say. The
way for a young man to rise is to im-
prove himself every way he can, never
suspecting that anybody wishes to
hinder him. Allow me to assure you
that suspicion and jealousy never did
keep any man in any situation. There
may be sometimes ungenerous attempts
to keep a young man down; and they
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will succeed, tdo, if he allows his mind
to be diverted from its true channel to
brood over the attempted injury. Cast
about, and see if this feeling has not
injured every person you have ever
known to fall into it.

"Now in what I have said, I am sure
you will suspect nothing but sincere
friendship. I would save you from a
fatal error. You have been a laborious,
studious young man. You are far bet-
ter informed on almost all subjects
than I have ever been. You cannot fail
in ai^ laudable object, unless you allow
your mind to be improperly directed.
I have somewhat the advantage of you
in the world's experience, merely by
being older ; and it is this that induces
me to advise.

"Your friend, as ever,

"A. Lincoln."

LAST DATS OF THOMAS LINCOLN

Mr. Lincoln did not allow bis name to be used
as a candidate for re-election, as there were
other men in the congressional district who de-
served the honor of going to Washington as
much as he. On his way home from Washing-
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Abraham Lincoln

gress, he Tisited New England, where he made a
few speeches, and stopped at Niagara Falls,
which impressed >iiTn so stiongly that he wrote a
lecture on the subject.

After returning home he made a flying viait to
"Washington to enter his patent steamboat,
equipped so that it would navigate shallow west-
em rivers. This boat, he told a friend, "would
go where the ground is a little damp." The
model of Lincoln's steamboat is one of the si^ts
of the Patent Office to this day.

After Mr. Lincoln had settled down to his law
business, permanently, as he hoped, his former
fellow-fllerk, William G. Greene, having busi-
ness in Coles County, went to "Goosenest Prai-
rie" to call on Abe's father and stepmother, who
still lived in a log cabin. Thomas Lincoln re-
ceived his son's friend very hospitably. During
the young man's visit, the father reverted to the
old subject, his disapproval of his son's wasting
his time in study. He said:

"I s'pose Abe's still a-foolin' hisself with
eddication. I tried to stop it, but he's got that
fool idee in his head an' it can't be got out. Now
I baint got no eddication, but I git along better
than if I had."

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Kot loi^ after this, in 1851, Abraham learned
that his father waa very ill. As he could not
leave Springfield then, he wrote to his step-
brother (for Thomas Lincoln could not read)
the following comforting letter to be read to his
father:

"I sincerely hope father may recover his
health; but at all events, tell bim to remember to
call upon and confide in our great and merciful
Maker, who will not turn away from him in any
extremity. He notes the fall of the sparrow, and
numbers the hairs of our heads, and He will not
forget the dying man who puts his trust in Him.
Say to him, that, if we could meet now, it is
doubtful whether it would be more painful than
pleasant, but if it is his lot to go now, he will
soon have a joyful meeting with the loved ones
gone before, and where the rest of us, through
the mercy of God, hope ere long to join them."

Thomas Lincoln died that year, at the age of
seventy-three.

A KIND Bin MASTERFUL IfTTFEB TO HIS

After his father's death Abraham Lincoln
had, on several occasions, to protect his step-
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mother against the schemes of her own lazy,
good-for-nothing son. Here is one of the letters
written, at this time, to his stepbrother, John
Johnston :

"Dear Bbother : I hear that you were anxious
to sell the land where you live, and move to
Missouri. "What can you do in Missouri better
than here? Is the land any richer! Can you
there, any more than here, raise com and wheat
and oats without work! Will anybody there,
any more than here, do your work for you I If
you intend to go to work, there is no better place
than right where you are ; if you do not intend
to go to work, you cannot get along anywhere.
Squirming and crawling about from place to
place can do no good. Tou have raised no crop
this year, and what you reaUy want is to sell the
land, get the money and spend it. Part with the
land you have and, my life upon it, you will
never own a spot big enough to bury you ip.
Half you will get for the land you will spend in
moving to Missouri, and the other half you will.
eat and drink and wear out, and no foot of land
will be bought.

