IN -THE -BOYHOOD 
 + OF-LINCOLN-I- 
 
 HEZEKIAH-BUTTERWORTH
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 COMMODORE BYRON MCCANDLESS
 
 
 7^c
 
 THE RESCUE.
 
 IN THE 
 
 BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN 
 
 BY 
 
 HEZEKIAH BUTTERWORTH 
 
 AUTHOR OF THE LOG SCHOOL-HOUSE ON THE COLUMBIA 
 
 Let us have faith that right makes might, and 
 in that faith as to the end dare to do our duty. 
 PRESIDENT LINCOLN. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
 1892
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1892, 
 BY D. APPLETON AND COMPANY.
 
 PEEFACE. 
 
 BEAHAM LINCOLN has become the typical 
 character of American institutions, and it is the 
 purpose of this book, which is a true picture 
 in a framework of fiction, to show how that 
 character, which so commanded the hearts and 
 the confidence of men, was formed. He who in youth unsel- 
 fishly seeks the good of others, without fear or favor, may be 
 ridiculed, but he makes for himself a character fit to govern 
 others, and one that the people will one day need and honor. 
 The secret of Abraham Lincoln's success was the " faith that 
 right makes might." This principle the book seeks by abun- 
 dant story-telling to illustrate and make clear. 
 
 In this volume, as in the " Log School-House on the Co- 
 lumbia," the adventures of a pioneer school-master are made to 
 represent the early history of a newly settled country. The 
 " Log School-House on the Columbia" gave a view of the early 
 history of Oregon and Washington. This volume collects 
 many of the Indian romances and cabin tales of the early 
 settlers of Illinois, and pictures the hardships and manly 
 struggles of one who by force of early character made himself 
 
 the greatest of representative Americans. 
 
 (iii) 
 
 973404
 
 jv IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 The character of the Dunkard, or Tunker, as a wandering 
 school-master, may be new to many readers. Such mission- 
 aries of the forests and prairies have now for the most part 
 disappeared, but they did a useful work among the pioneer 
 settlements on the Ohio and Illinois Kivers. In this case we 
 present him as a disciple of Pestalozzi and a friend of Froebel, 
 and as one who brings the German methods of story-telling 
 into his work. 
 
 " Was there ever so good an Indian as Umatilla ? " asks an 
 accomplished reviewer of the " Log School-House on the Co- 
 lumbia." The chief whose heroic death in the grave of his son 
 is recorded in that volume did not receive the full measure of 
 credit for his devotion, for he was really buried alive in the 
 grave of his boy. A like question may be asked in regard to 
 the father of Waubeno in this volume. We give the story very 
 much as Black Hawk himself related it. In Drake's History 
 of the Indians we find it related in the following manner : 
 
 " It is related by Black Hawk, in his Life, that some time 
 before the War of 1812 one of the Indians had killed a French- 
 man at Prairie des Chiens. * The British soon after took him 
 prisoner, and said they would shoot him next day. His family 
 were encamped a short distance below the mouth of the Ouis- 
 consin. He begged permission to go and see them that night, 
 as he was to die the next day. They permitted him to go, after 
 promising to return the next morning by sunrise. He visited 
 his family, which consisted of a wife and six children. I 
 can not describe their meeting and parting to be understood 
 by the whites, as it appears that their feelings are acted upon 
 by certain rules laid down by their preachers ! while ours
 
 PREFACE. v 
 
 are governed only by the monitor within us. He parted from 
 his wife and children, hurried through the prairie to the fort, 
 and arrived in time. The soldiers were ready, and immedi- 
 ately marched out and shot him down ! ' If this were not 
 cold-blooded, deliberate murder on the part of the whites I 
 have no conception of what constitutes that crime. What 
 were the circumstances of the murder we are not informed ; 
 but whatever they may have been, they can not excuse a still 
 greater barbarity." 
 
 It belongs, like the story of so-called Umatilla in the 
 " Log School-House on the Columbia," to a series of great 
 legends of Indian character which the poet's pen and the 
 artist's brush would do well to perpetuate. The examples of 
 Indians who have valued honor more than life are many, and 
 it is a pleasing duty to picture such scenes of native worth, 
 as true to the spirit of the past. 
 
