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diff --git a/22925-8.txt b/22925-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..674b32a --- /dev/null +++ b/22925-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6921 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln, by Wayne Whipple + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln + +Author: Wayne Whipple + +Release Date: October 8, 2007 [EBook #22925] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF YOUNG ABRAHAM LINCOLN *** + + + + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Emmy and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +The Story of +Young Abraham Lincoln + +By + +WAYNE WHIPPLE + +Author of The Story of the American Flag, The Story of the Liberty Bell, +The Story of the White House, The Story of Young George Washington, the +Story of Young Benjamin Franklin, etc. + +Illustrated + +PHILADELPHIA + +HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY + + + + +COPYRIGHT, 1915, BY HOWARD E. ALTEMUS + +COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY HOWARD E. ALTEMUS + +PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA + + + + +CONTENTS + +CHAPTER PAGE + + INTRODUCTION 9 + + I. ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S FOREFATHERS 15 + + II. ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S FATHER AND MOTHER 24 + + III. THE BOY LINCOLN'S BEST TEACHER 33 + + IV. LEARNING TO WORK 40 + + V. LOSING HIS MOTHER 52 + + VI. SCHOOL DAYS NOW AND THEN. 62 + + VII. ABE AND THE NEIGHBORS 77 + + VIII. MOVING TO ILLINOIS 94 + + IX. STARTING OUT FOR HIMSELF 102 + + X. CLERKING AND WORKING 115 + + XI. POLITICS, WAR, STOREKEEPING, AND STUDYING LAW 126 + + XII. BUYING AND KEEPING A STORE 140 + + XIII. THE YOUNG LEGISLATOR IN LOVE. 147 + + XIV. MOVING TO SPRINGFIELD 162 + + XV. LINCOLN & HERNDON 184 + + XVI. HIS KINDNESS OF HEART 194 + + XVII. WHAT MADE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ABRAHAM + LINCOLN AND HIS STEPBROTHER 208 + +XVIII. HOW EMANCIPATION CAME TO PASS 215 + + XIX. THE GLORY OF GETTYSBURG 226 + + XX. "NO END OF A BOY" 234 + + XXI. LIEUTENANT TAD LINCOLN, PATRIOT 248 + + + + +INTRODUCTION + +LINCOLN FROM NEW AND UNUSUAL SOURCES + + +The boy or girl who reads to-day may know more about the real Lincoln +than his own children knew. The greatest President's son, Robert +Lincoln, 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 our family matters than I do!" + +This is because "all the world loves a lover"--and Abraham Lincoln loved +everybody. With all 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 heard 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 modern world are +acquainted with the story of the rise of Abraham Lincoln from a poorly +built log cabin to the highest place among "the seats of the mighty," +than are familiar with the Bible story of Joseph who arose and stood +next to the throne of the Pharaohs. + +Nearly every year, especially since the Lincoln Centennial, 1909, +something new has been added to the universal 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 him +once" or shook hands with him, have been called upon to tell what they +saw him 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--"the touch of Nature" which has made "the whole world kin" to +him. + +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 tender feeling. + +There are many such people who did not rush into print with their +observations and experiences. Their Lincoln memories seemed too sacred +to scatter far and wide. Some of them have yielded, with real +reluctance, in relating all for publication in THE STORY OF YOUNG +ABRAHAM LINCOLN only because they wished their recollections to benefit +the rising generation. + +Several of these modest folk have shed true light on important phases +and events in Lincoln's life history. For instance, there has been much +discussion concerning Lincoln's Gettysburg 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 unconsciously settles the whole dispute, whether +Lincoln held his notes in his right hand or his left--if he used them at +all!--while making his immortal "little speech." To a group of veterans +of the Grand Army of the Republic he related, casually, what he saw +while a college student at Gettysburg, after working his way through the +crowd of fifteen thousand people to the front of the platform on that +memorable day. From this point of vantage he saw and heard everything, +and there is no gainsaying the vivid memories of his first +impressions--how the President held the little pages in both hands +straight down before him, swinging his tall form to right, to left and +to the front again as he emphasized the now familiar closing words, +"_of_ the people--_by_ 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 Robert, +Lincoln's only living 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 guilty 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 not wish her name +given, about herself when she was a little girl, when a "drove of +lawyers riding the old Eighth Judicial District of Illinois," 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 leaning against the fence. The +little girl cried over this contemptuous treatment of her "child." + +Young Lawyer Lincoln, seeing it all, sprang in and quickly picked up the +fallen doll. Brushing off the dust with his great awkward hand he said, +soothingly, to the wounded little mother-heart: + +"There now, little Black Eyes, don't cry. Your baby's alive. See, she +isn't hurt a bit!" + +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 rescuing 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, Illinois. + +These and many other new and corrected incidents are now collected for +THE STORY OF YOUNG ABRAHAM LINCOLN, in addition to the best of +everything suitable that was known before--as the highest patriotic +service which the writer can render to the young people of the United +States of America. + + WAYNE WHIPPLE. + + + + +THE STORY OF +YOUNG 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 Lincolns had intermarried for +generations. The Lincolns were of good old English stock. When he was +President, 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 sacrificed +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" in the wilderness of the "Dark-and-Bloody-Ground"--the meaning of +the Indian name, "Ken-tuc-kee." + +Grandfather Lincoln had built a solid log cabin and cleared a field or +two around it, near the Falls of the Ohio, about where Louisville now +stands. But, in the Summer of 1784, the tragic day dawned upon the +Lincolns which has come to many a pioneer family in Kentucky and +elsewhere. His son Thomas told this story to his children: + + +HOW INDIANS KILLED "GRANDFATHER LINCOLN" + +"My father--your grandfather, Abraham Lincoln--come over the mountains +from Virginia with his cousin, Dan'l Boone. He was rich for them times, +as he had property worth seventeen thousand dollars; but Mr. Boone he +told Father he could make a good deal more by trappin' and tradin' with +the Injuns for valuable pelts, or fur skins. + +"You know, Dan'l Boone he had lived among the Injuns. He was a sure shot +with the rifle so's he could beat the redskins at their own game. They +took him a prisoner oncet, and instead of killin' him, they was about +ready to make him chief--he pretended all the while as how he'd like +that--when he got away from 'em. He was such a good fellow that them +Injuns admired his shrewdness, and they let him do about what he +pleased. So he thought they'd let Father alone. + +"Well, your grandfather was a Quaker, you see, and believed in treatin' +them red devils well--like William Penn done, you know. He was a man for +peace and quiet, and everything was goin' smooth with the tribes of what +we called the Beargrass Country, till one day, when he and my brothers, +Mordecai--'Mord' was a big fellow for his age--and Josiah, a few years +younger--was out in the clearin' with the oxen, haulin' logs down to the +crick. I went along too, but I didn't help much--for I was only six. + +"Young as I was, I remember what happened that day like it was only +yesterday. It come like a bolt out of the blue. We see Father drop like +he was shot--for he _was_ shot! Then I heard the crack of a rifle and I +saw a puff of smoke floatin' out o' the bushes. + +"Injuns!" gasps Mord, and starts on the run for the house--to get his +gun. Josiah, he starts right off in the opposite direction to the +Beargrass fort--we called it a fort, but it was nothin' but a stockade. +The way we boys scattered was like a brood o' young turkeys, or +pa'tridges, strikin' for cover when the old one is shot. I knowed I'd +ought to run too, but I didn't want to leave my father layin' there on +the ground. Seemed like I'd ought to woke him up so he could run too. +Yet I didn't feel like touchin' him. I think I must 'a' knowed he was +dead. + +"While I was standin' still, starin' like the oxen, not knowin' what to +do, a big Injun come out o' the brush, with a big knife in his hand. I +knowed what he was goin' to do--skelp my father! I braced up to 'im to +keep 'im away, an' he jist laffed at me. I never think what the devil +looks like without seein' that red demon with his snaky black eyes, +grinnin' at me! + + +TOM LINCOLN CHASED BY INDIANS + +"He picked me up like I was a baby an set me on the sawlog, an' was +turnin' back to skelp Father, when--biff!--another gun-crack--and Mr. +Big Indian he drops jist like your grandfather did, only he wriggles and +squirms around, bitin' the dust--like a big snake for all the world! + +"I was standin' there, kind o' dazed, watchin' another puff o' white +smoke, comin' out between two logs in the side of our house. Then I +knowed 'Mord' had shot my Injun. He had run in, got the gun down off'n +the wall, an' peekin' out through a crack, he sees that Injun takin' +hold o' me. Waitin' till the ol' demon turns away, so's not to hit me, +'Mord' he aims at a silver dangler on Mr. Injun's breast and makes him +drop in his tracks like I said. Your Uncle 'Mord' he was a sure +shot--like Cousin Dan'l Boone. + +"Then I hears the most blood-curdlin' yells, and a lot o' red devils +jump out o' the bushes an' come for me brandishin' their tomahawks an' +skelpin' knives. It was like hell broke loose. They had been watchin' +an', of course, 'twas all right to kill Father, but when 'Mord' killed +one o' their bucks, that made a big difference. I had sense enough left +to run for the house with them Injuns after me. Seemed like I couldn't +run half as fast as usual, but I must 'a' made purty good time, from +what 'Mord' an' Mother said afterward. + +"He said one was ahead o' the rest an' had his tomahawk raised to brain +me with it when--bing!--an' 'Mord' fetches _him_ down like he did the +fellow that was goin' to skelp Father. That made the others mad an' they +took after me, but 'Mord' he drops the head one jist when he's goin' to +hit me. But all I knowed at the time was that them red devils was +a-chasin' me, and I'd got to 'leg it' for dear life! + +"When I gits near enough to the house, I hears Mother and 'Mord' +hollerin' to make me run faster and go to the door, for Mother had it +open jist wide enough to reach out an' snatch me in--when the third +Injun was stoopin' to grab me, but 'Mord' makes him bite the dust like +the others. + +"My, but wasn't them Injuns mad! Some of 'em sneaked around behind the +house--they had to give 'Mord's' gun a wide berth to git there!--but he +could only protect the front--and was a-settin' fire to our cabin to +smoke us out or roast us alive, jist when the soldiers come with Josiah +from the fort and saved our lives. Then the Injuns made 'emselves +scurce--but they druv off the oxen and all our other stock. + + +"MORD" LINCOLN, INDIAN FIGHTER + +"That was the breaking up of our family. None of us boys was old enough +to take Father's place, an' Mother she was afraid to live there alone. +Accordin' to the laws o' Virginia--Kentucky belonged to Virginia +then--the oldest son got all the proputty, so 'Mord' he gets it all. He +was welcome to it too, for he was the only one of us that could take +care of it. 'Mord' he wasn't satisfied with killin' a few Injuns that +day to revenge Father's death. He made a business of shootin' 'em on +sight--a reg'lar Injun stalker! He couldn't see that he was jist as +savage as the worst Injun, to murder 'em without waitin' to see whether +Mr. Injun was a friend or a foe. + +"Oncet when I told 'im there was good an' bad red men like they wuz good +an' bad white men, he said I might jist as well say 'good _devil_' as +'good Injun!' He says 'the only good Injun's the dead Injun!' + +"Well, the settlers must 'a' 'greed with 'Mord,' for they made him +sheriff o' the county--he was sech a good shot, too--an' they 'lected +him to the Legislatur' after Kentucky come in as a State. He stood high +in the county. Folks didn't mind his shootin' an' Injun or two, more or +less, when he got the chancet. They all looked on redskins like they +was catamounts an' other pesky varmints. + +"Your grandmother Lincoln an' Josiah an' me moved over into Washington +County, but she had hard scrabblin' to git a livin'. Josiah he stayed +with her, an' between him an' 'Mord,' they helped her along, but I had +to git out and scratch for a livin'. From the time I was ten I was hired +out to work for my 'keep,' an' anything else I could git. I knocked +aroun' the country, doin' this, that an' t'other thing till I picked up +carpenterin' o' Joseph Hanks, a cousin o' mine, an' there I met his +sister Nancy, an' that's how she come to be your mother--an' 'bout how I +come to be your father, too!" + +Little is known today of Mordecai Lincoln, and there would be less +interest in poor Thomas if he had not become the father of Abraham +Lincoln, the sixteenth President of the United States. Mordecai Lincoln +was a joker and humorist. One who knew him well said of him: + +"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 laugh, and that was 'Artemus Ward.' + +"Mordecai was quite a story-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 charitable and benevolent. + +"Abe Lincoln had a very high opinion of his uncle, and 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 before he was nominated for +the presidency, Abraham Lincoln wrote: + +"My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished +families--second families, perhaps I should say. My mother was of a +family of the name of Hanks. My paternal grandfather, Abraham Lincoln, +emigrated from Rockingham County, Virginia, to Kentucky about 1781 or 2, +where, a year or two later, he was killed by Indians--not 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 County, +Pennsylvania. An effort to identify them with the New England family of +the same name ended in nothing more definite than a similarity of +Christian names in both 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 without education." + + + + +CHAPTER II + +ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S FATHER AND MOTHER + + +While Thomas Lincoln was living with a farmer and doing odd jobs of +carpentering, he met Nancy Hanks, a tall, slender woman, with dark skin, +dark brown hair and small, deep-set gray eyes. She had a full forehead, +a sharp, angular face and a sad expression. Yet her disposition was +generally cheerful. For her backwoods advantages she was considered well +educated. She read well and could write, too. It is stated that Nancy +Hanks taught Thomas Lincoln to write his own name. Thomas was +twenty-eight and Nancy twenty-three when their wedding day came. +Christopher Columbus Graham, when almost one hundred years old, gave +the 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 +Linkhorn, as the family was miscalled, was born in lawful wedlock, for I +saw Thomas Lincoln marry Nancy 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 mainly 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 cabinet maker by trade, and as he was then a neighbor, 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 was treated +with respect. + +"I was at the infare, too, given by John H. Parrott, her guardian, and +only girls with money had guardians appointed by the court. We had bear +meat; venison; wild turkey and ducks' eggs, wild and tame--so common +that you could buy them at two bits a bushel; maple sugar, swung on a +string, to bite off 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 +Elizabethtown. 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 fourteen miles +away. There was so little carpentering 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 primitive wearing apparel of the +pioneers. A daughter was born to the young couple at Elizabethtown, whom +they named Sarah. + +Dennis Hanks, a cousin of Nancy, lived near the Lincolns in the early +days of their married life, and gave Mrs. Eleanor Atkinson this +description of their early life together: + +"Looks didn't count them days, nohow. It was stren'th an' work an' +daredevil. A lazy man or a coward was jist pizen, an' a spindlin' feller +had to stay in the settlemints. 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 putickalar. +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 everlastin'ly at work to git enough to eat. So Tom tuk up some +land. It was mighty ornery land, but it 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 porer than +anybody. Choppin' trees an' grubbin' roots an' splittin' rails an' +huntin' an' trappin' didn't leave Tom no time. It was all he could do to +git his fambly 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 pesterin' kind. She was purty as a pictur' an' smart +as you'd find 'em anywhere. 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 could lick a bully if he had to. He jist couldn't git +ahead, somehow." + + +"NANCY'S BOY BABY" + +Evidently Elizabethtown failed to furnish Thomas Lincoln a living wage +from carpentering, 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 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 "Rock 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 American." + +Abraham Lincoln was born to poverty and privation, but he was never a +pauper. His hardships were those of many other pioneers, the wealthiest +of whom suffered greater privations than the poorest laboring man has to +endure to-day. + +After his nomination to the presidency, Mr. Lincoln gave to Mr. Hicks, a +portrait painter, this memorandum of his birth: + + "I was born 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 know + no means of identifying the precise locality. + It was on Nolen Creek. + + "A. LINCOLN. + "JUNE 14, 1860." + +The exact spot was identified after his death, and the house was found +standing many years later. The logs 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 materials +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 +born. I ricollect Tom comin' over to our house one cold mornin' in +Feb'uary an' sayin' kind o' slow, 'Nancy's got a boy baby.' + +"Mother got flustered an' hurried up 'er work 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 him, 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 fireplace 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, settin' on a stool, starin' at a visitor. +All 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 putection ag'inst the wet. Birch bark +with hickory bark soles, strapped on over yarn 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, +fishin' in the creek, settin' traps fur rabbits an' muskrats, goin' on +coon-hunts with Tom an' me an' the dogs, follerin' up bees to find +bee-trees, an' drappin' corn 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 four years old his father and mother moved from Rock +Spring Farm to a better place on Knob Creek, a few miles to the +northeast of the farm where he was born. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE BOY LINCOLN'S BEST TEACHER + + +At Knob Creek the boy began to go to an "A B C" school. His first +teacher was Zachariah 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 schoolhouse. 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 Gollaher, used to like to tell of the days when +he and little Abe went to school together. He said: + +"Abe was an unusually bright boy at school, and made splendid progress +in his studies. Indeed, he learned faster than any of his schoolmates. +Though so young, he studied very hard." + +Although Nancy Lincoln insisted on sending the children to school, when +there was any, she had a large share in Abe's early education, just as +she had taught his father to write his own name. She told them Bible +stories and such others as she had picked up in her barren, backwoods +life. She and her husband were too religious to believe in telling their +children fairy tales. + +The best thing of all was the reading of "The Pilgrim's Progress" during +the long Winter evenings, after the wood was brought in and Father Tom +had set his traps and done his other work for the night. Nancy's voice +was low, with soft, southern tones and accents. Tom and the children +enjoyed the story of Christian's pilgrimage from the City of Destruction +to the Celestial City the more because of her love for the story she was +reading to them, as they lay on bearskin rugs before the blazing fire. + +Abe was only six, but he was a thoughtful boy. He tried to think of some +way to show his gratitude to his mother for giving them so much +pleasure. While out gathering sticks and cutting wood for the big +fireplace, a happy thought came to him--he would cut off some spicewood +branches, hack them up on a log, and secrete them behind the cabin. +Then, when the mother was ready to read again, and Sarah and the father +were sitting and lying before the fire, he brought in the hidden +branches and threw them on, a few twigs at a time, to the surprise of +the others. It worked like a charm; the spicewood boughs not only added +to the brightness of the scene but filled the whole house with the +"sweet smelling savour" of a little boy's love and gratitude. + +No one can fathom the pleasure of that precious memory throughout those +four lives, as the story of Great Heart and Christiana followed +Christian along the path that "shineth more and more unto the perfect +day." While the father and sister were delighted with the crackle, +sparkle and pleasant aroma of the bits of spicewood, as Abe tossed them +upon the fire, no one could appreciate the thoughtful act of the boy so +much as his mother. It would be strange if her eyes did not fill, as she +read to her fascinated family, but that was not the sort of thing the +fondest mother could speak of. + +Little did Nancy dream that, in reading to her son of the devotion of +Great Heart to his charges, she was fostering a spirit in her little son +that would help him make the noble pilgrimage from their hovel to the +highest home in the land, where another President of the United States +would refer to him as "the Great Heart of the White House." If any one +could have looked ahead fifty years to see all this, and could have told +Nancy Hanks Lincoln, she would not have believed it. After her own life +of toil and hardship it would have seemed to her "too good to be true." +But in the centuries following the humble yet beautiful career of "the +Backwoods Boy" from the hut to the White House, history keeps the whole +world saying with bated breath, "the half was never told!" + + +AN OLD MAN'S STORY OF SAVING ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S LIFE + +Austin Gollaher, grown to manhood, still living in his old log cabin +near the Lincoln house in Knob Creek nearly twenty years after +Lincoln's assassination, and gave the following account of an adventure +he had with the little Lincoln boy: + +"I once saved Lincoln's life. We had been going 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. Glad 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 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!' 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 hands. 