* ' Now, I feel that it is my duty to have no hand
in such a piece of foolery. I feel it is so even on
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your own account, and particularly on mother's
account.

"Now do not misunderstand this letter. I do
not write it in any unkindness. I write it in
order, if possible, to get you to face the truth,
which truth is, you are destitute because you
have idled away your time. Your thousand pre-
tenses deceive nobody but yourself. Go to work
is the only cure for your case."

CHAPTER XVn

What Made the Difference Between Abba-
ham liOTCOLN AND HiS StEPBBOTHEB

These letters show the wide difference be-
tween the real lives of two boys brought up in
the same surroundii^s, and under sinular con-
ditions. The advantages were in John Johns-
ton's favor. He and Dennis Hanks never rose
above the lower level of poverty and igno-
rance. John was looked down upon by the
poor illiterates around him as a lazy, good-
for-nothing fellow, and Dennis Hanks was
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known to be careless about telling the truth.
. In speaking of the early life of Abe's father
and mother, Dennis threw in the remark that
"the Hankses was some smarter than the Lin-
colns." It was not "smartness" that made Abe
Lincoln grow to be a greater man than Dennis
Hanks. There are men in Springfield to-day
who say, "There were a dozen smarter men in
this town than Mr. Lincoln when he happened
to be nominated, and peculiar conditions pre-
vailing at that time brought about his election
to the presidency 1"

True greatness is made of goodness rather
than smartness. Abraham Lincoln was honest
with himself while a boy and a man, and it was
"Honest Abe" who became President of the
United States. The people loved him for his big
heart — because he loved them more than he loved
himself and they knew it. Id his second in-
augural address as President he used this ex-
pression: "With malice toward none, with char-
ity for all." This was not a new thought, but it
was full of meaning to the country because little
Abe Lincoln had lived that idea all his life, with
his own family, his friends, acquaintances, and
employers. He became the most beloved man in
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the world, in his own or any other time, becaiiae
he himself loved everybody.

Mrs. Crawford, the wife of "Old Blue Kose,"
used to laugh, at the very idea of Abe LLncoln
ever becoming President. Lincoln often said to
her: "111 get ready and the time wUl come."
He got ready in his father's log hut and when
the door of opportunity opened he walked ri^t
into the White House. He "made himself at
home" there, because he had only to go on in
the same way after he became the "servant of
the people" that he had followed when he was
"Old Blue N'ose*s" hired boy and man.

ONE PABTNER IN THE WHITE HOUSE, THE OTHER IN
THE FOOB HOUSE

Then there was William F. Hemdon, known
to the world only because he happened to be
"Lincoln's law partner." His advantages were
superior to those of Lincoln's. More than that,
he had his great partner's help to push him for-
ward and upward. But "poor Billy" had an
unfortunate appetite. He could not deny him-
self, though it always made him ashamed and
miserable. It dragged him down, down from
"the President's partner" to the gutter. That
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was not all. When he asked his old partner to
give him a government appointment whidi he
had, for years, been making himself wholly un-
worthy to fill, President Lincoln, much as he had
loved Billy all along, could not give it to him.
It grieved Mr. Lincoln's great heart to refuse
Billy an3rthing. But Hemdon did not blame
himself for all that. He spent the rest of his
wretched life in bitterness and spite — avenging
himself on his noble benefactor by putting un-
truths into the "Life of Lincoln" he was able to
write because Abraham Lincoln, against the ad-
vice of his wife and friends, had insisted on
keeping Tn'm close to his heart. It is a terrible
thing— tiiat spirit of spite I Among many good
and true things he had to say about his fatherly
law partner, he poisoned the good name of Abra-
ham Lincoln in the minds of millions, by writing
stealthy slander about Lincoln's motiier and
wife, and made many people believe that the
most religious of men at heart was an infidel
(because he himself was one I), that Mr. Lincoln
sometimes acted from unworthy and unpatriotic
motives, and that he failed to come to his own
wedding. If these things had been true it would
have been wrong to publish them to the preju-
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dice of a great man's good name — ^then how
much more wicked to invent and spread broad-
cast falsdioods which hurt the heart and in-
jured the mind of the whole world — and just to
spite the memory of the best friend a man ever
had I The fate of the firm of Lincoln & Hemdon
shows in a striking way how the world looks
upon the heart that hates and the heart that
loves, for the hateful junior partner died miser-
ably in an almshouse, wMle the senior partner
was crowned with immortal martyrdom in the
White House.