 We have in this volume, as in the former book, freely 
 mingled history, tradition, and fiction, but we believe that 
 we have in no case been untrue to the fact and spirit of the 
 times we picture, and we have employed fiction chiefly as a 
 framework to bring what is real more vividly into view. We 
 have employed the interpretive imagination merely for narra- 
 tive purposes. Nearly all that has distinctive worth in the 
 volume is substantially true to history, tradition, and the gen- 
 eral spirit of old times in the Illinois, the Sangamon, and 
 the Chicago ; to the character of the " jolly old pedagogue long 
 ago" ; and to that marvelous man who accepted in youth the 
 lesson of lessons, that " right makes might." 
 
 28 WORCESTER STREET, BOSTON, MASS.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 I. INTRODUCED 1 
 
 II. THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES 17 
 
 III. THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP AND THE MERRY STORY-TELLERS. 33 
 
 IV. A BOY WITH A HEART 55 
 
 V. JASPER COBBLES FOR AUNT OLIVE. HER QUEER STORIES . 62 
 VI. JASPER GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF HIS VISIT TO BLACK HAWK. 
 
 AUNT INDIANA'S WIG 75 
 
 VII. THE EXAMINATION AT CRAWFORD'S SCHOOL . . . .87 
 VIII. THE PARABLE PREACHES IN THE WILDERNESS . . . 100 
 
 IX. AUNT INDIANA'S PROPHECIES 108 
 
 X. THE INDIAN RUNNER 115 
 
 XI. THE CABIN NEAR CHICAGO 122 
 
 XII. rTHE WHITE INDIAN OF CHICAGO 133 
 
 XIII. LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA. THE STATELY MINUET . . 140 
 
 XIV. WAUBENO AND YOUNG LINCOLN 156 
 
 XV. THE DEBATING SCHOOL 166 
 
 XVI. THE SCHOOL THAT MADE LINCOLN PRESIDENT . . . 177 
 
 XVII. THOMAS LINCOLN MOVES 184 
 
 XVIII. MAIN-POGUE 196 
 
 XIX. THE FOREST COLLEGE 202 
 
 XX. MAKING LINCOLN A " SON OF MALTA " 214 
 
 XXI. PBAIRIE ISLAND 218 
 
 XXII. THE INDIAN PLOT 229 
 
 XXIII. FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE 236 
 
 XXIV. " OUR LINCOLN is THE MAN " 251 
 
 XXV. AT THE LAST 265 
 
 (vil)
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PACING 
 PAGE 
 
 The rescue Frontispiece 
 
 The Tunker schoolmaster's class in manners 14 
 
 Lines written by Lincoln on the leaf of his school-book . . .22 
 
 Story-telling at the smithy 35 
 
 The home of Abraham Lincoln when in his tenth year . . .55 
 
 Aunt Olive's wedding 68 
 
 Abraham as a peace-maker 90 
 
 Black Hawk tells the story of Waubeno 118 
 
 A queer place to write poetry 160 
 
 Sarah Bush Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln's step-mother . . . .217 
 
 The approach of the mysterious Indian 240 
 
 The Lincoln family record 250 
 
 Abraham Lincoln, the man 262
 
 IN THE BOYHOOD OF 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 INTRODUCED. 
 
 Y, are there any schools in these parts ? " 
 " Crawford's." 
 
 " And who, my boy, is Crawford ? " 
 " The schoolmaster, don't yer know ? He's 
 great on thrashing on thrashing and and 
 he knows everything. Everybody in these parts has heard of 
 Crawford. He's great." 
 
 " That is all very extraordinary. ' Great on thrashing, and 
 knows everything.' Very extraordinary ! Do you raise much 
 wheat in these parts ? " 
 
 " He don't thrash wheat, mister. Old Dennis and young 
 Dennis do that with their thrashing- flails." 
 
 " But what does he thrash, my boy what does he thrash ? " 
 " He just thrashes boys, don't you know." 
 " Extraordinary very extraordinary. He thrashes boys." 
 " And teaches 'em their manners. He teaches manners, 
 Crawford does. Didn't you never hear of Crawford? You 
 must be a stranger in these parts." 
 