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 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 exhorter, 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 +wonder 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!" + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +LEARNING TO WORK + + +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 Creek seems to have been a little more +fertile than the other two places on which his father had chosen to +live. + +Once while living in the White House, President Lincoln was asked if he +could remember his "old Kentucky home." He replied with considerable +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 Saturday afternoon; the other boys +planted the corn in what we called the big field--it contained seven +acres--and I dropped the pumpkin seed. I dropped two seeds in every +other row and every other hill. 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, corn, pumpkin seeds and +all, clear off the field!" + +Although this was the last thing Lincoln could remember doing on that +farm, it is not at all likely that it was the last thing he did there, +for Thomas Lincoln was not the man to plant corn in a field he was about +to leave. (The Lincolns moved away in the fall.) + +Another baby boy was born at Knob Creek 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 coffin, and the +Lincoln family wept over a lonely little grave in the wilderness. + +About this time Abe began to learn 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 at home that we must be good to the soldiers, I gave him my fish." + +An old man, Major Alexander Sympson, 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 neighboring mill while a grist was being ground. + +"He was the shyest, most reticent, most uncouth and awkward-appearing, +homeliest and worst-dressed of any in the crowd. So superlatively +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 +from the Bible, "The Pilgrim's Progress," "Ęsop'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 determined 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 +improvident though his father was, he had no use for that class of white +slaves, who seemed to fall even lower than the blacks. + +There was trouble, too, about the title to much of the land in Kentucky, +while Indiana offered special inducements to settlers in that new +territory. + +In his carpenter work, Thomas Lincoln had learned how to build a +flatboat, and had made at 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 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 +all sides. The soil was excellent, but there was one serious +drawback--there was no water fit to drink within a mile! 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. + +Instead of taking his 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 camping out every night 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 consisted 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 them on the two horses. It was a +rough wagon ride, jolting over stumps, logs, and roots of trees. An +earlier settler had cut out a path 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 mother, she was accustomed to all +such hardships; she had learned to take life as it came and make the +best of it. + +Nancy Lincoln needed all her Christian fortitude 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 decided 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, that 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 Mansion was being restored. +The blackened stone walls, left standing after the fire, were _painted +white_, and on that account the President's mansion came to be known as +"the White House." + +Little Abe, without a thought of his great future, 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 rainwater 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 there 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 years old, and had had some practice 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 corner +to stick the legs in. Their bedsteads were poles fitted into holes bored +in logs in the 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 puncheon floor of their cabin. Abe's bed was a pile of dry leaves +laid in one corner 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 +kinds. This, with Tom Lincoln'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 +corn for the "corndodgers" 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. Once 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 ground 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! There is no 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 was the principal sport of the youth and their fathers +in Lincoln's younger days, Abe was too kind to inflict needless +suffering 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." + + + + +CHAPTER V + +LOSING HIS MOTHER + + +In the fall of 1817, when the Lincoln family had moved from the shed +into the rough log cabin, Thomas and Betsy Sparrow came and occupied the +"darned little half-faced camp," as Dennis Hanks called it. Betsy +Sparrow was the aunt who had brought up Nancy Hanks, and she was now a +foster-mother to Dennis, her nephew. Dennis became the constant +companion of the 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 days 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 with a long +whipsaw 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 coffin. They +buried the Sparrows under the trees "without benefit of clergy," for +ministers came seldom to that remote region. + +Nancy Lincoln did not long survive the devoted aunt and uncle. She had +suffered too much from exposure and privation to recover her strength +when she was seized by the strange malady. One who was near her during +her last illness wrote, long afterward: + +"She struggled on, day by day, like the patient 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 miles. + +"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. Placing 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 both. While expressing her +hope that they might live, as she had taught them to live, in the love +of their kindred and the service of God, Nancy Hanks Lincoln passed from +the miserable 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 religious 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 turkey-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 first letter. It was +addressed to Parson Elkin, the Baptist preacher, who had sometimes +stayed over night with the family when they lived in Kentucky, to ask +that elder to come and preach a sermon over his mother's grave. It had +been a long struggle to learn to write "good enough for a +preacher"--especially for a small boy who is asking such a favor of a +man as "high and mighty" as a minister of the Gospel seemed to him. + +It was a heartbroken plea, but the lad did not realize it. It was a +short, straightforward note, but the good preacher's eyes filled with +tears as he read it. + +The great undertaking was not finished when the letter was written. The +postage was a large matter for a little boy. It cost sixpence (equal to +twelve-and-a-half cents today) to send a letter a short distance--up to +thirty miles. Some letters required twenty-five cents--equal to fifty in +modern money. Sometimes, when the sender could not advance the postage, +the receiver had to pay it before the letter could be opened and read. +On this account letters were almost as rare and as expensive as +telegrams are today. When the person getting a letter could not pay the +postage, it was returned to the writer, who had to pay double to get it +back. + +In those days one person could annoy another and put him to expense by +writing him and forcing him to pay the postage--then when the letter +was opened, it was found to be full of abuse, thus making a man pay for +insults to himself! + +There was a great general who had suffered in this way, so he made a +rule that he would receive no letters unless the postage was prepaid. +One day there came to his address a long envelope containing what seemed +to be an important document. But it was not stamped, and the servant had +been instructed not to receive that kind of mail. So it was returned to +the sender. When it came back it was discovered that it had been mailed +by mistake without a stamp. That letter announced to General Zachary +Taylor that he had been nominated by a great convention as candidate for +President of the United States! + +All this seems very strange now that a letter can be sent around the +world for a few cents. Besides, the mails did not go often and were +carried on horseback. For a long time one half-sick old man carried the +mail on a good-for-nothing horse, once a week, between New York and +Philadelphia, though they were the largest cities in the country. + +So it was many months before Abe received an answer to his letter. +Elder Elkin may have been away from home on one of the long circuits +covered by pioneer preachers. As the days and weeks went by without the +lad's receiving any reply he was filled with misgivings lest he had +imposed upon the good man's former friendship. + +At last the answer came and poor Abe's anxiety was turned to joy. The +kind elder not only said he would come, but he also named the Sunday +when it would be, so that the Lincoln family could invite all their +friends from far and near to the postponed service--for it often +happened in this new country that the funeral could not take place for +months after the burial. + +It was late in the following Summer, nearly a year after Nancy's death, +that the devoted minister came. The word had gone out to all the region +round about. It was the religious event of the season. Hundreds of +people of all ages came from twenty miles around on horseback--a father, +mother and two children on one horse--also in oxcarts, and on foot. They +sat in groups in the wagons, and on the green grass, as at the feeding +of the multitudes in the time of the Christ. But these people brought +their own refreshments as if it were a picnic. + +They talked together in low, solemn tones while waiting for the poor +little funeral procession to march out from the Lincoln cabin to the +grass-covered grave. Pioneer etiquette required the formalities of a +funeral. Elder Elkin was followed by the widowed husband, with Abraham +and Sarah and poor Cousin Dennis, also bereaved of his foster-parents, +and now a member of the Lincoln family. + +There were tender hearts behind those hardened faces, and tears +glistened on the tanned cheeks of many in that motley assemblage of +eager listeners, while the good elder was paying the last tribute of +earth to the sweet and patient memory of his departed friend of other +days. + +The words of the man of God, telling that assembled multitude what a +lovely and devoted girl and woman his mother had been, gave sweet and +solemn joy to the soul of the little Lincoln boy. It was all for her +dear sake, and she was, of all women, worthy of this sacred respect. As +he gazed around on the weeping people, he thought of the hopes and fears +of the months that had passed since he wrote his first letter to bring +this about. + +"God bless my angel mother!" burst from his lonely lips--"how glad I am +I've learned to write!" + + +THE COMING OF ANOTHER MOTHER + +All that a young girl of twelve could do, assisted by a willing brother +of ten, was done by Sarah and Abraham Lincoln to make that desolate +cabin a home for their lonesome father, and for cousin Dennis Hanks, +whose young life had been twice darkened by a double bereavement. But +"what is home without a mother?" Thomas Lincoln, missing the balance and +inspiration of a patient wife, became more and more restless, and, after +a year, wandered back again to his former homes and haunts in Kentucky. + +While visiting Elizabethtown he saw a former sweetheart, the Sally Bush +of younger days, now Mrs. Daniel Johnston, widow of the county jailer +who had recently died, leaving three children and considerable property, +for that time and place. Thomas renewed his suit and won the pitying +heart of Sarah Johnston, and according to the story of the county clerk: + +"The next morning, December 2, 1819, I issued the license, and the same +day they were married, bundled up, and started for home." + +Imagine the glad surprise of the three children 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! Then they were told that this woman was to +be their mother and they had two more sisters and another brother! + +To the 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 Matilda, so Sarah Lincoln's name was promptly changed to Nancy +for her dead mother, as there were two Sarahs already in the combined +family. + +Mrs. 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 children, till she, as she expressed it, "made +them look more human." + +Dennis 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 everything had been +wanting, all was snug and comfortable. She was a woman of great energy, +of remarkable good sense, very industrious 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 children love their parents as he loved his +stepmother. She dressed him up in entire new clothes, and from 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 chairs, one large +clothes chest, cooking utensils, knives, forks, bedding and other +articles." + +It must have been a glorious day when such a splendid array of household +furniture was carried 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 bottoms of their grateful hearts. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +SCHOOL DAYS NOW AND THEN + + +Lincoln 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 the time 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 qualification was ever required of a teacher +beside readin', writin', and cipherin' to the Rule of Three (simple +proportion). If a straggler supposed to understand 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 built 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 miles 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 with him to work, so that he +might read when he rested from labor." + +Thomas Lincoln had no use for "eddication," as he called it. "It will +spile 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 thought Abe's studious habits were due to "pure laziness, +jest to git shet o' workin'." So, whenever 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 trying to a boy as hungry to learn 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 +Crawford, came and settled near Gentryville. Having 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: + +"Another chance for you to go to school." + +"Where?" + +"That man Crawford that 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 limber." + +The tactful wife accomplished it somehow and Abe started off to school +with Nancy, and a light heart. A neighbor described him as he appeared +in Crawford's school, as "long, wiry and strong, while his big feet and +hands, and the length of his legs and arms, were out of all proportion +to his small trunk and head. His complexion was swarthy, and his skin +shriveled and yellow even then. He wore low shoes, buckskin breeches, +linsey-woolsey shirt, and a coonskin cap. The breeches hung close to his +legs, but were far from meeting the tops of his shoes, exposing 'twelve +inches of shinbone, sharp, blue and narrow.'" + +"Yet," said Nat Grigsby, "he was always in good health, never sick, and +had an excellent constitution." + + +HELPING KATE ROBY SPELL + +Andrew Crawford must have been an unusual 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. "D-e-f," said +Kate, then she hesitated over the next letter. Abe pointed to his eye +and winked significantly. The girl took the hint and went on glibly +"i-e-d," and "went up head." + + +"I DID IT!" + +There was a buck's head nailed over the school house 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 on it--and it broke!" +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 arithmetic. He had a copybook, +made by himself, in which he entered tables of weights and measures and +"sums" he had to do. Among these was a specimen of schoolboy doggerel: + + "Abraham Lincoln, + His hand and pen, + He will be good-- + But God knows when!" + +In another place he wrote some solemn reflections on the value of time: + + "Time, what an empty vapor 'tis, + And days, how swift they are! + 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 boys to follow. In the book of a boy named +Richardson, he wrote this prophetic couplet: + + "Good boys who to their books apply + Will all be great men by and by." + + +A "MOTHER'S BOY"--HIS FOOD AND CLOTHING + +Dennis Hanks related of his young companion: "As far as food and +clothing were concerned, 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 hoss +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 be ready for supper_! + +"For clothing he had jeans. He was grown before he wore all-wool pants. +It was a new country, 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, +love of humanity, hatred of slavery, all came from his mother. I am +free to say Abe was a 'mother's boy.'" + +Dennis 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 Progress," Ęsop'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 Guardsmen," or "The Hound of the Baskervilles." He +made notes of what he read with his turkey-buzzard pen and brier-root +ink. If he did not 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, shaving +it off clean when both sides were full of figures. When he got hold of +paper enough to make a copy-book he would go about transferring 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 +moment. + +Besides the books he had at hand, he borrowed all he could get, often +walking 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! + + +"THE BEGINNING 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: + +"Did you ever write out a story in your mind? I 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 followed 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 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 "LIFE OF WASHINGTON" + +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 flickering 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 beside 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 between 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 neighborhood, Josiah Crawford, who +was so unpopular that he went by the nickname of "Old Blue Nose"? + +The only course was to show the angry 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 bloodcurdling 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 twinkling in spite of himself +at the thought of owning 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 +bargain. He cheerfully did the work for a man who was mean enough to +take advantage of his misfortune. He comforted himself with the thought +that he would be the owner of the precious "Life of Washington." Long +afterward, in a speech before the New Jersey Legislature, on his way to +Washington to be inaugurated, like Washington, as President of the +United States, he referred to this strange book. + + +"THE WHOLE TRUTH AND NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH" + +One morning, on his way to work, with an ax on his shoulder, his +stepsister, Matilda Johnston, 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 +mischievous Matilda shrieked with fright 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 +tell mother about it?" + +"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. +You just tell the whole truth, 'Tilda, and trust mother for the rest." + +Matilda went limping home and told her mother 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 because 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 anything 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 out what was the exact +meaning of some of their, to me, dark sayings. + +"I could not sleep, although 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 boy I knew to comprehend. + +"This was a kind of a passion with me, and it has stuck by me; for I am +never easy now when I am bounding a thought, till I have bounded it +east, and bounded it west, and bounded it north, and bounded it south." + + +HIGH PRAISE FROM HIS STEPMOTHER + +Not long before her death, Mr. Herndon, Lincoln's law partner, called +upon Mrs. Sarah Lincoln 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 stepson: + +"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 appearance, +to do anything I asked him. His mind and mine seemed to run together. + +"I had 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 honesty. Abraham Lincoln +could not have become so popular all over the world on account of his +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 born." But only a good, kind, honest man, considerate of others, +can be elected President of the United States. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +ABE AND THE NEIGHBORS + + +"PREACHING" AGAINST CRUELTY TO ANIMALS + +Nat Grigsby stated once that writing compositions was not required by +Schoolmaster Crawford, but "Abe took it up on his own account," and his +first essay was against cruelty to animals. + +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, according to his sister Matilda, +"caught a terrapin, 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." + + +ROUGHLY DISCIPLINED FOR BEING "FORWARD" + +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 demand than those of his +stepbrother, John Johnston, 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. Yet 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. No 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 +arguments with his fellow-laborers, 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 his +"superiors," Thomas Lincoln struck Abe a heavy blow which knocked him +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 +discipline. In their opinion Abe Lincoln was getting 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 superior. A visitor to +Springfield, Ill., 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 presidency!" + + +SPORTS AND PASTIMES + +Abe was "hail fellow, well met" everywhere. The women comprehended his +true greatness before the men did so. There was a rough gallantry about +him, which, though lacking in "polish," was true, "heart-of-oak" +politeness. He wished every one well. His whole life passed with "malice +toward none, with charity for all." + +When he "went out evenings" Abe Lincoln took the greatest pains to make +everybody comfortable 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 chimney. He was the +best helper in paring the apples, shelling the corn 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 "chose 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 barn 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 helpless animals. + +Coon hunting, however, was an exception. The coon was a pest and a +plague to the farmer, so it should be got rid of. He once told the +following story: + + +THE LITTLE YELLOW "COON DOG" + +"My father had a little yellow house dog which invariably gave the alarm +if we boys undertook to slip away unobserved after night had set in--as +we sometimes did--to go coon hunting. One night my brother, John +Johnston, and I, with the usual complement of boys required for a +successful coon hunt, took the insignificant little cur with us. + +"We located the coveted coon, killed him, and then in a sporting vein, +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, scenting +coon, tracked the little animal home and apparently mistaking him for a +real coon, speedily demolished him. The next morning, father found, +lying in his yard, the lifeless remains of yellow 'Joe,' with strong +circumstantial evidence, in the form of fragments of coon skin, against +us. + +"Father was much incensed at his death, but as John and I, scantily +protected from the morning wind, stood shivering in the doorway, we felt +assured that little yellow Joe would never again be able to sound the +alarm of another coon hunt." + + +THE "CHIN FLY" AS AN INCENTIVE TO WORK + +While he was President, Mr. Lincoln told Henry J. Raymond, the founder +of the New York _Times_, the following story of an experience he had +about this time, while working with his stepbrother in a cornfield: + +"Raymond," said he, "you were brought up on a farm, were you not? Then +you know what a 'chin fly' is. My brother and I were plowing corn once, +I driving the horse and he holding the plow. The horse was lazy, but on +one occasion 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 want the +old horse bitten in that way. + +"'Why,' said my brother,'that's all that made him go.'" + +"Now if Mr. Chase (the Secretary of the Treasury) has a presidential +'chin fly' biting him, I'm not going to knock it off, if it will only +make his department go." + + +"OLD BLUE 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 attraction, 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 off his hat to me and bowing. He was a sensitive lad, never +coming where he was not wanted. He was tender and kind--like his sister. + +"He liked to hang around 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 child a coat,' and the long-legged hired boy +would stride away and catch up with the others." + +One day when he was asked to kill a hog, Abe answered promptly that he +had never done that, "but if you'll risk the hog, I'll risk myself!" + +Mrs. Crawford told also about "going to meeting" 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 husbands' old overcoats, wrap up +their little ones, and take two or three of them on their beasts, while +their husbands would walk. + +"In winter time they would hold church in some of the neighbors' houses. +At such times they were always treated with the utmost kindness; a +basket of apples, or turnips--apples were scarce in those days--was set +out. Sometimes potatoes were used for a 'treat.' In old Mr. Linkhorn's +(Lincoln's) house a plate of potatoes, washed and pared nicely, was +handed around." + + +FEATS OF STRENGTH + +Meanwhile the boy was growing to tall manhood, both in body and in mind. +The neighbors, 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 marvelous tales of +his prowess, some of which may have grown somewhat in the telling. Mr. +Richardson 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 six hundred if not much more." + +When the Richardsons were building their corn-crib, Abe saw three or +four men getting ready to carry several huge 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, +carrying them to the place desired. He performed these feats off-hand, +smiling down in undisguised pleasure as the men around him expressed +their amazement. It seemed to appeal to his sense of humor as well as +his desire to help others out of their difficulties. + +Another neighbor, "old Mr. Wood," said of Abe: "He could strike, with a +maul, a heavier 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 so fast. + +On one occasion after he had been threshing wheat for Mr. Turnham, 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 youths 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 +him lay in it!" + +The rest laughed--for the "bed" was freezing mud. But Abe could see no +humor in the situation. 