HOLDING THE PRESIDENT'S HAT

There was Stephen A. Douglas, also, "the
Little Giant, ' ' who latched and sneered at young
Lincoln. Brilliant and resourceful, be always
kept ahead of his big, plodding opponent. Doug-
las was a great and successful politician, but he
was not honest with himself — ^that is, he was not
sincere through Eind through. He held certain
opinions because he tiiought they would make
him President. Lincoln challenged bim to de-
bate certain questions before the country while
both were candidates for the Senate. Douglas
won the fight for senator from Illinois, but Lin-

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Abraham Lincoln

coin exposed his opponent's lack of sincerity,
before the whole nation, and the people, seeing
the difference, made Lincoln President of the
United States.

When President Lincoln came forward to de-
liver his first inaugural address, he had his hat
in his hand. While looking about for a place to
put it down, Senator Douglas, his lifelong oppo-
nent, sprang forward and took it, saying with a
meaning smile as he did so :
"If I can't be President, I can hold his hat!"
Imagine Mrs. Lincoln's feelings then I She
had gained the goal of her girlhood ambition,
she was now "Mistress of the White House."
But above all, she was a devoted mother. Be-
fore the Lincolns had lived in the White House
a year, Willie died, and the heart-broken mother
never again could go into the room where he
died, nor enter the beautiful Blue Boom where
his funeral had been held. It is true that great
sorrows come to mothers in humbler homes, but
Mrs. Lincoln's greatest griefs were so sudden
and terrible that they xmhinged her reason. It
would have been wonderful if she could have
borne them all without a breaking heart and
brain.

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The Story of Young

Abraham Lincobi's end came as he would have
had it if he could have <^osen — sudden and pain-
less. He had been a martyr all his life long, suf-
fering with the sorrows of others. H i s friends
used to say that, even when he was young, his
face, in unconscious repose, was the saddest
thing they ever saw — "It would make you cry,"
they said.

CHAPTER XVlil

"No End op a Bot"

"The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln"
would be incomplete without some insight into
the perfect boyishn^s of the President of the
ITnited States. "When the cares of State and the
horrors of war had made his homely yet beauti-
ful face pallid and seamed, till it became a sen-
sitive map of the Civil War, it was said that the
only times the President was ever happy were
when he was playing with little Tad.

He used to carry the boy on his shoulder or
"pick-a-back," cantering through the spacious
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Abraham Lincoln

rooms of the Executive Mansion, hoik yelling

like Comanches, The little hoy was lonely after
Willie died, and the father's heart yearned over
the only boy left at home, for Bobert was at Har-
vard until near the close of the war, when he went
to the front as an aide to General Grant So
little Tad was his father's most constant com-
panion and the President became the boy's only
playfellow. Mr. Lincoln, with a heart as fuU of
faith as a little child's, had always lived in
deep sympathy with the children, and this
feeling was intensified toward his own off-
spring.

When Abe Lincoln was living in New Salem
he distinguished himself by carii^ for the little
children — ^a thing beneath the dignity of the
other young men of the settlement.

Hannah Armstrong, wife of the Clary*s Grove
bully, whom Abe had to "lick" to a finish in
order to establish himself on a solid basis in
New Salem society, told how friendly their rela-
tions became after the thrashing he gave her
husband:

"Abe would come to our house, drink milk,
eat mush, combread and butter, bring the chil-
dren candy and rock the cradle." (This seemed
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The Story of Young

a strange thing to her.) "He would nurse
babies — do anything to accommodate anybody."