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 young men hurried on in the cold, shrugging their shoulders +and shaking their heads--"Poor Abe!--he's a hopeless case," and left +Lincoln to do the work of a Good Samaritan alone. He had no beast on +which to carry the dead weight 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 body of the +mud-covered 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 him "a good talking +to," and the unfortunate man is said to have been so deeply impressed 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 Herculean effort to save him, he added: + +"It was mighty clever in Abe Lincoln to tote me to a warm fire that cold +night." + + +IN JONES' STORE + +While Abe was working for the farmers round about his father's farm he +spent many of his evenings in Jones' grocery "talking politics" and +other things with the men, who also gathered 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 "Indiana Statutes" he was supposed to "know more law than +the constable." In fact, his taste for the law was so pronounced at that +early age that he went, sometimes, 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 congratulate the lawyer, who looked at the awkward +youth in amazement and passed on without 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 politics discussed at the country +store, and Abe Lincoln often raised a laugh at the expense of some +braggart or bully. There was "Uncle Jimmy" Larkins, who posed as the +hero of his own stories. In acknowledgment 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 Lincoln seemed to pay no +heed. Larkins repeated: + +"Abe, I've got the best horse in the world; he won the race and never +drew a long breath." + +Young Lincoln still appeared not to be paying 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 +running he never drew a long breath." + +"Well, Larkins," drawled young Lincoln, "why don't you tell us how many +_short_ breaths he drew." The laugh was on the boastful and discomfited +Larkins. + + +TRYING TO TEACH ASTRONOMY TO A YOUNG GIRL + +Abe's efforts were not always so well received, for he was sometimes +misunderstood. The neighbors used to think the Lincoln boy was secretly +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: + +"Abe," said Kate, "the sun's goin' down." + +"Reckon not," Abe answered, "we're coming up, that's all." + +"Don't you s'pose 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!" exclaimed Kate, who was not to blame +for her ignorance, for astronomy had never been taught in Crawford's +school. + + +THE EARLY DEATH OF SISTER NANCY + +While brother and sister were working for "Old Blue Nose," Aaron +Grigsby, "Nat's" brother, was "paying attention" to Nancy Lincoln. 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 resembled 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 beside her mother, but with the Grigsbys in the +churchyard of the old Pigeon Creek meeting-house. + + +EARNING HIS FIRST DOLLAR + +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. Abe accepted this as right and +proper. He never complained of it. + +After he became President, Lincoln told his Secretary of State the +following story of the first dollar 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 . . . 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 in 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 down +to the shore in carriages, and looking at the different 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 they would give me a couple of 'bits.' The +trunks were put in my boat, the passengers seated themselves 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: + +"'You have forgotten to pay me.' + +"Each of them 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 incident 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." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +MOVING TO ILLINOIS + + +"FOLLOWING THE RIVER" + +Thomas Lincoln had become restless again. Fourteen years was a long time +for him to live in one place. Abe was seven years old when they came +over from Kentucky, 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 fortunes +in a newer country had taken possession of him. + +John Hanks had gone to Illinois, and had written back that everything +was more favorable there for making a living. Thomas Lincoln had not +been successful in Indiana. His children's prospects seemed to be +against them. After working as a hired hand on the surrounding farms, +Abe had served for a time as a ferryman, and, working by the river, had +learned to 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 +April, 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 footsteps of midnight marauders on board. + +Young Gentry was first aroused. He sprang up and found a gang of +lawless negroes on deck, evidently 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!" 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 Gentryville came back in June, with good stories of +their experiences to tell in Jones' store. + +Not long after this Thomas Lincoln, in response 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 corn 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. It was February, 1830, before the pioneer wagon got +under way. The emigrant family consisted of Thomas Lincoln and Sarah, +his wife, Abraham, and John Johnston; Sarah and Matilda Johnston were +both married, and, with their husbands, a young man named Hall and +Dennis 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 TRAVELING PEDDLER + +Merchant Jones, for whom Abe had worked that fall and winter, after his +return from New Orleans, sold the young man a pack of "notions" 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, buttons, 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 purchases +by selling them along the road. Unfortunately we did not keep that +letter, not thinking how highly we would prize it afterward." + +In the early days of his presidency, an international problem came +before the cabinet which reminded Mr. Lincoln 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. +Perhaps you don't see what I am driving at. + +"Just before we left Indiana and were crossing into Illinois we came +across a small farmhouse 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 thought there wasn't much use in asking the head of that house if she +wanted any 'notions.' She was too busy. It was evident that an +insurrection had been in progress, but it was pretty well quelled when I +got there. She saw me when I came up, and from her look I thought she +surmised that I intended to interfere. Advancing 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 irritated way; 'there's +trouble here, and lots of it, too, but I kin manage my own affairs +without the help of outsiders. This is jest a family row, but I'll 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' round tryin' to find out how I do it either.' + +"That's the case 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." + + +"WINNING A DOG'S GRATITUDE" + +Abe strode along in the mud, driving the four oxen much of the time, +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 floundered 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 +he 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 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 me for all the exposure I +had undergone." + + +SPLITTING THE HISTORIC RAILS + +After two weary weeks of floundering through muddy prairies and jolting +over rough forest roads, now and then fording swollen and dangerous +streams, the Lincolns were met near Decatur, Illinois, by Cousin John +Hanks, 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 +newcomers. Besides young Abe, with the strength of three, there were +five men in the party, so they were able to erect their first 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 account of the splitting of the +rails which afterward became the talk of the civilized world: + +"Without the assistance of John Hanks he plowed fifteen acres, and +split, from the tall walnut trees of the primeval forest, enough rails +to surround them 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 reach to +endless generations." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +STARTING OUT FOR HIMSELF + + +HIS FATHER AND HIS "FREEDOM SUIT" + +According to his own account, Abe had made about thirty dollars as a +peddler, besides bearing 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 birthday 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-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. + +But neither Thomas Lincoln nor his son seems to have thought of such a +thing. Instead of entertaining resentment, Abraham stayed by, doing all +he could to make his father and stepmother comfortable before he left +them altogether. 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 parents. Though his father had seemed to favor +his stepchildren 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 trousers, 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 hundred rails more than they would if he had been a man +of ordinary height. + +But Abraham hovered about, helping clear a little farm, and making the +cabin comfortable 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 special reason Thomas Lincoln had for leaving Indiana was to get +away from "the milksick." But the fall of 1830 was a very bad season in +Illinois for chills and fever. The father and, in fact, nearly the 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 afflicted at once, and one married +daughter was almost as ill. They were all so sick that Thomas Lincoln +registered a shaky but vehement resolve that as soon as they could +travel they would "git out o' thar!" He had been so determined to move +to Illinois that no persuasion could induce him to give up the project, +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. + + +BUILDING THE FLATBOAT + +Early in the spring after "the big snow," John Hanks, Lincoln and John +Johnston met Denton Offutt, a man who was to wield an influence on the +life of young Lincoln. Offutt engaged 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 him and John Johnston, his stepbrother, +to Offutt. After some talk we at last made an engagement with Offutt at +fifty cents a day and sixty dollars to make the trip to New Orleans. Abe +and I came down the Sangamon 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 drinking 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 employer met them on their +arrival with profuse apologies, and the three men were engaged to build +the boat and load it up for the journey. + +During the four weeks required to build the raft, the men of that +neighborhood became acquainted 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 roundabout 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 pantaloons +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. Young Lincoln 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 boys on the log +would whoop and roll off." In this way the log was polished smooth as +glass, and came to be known in the neighborhood as "Abe's log." + +A traveling 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 explanation +for his delay: "It was out of respect for the eggs--not care for my +hat!" + + +ABE LINCOLN SAVES THREE LIVES + +While they were at work on the flatboat the humorous young stranger from +Indiana became the hero of a thrilling adventure, described as follows +by John Roll, who was an eye witness to the whole scene: + +"It was the spring following 'the winter of the deep snow.' Walter +Carman, John Seamon, 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 small boat with the +flat. We found 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 +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. Carman had the paddle, and Seamon was in the stern 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 flatboat, the first ever +built on the Sangamon, which had sunk and gone to pieces, leaving 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, +leaving 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 channel, which the action +of the water had changed. + +"Carman, being a good swimmer, succeeded in catching a branch, and +pulled himself up out of the water, which was very cold, and had almost +chilled him to death; and there he sat, shivering 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 under the water. Another desperate lunge was successful, and he +climbed up beside Carman. + +"Things were pretty exciting now, for there were two men in the tree, +and the boat gone. It was a cold, raw April day, and there was great +danger of the men becoming benumbed and falling 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 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 Seamon 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 his 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 gathered on the river bank. Lincoln 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 +gradually drew it back to the tree, holding it there until the three now +nearly frozen men had climbed down and seated themselves 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 taut +rope, swung 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 exploit." + + +"DOWN THE RIVER" + +The launching of that flatboat was made a feast-day in the neighborhood. +Denton Offutt, its proprietor, was invited to break away from the +"Buckhorn" tavern at Springfield to witness the ceremonies, which, of +course, took a political 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, corn, and hogs, and it +slid into the Sangamon River, then overflowing with the spring "fresh," +with a big splash. + +The three sturdy navigators, accompanied by Offutt himself, floated away +in triumph from the waving crowd on the bank. + +The first incident in the voyage occurred the 19th of April, at +Rutledge's mill dam at New Salem, where the boat stranded and "hung" +there a day and a night. + + +HOW ABE GOT THE FLATBOAT OVER THE DAM + +New Salem was destined to fill an important place in the life of Abraham +Lincoln. One who became well acquainted with him described him as the +New Salemites first saw him, "wading round on Rutledge's dam with his +trousers rolled up nine feet, more or less." + +One of the crew gave this account of their mode of operations to get the +stranded raft over the dam: + +"We unloaded the boat--that is, we transferred the goods from our boat +to a borrowed one. We then rolled the barrels forward; Lincoln bored a +hole in the end (projecting) over the dam; the water which had leaked in +ran out then and we slid over." + +Offutt's enthusiasm over Abe's simple method of surmounting this great +obstacle was boundless. 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, "You will +be President, and all the negroes will 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 probable, but even this is not certain to have happened +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 that in such sights, as +one of his companions related, "Slavery ran the iron into him then and +there." + + +"I'LL HIT IT HARD!" + +But the story goes that the three young fellows--Hanks, Johnston and +Lincoln--went wandering about the city, and passed a slave market, where +a comely young mulatto girl was offered to the highest bidder. They saw +prospective purchasers 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--"_I'll hit it hard_!" + +In June the 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 charge. + + +WRESTLING WITH THE COUNTY CHAMPION + +The other three started on foot to reach their several homes in +Illinois. Abe improved the opportunity to visit his father's family in +Coles County, where Thomas Lincoln had removed as soon as he was able +to leave their first Illinois 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 laughingly accepted and threw Needham +twice. The crestfallen wrestler's pride was 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 you? If you are not, and +must be convinced through a thrashing, I will do that, too--_for your +sake_!" + + + + +CHAPTER X + +CLERKING AND WORKING + + +HE COULD "MAKE A FEW RABBIT TRACKS" + +It was in August, 1831, that Abraham Lincoln appeared in the village of +New Salem, Illinois. Neither Denton Offutt nor his merchandise 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 found something useful and +helpful to do. This time there was a local election, and one of the +clerks had not appeared to perform his duties. A New Salem woman wrote +of Lincoln's first act in the village: + +"My father, Mentor Graham, was on that day, as usual, appointed to be a +clerk, and Mr. McNamee, who was to be the other, was sick and failed to +come. They were looking around 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.'" + + +PILOTING A FAMILY FLATBOAT + +A few days after the election the young stranger, who had become known +by this time as the hero of the flatboat on Rutledge's dam four months +before, found employment as a pilot. A citizen, Dr. Nelson, was about to +emigrate to Texas. The easiest and best mode of travel in those days +was by flatboat down the river. He had loaded all his household goods +and movable property on his "private conveyance" and was looking about +for a "driver." Young Lincoln, still waiting, unemployed, offered his +services and took the Nelson family down the Sangamon River--a more +difficult 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. + + +ANNOYED BY THE HIGH PRAISES OF HIS EMPLOYER + +Denton Offutt and his stock for the store arrived at last, and Lincoln +soon had a little store opened for business. A country store seemed too +small for a clerk of such astounding abilities, so the too enthusiastic +employer bought Cameron'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. Offutt sounded the praises of the new clerk to all +comers. He claimed that Abraham Lincoln "knew more than 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, Offutt boasted that Abe could "beat the county" +running, jumping and wrestling. Here was something 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 ceremonies were conducted with a savage sense of +humor 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. Sometimes 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. + +So when young Lincoln heard his employer bragging about his brain and +brawn he was sufficiently 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 Armstrong. Abe accepted the +gauntlet with an alacrity that pleased the crowd, especially the chief +of the bully "Boys," who expected an easy victory. But Jack was +surprised to find that the stranger was his match--yes, more than his +match. Others of "the Boys" saw this, also, and began to interfere by +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 throat 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 Jack Armstrong upon the ground, in his 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 indignation, they acknowledged him +as their conqueror, and declared that "Abe Lincoln is the cleverest +fellow that ever broke into the settlement." + +The initiation was over, and young Lincoln'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. + + +GIVING ANOTHER BULLY "A DOSE OF SMARTWEED" + +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. Lincoln quietly asked 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 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 violently abusive. Young Lincoln +calmly went outside 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 him. 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 bully's eyes until he +roared with pain. An observer 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 CLERK GIVE UP GAMBLING + +Lincoln's morals were unusually good for that time and place. Smoking, +chewing, drinking, swearing and gambling were almost universal among +his associates. Offutt hired a young man, William G. 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 +petty 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." + +"I'll help you get that back," urged Lincoln, "if you'll 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 bunghole." + +Billy agreed, and the two clerks chuckled as they fixed the barrel so +that the bunghole would 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 parleying and bantering the wager was laid. Lincoln +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 Herculean +effort, actually succeeded in taking a drink from the bunghole--though +he spat it out immediately. "That was the only time," said Greene long +afterward, "that I ever saw Abraham Lincoln take a drink of liquor of +any kind." This was the more remarkable, as whisky was served on all +occasions--even passed around with refreshments 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 NAME OF "HONEST ABE" + +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 something over two dollars. She +paid Abe the money and went away satisfied. That night, on going 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 doing 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 walking +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 "constitutional" it must have been a benefit to his health, for it +satisfied his sensitive conscience and soothed his tender heart to "make +good" in that way. + +Drink and misdirected enthusiasm interfered with Denton Offutt's +success. After about a year in New Salem he "busted up," as the +neighbors 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 welcome with Jack Armstrong, the best +fighter of Clary's Grove! + +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 Offutt's store was one of great +advance. He had made new and valuable acquaintances, read many 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 +nickname, 'Honest Abe'--a characterization that he never dishonored, an +abbreviation that he never outgrew. He was 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 New Salem and the region round about." + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +POLITICS, WAR, STOREKEEPING AND STUDYING LAW + + +STUDYING GRAMMAR FIRST + +By "a step still further in advance" Dr. Holland must have meant the +young clerk's going into politics. He had made many friends in New +Salem, and they reflected back his good-will by urging him to run for +the State Legislature. 