DEFENDIKO THE LIFE OF A BOY HE HAD BOOKED

"When Mrs. Armstrong's baby boy grew to
manhood he got into deep trouble; He was ar-
rested for murder. His mother was a poor
widow and had no money to defend her son.
Lawyer Lincoln, then living in Springfield, and
known as a successful jury pleader^ wrote and
offered his services in behalf of the child he had
rocked, "without money and without price," be-
cause the mother had been kind to him in days
gone by.

It became a celebrated ease. Mr. Lincoln se-
cured his acquittal by showing that there was a
conspiracy on the part of the young man's ac-
cusers, one of whom testified that he saw
"Buck" Armstrong strike the fatal blow by the
bright light of the moon. Lawyer Lincoln, after
drawing the witness out and making him de-
scribe minutely what he had seen, suddenly pro-
duced an almanac proving that there was. no
moon in the sky at that time I

The tears of that widowed mother and the
gratitude of the boy he had rocked were the best

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HE USED TO CARRY THE nOV "PICK-A-BACK,"

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Abraham Lincoln

sort of pay to Lawyer Lincoln for an act of kind-
ness and life-saving.

"jtrsT what's the matter with the whoi^
woeldI"

A Springfield neighbor used to say tiiat it was
almost a habit with Mr. Lincoln to carry his
children about on his shoulders. Indeed, the
man said he seldom saw the tall lawyer go by
without one or both boys perched on high or tug-
ging at the tails of his long coat. This neighbor
relates that he vras attracted to the door of his
own house one day by a great noise of crying
children, and saw Mr. Lincoln passing witii the
two boys in their usual position, and both were
howling lustily.

"Why, Mr. Lincoln, what's the matter 1" he
asked in astoniedmieiit

"Just what's the matter with the whole
world," the lawyer replied coolly. "I've got
three walnuts, and each wants two."

THE "buokhtq" chess board

Several years later Judge Treat, of Spring-
field was playing chess witii Mr. Lincoln in bis
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The Story of Young

law office when Tad came in to call his father to
supper. The boy, impatient at the delay of the
slow and silent game, tried to break it up by a
flank moTement against the chess board, but the
attacks were warded off, each time, by his
father's long arma

The child disappeared, and when the two
players had begun to believe they were to be per-
mitted to end the game in peace, the table sud-
denly '*bueked" and tiie board and diessmen
were sent flying all over the floor.

Judge Treat was much vexed, and expressed
impatience, not hesitatii^ to tell Mr. Lincoln
that the boy ought to be punished severdy.

Mr. Lincoln replied, as he gently took down
his hat to go home to supper:

"Considering the position of your pieces,
judge, at the time of the upheaval, I think you
have no reason to complain."

WHEN TAD GOT A SFAKEINO

Tet, indulgent as he was, there were some
things Mr. Lincoln would not allow even his
youngest child to do. An observer who saw the
President-elect and his family in their train on
the way to Washington to take the helm of State,
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Abraham Lincoln

relates that little Tad amused himself by raising
the car window an inch or two and trying, by
shutting it down suddenly, to catch the fingera
of the curious boys outside who were holding
themselves up by their hands on the window sill
of the car to catch sight of the new President
and his family.

The President-elect, who had to go out to the
platform to make a little speech to a crowd at
nearly every stop, noticed Tad's attempts to
pinch the boj^' fingers. He spoke sharply to his
son and commanded him to stop that. Tad
obeyed for a time, but his father, catching bim
at ihe same trick again, leaned over, and taking
the little fellow across his knee, gave him a good,
sound spanking, exclaiming as he did so :

"Why do you want to mash those boys* fin-

TEE TRUE 8T0BT OF BOB'b LOSIKa THE IKATiaiTBAL

Mr. Lincoln was always lenient when the of-
fense was against himself. The Hon. Robert
Todd Lincoln, the only living son of the great
President, tells how the satchel containing his
father's inaugural address was lost for a time.

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The Story; of Young

Some writers have related the story of this loss,
stating that it all happened at Harrisburg, and
telling how the President-elect discovered a bag
lite his own, and on opening it found only a
pack of greasy cards, a bottle of whis^ and a
soiled paper collar. Also that Mr. Lincoln was
"reminded" of a cheap, ill-fitting story— but
none of these things really took place.