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 politics, he would disgrace his office and +himself by not speaking and writing English correctly. + +The schoolmaster advised: "If you expect to go before the public in any +capacity, I think the best thing you can do is to study English +grammar." + +"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 as he could stride. In an +incredibly short 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 young Lincoln, with +the aid of Schoolmaster Graham, had mastered the principles of English +grammar, and felt himself better equipped to enter politics and public +life. Some of his rivals, however, did not trouble themselves about +speaking and writing correctly. + + +GOING INTO POLITICS + +James Rutledge, a "substantial" citizen, and the former owner of +Rutledge'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 funny story, but +Abe proceeded to discuss the question before the house in very good +form. He was awkward in his 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 lyceum, 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 +position in public life." + +But there were occasions enough where something besides culture was +required. A man who was present and heard Lincoln's first real stump +speech describes his appearance and actions in the following picturesque +language: + +"He wore a mixed jean coat, clawhammer 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 remember 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 Pappyville, a village eleven miles from Springfield. After the +sale was over and speechmaking had begun, a fight--a 'general fight' as +one of the bystanders relates--ensued, and Lincoln, noticing one of his +friends about to succumb to the attack of an infuriated ruffian, +interposed to prevent it. He did so most effectually. Hastily descending +from the rude platform, he edged his way through the crowd, and seizing +the bully by the neck and the seat of his trousers, threw him by means +of his great strength and long arms, as one witness stoutly insists, +'twelve feet away.' Returning to the stand, and throwing aside his hat, +he inaugurated his campaign with the following brief and juicy +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 candidate +for the Legislature. My politics are "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 thankful; 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, +according to custom, in a circular of about two thousand words, +rehearsing his experiences on the Sangamon River 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 speech, it was a bold and dignified document, +closing as follows: + +"Considering the great degree of modesty which should always attend +youth, it is probable I have already been presuming more than becomes +me. However, upon the subjects of which I have treated, I have spoken as +I have thought. 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 wrong, so soon as I discover my opinions to be +erroneous, I shall be ready to renounce them. + +"Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. 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 fellow-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 many of you. I was born, and +have ever remained in the most humble walks of life. I have no wealthy +or popular relations or friends to recommend me. My case is thrown +exclusively upon the independent 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 compensate. 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." + + +"CAPTAIN LINCOLN" + +Lincoln had hardly launched in his first political venture when, in +April, 1832, a messenger arrived in New Salem with the announcement from +Governor Reynolds, of Illinois, that the Sacs and other hostile tribes, +led by Black Hawk, had invaded the northern part of the State, spreading +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 River, 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 in that region, worked in Kirkpatrick'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 without 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 now. I guess I'll run against him 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 command was given. At the word, "March," three-fourths +of the company rallied round Abe Lincoln. More than twenty-five years +afterward, when Lincoln was a candidate for the presidency of the United +States, he referred to himself in the third person in describing this +incident, saying 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." + + +IGNORANCE OF MILITARY TACTICS + +But Lincoln was a "raw hand" at military tactics. He used to enjoy +telling of his ignorance 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 gateway into +the next field. He said: + +"I could not, for the life of me, remember the word for getting the +company _endwise_ so that it could go through the gate; so, 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 fence.'" + + +A HISTORIC MYSTERY EXPLAINED + +Captain Lincoln had his sword taken from him for shooting within limits. +Many have wondered that a man of Lincoln's intelligence should have been +guilty of this stupid infraction of ordinary army regulations. +Biographers of Lincoln puzzled over this until the secret was explained +by William Turley Baker, of Bolivia, Ill., at the Lincoln Centenary in +Springfield. All unconscious of solving a historic mystery, "Uncle +Billy" Baker related the following story which explains that the +shooting was purely accidental: + +"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 black walnuts--the 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 soldiers +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 that. + +"Well, that evening when the company came to camp, some of them had dog +tents--just a big canvas sheet--and the boys laughed to see Lincoln +crawl under 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 cleaned 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's forefinger was long enough to use as a ramrod for +it. But before he began operations he snapped the trigger and, to his +astonishment, the thing went off! + +"Pretty soon an orderly came along in great haste, yellin', 'Who did +that?--Who fired that shot?' Some of the men tried to send the orderly +along about his business, making believe the report was heard further +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 weskit! + +"But he had to pay the penalty just the same, for they took his sword +away from him for several days. You see, he was a captain and ought to +'a' set a good example in military discipline." + + +HOW CAPTAIN LINCOLN SAVED AN INDIAN'S LIFE + +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 general's letter before +their eyes. + +"Me good Injun," he kept saying, "white war chief say me good Injun. +Look--talking paper--see!" + +"Get out! It's a forgery! Shoot him! String him up!" 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 +indignantly: + +"Stand back, all of you! For shame! I'll 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 County to give it to him." + +The three months for which the men were enlisted soon expired, and +Lincoln's captaincy also ended. But he re-enlisted as a private, and +remained in the ranks until the end of the war, which found him in +Wisconsin, hundreds of miles from New Salem. He and a few companions +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 Lincoln and Jefferson Davis met at +this early day, as officers in the Black Hawk War, but this statement +is not founded on fact, for young Lieutenant Davis was absent on a +furlough and could not have encountered the tall captain from the +Sangamon then, as many would like to believe. + +Lincoln always referred to the Black Hawk War as a humorous adventure. +He made a funny 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 enlisted 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 excitement prevailed. The coming of the _Talisman_ 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 navigable, and even New Salem (which is not +now to be found on the map) was to become a flourishing city, in the +hopeful imaginings of its few inhabitants. Lincoln, being a candidate, +naturally "took the fever," and shared the delirium that prevailed. He +could hardly have done otherwise, even if he had been so disposed. This +was before the days of railroads, and the commerce and prosperity of the +country depended on making the smaller streams navigable. Lincoln +received forty dollars, however, for his services as pilot. The +_Talisman_, instead of establishing a river connection with the +Mississippi River 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 shallow creek, was soon forgotten. + + +LINCOLN'S ONLY DEFEAT BY A DIRECT VOTE + +When Abe returned from the war he had no steady employment. On this +account, especially, he must have been deeply disappointed to be +defeated in the election which took place within two weeks after his +arrival. His patriotism had been stronger than his political sagacity. +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 the +county. One of the four representatives chosen was Peter Cartwright, the +backwoods preacher. + +Lincoln afterward mentioned that this was the only time he was ever +defeated by a direct vote of the people. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +BUYING AND KEEPING A STORE + + +After making what he considered a bad beginning politically, young +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 his store fixtures 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 from Reuben Radford to William Berry and +Abraham Lincoln. Berry had $250 in cash and made the first payment. In a +few hours after a violent visit from those ruffians from Clary's Grove +Berry and Lincoln had formed a partnership and were the nominal owners +of a country store. + +The new firm soon absorbed the stock and business of another firm, James +and Rowan Herndon, 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 Herndon 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 +junior partner was given over to the 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 painting 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 household plunder. He +asked me if I would buy an old barrel for which he had no room in his +wagon, and which contained nothing 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 bottom +of the rubbish a complete set of 'Blackstone's Commentaries.' 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 intensely 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 surprising that the business "winked out," as Lincoln +whimsically expressed it, leaving the conscientious junior partner +saddled with the obligations of the former owners of two country stores, +and owing an amount so large that Lincoln 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 contracted +by the other men, but Lincoln could never be induced even to compromise +any of the accounts the others had gone off and left him to settle. +"Honest Abe" paid the last cent of his "national debt" nearly twenty +years later, after much toil, self-denial and hardship. + + +POSTMASTER LINCOLN AND JACK ARMSTRONG'S FAMILY + +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 with Berry +he received the appointment as postmaster. The pay of the New Salem post +office was not large, but Lincoln, always longing for news and +knowledge, had the privilege of reading the newspapers which passed +through his hands. He took so much pains in delivering the letters and +papers that came into his charge as postmaster that he anticipated the +"special delivery" and "rural free delivery" features of the postal +service of the present day. + + +"A. LINCOLN, DEPUTY SURVEYOR" + +Later John Calhoun, the county surveyor, sent word to Lincoln that he +would appoint him deputy surveyor of the county if he would accept the +position. The young man, greatly astonished, 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 appointment did not +involve any political obligation--for Calhoun was a Jackson Democrat, +and Lincoln 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 +Mentor 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 ability to do field work, the +chief surveyor appointed him a deputy and assigned him to the northern +part of Sangamon County. + +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 him to pay one of the old debts left by the +failure of Berry & Lincoln. This man sued Lincoln and, getting judgment, +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. 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 measures while he was a clerk and storekeeper. In whatever +he attempted he did his best. He had that true genius, which is defined +as "the ability to take pains." With all his jokes and fun Abraham +Lincoln was deeply in earnest. Careless work in making surveys involved +the landholders of that part of the country in endless disputes and +going to law about boundaries. But Lincoln's surveys were recognized as +correct always, so that, although he had mastered the science in six +weeks, lawyers and courts had such confidence in his skill, as well as +his honesty, that his record as to a certain corner or line was accepted +as the true verdict and that ended the dispute. + + +ELECTED TO THE LEGISLATURE + +Hampered though he was by unjust debts and unreasonable creditors, +Postmaster and Surveyor Lincoln gained an honorable reputation +throughout the county, so that when he ran for the State Legislature, +in 1834, he was elected by a creditable majority. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +THE YOUNG LEGISLATOR IN LOVE + + +SMOOT'S RESPONSIBILITY + +Paying his debts had kept Lincoln so poor that, though he had been +elected to the Legislature, he was not properly clothed or equipped to +make himself presentable as the people's representative 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 money to buy suitable clothing, for I want to make a decent +appearance in the 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 received the money at once. + + +ANN RUTLEDGE--"LOVED AND LOST" + +Abe Lincoln's new suit of clothes made him look still more handsome in +the eyes of Ann, the daughter of the proprietor of Rutledge's Tavern, +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 this young man was going +about under an assumed name and certain suspicious circumstances came to +light. But Ann, though she loved the young 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 recreant lover preyed upon her mind so that +she fell into a decline in the summer of 1835, about a year after her +true lover's election to the Legislature. + +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 Rutledge told her suitor that her +heart was his, but early in 1835 it was publicly known that they were +solemnly betrothed. Even then the scrupulous maiden waited for the +return of the absent McNamar, that she might be formally released from +the obligation to him which he had so recklessly forfeited. Her friends +argued with her that she was carrying her scruples too far, and at last, +as neither man nor letter came, she permitted 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 shadow on their wings. It was a shadow that was not to pass +away. Little by little came indications that the health of Ann Rutledge +had suffered under the prolonged strain to which she had been subjected. +Her sensitive nature had been strung to too high a tension and 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 +Lincoln. . . . 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 moments 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 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 all New Salem +said that he was insane. He piteously 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 influence over him, . . . all +but one; for Bowling Green . . . managed to entice the poor fellow to his +own home, a short 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 fears 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 boyhood, and had gradually made +himself familiar with large parts of Shakespeare's plays and the works +of other great writers. He now discovered, 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: + + "'Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud? + Like a swift fleeting meteor, a fast flying cloud, + A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave, + He passeth from life to his rest in the grave:'" + + +"THE LONG NINE" AND THE REMOVAL TO SPRINGFIELD + +Two years was the term for which Lincoln was elected to the Legislature. +The year following the death of Ann Rutledge he 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 as "the Long Nine," 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 SALEM, June 13, 1836. + + "TO THE EDITOR OR THE JOURNAL: + + "In your paper of last Saturday I see a + communication over the signature of 'Many + Voters' in which the candidates who are + announced in the _Journal_ are called upon to + 'show their hands.' + + "Agreed. Here's mine: + + "I go in for all sharing the privileges 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 constituents, as well those that + oppose as those that support me. + + "While acting as their Representative, 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 advance + their interests. Whether elected or not, I go + for distributing the proceeds of public lands + to the several States to enable our State, in + common with others, to dig canals and construct + railroads without borrowing and paying interest + on it. + + "If alive on the first Monday in November, 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 preceding 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 "improvements" to the grand possibilities of +railway transportation. + +Many are the stories of the remarkable Sangamon campaign in 1836. Rowan +Herndon, Abe's fellow pilot and storekeeper, told the following: + + +WINNING VOTES, WIELDING THE "CRADLE" IN 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 +were 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. Barnett, who had asked me who this man Lincoln was. I told him that +he was a candidate for the Legislature. He laughed and said: + +"'Can't the party raise any better material than that?' + +"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-in." He knows more than +all of them put together.'" + + +TALKED TO A WOMAN WHILE HIS RIVAL 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 objection, but +improved the opportunity thus given to chat with their hostess. This he +did so successfully 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 "_such a +pleasant talk with Mr. Lincoln_!" + + +HOW THE LIGHTNING STRUCK FORQUER, IN SPITE OF HIS LIGHTNING-ROD + +Abe distinguished himself in his first political speech at Springfield, +the county seat. A leading citizen there, George Forquer, was accused +of changing his political opinions to secure a certain government +position; he also had his fine residence protected by the first +lightning-rod ever seen in that part of the country. + +The contest was close and exciting. There were seven Democratic and +seven Whig candidates for the lower branch of the Legislature. Forquer, +though not a candidate, asked to be heard in reply to young Lincoln, +whom he proceeded 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 announced his intention +in these words: "This young 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!--could hardly be restrained from arising in their might and +smiting 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 opponent. +Among other things he said: + +"The gentleman commenced his speech by saying 'this young man,' alluding +to me, 'must be 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 God!" + +This stroke blasted Forquer's political prospects forever, and satisfied +the Clary's Grove Boys that it was even better than all the things they +would have done to him. + + +ABE LINCOLN AS A "BLOATED ARISTOCRAT" + +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 +Democrats, "the bone and sinew, the hard-fisted yeomanry of the land," +and sneered at those "rag barons," those Whig aristocrats, the "silk +stocking gentry!" As Abe Lincoln, the leading Whig present, was dressed +in Kentucky jeans, coarse boots, a checkered shirt without a collar or +necktie, and an old slouch hat, Colonel Taylor's attack 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 Democrat! 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!' Here is one of your 'silk stocking gentry!'" 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, wisdom and power of +ridicule made him 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, which had always been strongly Democratic, elected Whig +representatives that year. + +After Herculean labors "the Long Nine" succeeded 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 movement than the removal of a State capital. Resolutions were +adopted in the Legislature in favor of slavery and denouncing the hated +"abolitionists"--or people who spoke and wrote for the abolition of +slavery. It required true heroism for a young man thus to stand out +against the legislators of his 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 +willing to sign a protest against the resolutions favoring slavery, +which read as follows: + + "Resolutions upon the subject of domestic + 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 founded on both injustice and bad policy. + [After several statements of their belief + concerning the powers of Congress, the protest + closed as follows:] + + "The difference between their opinions and + those contained in the said resolution is their + reason for entering this protest. + + + "DAN STONE, + "A. LINCOLN." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +MOVING TO SPRINGFIELD + + +New Salem could no longer give young Lincoln scope for his growing power +and influence. Within a few weeks after the Lincoln-Stone protest, 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 effects into his +saddle-bags, borrowed a horse of his good friend "Squire" Bowling Green, +and reluctantly said good-bye to his friends there. 