Here is the true story, as related to the writer
by Robert Lincoln himself:

"My father had confided to me the care of the
satchel containing his inaugural address. It was
lost for a little while during the stay of our party
at the old Bates House in Indianapolis. When
we entered the hotel I set the bag down with the
other luggage, which was all removed to a room
back of the clerk's desk.

"As soon as I missed the valise I went right
to father, in great distre^ of mind. He ordered
a search made. We were naturally much
alarmed, for it was the only copy he had of his
inaugural address, which he had carefully writ-
ten before leaving Springfield. Of course, he
added certain parts after reaching Washington.
The missing bag was soon found in a safe place.

"Instead of taking out the precious manu-
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Abraham Lincoln

script and stuffing it into his own pocket, fattier
handed it right back to me, saying :

" 'There, Bob, see if you can't take better care
of it this time' — and you may be sure I was true
to the trust he placed in me. Why, I hardly let
that precious gripsack get out of my sight dur-
ing my waking hours all the rest of the long
roundabout journey to "Washington.**

THE TEBBIBLE L017ELINES8 AFTER WILLIE DIED

The death of Willie, who was nearly three
years older than Tad, early in 1862, during their
first year in the White House, nearly broke his
father's heart. It was said that Mr. Lincoln
never recovered from that bereavement It
made Mm yearn the more tenderly over his
youngest son who sadly missed the brother who
had been his constant companion.

It was natural for a lad who was so much in-
dulged to take advantage of his freedom. Tad
had a slight impediment in his speech -wbich
made the street urchins laugh at him, and even
cabinet members, because they could not under-
stand him, considered him a little nuisance. So
Tad, though known as "the child of the nation,"
and greatly beloved and petted by those who
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The Story of Young

knew him for a lovable affectionate child, found
himself alone in a class by himself, and against
all classes of people.

TUBNINO THE HOSE 017 HIOH OFFICIAIA

He illustrated this spirit one day by getting
hold of the hose and turning it on some dignified
State officials, several army officers, and finally
on a soldier on guard who was ordered to charge
and take possession of that water battery. Al-
though that little escapade appealed to the Pres-
ident's sense of humor, for he himself liked
nothi]^ better than to take generals and pom-
pous officials down "a peg or two," Tad got well
spanked for the havoc he wrought that day.

BBEAKINO INTO A CABINET MEETINO

The members of the President's cabinet had
reason to be annoyed by the boy*8 frequent in-
terruptions. He seemed to have ttie right of
way wherever his father happened to be. No
matter if Senator Sumner or Secretary Stanton
was discussii^ some weighty matter of State or
war, if Tad came in, his father turned from the
men of high estate to minister to the wants of his
little boy. He did it to get rid of him, for of
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Abraham Lincoln

course he knew Tad would raise sudi a racket
that no one could talk or think tiU his wants
were disposed of.

AN EXECUTIVE ORD^ 017 THE COMHISSABT DEPABT-
MENT rOB TAD AND HIS BOY FEIENDS

A story is told of the boy's interruption of a
council of war. This habit of Tad's enraged
Secretary Stanton, whose horror of the boy was
similar to that of an elephant for a mouse. The
President was giving his opinion on a certain
piece of strategy which he thought the general
in question might carry out— when a great noise
was heard out in the hall, followed by a number
of sharp raps on the door of the cabinet room.

Strategy, war, everything was, for the mo-
ment forgotten by the President, whose wan face
assumed an expression of unusual pleasure,
while he gathered up his great, weary length
from different parts of the room as he had half
lain, sprawling about, across and around his
chair and the great table.

"That's Tad," he exclaimed, "I wonder what

that boys wants now." On his way to open the

door, Mr. Lincoln explained that those knocks

had just been adopted by the boy and himself, as

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The Storjr of Young

part of the telegraph ^j^ten^ and that he was
obliged to let the lad in — "for it wouldn't do to
go back on the code now," he added, half in
apology for permitting such a sudden break in
their deliberations.

"When the door was opened, Tad, with flushed
face and sparkling eyes, sprang in and threw hia
arms around his father's neck. The President
straightened up and embraced the boy with an
expression of happiness never seen on his face
except while playing with his little son.

Mr. Lincoln turned, with the boy still in his
arms, to explain that he and Tad had agreed
upon this telegraphic code to prevent the lad
from bursting in upon them without warning.
The members of the cabinet looked pxizzled or
disgusted, as though th^ failed to see that sev-
eral startling raps could be any better than hav-
ing Tad break in with a whoop or a wall, as had
been the boy's custom.

ISSTHNG TEE EXECUTIVE ORDER OK PETER TOR PIE

The boy raised a question of right. He had

besieged Peter, the colored steward, demandmg

that a dinner be served to several urchins he had

picked up outside — ^two of whom were sons of

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Abraham Liucolii

soldiers. Peter had protested that he "had
other fish to fry" just then.

The President recognized at once that this was
a case for diplomacy. Turning to various mem-
bers of the cabinet^ he called on each to con-
tribute from his store of wisdom, what would be
best to do in a case of such vast importance.
Tad looked on in wonder as his father set the
great machinery of government in motion to
make out a commissary order on black Peter,
which would force that astonished servant to de-
liver certain pieces of pie and other desired eat-
ables to Tad, for himself and his boy friends.

At last an "order'* was prepared by the Chief
Executive of the United States directing "The
Commissary Department of the Presidential
Residence to issue rations to Lieutenant Tad
Lincoln and his five associates, two of whom are
the sons of soldiers in the Army of the Po-
tomac.'*

With an expression of deep gravity and a sol-
emn flourish, the President tendered this Com-
missary Order to the lieutenant, his son, saying
as he presented the document:

"I reckon Peter will have to come to time
now."

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The StoiT; of Toung
CHAPTER XIX

LzEUiXNANT Tad Linooln, Patriot

There was no more sturdy little patriot ia the
whole country than Lieutenant Tad Lincoln,
"the child of the nation," nor had the President
of the United States a more devoted admirer
and follower than his own small son. A word
from his father would melt the lad to tears and
submission, or bring bim out of a nervous tan-
trum with his small round face wreathed with
smiles, and a chuckling in his throat of "Papa-
day, my papa-day I " No one knew exactly what
the boy meant by papa-day. It was his pet name
for the dearest man on earth, and it was his only
way of expressing the greatest pleasure his boy-
ish heart was able to hold. It was the "sweetest
word ever heard" by the war-burdened, crushed
and sorrowing soul of the broken-hearted Presi-
dent of the United States.

Mr. Lincoln took his youngest son with him

everywhere — on his great mission to Portress

Monroe, and th^ — "the long and the short of

it," l^e soldiers said — ^marched hand in hand

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Abraham Lincoln

through the streets of fallen Richmond. The
understanding between the man and the boy was
so complete and sacred, that some acts which
seemed to outsiders absurd and ill-fittii^, be-
came perfectly right and proper when certain
unknown facts were taken into account.

WATZNO TEB "STABS AM) BABS" OUT OF A "WHITE
HOUSE WINDOW

For instance, one night, during an entiiusi-
astic serenade at the White House, after a great
victory of the northern armies, when the Presi-
dent had been out and made a happy speech in
response to the congratulations he had received,
everybody was horrified to see the Confederate
"Stars and Bars" waving frantically from an
upper window with shouts followed by shrieks
as old Edward, the faithful colored servant,
pulled in the flag and the boy who was guilty of
the mischief.

"That was little Tad I" exclaimed some one in
the crowd. Many laughed, but some spectators
thought the boy ought to be punished for such a
treasonable outbreak on the part of a Presi-
dent's boy in a soldier's uniform,

"If he don't know any better than that," said
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The Story; of Young

one man, "he should be taught better. It's an
insult to the North and the President ought to
stop it and ajwlogize, too."

*'bOT8 en K.UE" AND "B0T8 IN GBAY"

But little Tad understood his father's spirit
better than the crowd did. He knew that the
President's love was not confined to "the Boy^
in Blue, * ' but that his heart went out also to ' ' the
Boys in Gray." The soldiera were all "boys" to
him. They knew he loved them. They said
amoi^ themselves : ' 'He cares for us. He takes
our part. We will fight for him ; yes, we will die
for him."