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 Lincoln in those early days, +describes Abe's modest entry into the future State capital, with all his +possessions in a pair of saddle-bags, and calling at the store of Joshua +F. Speed, overlooking "the square," in the following dialogue: + +Speed--"Hello, Abe, just from Salem?" + +Lincoln--"Howdy, Speed! Yes, this is my first show-up." + +Speed--"So you are to be one of us?" + +Lincoln--"I reckon so, if you will let me take pot luck with you." + +Speed--"All right, Abe; it's better than Salem." + +Lincoln--"I've 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 dollars or so." + +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, I'll 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 better." + +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've moved!" + + +STUART & LINCOLN + +Major Stuart had grown so thoroughly interested 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 before, and had practiced law +in a small way before Squire Bowling Green in New Salem. Greatly +flattered 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: + + ------------------------------ + | STUART & LINCOLN | + | ATTORNEYS-AT-LAW | + ------------------------------ + + +"I NEVER USE ANYONE'S MONEY BUT MY OWN" + +After a while Lincoln left Speed's friendly loft and slept on a lounge +in the law office, keeping his few effects in the little old-fashioned +trunk pushed out of sight under his couch. + +One day an agent of the Post Office Department 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 +required, over seventeen dollars, evidently the very 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 anyone's money but my own." + + +DROPS THROUGH THE CEILING TO DEMAND FREE SPEECH + +Stuart & Lincoln's office was, for a time, over a court room, which was +used evenings 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 +Lincoln slept. One night there was a promiscuous crowd in the hall, and +Lincoln's friend, E. D. Baker, was delivering a political harangue. +Becoming somewhat excited Baker made an accusation against a well-known +newspaper in Springfield, and the remark was resented by several in the +audience. + +"Pull him down!" yelled one of them as they came up to the platform +threatening Baker with personal violence. There was considerable +confusion which might become a riot. + +Just at this juncture 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 the country in which we live. This is a land where +freedom of speech is guaranteed. Mr. Baker has a right to speak, and +ought to be permitted to do so. I am here to protect him and no man +shall take him from this stand if I can prevent it." Lincoln had opened +the trap door in his room and silently watched the proceedings until he +saw that 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 DEFENSELESS + +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 poor 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 proceedings at +once to prevent the extortionate attorney from practicing law any longer +at the Springfield bar. + +If a negro had been wronged in any way, Lawyer Lincoln was the only +attorney in Springfield who dared to appear in his behalf, for he always +did so at great risk to his political standing. Sometimes he appeared in +defense of fugitive 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 which slavery was not allowed. Lawyer +Lincoln did all this at the risk of making himself very unpopular with +his fellow-attorneys and among the people at large, the greater part of +whom were then in favor of permitting 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 him to settle their disputes without going to law. Once he told a man +he would charge him a large 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 excellent counsel Lawyer Lincoln gave, in later life, in +an address to a class of young attorneys: + +"Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors 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 opportunity of becoming a good man. There will always be +enough business. Never stir up litigation. 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 it." + + +YOUNG LAWYER LINCOLN OFFERS TO PAY HALF THE DAMAGES + +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. 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 young 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 heartily at the fun they +were all having. When the note was handed to him, Lincoln said: + +"All right, wait a minute," and the game soon ended amid peals of +laughter. Then the young lawyer jumped into the buggy. On the way back +Mr. Lincoln told his companion such funny stories that the young 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. + +"What am I to pay you?" asked the client delighted. + +"I hope you won't think ten or fifteen dollars too much," said the young +attorney, "and I'll pay half the hire of the buggy and half the cost of +repairing it." + + +LAWYER LINCOLN AND MARY OWENS + +About the time Mr. Lincoln was admitted to the bar, Miss Mary Owens, a +bright and beautiful young woman from Kentucky, 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 himself under obligations to marry Miss Owens if that young +lady proved willing. + +After he went to live in Springfield, with no home but his office, he +wrote the young lady a long, discouraging letter, of which this is a +part: + + + "I am thinking of what we said about your + coming to live in Springfield. I am afraid you + would not be satisfied. There is a great deal + of flourishing about in carriages here, which + it would be your doom to see without sharing + it. You would have to be poor without the means + of hiding your poverty. Do you believe that you + could bear that patiently? Whatever woman may + cast her lot with mine, should any ever do so, + it is my intention to do all in my power to + make her happy and contented, and there is + nothing I can imagine that could make me more + unhappy 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 think seriously before + you decide. What I have said, I will most + 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., + "LINCOLN." + +For a love letter this was nearly as cold and formal as a legal +document. Miss Owens could see well enough that Lawyer Lincoln 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 confided to a +friend that "Mr. Lincoln was deficient in those little links which make +up the chain of a woman's happiness." + + +THE EARLY RIVALRY BETWEEN LINCOLN AND DOUGLAS + +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. Douglas'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 drink_!" + +In spite of this remark, Mr. Lincoln _was_ an ardent temperance man. One +Washington's birthday he delivered a temperance address before the +Washingtonian Society of Springfield, 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 became 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 State. From +this senior partner he learned to make the thorough study of his cases +that characterized his work throughout his later career. + +While in partnership with Logan, Mr. Lincoln was helping a young fellow +named "Billy" Herndon, a clerk in his friend Speed's store, advising him +in his law studies and promising to give the youth a place in his own +office as soon as young Herndon should be fitted to fill it. + + +WHAT LINCOLN DID WITH HIS FIRST FIVE HUNDRED 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 +conducted 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 +lawyer 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 it? Why, I never +in my life had so much money all at once!" + +Then his manner 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 hundred and fifty dollars needed. +While drawing up the necessary papers, the old judge gave the young +lawyer this advice: + +"Lincoln, I wouldn't do it quite that way. Your stepmother is getting +old, and, in all probability, will not live many years. I would settle +the property upon her for use during her lifetime, to revert to you upon +her death." + +"I shall do no such thing," Lincoln replied 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 him 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. + + +IN LOVE WITH A BELLE FROM LEXINGTON + +Lincoln's popularity in Sangamon County, always increasing, was greatly +strengthened by the part he had taken in the removal of the capital 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 office with Major Stuart +that gentleman's cousin, Miss Mary Todd, a witty, accomplished young +lady from Lexington, Kentucky, came to Springfield to visit her sister, +wife of Ninian W. Edwards, one of the "Long Nine" in the State Assembly. + +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 numerous 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 likely to fulfill Miss Todd's +high ambition. He was a society man, witty in conversation, popular with +women as well as with men, and had been to Congress, so he had a +national reputation, 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 Confederate 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 members of her own family. With a +woman's intuition she saw the true worth of Abraham Lincoln, and before +long they were understood to be engaged. + +But the young lawyer, after his recent experience with Mary Owens, +distrusted his ability to make any woman happy--much less the belle from +Louisville, so brilliant, vivacious, well educated and exacting. He +seemed to grow morbidly 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 smooth." + +Their engagement, if they were actually betrothed, was broken, and the +lawyer-lover was plunged in deep melancholy. He wrote long, morbid +letters to his friend Speed, who had returned to Kentucky, 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 Mary Todd was broken. From this expression, one of +Lincoln's biographers elaborated a damaging fiction, stating that +Lincoln and his affianced were to have been married that day, that the +wedding supper was ready, that the bride was all dressed for the +ceremony, the guests assembled--but the melancholy bridegroom failed to +come to his own wedding! + +If such a thing had happened in a little town like Springfield in those +days, the guests would have told of it, and everybody would have +gossiped 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 STRANGE EVENTS LEADING UP TO LINCOLN'S MARRIAGE + +After Lincoln's return from visiting the Speeds in Louisville, he threw +himself into politics again, not, however, in his own behalf. He +declined to be a candidate again for the State Legislature, in which he +had served four consecutive 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 entirely 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, which I claim that 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 _Sangamon Journal_ a +humorous criticism of State Auditor Shields, a vain and "touchy" little +man. This 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 another, less humorous, 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 +Jayne. 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 +humiliating affair plainly showed that, while Shields would gladly have +killed _him_, he had no intention of injuring the man who had challenged +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 +performed in Springfield by the use of the Episcopal ritual. + +When one of the guests, bluff old Judge Tom Brown, saw the bridegroom +placing the ring on Miss Todd's finger, and repeating after the +minister, "With this ring"--"I thee wed"--"and with all"--"my worldly +goods"--"I thee endow"--he exclaimed, in a stage whisper: + +"Grace to Goshen, Lincoln, the statute fixes all that!" + +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 prepared for you and we'll all be merry together for +a while." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +LINCOLN & HERNDON + + +YOUNG HERNDON'S STRANGE FASCINATION FOR LINCOLN + +Lincoln remained in the office with Judge Logan about four years, +dissolving partnership in 1845. Meanwhile he was interesting himself in +behalf of young William H. Herndon, who, after Speed's removal to +Kentucky, had gone to college at Jacksonville, Ill. The young 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 "Billy" +with him in a business of his own. + +Mrs. Lincoln, with that marvelous instinct which women often possess, +opposed her husband's taking Bill Herndon 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 Lincoln's +business career. As Mr. Lincoln had not yet paid off "the national debt" +largely due to his first business partner's drunkenness, it seems +rather strange that he did not listen to his wife's admonitions. But +young Herndon 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 devoted. + +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 delegates, so that in +getting 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 declined the honor. Mrs. Lincoln, who had supreme +confidence in her husband's ability, tried to make him more +self-seeking in his political efforts. He visited his old home in +Indiana, making 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 +Gentryville, and one he made in the "Old Carter Schoolhouse." After this +address he drove home with Mr. Josiah Crawford--"Old Blue Nose" for whom +he had "pulled fodder" to pay an exorbitant price for Weems's "Life of +Washington," and in whose house his sister and he had lived as hired +girl and hired man. He delighted the old friends by asking about +everybody, and being interested in the "old swimming-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 learn the +blacksmith's trade. He went around and called on all his former +acquaintances who were still 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: + + "My childhood's home I see again + And sadden with the view; + And still, as memory crowds the brain, + There's pleasure in it, too. + + "Ah, Memory! 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." + + +TRYING TO SAVE BILLY FROM A BAD HABIT + +As Mr. Lincoln spent so much of his time away from Springfield he felt +that he needed a younger assistant to "keep office" and look after his +cases in the different courts. He should not have made "Billy" Herndon +an equal partner, but he did so, though the young man had neither the +ability nor experience to earn anything like half the income of the +office. If Herndon 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 +sort. He took advantage of his senior partner's absences by going on +sprees with several dissipated young men about town. + + +WHAT LAWYER LINCOLN DID WITH A FAT FEE + +A Springfield gentleman relates the following story which shows Lawyer +Lincoln's business methods, his unwillingness to charge much for his +legal services; and his great longing to save his young partner from the +clutches of drink: + +"My father," said the neighbor, "was in business, 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 business, he told Mr. Lincoln he +would give him 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 neither a shark nor a shyster, Mr. Man. If I should collect +it, I would accept only my regular percentage.' + +"'But I mean it,' father said earnestly. 'I should consider it as good +as finding money in the street.' + +"'And "the finder will be liberally rewarded," eh?' said Mr. Lincoln +with a laugh. + +"'Yes,' 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 services, and I'm willing to do +my share toward educating 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: + +"'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 Shylock. I always try to get them +to settle it without going into court. I tell them if they will make it +up among themselves I won't charge them anything.' + +"'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 millennium, Mr. Man--still, as a great +favor, I'll charge you a fat fee if I ever find that fellow and can get +anything out of him. But that's like promising to give you half of the +first dollar I find floating up the Sangamon on a grindstone, isn't it? +I'll take a big slice, though, out of the grindstone itself, if you say +so,' and the tall attorney went out with the peculiar laugh that +afterward became world-famous. + +"Not long afterward, while in Bloomington, out on the circuit, Mr. +Lincoln ran across the man who had disappeared from Springfield 'between +two days,' carrying on an apparently prosperous business under an +assumed name. Following the man to his office and managing to talk with +him alone, the lawyer, by means of threats, made the man go right to the +bank and draw out the whole thousand then. It meant payment in full or +the penitentiary. The man understood it and went white as a sheet. In +all his sympathy for the poor and needy, Mr. Lincoln had no pity on the +flourishing criminal. Money could not purchase the favor of Lincoln. + +"Well, I hardly know which half of that thousand dollars father 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 attorney. + +"'One hundred dollars is all I'll take out of that,' Mr. Lincoln replied +emphatically. 'It was no trouble, and--and I haven't earned even that +much.' + +"'But Mr. Lincoln,' my father demurred, 'you promised to take half.' + +"'Yes, but you got my word under false pretenses, as it were. Neither of +us had the least idea I would collect the bill even if I ever found the +fellow.' + +"As he would not accept more than one hundred dollars that day, father +wouldn't give him any of the money due, for fear the too scrupulous +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 necessity in his own family. His young partner, 'Billy' +Herndon, had been carousing with several of his cronies in a saloon +around on Fourth Street, and the gang had broken mirrors, decanters 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 morning, went in search of him, and found him and his +partners in distress, locked up in the calaboose. 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 hundred 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. + +"'Currency, if you've got it handy.' + +"'Give Mr. Lincoln two hundred and fifty dollars,' father called to a +clerk in the office. + +"There was a moment's pause, during which my father refrained from +asking any questions, and Mr. Lincoln was in no mood to give +information. As soon as the money was brought, the tall attorney seized +the bills and stalked out without counting it or saying anything 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 behind; then go up the Court House steps, two at a +time, and disappear. + +"We learned afterward what he did with the money. Of course, Bill +Herndon was penitent and promised to mend his ways, and, of course, Mr. +Lincoln believed him. He took the money very much against his will, even +against his principles--thinking it might save his junior partner from +the drunkard's grave. But the heart of Abraham Lincoln was hoping +against hope." + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +HIS KINDNESS OF HEART + + +PUTTING TWO YOUNG BIRDS BACK IN THE NEST + +Mr. Lincoln's tender-heartedness was the subject of much amusement among +his fellow attorneys. One day, while out riding with several friends, +they missed Lincoln. One of them, having 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 hitched his horse and climbed the fence into the thicket +where the fledglings were fluttering 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 with his companions, who +laughed at him for what they called his "childishness." He answered them +earnestly: + +"Gentlemen, you may laugh, but I could not have slept tonight if I had +not saved those little birds. The mother's cries and theirs would have +rung in my ears." + + +LAWYER LINCOLN, IN A NEW SUIT OF CLOTHES, RESCUING A PIG STUCK IN THE +MUD + +Lawyer Lincoln rode from one county-seat to another, on the Eighth +Judicial Circuit of Illinois, either on the back of a raw-boned horse, +or in a rickety buggy drawn by the same old "crowbait," as his legal +friends called the animal. The judge and lawyers of the several courts +traveled together and whiled away the time chatting and joking. Of +course, Abraham Lincoln was in great demand because of his unfailing +humor. + +One day he appeared in a new suit of clothes. This was such a rare +occurrence that the friends made remarks about it. The garments did not +fit him very well, and the others felt in duty bound to "say things" +which were anything but complimentary. + +As they rode along through the mud they were making Lincoln the butt of +their gibes. He was not like most jokers, for he could take as well as +give, while he could "give as good as he got." + +In the course of their "chaffing" they came to a spot about four miles +from Paris, Illinois, where they saw a pig stuck in the mud and +squealing lustily. The men all laughed at the poor animal and its absurd +plight. + +"Poor piggy!" exclaimed Mr. Lincoln impulsively. "Let's get him out of +that." + +The others jeered at the idea. "You'd better do it. You're dressed for +the job!" exclaimed one. + +"Return to your wallow!" laughed another, pointing in great glee to the +wallowing hog and the mudhole. + +Lincoln looked at the pig, at the deep mud, then down at his new +clothes. Ruefully he rode on with them for some time. But the cries of +the helpless animal rang in his ears. He could endure it no longer. +Lagging behind the rest, he waited until they had passed a bend in the +road. Then he turned and rode back as fast as his poor old horse could +carry him through the mud. Dismounting, he surveyed the ground. The pig +had struggled until it was almost buried in the mire, and was now too +exhausted to move. After studying the case as if it were a problem in +civil engineering, he took some rails off the fence beside the road. +Building a platform of rails around the now exhausted hog, then taking +one rail for a lever and another for a fulcrum, he began gently to pry +the fat, helpless creature out of the sticky mud. In doing this he +plastered his new suit from head to foot, but he did not care, as long +as he could save that pig! + +"Now, piggy-wig," he said. "It's you and me for it. You do your part and +I'll get you out. Now--'one-two-_three_--_up-a-daisy_!'" + +He smiled grimly as he thought of the jeers and sneers that would be +hurled at him if his friends had stayed to watch him at this work. + +After long and patient labor he succeeded in loosening the hog and +coaxing it to make the attempt to get free. At last, the animal was +made to see that it could get out. Making one violent effort it wallowed +away and started for the nearest farmhouse, grunting and flopping its +ears as it went. + +Lawyer Lincoln looked ruefully down at his clothes, then placed all the +rails back on the fence as he had found them. + +He had to ride the rest of the day alone, for he did not wish to appear +before his comrades until the mud on his suit had dried so that it could +be brushed off. That night, when they saw him at the tavern, they asked +him what he had been doing all day, eying his clothes with suspicious +leers and grins. He had to admit that he could not bear to leave that +hog to die, and tried to excuse his tender-heartedness to them by +adding: "Farmer Jones's children might have had to go barefoot all +Winter if he had lost a valuable hog like that!" + + +"BEING ELECTED TO CONGRESS HAS NOT PLEASED ME AS MUCH AS I EXPECTED" + +In 1846 Abraham Lincoln was elected to Congress, defeating the Rev. +Peter Cartwright, the famous backwoods preacher, who was elected to the +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 respect +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 suspension of our + correspondence to the true philosophic cause; + though it must be confessed by both of us that + this is a rather cold reason for allowing such + a friendship as ours to die out by degrees. + + "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 him than being elected to +Congress: + + "We have another boy, born 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 talks 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 messenger came to + tell me Bob was lost; but by the 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. LINCOLN." + +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 born in 1843. William, born in 1850, died +in the White House. The youngest was born in 1853, after the death of +Thomas Lincoln, so he was named for his grandfather, but he was known +only by his nickname, "Tad." "Little Tad" was his father's constant +companion during the terrible years of the Civil War, especially after +Willie's death, in 1862. "Tad" became "the child of the nation." He died +in Chicago, July 10, 1871, at the age of eighteen, after returning from +Europe with his widowed mother and his brother Robert. Robert 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 personal popularity. Daniel Webster +was then living 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: + +"Born February 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. + +"Education defective. + +"Profession, lawyer. + +"Military service, captain of volunteers in Black Hawk War. + +"Offices held: Postmaster at a very small office; four times a member of +the Illinois Legislature, and elected to the lower House of the next +Congress." + +Mr. Lincoln was in Congress while the Mexican War was in progress, and +there was much discussion over President Polk's action in declaring that +war. + +As Mrs. Lincoln was obliged to stay in Springfield to care for her two +little boys, Congressman Lincoln lived in a Washington boarding-house. +He soon gained the reputation of telling the best stories at the +capital. He made a humorous 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 +Herndon, 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: + + + "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?" + + "DEAR 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 impression of the motives + of the old men. Of course I 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 improve 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 + will succeed, too, 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 + better informed on almost all subjects than I + have ever been. You cannot fail in any 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 DAYS OF THOMAS LINCOLN + +Mr. Lincoln did not allow his name to be used as a candidate for +re-election, as there were other men in the congressional district who +deserved the honor of going to Washington as much as he. On his way home +from Washington, after the last session of the Thirtieth Congress, he +visited New England, where he made a few speeches, and stopped at +Niagara Falls, which impressed him so strongly that he wrote a lecture +on the subject. + +After returning home he made a flying visit to Washington to enter his +patent steamboat, equipped so that it would navigate shallow western +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 sights of +the Patent Office to this day. + +After Mr. Lincoln had settled down to his law business, permanently, as +he hoped, his former fellow-clerk, William G. Greene, having business in +Coles County, went to "Goosenest Prairie" to call on Abe's father and +stepmother, who still lived in a log cabin. Thomas Lincoln received 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 haint got no eddication, but I git along better than if I had." + +Not long after this, in 1851, Abraham learned that his father was very +ill. As he could not leave Springfield then, he wrote to his stepbrother +(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 +him 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 BUT MASTERFUL LETTER TO HIS STEPBROTHER + +After his father's death Abraham Lincoln had, on several occasions, to +protect his stepmother 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 BROTHER: 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 +corn and wheat and oats without work? Will anybody there, any more than +here, do your work for you? 