And a lai^e part of the common soldier's pa-
triotism was this heart-response of "the boys"
to the great "boy" in the Whit© House. That
was tiie meaning of their song as they trooped to
the front at his call :

"We are coming, Father Abraham;
Three hundred thousand more."

Little Taa saw plenty of evidences of his
father's love for the younger soldiers — ^the real
boys of the army. Going always with the Presi-
dent, he had heard his "Papa-day" say of sev-
218

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Abraliam Lincoln

eral youths condemned to be shot for Bleeping at
their post or some like ofEense :

"That boy is worth more above ground than
under;" or, "A live boy can serve his country
better than a dead one."

"Give the boys a chance," was Abraham Lin-
coln's motto. He hadn't had much of a chance
himself and he wanted all other boys to have a
fair show. His own father had been too hard
with him, and he was going to make it up to all
the other boj^ he could readi. This passion for
doing good to others began in the log cabin when
he had no idea he could ever be exercising liis
loving kindness in l^e Executive Mansion— the
Home of the Nation. "With malice toward
none, with charity for all," was the rule of his
life in the backwoods as well as in the National
Capital.

And "the Boys in Gray" were his "boys," too,
but they didn't understand, so they had wan-
dered away— they were a little wayward, but he
would win them back. The great diivalrous
South has learned, since those bitter, ruinous
days, ttiat Abraham Lincoln was the best friend
the South then had in the North. Tad had seen
his father show great tenderness to all the
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The Stoij of Young

"boyB" he met in the gray umform, but the
President had few opportunities to show his
tenderness to the South — though there was a se-
cret pigeonhole in his desk stuffed full of threats
of assassination. He was not afraid of death —
Indeed, he was glad to die if it would do his
"boys" and the country any good. But it hurt
him deep in his heart to know that some of his
beloved children misimderstood him so that they
were willing to kill h im I

It was no one*8 bullet whidi made Abraham
Lincoln a martyr. All his life he bad shown the
spirit of love which was willing to give his very
life if it could save or help others.

All these things little Tad could not have ex-
plained, but they were inbred into the deep un-
derstanding of the big father and the small son
who were living in the "White House as boys to-
gether.

MB. LmCOUr'S last speech AltD HOW TAD HELPED

A few days after the war ended at Appomat-
tox, a great crowd came to the White House to
serenade the President. It was Tuesday even-
ing, April 11, 1865. Mr. Lincoln had written a
short address for the occasion. The times were
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Abraham Lincoln

BO oat of joint and evety word was bo important
that the President could not trust himself to
epeak oif-hand.

A friend stepped out on the northern portico
with him to hold the candle by which Mr. Lin-
coln was to read his speech. Little Tad was with
his father, as usual, and when the President had
finished reading a page of his manuscript he let
it flutter down, like a leaf, or a big white butter-
fly, for Tad to catch. When the pages came too
slowly the boy pulled his father's coat-tail, pip-
ing up in a muffled, excited tone :

"Give me 'nother paper, Papa-day."

To the few in the front of the crowd who wit-
nessed this little by-play it seemed ridiculous
that the President of the United States should
allow any child to behave Uke that and hamper
him while delivering a great address which
would wield a national, if not world-wide influ-
ence. But little Tad did not trouble his father
in the least. It was a part of the little game they
were constantly playing together.

The address ojwned with these words :

"Fellow-citizenb: We meet this
evening not in sorrow, but gladness of
heart The evacuation of Petersburg

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The Btory of Young

and Richmond, and the surrender of
the principal insurgent army (at Ap-
pomattox) give hope of a righteous
and si>eedy peace whose joyous expres-
sion cannot be restrained. In the midst
of this, however, He from whom all
blessings flow mxisi not be forgotten. A
call for national thanksgiving is being
prepared and will be duly promul-
gated."