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. You have raised no crop this year, and +what you really 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 in. 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 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 pretenses deceive nobody but yourself. Go to +work is the only cure for your case." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +WHAT MADE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND HIS STEPBROTHER + + +These letters show the wide difference between the real lives of two +boys brought up in the same surroundings, and under similar conditions. +The advantages were in John Johnston's favor. He and Dennis Hanks never +rose above the lower level of poverty and ignorance. John was looked +down upon by the poor illiterates around him as a lazy, good-for-nothing +fellow, and Dennis Hanks was 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 Lincolns." 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 prevailing at that time brought about +his election to the presidency!" + +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. In his second inaugural address as President he used +this expression: "With malice toward none, with charity 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 the world, in his own or any other time, because he +himself loved everybody. + +Mrs. Crawford, the wife of "Old Blue Nose," used to laugh at the very +idea of Abe Lincoln ever becoming President. Lincoln often said to her: +"I'll get ready and the time will come." He got ready in his father's +log hut and when the door of opportunity opened he walked right 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 Nose's" hired boy and man. + + +ONE PARTNER IN THE WHITE HOUSE, THE OTHER IN THE POOR HOUSE + +Then there was William H. Herndon, known to the world only because he +happened to be "Lincoln's law partner." His advantages were superior to +Lincoln's. And far more than that, he had his great partner's help to +push him forward and upward. But "poor Billy" had an unfortunate +appetite. He could not deny himself, though it always made him ashamed +and miserable. It dragged him down, down from "the President's partner" +to the gutter. That was not all. When he asked his old partner to give +him a government appointment which he had, for years, been making +himself wholly unworthy 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 anything. But Herndon 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 untruths into +the "Life of Lincoln" he was able to write because Abraham Lincoln, +against the advice of his wife and friends, had insisted on keeping him +close to his heart. It is a terrible thing--that spirit of spite! Among +many good and true things he _had_ to say about his fatherly law +partner, he poisoned the good name of Abraham Lincoln in the minds of +millions, by writing stealthy slander about Lincoln's mother and wife, +and made many people believe that the most religious of men at heart was +an infidel (because he himself was one!), 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 prejudice of a great man's good name--then +how much more wicked to invent and spread broadcast falsehoods which +hurt the heart and injure the mind of the whole world--just to spite the +memory of the best friend a man ever had! + +The fate of the firm of Lincoln & Herndon 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 miserably in an almshouse, but the +senior was crowned with immortal martyrdom in the White House. + + +THE RIVAL FOR LOVE AND HONORS + +Stephen A. Douglas, "the Little Giant," who had been a rival for the +hand of the fascinating Mary Todd, was also Lincoln's chief opponent in +politics. Douglas was small and brilliant; used to society ways, he +seemed always to keep ahead of his tall, uncouth, plodding competitor. +After going to Congress, Mr. Lincoln was encouraged to aspire even +higher, so, ten years later, he became a candidate for the Senate. +Slavery was then the burning question, and Douglas seemed naturally to +fall upon the opposite side, favoring and justifying it in every way he +could. + +Douglas was then a member of the Senate, but the opposing party +nominated Lincoln to succeed him, while "the Little Giant" had been +renominated to succeed himself. Douglas sneered at his tall opponent, +trying to "damn him with faint praise" by referring to him as "a kind, +amiable and intelligent gentleman." Mr. Lincoln challenged the Senator +to discuss the issues of the hour in a series of debates. + +Douglas was forced, very much against his will, to accept, and the +debates took place in seven towns scattered over the State of Illinois, +from August 21st to October 15th, 1858. Lincoln had announced his belief +that "a house divided against itself cannot stand;" therefore the United +States could not long exist "half slave and half free." + +"The Little Giant" drove from place to place in great style, traveling +with an escort of influential friends. These discussions, known in +history as the "Lincoln-Douglas Debates," rose to national importance +while they were in progress, by attracting the attention, in the +newspapers, of voters all over the country. They were attended, on an +average, by ten thousand persons each, both men being accompanied by +bands and people carrying banners and what Mr. Lincoln called +"fizzlegigs and fireworks." + +Some of the banners were humorous. + + ------------------------ + | | + | Abe the Giant-Killer | + | | + ------------------------ + +was one. Another read: + + ----------------------------------------------------------- + | | + | Westward the Star of Empire takes its way; | + |The girls link on to Lincoln, their mothers were for Clay. | + | | + ----------------------------------------------------------- + +At the first debate Lincoln took off his linen duster and, handing it to +a bystander, said: + +"Hold my coat while I stone Stephen!" + +In the course of these debates Lincoln propounded questions for Mr. +Douglas to answer. Brilliant as "the Little Giant" was, he was not +shrewd enough to defend himself from the shafts of his opponent's wit +and logic. So he fell into Lincoln's trap. + +"If he does that," said Lincoln, "he may be Senator, but he can never be +President. I am after larger game. The battle of 1860 is worth a hundred +of this." + +This prophecy proved true. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +HOW EMANCIPATION CAME TO PASS + + +When Abraham Lincoln was a small boy he began to show the keenest +sympathy for the helpless and oppressed. The only time he betrayed anger +as a child was, as you already have learned, when he saw the other boys +hurting a mud-turtle. In his first school "composition," on "Cruelty to +Animals," his stepsister remembers this sentence: "An ant's life is as +sweet to it as ours is to us." + +As you have read on an earlier page, when Abe grew to be a big, strong +boy he saved a drunken man from freezing in the mud, by carrying him to +a cabin, building a fire, and spent the rest of the night warming and +sobering him up. Instead of leaving the drunkard to the fate the other +fellows thought he deserved, Abe Lincoln, through pity for the helpless, +rescued a fellow-being not only from mud and cold but also from a +drunkard's grave. For that tall lad's love and mercy revealed to the +poor creature the terrible slavery of which he was the victim. Thus Abe +helped him throw off the shackles of drink and made a man of him. + + +BLACK SLAVES AND WHITE + +As he grew older, Abe Lincoln saw that the drink habit was a sort of +human slavery. He delivered an address before the Washingtonian +(Temperance) Society in which he compared white slavery with black, in +which he said: + +"And when the victory shall be complete--when there shall be neither a +slave nor a drunkard on the earth--how proud the title of that land +which may truly claim to be the birthplace and the cradle of both those +revolutions that have ended in that victory." + +This address was delivered on Washington's Birthday, 1842. The closing +words throb with young Lawyer Lincoln's fervent patriotism: + +"This is the one hundred and tenth anniversary of the birth of +Washington; we are met to celebrate this day. Washington is the +mightiest name of earth, long since the mightiest in the cause of civil +liberty, still mightiest in moral reformation. On that name no eulogy is +expected. It cannot be. To add to the brightness of the sun or glory to +the name of Washington is alike impossible. Let none attempt it. In +solemn awe we pronounce the name and, in its naked, deathless splendor, +leave it shining on." + +It was young Lincoln's patriotic love for George Washington which did so +much to bring about, in time, a double emancipation from white slavery +and black. + +Once, as President, he said to a boy who had just signed the temperance +pledge: + +"Now, Sonny, keep that pledge and it will be the best act of your life." + +President Lincoln was true and consistent in his temperance principles. +In March, 1864, he went by steamboat with his wife and "Little Tad," to +visit General Grant at his headquarters at City Point, Virginia. + +When asked how he was, during the reception which followed his arrival +there, the President said, as related by General Horace Porter: + +"'I am not feeling very well. I got pretty badly shaken up on the bay +coming down, and am not altogether over it yet.' + +"'Let me send for a bottle of champagne for you, Mr. President,' said a +staff-officer, 'that's the best remedy I know of for sea-sickness.' + +"'No, no, my young friend,' replied the President, 'I've seen many a +man in my time seasick ashore from drinking that very article.' + +"That was the last time any one screwed up sufficient courage to offer +him wine." + + +"THE UNDER DOG" + +Some people are kinder to dumb animals--is it _because_ they are +dumb?--than to their relatives. Many are the stories of Lincoln's +tenderness to beasts and birds. But his kindness did not stop there, nor +with his brothers and sisters in white. He recognized his close +relationship with the black man, and the bitterest name his enemies +called him--worse in their minds than "fool," "clown," "imbecile" or +"gorilla"--was a "Black Republican." That terrible phobia against the +negro only enlisted Abraham Lincoln's sympathies the more. He appeared +in court in behalf of colored people, time and again. The more bitter +the hatred and oppression of others, the more they needed his +sympathetic help, the more certain they were to receive it. + +"My sympathies are with the under dog," said Mr. Lincoln, one day, +"though it is often that dog that starts the fuss." + +The fact that the poor fellow may have brought the trouble upon himself +did not make him forfeit Abraham Lincoln's sympathy. That was only a +good lesson to him to "Look out and do better next time!" + + +THE QUESTION OF EMANCIPATION + +After he went to Washington, President Lincoln was between two fires. +One side wanted the slaves freed whether the Union was broken up or not. +They could not see that declaring them free would have but little +effect, if the government could not "back up" such a declaration. + +The other party did not wish the matter tampered with, as cheap labor +was necessary for raising cotton, sugar and other products on which the +living of millions of people depended. + +The extreme Abolitionists, who wished slavery abolished, whether or no, +sent men to tell the President that if he did not free the slaves he was +a coward and a turncoat, and they would withhold their support from the +Government and the Army. + +Delegations of Abolitionists from all over the North arrived almost +daily from different cities to urge, coax and threaten the President. +They did not know that he was trying to keep the Border States of +Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri from seceding. If Maryland alone had +gone out of the Union, Washington, the national capital, would have been +surrounded and forced to surrender. + +Besides, at this time, the armies of the North were losing nearly all +the battles. + +To declare all the slaves down South freed, when the Government could +not enforce such a statement and could not even win a battle, would be +absurd. To one committee the President said: "If I issued a proclamation +of emancipation now it would be like the Pope's bull (or decree) against +the comet!" + +A delegation of Chicago ministers came to beg Mr. Lincoln to free the +slaves. He patiently explained to them that his declaring them free +would not make them free. These men seemed to see the point and were +retiring, disappointed, when one of them returned to him and whispered +solemnly: + +"What you have said to us, Mr. President, compels me to say to you in +reply that it is a message from our divine Master, through me, +commanding you, sir, to open the doors of bondage that the slave may go +free!" + +"Now, isn't that strange?" the President replied instantly. "Here I am, +studying this question, day and night, and God has placed it upon me, +too. Don't you think it's rather odd that He should send such a message +by way of that awful wicked city of Chicago?" + +The ministers were shocked at such an answer from the President of the +United States. They could not know, for Mr. Lincoln dared not tell them, +that he had the Emancipation Proclamation in his pocket waiting for a +Federal victory before he could issue it! + + +THE PROCLAMATION + +Then, came the news of Antietam, a terrible battle, but gained by the +Northern arms. At last the time had come to announce the freeing of the +slaves that they might help in winning their liberties. The President +had not held a meeting of his Cabinet for some time. He thought of the +occasion when, as a young man he went on a flatboat trip to New Orleans +and saw, for the first, the horrors of negro slavery, and said to his +companions: + +"If ever I get a chance to hit that thing I'll hit it hard!" + +Now the "chance to hit that thing"--the inhuman monster of human +slavery--had come, and he was going to "hit it hard." + +He called the Cabinet together. Edwin M. Stanton, the Secretary of War, +has described the scene: + +"On the 22nd of September, 1862, I had a sudden and peremptory call to a +Cabinet meeting at the White House. I went immediately and found the +historic War Cabinet of Abraham Lincoln assembled, every member being +present. The President hardly noticed me as I came in. He was reading a +book of some kind which seemed to amuse him. It was a little book. He +finally turned to us and said: + +"'Gentlemen, did you ever read anything from "Artemus Ward?" Let me read +you a chapter that is very funny.' + +"Not a member of the Cabinet smiled; as for myself, I was angry, and +looked to see what the President meant. It seemed to me like buffoonery. +He, however, concluded to read us a chapter from 'Artemus Ward,' which +he did with great deliberation. Having finished, he laughed heartily, +without a member of the Cabinet joining in the laughter. + +"'Well,' he said, 'let's have another chapter.' + +"I was considering whether I should rise and leave the meeting abruptly, +when he threw the book down, heaved a long sigh, and said: + +"'Gentlemen, why don't you laugh? With the fearful strain that is upon +me night and day, if I did not laugh I should die, and you need this +medicine as much as I do.' + +"He then put his hand in his tall hat that sat upon the table, and +pulled out a little paper. Turning to the members of the Cabinet, he +said: + +"'Gentlemen, I have called you here upon very important business. I have +prepared a little paper of much significance. I have made up my mind +that this paper is to issue; that the time is come when it should issue; +that the people are ready for it to issue. + +"'It is due to my Cabinet that you should be the first to hear and know +of it, and if any of you have any suggestions to make as to the form of +this paper or its composition, I shall be glad to hear them. But the +paper is to issue.' + +"And, to my astonishment, he read the Emancipation Proclamation of that +date, which was to take effect the first of January following." + +Secretary Stanton continued: "I have always tried to be calm, but I +think I lost my calmness for a moment, and with great enthusiasm I +arose, approached the President, extended my hand and said: + +"'Mr. President, if the reading of chapters of "Artemus Ward" is a +prelude to such a deed as this, the book should be filed among the +archives of the nation, and the author should be canonized. Henceforth I +see the light and the country is saved.' + +"And all said 'Amen!' + +"And Lincoln said to me in a droll way, just as I was leaving, 'Stanton, +it would have been too early last Spring.' + +"And as I look back upon it, I think the President was right." + +It was a fitting fulfillment of the Declaration of Independence, which +proclaimed that: + +"All men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with +certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the +pursuit of happiness." + +That Declaration young Abe Lincoln first read in the Gentryville +constable's copy of the "Statutes of Indiana." + +At noon on the first of January, 1863, William H. Seward, Secretary of +State, with his son Frederick, called at the White House with the +Emancipation document to be signed by the President. It was just after +the regular New Year's Day reception. + +Mr. Lincoln seated himself at his table, took up the pen, dipped it in +the ink, held the pen a moment, then laid it down. After waiting a while +he went through the same movements as before. Turning to his Secretary +of State, he said, to explain his hesitation: + +"I have been shaking hands since nine o'clock this morning, and my arm +is almost paralyzed. If my name ever goes into history, it will be for +this act, and my whole soul is in it. If my hand trembles when I sign +the Proclamation, all who examine the document hereafter will say: + +"'He hesitated.'" + +Turning back to the table, he took the pen again and wrote, deliberately +and firmly, the "Abraham Lincoln" with which the world is now familiar. +Looking up at the Sewards, father and son, he smiled and said, with a +sigh of relief: + +"_That will do!_" + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +THE GLORY OF GETTYSBURG + + +THE BATTLE + +The Battle of Gettysburg, which raged through July 1st, 2nd and 3d, +1863, was called the "high water mark" of the Civil War, and one of the +"fifteen decisive battles" of history. It was decisive because General +Robert E. Lee, with his brave army, was driven back from Gettysburg, +Pennsylvania. If Lee had been victorious there, he might have destroyed +Philadelphia and New York. By such a brilliant stroke he could have +surrounded and captured Baltimore and Washington. This would have +changed the grand result of the war. + +In point of numbers, bravery and genius, the battle of Gettysburg was +the greatest that had ever been fought up to that time. Glorious as this +was, the greatest glory of Gettysburg lay in the experiences and +utterances of one man, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States +of America. + +It came at a terrible time in the progress of the war, when everything +seemed to be going against the Union. There had been four disastrous +defeats--twice at Bull Run, followed by Fredericksburg and +Chancellorsville. Even the battle of Antietam, accounted victory enough +for the President to issue his Emancipation Proclamation, proved to be a +drawn battle, with terrific losses on both sides. Lee was driven back +from Maryland then, it is true, but he soon won the great battles of +Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, and had made his way north into +Pennsylvania. + +The night after the battle of Chancellorsville (fought May 2nd and 3d, +1863), was the darkest in the history of the Civil War. President +Lincoln walked the floor the whole night long, crying out in his +anguish, "O what will the country say!" + +To fill the decimated ranks of the army, the Government had resorted to +the draft, which roused great opposition in the North and provoked +foolish, unreasoning riots in New York City. + +After winning the battle of Gettysburg, which the President hoped would +end the war, General Meade, instead of announcing that he had captured +the Confederate army, stated that he had "driven the invaders from our +soil." Mr. Lincoln fell on his knees and, covering his face with his +great, strong hands, cried out in tones of agony: + +"'Driven the invaders from our soil!' My God, is that all?" + +But Lincoln's spirits were bound to rise. Believing he was "on God's +side," he felt that the cause of Right could not lose, for the Lord +would save His own. + +The next day, July 4th, 1863, came the surrender of Vicksburg, the +stronghold of the great West. Chastened joy began to cover his gaunt and +pallid features, and the light of hope shone again in his deep, gray +eyes. + +Calling on General Sickles, in a Washington hospital--for the general +had lost a leg on the second day of the battle of Gettysburg--the +President was asked why he believed that victory would be given the +Federal forces at Gettysburg. + +"I will tell you how it was. In the pinch of your campaign up there, +when everybody seemed panic-stricken, and nobody could tell what was +going to happen, I went to my room one day and locked the door, and got +down on my knees before Almighty God, and prayed to him mightily for +victory at Gettysburg. I told Him this was His war, and our cause His +cause, but that we couldn't stand another Fredericksburg or +Chancellorsville. And I then and there made a solemn vow to Almighty God +that if He would stand by our boys at Gettysburg, I would stand by Him. +And He _did_, and I _will_!" + +The President's call on General Sickles was on the Sunday after the +three-days' battle of Gettysburg, before the arrival of the gunboat at +Cairo, Illinois, with the glad tidings from Vicksburg, which added new +luster to the patriotic joy of Independence Day. The telegraph wires had +been so generally cut on all sides of Vicksburg that the news was sent +to Cairo and telegraphed to Washington. In proof that his faith even +included the Mississippi blockade he went on: + +"Besides, I have been praying over Vicksburg also, and believe our +Heavenly Father is going to give us victory there, too, because we need +it, in order to bisect the Confederacy, and let 'the Father of Waters +flow unvexed to the sea.'" + + +THE ADDRESS + +Not long after the conflict at Gettysburg a movement was on foot to +devote a large part of that battle-ground to a national cemetery. + +The Hon. Edward Everett, prominent in national and educational affairs, +and the greatest living orator, was invited to deliver the grand +oration. The President was asked, if he could, to come and make a few +dedicatory remarks, but Mr. Everett was to be the chief speaker of the +occasion. + +The Sunday before the 19th of November, 1863, the date of the +dedication, the President went with his friend Noah Brooks to Gardner's +gallery, in Washington, where he had promised to sit for his photograph. +While there he showed Mr. Brooks a proof of Everett's oration which had +been sent to him. As this printed address covered two newspaper pages, +Mr. Lincoln struck an attitude and quoted from a speech by Daniel +Webster: + +"Solid men of Boston, make no long orations!" and burst out laughing. +When Mr. Brooks asked about _his_ speech for that occasion, Mr. Lincoln +replied: "I've got it written, but not licked into shape yet. It's +short, _short_, SHORT!" + +During the forenoon of the 18th, Secretary John Hay was anxious lest the +President be late for the special Presidential train, which was to leave +at noon for Gettysburg. + +"Don't worry, John," said Mr. Lincoln. "I'm like the man who was going +to be hung, and saw the crowds pushing and hurrying past the cart in +which he was being taken to the place of execution. He called out to +them: 'Don't hurry, boys. There won't be anything going on till I get +there!'" + +When the train stopped, on the way to Gettysburg, a little girl on the +platform held up a bouquet to Mr. Lincoln, lisping: "Flowerth for the +Prethident." + +He reached out, took her up and kissed her, saying: + +"You're a sweet little rosebud yourself. I hope your life will open into +perpetual beauty and goodness." + +About noon on the 19th of November, the distinguished party arrived in a +procession and took seats on the platform erected for the exercises. The +President was seated in a rocking-chair placed there for him. There +were fifteen thousand people waiting, some of whom had been standing in +the sun for hours. It was a warm day and a Quaker woman near the +platform fainted. An alarm was given and the unconscious woman was in +danger of being crushed. + +The President sprang to the edge of the staging and called out: + +"Here, let me get hold of that lady." + +With a firm, strong grasp he extricated her from the crush and seated +her in his rocking-chair. When that modest woman "came to," she saw +fifteen thousand pairs of eyes watching her while the President of the +United States was fanning her tenderly. + +This was too much for her. She gasped: + +"I feel--better--now. I want to go--back to--my husband!" + +"Now, my dear lady," said Mr. Lincoln. "You are all right here. I had an +awful time pulling you up out of there, and I couldn't stick you back +again!" + +A youth who stood near the platform in front of the President says that, +while Mr. Everett was orating, Mr. Lincoln took his "little speech," as +he called it, out of his pocket, and conned it over like a schoolboy +with a half-learned lesson. The President had put the finishing touches +on it that morning. As it was expected that the President would make a +few offhand remarks, no one seems to have noticed its simple grandeur +until it was printed in the newspapers. + +Yet Mr. Lincoln was interrupted four or five times during the two +minutes by applause. The fact that the President was speaking was +sufficient, no matter what he said. The people would have applauded +Abraham Lincoln if he had merely recited the multiplication table! When +he finished, they gave "three times three cheers" for the President of +the United States, and three cheers for each of the State Governors +present. + +That afternoon there was a patriotic service in one of the churches +which the President decided to attend. Taking Secretary Seward with him, +he called on an old cobbler named John Burns, of whose courage in the +battle of Gettysburg Mr. Lincoln had just heard. Those who planned the +dedication did not think the poor cobbler was of much account. The old +hero, now known through Bret Harte's poem, "John Burns of Gettysburg," +had the pride and joy of having all the village and visitors see him +march to the church between President Lincoln and Secretary Seward. This +simple act was "just like Lincoln!" He honored Gettysburg in thus +honoring one of its humblest citizens. It was Abraham Lincoln's tribute +to the patriotism of the dear "common people" whom he said "God must +love." + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +"NO END OF A BOY" + + +"THE STORY OF YOUNG ABRAHAM LINCOLN" would be incomplete without some +insight into the perfect boyishness of the President of the United +States. When the cares of State and the horrors of war had made his +homely yet beautiful face pallid and seamed, till it became a sensitive +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 rooms of the Executive Mansion, both yelling like +Comanches. The little boy was lonely after Willie died, and the father's +heart yearned over the only boy left at home, for Robert was at Harvard +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 companion +and the President became the boy's only playfellow. Mr. Lincoln, with a +heart as full of faith as a little child's, had always lived in deep +sympathy with the children, and this feeling was intensified toward his +own offspring. + +When Abe Lincoln was living in New Salem he distinguished himself by +caring 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 relations became after the +thrashing he gave her husband: + +"Abe would come to our house, drink milk, eat mush, cornbread and +butter, bring the children candy and rock the cradle." (This seemed a +strange thing to her.) "He would nurse babies--do anything to +accommodate anybody." + + +HOW HE REPAID THE ARMSTRONGS' KINDNESS + +The Armstrong baby, Willie, grew to be a youth of wrong habits, and was +nicknamed "Duff." He was drawn, one afternoon, into a bad quarrel with +another rough young man, named Metzker, who was brutally beaten. In the +evening a vicious young man, named Morris, joined the row and the lad +was struck on the head and died without telling who had dealt the fatal +blow. The blame was thrown upon "Duff" Armstrong, who was arrested. +Illinois law preventing him from testifying in his own behalf. + +When Lawyer Lincoln heard of the case, he wrote as follows: + + + "SPRINGFIELD, ILL., September, 1857. + + "DEAR MRS. ARMSTRONG: + + "I have just heard of your deep affliction, and + the arrest of your son for murder. + + "I can hardly believe that he can be capable of + the crime alleged against him. + + "It does not seem possible. I am anxious that + he should be given a fair trial, at any rate; + and gratitude for your long-continued kindness + to me in adverse circumstances prompts me to + offer my humble services gratuitously in his + behalf. + + "It will afford me an opportunity to requite, + in a small degree, the favors I received at + your hand, and that of your lamented husband, + when your roof afforded me a grateful shelter, + without money and without price. + + "Yours truly, + "A. LINCOLN." + +The feeling in the neighborhood where the crime was committed was so +intense that it was decided that it must be taken over to the next +county to secure a fair trial. Lawyer Lincoln was on hand to defend the +son of his old friend. + +Besides those who testified to the bad character of the young prisoner, +one witness, named Allen, testified that he saw "Duff" Armstrong strike +the blow which killed Metzker. + +"Couldn't you be mistaken about this?" asked Mr. Lincoln. "What time did +you see it?" + +"Between nine and ten o'clock that night." + +"Are you certain that you saw the prisoner strike the blow?--Be +careful--remember--you are under oath!" + +"I am sure. There is no doubt about it." + +"But wasn't it dark at that hour?" + +"No, the moon was shining bright." + +"Then you say there was a moon and it was not dark." + +"Yes, it was light enough for me to see him hit Metzker on the head." + +"Now I want you to be very careful. I understand you to say the murder +was committed about half past nine o'clock, and there was a bright moon +at the time?" + +"Yes, sir," said the witness positively. + +"Very well. That is all." + +Then Lawyer Lincoln produced an almanac showing that there was no moon +that night till the early hours of the morning. + +"This witness has perjured himself," he said, "and his whole story is a +lie." + + * * * * * + +"Duff" Armstrong was promptly acquitted. The tears of that widowed +mother and the gratitude of the boy he had rocked were the best sort of +pay to Lawyer Lincoln for an act of kindness and life-saving. + + +"JUST WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH THE WHOLE WORLD!" + +A Springfield neighbor used to say that 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 tugging at the tails of his long coat. This neighbor +relates that he was attracted to the door of his own house one day by a +great noise of crying children, and saw Mr. Lincoln passing with the two +boys in their usual position, and both were howling lustily. + +"Why, Mr. Lincoln, what's the matter?" he asked in astonishment. + +"Just what's the matter with the whole world," the lawyer replied +coolly. "I've got three walnuts, and each wants two." + + +THE "BUCKING" CHESS BOARD + +Several years later Judge Treat, of Springfield was playing chess with +Mr. Lincoln in his 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 movement against the chess board, but +the attacks were warded off, each time, by his father's long arms. + +The child disappeared, and when the two players had begun to believe +they were to be permitted to end the game in peace, the table suddenly +"bucked" and the board and chessmen were sent flying all over the floor. + +Judge Treat was much vexed, and expressed impatience, not hesitating to +tell Mr. Lincoln that the boy ought to be punished severely. + +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 SPANKING + +Yet, 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, 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 fingers 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 boys' fingers. He spoke sharply to his son and commanded him to stop +that. Tad obeyed for a time, but his father, catching him at the 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' fingers?" + + +THE TRUE STORY OF BOB'S LOSING THE INAUGURAL ADDRESS + +Mr. Lincoln was always lenient when the offense 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. 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 like his own, and on opening it found only a pack of +greasy cards, a bottle of whisky 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 +distress 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 written 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 manuscript and stuffing it into his +own pocket, father 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 during my waking hours +all the rest of the long roundabout journey to Washington." + + +THE TERRIBLE LONELINESS 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 him 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 indulged to take advantage of +his freedom. Tad had a slight impediment in his speech which made the +street urchins laugh at him, and even cabinet members, because they +could not understand him, considered him a little nuisance. So Tad, +though known as "the child of the nation," and greatly beloved and +petted by those who knew him for a lovable affectionate child, found +himself alone in a class by himself, and against all classes of people. + + +TURNING THE HOSE ON HIGH OFFICIALS + +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. Although that little escapade appealed +to the President's sense of humor, for he himself liked nothing better +than to take generals and pompous officials down "a peg or two," Tad got +well spanked for the havoc he wrought that day. + + +BREAKING INTO A CABINET MEETING + +The members of the President's cabinet had reason to be annoyed by the +boy's frequent interruptions. He seemed to have the right of way +wherever his father happened to be. No matter if Senator Sumner or +Secretary Stanton was discussing 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 +course he knew Tad would raise such a racket that no one could talk or +think till _his_ wants were disposed of. + + +AN EXECUTIVE ORDER ON THE COMMISSARY DEPARTMENT FOR TAD AND HIS BOY +FRIENDS + +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 moment 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 boy 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 part of the telegraph system, +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 his 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 +puzzled or disgusted, as though they failed to see that several +startling raps could be any better than having Tad break in with a whoop +or a wail, as had been the boy's custom. + + +ISSUING THE EXECUTIVE ORDER ON PETER FOR PIE + +The boy raised a question of right. He had besieged Peter, the colored +steward, demanding that a dinner be served to several urchins he had +picked up outside--two of whom were sons of 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 members of the cabinet, he called on each to +contribute 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 deliver +certain pieces of pie and other desired eatables 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 +Potomac." + +With an expression of deep gravity and a solemn flourish, the President +tendered this Commissary Order to the lieutenant, his son, saying as he +presented the document: + +"I reckon Peter will _have_ to come to time now." + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +LIEUTENANT TAD LINCOLN, PATRIOT + + +There was no more sturdy little patriot in 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 him out of a nervous tantrum with his small round +face wreathed with smiles, and a chuckling in his throat of "Papa-day, +my papa-day!" 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 boyish heart was able to hold. It +was the "sweetest word ever heard" by the war-burdened, crushed and +sorrowing soul of the broken-hearted President of the United States. + +Mr. Lincoln took his youngest son with him everywhere--on his great +mission to Fortress Monroe, and they--"the long and the short of it," +the soldiers said--marched hand in hand 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-fitting, became perfectly right and proper when certain unknown +facts were taken into account. + + +WAVING THE "STARS AND BARS" OUT OF A WHITE HOUSE WINDOW + +For instance, one night, during an enthusiastic serenade at the White +House, after a great victory of the northern armies, when the President +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!" 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 President's boy in a soldier's +uniform. + +"If he don't know any better than that," said one man, "he should be +taught better. It's an insult to the North and the President ought to +stop it and apologize, too." + + +"BOYS IN BLUE" AND "BOYS IN GRAY" + +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 Boys in +Blue," but that his heart went out also to "the Boys in Gray." The +soldiers were all "boys" to him. They knew he loved them. They said +among themselves: "He cares for us. He takes our part. We will fight for +him; yes, we will die for him." + +And a large part of the common soldier's patriotism was this +heart-response of "the boys" to the great "boy" in the White House. That +was the meaning of their song as they trooped to the front at his call: + + "We are coming, Father Abraham; + Three hundred thousand more." + +Little Tad saw plenty of evidences of his father's love for the younger +soldiers--the real boys of the army. Going always with the President, he +had heard his "Papa-day" say of several youths condemned to be shot for +sleeping at their post or some like offense: + +"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 Lincoln'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 boys he could reach. This passion for doing +good to others began in the log cabin when he had no idea he could ever +be exercising his loving kindness in the 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 wandered away--they were a little wayward, but he would win +them back. The great chivalrous South has learned, since those bitter, +ruinous days, that Abraham Lincoln was the best friend the South then +had in the North. Tad had seen his father show great tenderness to all +the "boys" he met in the gray uniform, but the President had few +opportunities to show his tenderness to the South--though there was a +secret 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 misunderstood him so that they +were willing to kill him! + +It was no one's bullet which made Abraham Lincoln a martyr. All his life +he had 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 explained, but they were +inbred into the deep understanding of the big father and the small son +who were living in the White House as boys together. + + +MR. LINCOLN'S LAST SPEECH AND HOW TAD HELPED + +A few days after the war ended at Appomattox, a great crowd came to the +White House to serenade the President. It was Tuesday evening, April 11, +1865. Mr. Lincoln had written a short address for the occasion. The +times were so out of joint and every word was so important that the +President could not trust himself to speak off-hand. + +A friend stepped out on the northern portico with him to hold the candle +by which Mr. Lincoln 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 +butterfly, for Tad to catch. When the pages came too slowly the boy +pulled his father's coat-tail, piping up in a muffled, excited tone: + +"Give me 'nother paper, Papa-day." + +To the few in the front of the crowd who witnessed this little by-play +it seemed ridiculous that the President of the United States should +allow any child to behave like that and hamper him while delivering a +great address which would wield a national, if not world-wide influence. +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 opened with these words: + + "FELLOW-CITIZENS: We meet this evening not in + sorrow, but gladness of heart. The evacuation + of Petersburg and Richmond, and the surrender + of the principal insurgent army (at Appomattox) + give hope of a righteous and speedy peace whose + joyous expression cannot be restrained. In the + midst of this, however, He from whom all + blessings flow must not be forgotten. A call + for national thanksgiving is being prepared and + will be duly promulgated." + + +"GIVE US 'DIXIE,' BOYS!" + +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 'Dixie,' 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, bowing, +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!" + +The President smiled at his wife, through a look of inexpressible pain +and sadness, and shrugged his great shoulders, but "still he answered +not a word." + + +THE SEPARATION OF THE TWO "BOYS" + +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 him. 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 stairway with heartrending cries like a wounded animal. +Seeing Thomas Pendel, the faithful doorkeeper, he wailed from his +breaking heart: + +"Tom Pen, Tom Pen, they have killed Papa-day! They have killed my +Papa-day!" + + * * * * * + +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 empty rooms, aching with loneliness, murmuring +softly to himself: + +"Papa-day, where's my Papa-day. I'm tired--tired of playing alone. I +want to play together. Please, Papa-day, come back and play with your +little Tad." + +Young 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 his father's back, romping +through the stately 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 him 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-day?" + +"Your papa's gone 'way off"--said his companion, 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!"--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 BOYS A CHANCE" + +The fond-hearted little fellow went abroad with his mother a few years +after the tragedy that broke both their lives. By a surgical operation, +and by struggling manfully, he had corrected the imperfection in his +speech. But the heart of little Tad had been broken. While still a 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 misunderstandings his own +little son was robbed of this great boon. Little Tad had been denied the +one chance he sorely needed for his very existence. For this, as for all +the 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 all." + + +THE END + + + + +ALTEMUS BOOKS + + The Best and Least Expensive Books + for Twentieth Century Boys and Girls + + * * * * * + + + + + +BOOKS FOR BOYS + + + + + +THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +Dick Prescott, Dan Dalzell, Tom Reade, and the other members of Dick & +Co. are always found in the forefront of things--in scholarship, +athletics, and in school-boy fun. Small wonder that this series has made +such a hit with the boys of America. + + 1. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS OF GRIDLEY; or, Dick + and Co. Start Things Moving. + + 2. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS SNOWBOUND; or, Dick + and Co. at Winter Sports. + + 3. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS IN THE WOODS; or, + Dick and Co. Trail Fun and Knowledge. + + 4. THE GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS IN SUMMER ATHLETICS; + or, Dick and Co. Make Their Fame Secure. + + + + +THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +This series of stories, based on the actual doings of High School boys, +teems with incidents in athletics and school-boy fun. The real +Americanism of Dick Prescott and his chums will excite the admiration of +every reader. + + 1. THE HIGH SCHOOL FRESHMEN; or, Dick and Co.'s + First Year Pranks and Sports. + + 2. THE HIGH SCHOOL PITCHER; or, Dick and Co. on + the Gridley Diamond. + + 3. THE HIGH SCHOOL LEFT END; or, Dick and Co. + Grilling on the Football Gridiron. + + 4. THE HIGH SCHOOL CAPTAIN OF THE TEAM; or, + Dick and Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard. + + Sold by all Booksellers or Sent Postpaid on + Receipt of Price. + + * * * * * + + HENRY ALTEMUS COMPANY + 1326-1336 Vine Street, PHILADELPHIA, PA. + + + + +THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS VACATION SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +Outdoor sports are the keynote of these volumes. Boys will alternately +thrill and chuckle over these splendid narratives of the further +adventures of Dick Prescott and his chums. + + 1. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' CANOE CLUB; or, Dick + and Co.'s Rivals on Lake Pleasant. + + 2. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS IN SUMMER CAMP; or, The + Dick Prescott Six Training for the Gridley + Eleven. + + 3. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' FISHING TRIP; or, Dick + and Co. in the Wilderness. + + 4. THE HIGH SCHOOL BOYS' TRAINING HIKE; or, + Dick and Co. Making Themselves "Hard as Nails." + + + + +THE YOUNG ENGINEERS SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton meet every requirement as young civil +engineers with pick, shovel, and pluck, and with resourcefulness and +determination overcome all obstacles. + + 1. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN COLORADO; or, At + Railroad Building in Earnest. + + 2. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN ARIZONA; or, Laying + Tracks on the "Man-Killer" Quicksand. + + 3. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN NEVADA; or, Seeking + Fortune on the Turn of a Pick. + + 4. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS IN MEXICO; or, Fighting + the Mine Swindlers. + + 5. THE YOUNG ENGINEERS ON THE GULF; or, The + Dread Mystery of the Million-Dollar Breakwater. + + + + +THE ANNAPOLIS SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +Dave Darrin and Dan Dalzell proved their mettle at the U. S. Naval +Academy and gave promise of what might be expected of them in the great +war that was even at that moment hovering over the world. + + 1. DAVE DARRIN'S FIRST YEAR AT ANNAPOLIS; or, + Two Plebe Midshipmen at the U. S. Naval + Academy. + + 2. DAVE DARRIN'S SECOND YEAR AT ANNAPOLIS; or, + Two Midshipmen as Naval Academy "Youngsters." + + 3. DAVE DARRIN'S THIRD YEAR AT ANNAPOLIS; or, + Leaders of the Second Class Midshipmen. + + 4. DAVE DARRIN'S FOURTH YEAR AT ANNAPOLIS; or, + Headed for Graduation and the Big Cruise. + + + + +THE WEST POINT SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +Dick Prescott and Greg Holmes are not human wonders, but a pair of +average bright American boys who had a hard enough time working their +way through West Point. Their experiences will inspire all other +American boys. + + 1. DICK PRESCOTT'S FIRST YEAR AT WEST POINT; + or, Two Chums in the Cadet Gray. + + 2. DICK PRESCOTT'S SECOND YEAR AT WEST POINT; + or, Finding the Glory of the Soldier's Life. + + 3. DICK PRESCOTT'S THIRD YEAR AT WEST POINT; + or, Standing Firm for Flag and Honor. + + 4. DICK PRESCOTT'S FOURTH YEAR AT WEST POINT; + or, Ready to Drop the Gray for Shoulder Straps. + + + + +THE BATTLESHIP BOYS SERIES + +By FRANK GEE PATCHIN + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +Inspiring adventure, moving incidents over the seven seas, and in the +air above them; fighting the Huns from the decks of sinking ships, and +coming to grief above the clouds; strange peoples and still stranger +experiences, are some of the things that the readers of this series will +live when they cruise with Dan Davis and Sam Hickey. Mr. Patchin has +lived every phase of the life he writes about, and his stories truly +depict life in the various branches of the navy--stories that glow with +the spirit of patriotism that has made the American navy what it proved +itself to be in the world war. + + 1. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS AT SEA; or, Two + Apprentices in Uncle Sam's Navy. + + 2. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS' FIRST STEP UPWARD; or, + Winning Their Grades as Petty Officers. + + 3. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS IN FOREIGN SERVICE; or, + Earning New Ratings in European Seas. + + 4. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS IN THE TROPICS; or, + Upholding the American Flag in a Honduras + Revolution. + + 5. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS UNDER FIRE; or, The Dash + for the Besieged Kam Shau Mission. + + 6. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS IN THE WARDROOM; or, + Winning Their Commissions as Line Officers. + + 7. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS WITH THE ADRIATIC + CHASERS; or, Blocking the Path of the Undersea + Raiders. + + 8. THE BATTLESHIP BOYS ON SKY PATROL; or, + Fighting the Hun from Above the Clouds. + + + + +THE BOYS OF THE ARMY SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +These stimulating stories are among the best of their class that have +ever been written. They breathe the life and spirit of our army of +today, and in which Uncle Sam's Boys fought with a courage and devotion +excelled by none in the world war. There is no better way to instil +patriotism in the coming generation than by placing in the hands of +juvenile readers books in which a romantic atmosphere is thrown around +the boys of the army with thrilling plots that boys love. The books of +this series tell in story form the life of a soldier from the rookie +stage until he has qualified for an officer's commission, and, among +other things, present a true picture of the desperate days in fighting +the Huns. + + 1. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS IN THE RANKS; or, Two + Recruits in the United States Army. + + 2. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS ON FIELD DUTY; or, Winning + Corporals' Chevrons. + + 3. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS AS SERGEANTS; or, Handling + Their First Real Commands. + + 4. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS IN THE PHILIPPINES; or, + Following the Flag Against the Moros. + + 5. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS ON THEIR METTLE; or, A + Chance to Win Officers' Commissions. + + 6. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS AS LIEUTENANTS; or, Serving + Old Glory as Line Officers. + + 7. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS WITH PERSHING; or, Dick + Prescott at Grips with the Boche. + + 8. UNCLE SAM'S BOYS SMASH THE GERMANS; or, + Helping the Allies Wind Up the Great World War. + + + + +DAVE DARRIN SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +No more efficient officers ever paced the deck of a man-o'-war than Dave +Darrin and Dan Dalzell. The last two volumes chronicle the experiences +of Dave and Dan in the great war. + + 1. DAVE DARRIN AT VERA CRUZ; or, Fighting With + the U. S. Navy in Mexico. + + 2. DAVE DARRIN ON MEDITERRANEAN SERVICE; or, + With Dan Dalzell on European Duty. + + 3. DAVE DARRIN'S SOUTH AMERICAN CRUISE; or, Two + Innocent Young Naval Tools of an Infamous + Conspiracy. + + 4. DAVE DARRIN ON THE ASIATIC STATION; or, + Winning Lieutenants' Commissions on the + Admiral's Flagship. + + 5. DAVE DARRIN AND THE GERMAN SUBMARINES; or, + Making a Clean-up of the Hun Sea Monsters. + + 6. DAVE DARRIN AFTER THE MINE LAYERS; or, + Hitting the Enemy a Hard Naval Blow. + + + + +THE CONQUEST OF THE UNITED STATES SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +If the United States had not entered the war many things might have +happened to America. No liberty-loving American boy can afford to miss +reading these books. + + 1. THE INVASION OF THE UNITED STATES; or, Uncle + Sam's Boys at the Capture of Boston. + + 2. IN THE BATTLE FOR NEW YORK; or, Uncle Sam's + Boys in the Desperate Struggle for the + Metropolis. + + 3. AT THE DEFENSE OF PITTSBURGH; or, The + Struggle to Save America's "Fighting Steel" + Supply. + + 4. MAKING THE LAST STAND FOR OLD GLORY; or, + Uncle Sam's Boys in the Last Frantic Drive. + + + + +THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB SERIES + +By H. IRVING HANCOCK + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +Bright and sparkling as the waters over which the Motor Boat Boys sail. +Once cast off for a cruise with these hardy young fresh-water navigators +the reader will not ask to be "put ashore" until the home port has +finally been made. Manliness and pluck are reflected on every page; the +plots are ingenious, the action swift, and the interest always tense. +There is neither a yawn in a paragraph nor a dull moment in a chapter in +this stirring series. No boy or girl will willingly lay down a volume of +it until "the end." The stories also embody much useful information +about the operation and handling of small power boats. + + 1. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB OF THE KENNEBEC; or, The + Secret of Smugglers' Island. + + 2. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB AT NANTUCKET; or, The + Mystery of the Dunstan Heir. + + 3. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB OFF LONG ISLAND; or, A + Daring Marine Game at Racing Speed. + + 4. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB AND THE WIRELESS; or, + The Dot, Dash and Dare Cruise. + + 5. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB IN FLORIDA; or, Laying + the Ghost of Alligator Swamp. + + 6. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB AT THE GOLDEN GATE; or, + A Thrilling Capture in the Great Fog. + + 7. THE MOTOR BOAT CLUB ON THE GREAT LAKES; or, + The Flying Dutchman of the Big Fresh Water. + + + + +THE SUBMARINE BOYS SERIES + +By VICTOR G. DURHAM + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +A voyage in an undersea boat! What boy has not done so time and again in +his youthful dreams? The Submarine Boys did it in reality, diving into +the dark depths of the sea, then, like Father Neptune, rising dripping +from the deep to sunlight and safety. Yet it was not all easy sailing +for the Submarine Boys, for these hardy young "undersea pirates" +experienced a full measure of excitement and had their share of thrills, +as all who sail under the surface of the seas are certain to do. The +author knows undersea boats, and the reader who voyages with him may +look forward to an instructive as well as lively cruise. + + 1. THE SUBMARINE BOYS ON DUTY; or, Life on a + Diving Torpedo Boat. + + 2. THE SUBMARINE BOYS' TRIAL TRIP; or, "Making + Good" as Young Experts. + + 3. THE SUBMARINE BOYS AND THE MIDDIES; or, The + Prize Detail at Annapolis. + + 4. THE SUBMARINE BOYS AND THE SPIES; or, + Dodging the Sharks of the Deep. + + 5. THE SUBMARINE BOYS' LIGHTNING CRUISE; or, + The Young Kings of the Deep. + + 6. THE SUBMARINE BOYS FOR THE FLAG; or, Deeding + Their Lives to Uncle Sam. + + 7. THE SUBMARINE BOYS AND THE SMUGGLERS; or, + Breaking Up the New Jersey Customs Frauds. + + 8. THE SUBMARINE BOYS' SECRET MISSION; or, + Beating an Ambassador's Game. + + + + +THE PONY RIDER BOYS SERIES + +By FRANK GEE PATCHIN + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +This unusual and popular series tells vividly the story of four +adventure-loving lads, who, with their guardian, spent their summer +vacations in the saddle in search of recreation and healthful adventure. +Long journeys over mountain, through the fastness of primitive forest +and across burning desert, lead them into the wild places of their +native land as well as into many strange and exciting experiences. There +is not a dull moment in the series. + + 1. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE ROCKIES; or, The + Secret of the Lost Claim. + + 2. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN TEXAS; or, The Veiled + Riddle of the Plains. + + 3. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN MONTANA; or, The + Mystery of the Old Custer Trail. + + 4. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE OZARKS; or, The + Secret of Ruby Mountain. + + 5. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE ALKALI; or, + Finding a Key to the Desert Maze. + + 6. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN NEW MEXICO; or, The + End of the Silver Trail. + + 7. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN THE GRAND CANYON; or, + The Mystery of Bright Angel Gulch. + + 8. THE PONY RIDER BOYS WITH THE TEXAS RANGERS; + or, On the Trail of the Border Bandits. + + 9. THE PONY RIDER BOYS ON THE BLUE RIDGE; or, A + Lucky Find in the Carolina Mountains. + + 10. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN NEW ENGLAND; or, An + Exciting Quest in the Maine Wilderness. + + 11. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN LOUISIANA; or, + Following the Game Trails in the Canebrake. + + 12. THE PONY RIDER BOYS IN ALASKA; or, The Gold + Diggers of Taku Pass. + + + + +THE CIRCUS BOYS SERIES + +By EDGAR B. P. DARLINGTON + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +No call to the heart of the youth of America finds a readier response +than the call of the billowing canvas, the big red wagons, the crash of +the circus band and the trill of the ringmaster's whistle. It is a call +that captures the imagination of old and young alike, and so do the +books of this series capture and enthrall the reader, for they were +written by one who, besides wielding a master pen, has followed the +sawdust trail from coast to coast, who knows the circus people and the +sturdy manliness of those who do and dare for the entertainment of +millions of circus-goers when the grass is green. Mr. Darlington paints +a true picture of the circus life. + + 1. THE CIRCUS BOYS ON THE FLYING RINGS; or, + Making the Start in the Sawdust Life. + + 2. THE CIRCUS BOYS ACROSS THE CONTINENT; or, + Winning New Laurels on the Tanbark. + + 3. THE CIRCUS BOYS IN DIXIE LAND; or, Winning + the Plaudits of the Sunny South. + + 4. THE CIRCUS BOYS ON THE MISSISSIPPI; or, + Afloat with the Big Show on the Big River. + + 5. THE CIRCUS BOYS ON THE PLAINS; or, The Young + Advance Agents Ahead of the Show. + + + + +BOOKS FOR GIRLS + + + + +THE MADGE MORTON SERIES + +By AMY D. V. CHALMERS + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +The heroines of these stories are four girls, who with enthusiasm for +outdoor life, transformed a dilapidated canal boat into a pretty +floating summer home. They christened the craft "The Merry Maid" and +launched it on the shore of Chesapeake Bay. The stories are full of fun +and adventure, with not a dull moment anywhere. + + + 1. MADGE MORTON--CAPTAIN OF THE MERRY MAID. + 2. MADGE MORTON'S SECRET. + 3. MADGE MORTON'S TRUST. + 4. MADGE MORTON'S VICTORY. + + + + +THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS SERIES + +By JANET ALDRIDGE + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +Four clever girls go hiking around the country and meet with many +thrilling and provoking adventures. These stories pulsate with the +atmosphere of outdoor life. + + 1. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS UNDER CANVAS; or, Fun + and Frolic in the Summer Camp. + + 2. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS ACROSS COUNTRY; or, + The Young Pathfinders on a Summer Hike. + + 3. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS AFLOAT; or, The + Stormy Cruise of the Red Rover. + + 4. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS IN THE HILLS; or, The + Missing Pilot of the White Mountains. + + 5. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS BY THE SEA; or, The + Loss of the Lonesome Bar. + + 6. THE MEADOW-BROOK GIRLS ON THE TENNIS COURTS; + or, Winning Out in the Big Tournament. + + + + +THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS SERIES + +By LAURA DENT CRANE + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +Girls as well as boys love wholesome adventure, a wealth of which is +found in many forms and in many scenes in the volumes of this series. + + 1. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT NEWPORT; or, + Watching the Summer Parade. + + 2. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS IN THE BERKSHIRES; or, + The Ghost of Lost Man's Trail. + + 3. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS ALONG THE HUDSON; or, + Fighting Fire in Sleepy Hollow. + + 4. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT CHICAGO; or, Winning + Out Against Heavy Odds. + + 5. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT PALM BEACH; or, + Proving Their Mettle Under Southern Skies. + + 6. THE AUTOMOBILE GIRLS AT WASHINGTON; or, + Checkmating the Plots of Foreign Spies. + + + + +THE HIGH SCHOOL GIRLS SERIES + +By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +The scenes, episodes, and adventures through which Grace Harlowe and her +intimate chums pass in the course of these stories are pictured with a +vivacity that at once takes the young feminine captive. + + 1. GRACE HARLOWE'S PLEBE YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; + or, The Merry Doings of the Oakdale Freshmen + Girls. + + 2. GRACE HARLOWE'S SOPHOMORE YEAR AT HIGH + SCHOOL; or, The Record of the Girl Chums in + Work and Athletics. + + 3. GRACE HARLOWE'S JUNIOR YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; + or, Fast Friends in the Sororities. + + 4. GRACE HARLOWE'S SENIOR YEAR AT HIGH SCHOOL; + or, The Parting of the Ways. + + + + +THE COLLEGE GIRLS SERIES + +By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +Every school and college girl will recognize that the account of Grace +Harlowe's experiences at Overton College is true to life. + + 1. GRACE HARLOWE'S FIRST YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE. + 2. GRACE HARLOWE'S SECOND YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE. + 3. GRACE HARLOWE'S THIRD YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE. + 4. GRACE HARLOWE'S FOURTH YEAR AT OVERTON COLLEGE. + 5. GRACE HARLOWE'S RETURN TO OVERTON CAMPUS. + 6. GRACE HARLOWE'S PROBLEM. + 7. GRACE HARLOWE'S GOLDEN SUMMER. + + + + +THE GRACE HARLOWE OVERSEAS SERIES + +By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +[Illustration] + +Grace Harlowe went with the Overton College Red Cross Unit to France, +there to serve her country by aiding the American fighting forces. + + 1. GRACE HARLOWE OVERSEAS. + 2. GRACE HARLOWE WITH THE RED CROSS IN FRANCE. + 3. GRACE HARLOWE WITH THE MARINES AT CHATEAU THIERRY. + 4. GRACE HARLOWE WITH THE U. S. TROOPS IN THE ARGONNE. + 5. GRACE HARLOWE WITH THE YANKEE SHOCK BOYS AT ST. QUENTIN. + 6. GRACE HARLOWE WITH THE AMERICAN ARMY ON THE RHINE. + + + + +THE GRACE HARLOWE OVERLAND RIDERS SERIES + +By JESSIE GRAHAM FLOWER, A. M. + +PRICE, $1.00 EACH + +Grace Harlowe and her friends seek adventure on the mountain trails and +in the wilder sections of their homeland, after their return from +service in France. + + 1. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS ON THE OLD + APACHE TRAIL. + + 2. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS ON THE GREAT + AMERICAN DESERT. + + 3. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS AMONG THE + KENTUCKY MOUNTAINEERS. + + 4. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS IN THE GREAT + NORTH WOODS. + + 5. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS IN THE HIGH + SIERRAS. + + 6. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS IN THE + YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK. + + 7. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS IN THE BLACK + HILLS. + + 8. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS AT CIRCLE O + RANCH. + + 9. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS AMONG THE + BORDER GUERRILLAS. + + 10. GRACE HARLOWE'S OVERLAND RIDERS ON THE LOST + RIVER TRAIL. + + + + +ALTEMUS' NEW ILLUSTRATED YOUNG PEOPLE'S LIBRARY + +[Illustration] + +A series of choice literature for children, selected from the best and +most popular works. Printed on fine paper from large type, with numerous +illustrations in color and black and white, by the most famous artists, +making the most attractive series of juvenile classics before the +public. + + Fine English Cloth, Handsome New Original Designs + PRICE, 75 Cents Each + + THE ADVENTURES OF ROBINSON CRUSOE. 70 illustrations. + ALICE'S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND. 42 illustrations. + THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS AND WHAT ALICE FOUND THERE. + 50 illustrations. + BUNYAN'S PILGRIM'S PROGRESS. 46 illustrations. + A CHILD'S STORY OF THE BIBLE. 72 illustrations. + A CHILD'S LIFE OF CHRIST. 49 illustrations. + ĘSOP'S FABLES. 62 illustrations. + SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON. 50 illustrations. + THE MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY. By Edward Everett Hale. Illustrated. + GULLIVER'S TRAVELS. 50 illustrations. + MOTHER GOOSE RHYMES, JINGLES, AND FAIRY TALES. 234 + illustrations. + WOOD'S NATURAL HISTORY. 80 illustrations. + BLACK BEAUTY. By Anna Sewell. 50 illustrations. + ARABIAN NIGHTS' ENTERTAINMENTS. 130 illustrations. + + + + +WEE BOOKS FOR WEE FOLKS + +For little hands to fondle and for mother to read aloud. Every ounce of +them will give a ton of joy. + + +WEE BOOKS FOR WEE FOLKS SERIES + +[Illustration] + + MOTHER GOOSE NURSERY TALES. + MOTHER GOOSE NURSERY RHYMES. + A CHILD'S GARDEN OF VERSES. Robert Louis Stevenson. + THE FOOLISH FOX. + THREE LITTLE PIGS. + THE ROBBER KITTEN. + LITTLE BLACK SAMBO. + THE LITTLE SMALL RED HEN. + THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS. + THE LITTLE WISE CHICKEN THAT KNEW IT ALL. + THE FOUR LITTLE PIGS THAT DIDN'T HAVE ANY MOTHER. + THE LITTLE PUPPY THAT WANTED TO KNOW TOO MUCH. + THE COCK, THE MOUSE AND THE LITTLE RED HEN. + GRUNTY GRUNTS AND SMILEY SMILE--INDOORS. + GRUNTY GRUNTS AND SMILEY SMILE--OUTDOORS. + I DON'T WANT TO WEAR COATS AND THINGS. + I DON'T WANT TO GO TO BED. + LITTLE SALLIE MANDY. + JIMMY SLIDERLEGS. + SLOVENLY BETSY. + LITTLE BLACK SAMBO AND THE BABY ELEPHANT. + + +WEE FOLKS BIBLE STORIES SERIES + + WEE FOLKS STORIES FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. In Words of + One Syllable. + WEE FOLKS STORIES FROM THE NEW TESTAMENT. In Words of + One Syllable. + WEE FOLKS LIFE OF CHRIST. + WEE FOLKS BIBLE A B C BOOK. + LITTLE PRAYERS FOR LITTLE LIPS. + + +THE WISH FAIRY SERIES + + THE WISH FAIRY OF THE SUNSHINE AND SHADOW FOREST. + THE WISH FAIRY AND DEWY DEAR. + + PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED IN COLORS. PRICE, 50c. EACH + + + + +WEE FOLKS PETER RABBIT SERIES + +[Illustration] + + + THE TALE OF PETER RABBIT. + HOW PETER RABBIT WENT TO SEA. + PETER RABBIT AT THE FARM. + PETER RABBIT'S CHRISTMAS. + PETER RABBIT'S EASTER. + WHEN PETER RABBIT WENT TO SCHOOL. + PETER RABBIT'S BIRTHDAY. + PETER RABBIT GOES A-VISITING. + PETER RABBIT AND JACK-THE-JUMPER. + PETER RABBIT AND THE LITTLE BOY. + PETER RABBIT AND LITTLE WHITE RABBIT. + PETER RABBIT AND THE OLD WITCH WOMAN. + PETER RABBIT AND THE BIG BROWN BEAR. + PETER RABBIT AND THE TINYBITS. + WHEN PETER RABBIT WENT A-FISHING. + PETER RABBIT AND THE TWO TERRIBLE FOXES. + +WEE FOLKS CINDERELLA SERIES + + THE WONDERFUL STORY OF CINDERELLA. + THE STORY OF LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD. + THE OLDTIME STORY OF THE THREE BEARS. + THE OLD, OLD STORY OF POOR COCK ROBIN. + CHICKEN LITTLE. + PUSS IN BOOTS. + THREE LITTLE KITTENS THAT LOST THEIR MITTENS. + JACK THE GIANT KILLER. + JACK AND THE BEAN-STALK. + TOM THUMB. + + +LITTLE BUNNIE BUNNIEKIN SERIES + + LITTLE BUNNIE BUNNIEKIN. + LITTLE LAMBIE LAMBKIN. + LITTLE MOUSIE MOUSIEKIN. + LITTLE DEARIE DEER. + LITTLE SQUIRRELIE SQUIRRELIEKIN. + OLD RED REYNARD THE FOX. + HOOTIE TOOTS OF HOLLOW TREE. + FLAPSY FLOPPER OF THE FARM YARD. + + PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED IN COLORS. PRICE, 50c. EACH + + * * * * * + +Transcriber's notes: + +Obvious punctuation errors repaired. + +Page 87, "afer" changed to "after" (occasion after he) + +Page 126, "Store Keeping" changed to "Storekeeping" (War, Storekeeping, +and) + +Page 127, "sort" changed to "short" (incredibly short time) + +Page 156, "disinguished" changed to "distinguished" (Abe disinguished +himself) + +Page 174, "befor" changed to "before" (temperance address before) + +Page 174, duplicate word "the" removed. Original text read: + + the the Washingtonian Society of Springfield + +Page 198, duplicate word "the" removed. Original text read: + + until the the mud on + +Page 220, "solemly" changed to "solemnly" (whispered solemnly) + +Page 245, "boys" changed to "boy" (boy wants now) + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Story of Young Abraham Lincoln, by +Wayne Whipple + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF YOUNG ABRAHAM LINCOLN *** + +***** This file should be named 22925-8.txt or 22925-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/9/2/22925/ + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Emmy and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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