"orvE TJs 'dixie,' Boxal"

Then he went on outlining a policy of peace
and friendship toward the South — showing a
spirit far higher and more advanced than that of
the listening crowd. On concluding his address
and bidding the assembled multitude good night,
he turned to the serenading band and shouted
joyously :

"Give us *Bixie,* boys; play 'Dixie.* "We have
a right to that tune now. ' *

There was a moment of silence. Some of the
people gasped, as they had done when they saw
Tad waving the Confederate flag at the window.
But the band, loyal even to a mere whim (as they
then thought it) of "Father Abraham," started
the long-forbidden tune, and the President^ bow-

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Abraham Lincoln

ing, retired, with little Tad, within the White
House. Those words, "Give us 'Dixie,' boys,"
were President Lincoln's last public utterance.

As Mr. Lincoln came in through the door after
speaking to the crowd, Mrs. Lincoln — ^who had
been, with a group of friends, looking on from
within — exclaimed to him:

"You must not be so careless. Some one could
easily have shot you while you were speaking
there — and you know they are threatening your
life I"

The President smiled at his wife, through a
look of inexpressible pain and sadness, and
shrugged his great shoulders, but "still he an-
swered not a word."

THE SEPABATION OP THE TWO "bOTS"

At a late hour Good Friday night, that same
week, little Tad came in alone at a basement door
of the White House from the National Theater,
where he knew the manager, and some of the
company, had made a great pet of >^iTn. He had
often gone there alone or with his tutor. How
he had heard the terrible news from Ford's
Theater is not known, but he came up the lower
Btairway with heartrending cries like a wounded

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The Story of Toui^

animal. Seeing Thomas Pendel, the faithful
doorkeeper, he wailed from his breaking heart;
"Toln Pen, Tom Pen, they have killed Papa-
day I They have killed my Papa-day 1 ' '

After the funeral the little fellow was more
lonely than ever. It was hard to have his pony
burned up in the stable. It was harder still to
lose Brother Willie, his constant companion,
and now his mother was desperately ill, and his
father had been killed. Tad, of course, could not
comprehend why any one could be so cruel and
wicked as to wish to murder his darling Papa-
day, who loved every one so !

He wandered through the emply rooms,
aching with loneliness, murmuring sofUy to him-
self:

"Papa-day, Where's my Papa-day. I'm tired
— ^tired of playing alone. I want to play to-
gether. Please, Papa-day, come back and play
with your little Tad."

Toung though he was he could not sleep long
at night. His sense of loneliness penetrated his
dreams. Sometimes he would chuckle and
gurgle in an ecstacy, as he had done when riding
on bis father's back, romping through the stately
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Abraham Liucola

rooms. He would throw his arm about the neck
of the doorkeeper or lifeguard who had lain
down beside him to console the boy and try to get
^iJTn to sleep. "When the man spoke to comfort
him, Tad would find out his terrible mistake,
that his father was not with him.

Then he would wail again in the bitterness of
his disappointment:

"Papa-day, where's my Papa-dayt"

"Your papa's gone 'way off" — said his com-
panion, his voice breaking with emotion — "gone
to heaven."

Tad opened his eyes wide with wonder. "Is
Papa-day happy in heaven?" he asked eagerly.

"Yes, yes, I'm sure he's happy there, Taddie
dear; now go to sleep."

"Papa-day's happy. I'm glad — so glad I" —
sighed the little boy — "for Papa-day never was
.happy here."

Then he fell into his first sweet sleep since that
terrible night

"give the bots a chance"

The fond-hearted little fellow went abroad
with his mother a few years after the tragedy
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The Story of Young

that bcoke both their lives. By a surgical opera-
tion, and by struggling manfully, he had cor-
rected the imperfection in his speech. But the
heart of little Tad had been broken. While still
& lad he joined his fond father in the Beyond.

"Give the boys a chance," had amounted to a
passion with Abraham Lincoln, yet through
great wickedness and sad misunderstanding his
own little son was robbed of this great boon.
Little Tad had been denied ihe one chance he
sorely needed for his very existence. For this,
as for all tiie inequities the great heart of the
White House was prepared. His spirit had
shone through his whole life as if in letters of
living fire :

"With malice toward none; with charity for
aU."

226

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