 " Yes, 1 am a stranger in Indiana. I have been following 
 
 U)
 
 2 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 the timber along the creek, and looking out on the prairie 
 islands. This is a beautiful country. Nature has covered it 
 with grasses and flowers, and the bees will swarm here some 
 day ; I see them now ; the air is all bright with them, my boy." 
 
 " I don't see any bees ; it isn't the time of year for 'em. 
 Do you cobble?" 
 
 " You don't quite understand me. I was speaking spir- 
 itually. Yes, I cobble to pay my way. Yes, my boy." 
 
 " Do you preach ? " 
 
 " Yes, and teach the higher branches like Crawford. He 
 teaches the higher branches, does he not ? " 
 
 " Don't make any odds where he gets 'em. I didn't know 
 that he used the higher branches. He just cuts a stick any- 
 where, and goes at 'em, he does." 
 
 " You do not comprehend me, my boy. I teach the higher 
 branches in new schools Latin and singing. I do not use the 
 higher branches of the trees." 
 
 " Latin ! Then you must be a wizard." 
 
 " No, no, my boy. I am one of the brethren called. My 
 new name is Jasper. I chose that name because I needed 
 polishing. Do you see? "Well, the Lord is doing his work, 
 polishing me, and I shall shine by and by. * They that turn 
 many to righteousness shall shine like the stars of heaven.' 
 They call me the Parable." 
 
 " Then you be a Tunker? " 
 
 " I am one of the wandering Brethren that they call 
 ' Tunkers.' " 
 
 " You preach for nothin' ? They do." 
 
 " Yes, my boy ; the "Word is free."
 
 INTRODUCED. 3 
 
 " Then who pays you ? " 
 
 " My soul." 
 
 " And you teach for nothin', too, do ye ? ." 
 
 " Yes, my boy. Knowledge is free." 
 
 " Then who pays you ? " 
 
 " It all comes back to me. He that teaches is taught." 
 
 " You don't cobble for nothin', do ye ? " 
 
 " Yes I cobble to pay my way. I am a wayfaring man, 
 wandering to and fro in the wilderness of the world." 
 
 " You cobble to pay yourself for teachin' and preachin' ! 
 Why don't you make them pay you? I shouldn't think that' 
 you would want to preach and teach and cobble all for nothin', 
 and travel, and travel, and sleep anywhere. Father will be 
 proper glad to see you and mother ; we are glad to see near 
 upon anybody. I suppose that you will hold forth down to 
 Crawford's ; in the log meetin'-'ouse, or in the school- 'ouse, 
 may be, or under the great trees over Nancy Lincoln's grave. 
 Elkins he preached there, and the circuit-rider." 
 
 " If I follow the timber, I will come to Crawford's, my 
 boy?" 
 
 "Yes, mister. You'll come to the school-'ouse, and the 
 meetin'-'ouse. The school-'ouse has a low-down roof and a big 
 chimney. Crawford will be right glad to see you, won't he 
 now? They are great on spellin' down there have spellin'- 
 matches, and all the people come from far and near to hear 
 'em spell hundreds of 'em. Link he's the head speller he 
 could spell down anybody. It is the greatest school in all 
 these here new parts. You will have a right good time down 
 there ; they'll treat ye right well."
 
 4 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 "Good, my boy; you speak kindly. I shall have a good 
 time, if the people have ears." 
 
 " Ears ! They've all got ears just like other folks. You 
 didn't think that they didn't have any ears, did ye? " 
 
 " I mean ears for the truth. I must travel on. I am glad 
 that I met you, my lad. Tell your father and mother that old 
 Jasper the Parable has gone by, and that he has a message for 
 them in his heart. God bless you, my boy God bless you ! 
 You are a little rude in your speech, but you mean well." 
 
 The man went on, following the trail along the great trees 
 of Pigeon Creek, and the boy stood looking after him. The 
 water rippled under the trees, and afar lay the open prairie, 
 like a great sun sea. The air was cool, but the light of spring 
 was in it, and the blue-birds fluted blithely among the budding 
 trees. 
 
 As he passed along amid these new scenes, a singular figure 
 appeared in the way. It was a woman in a linsey-woolsey 
 dress, corn sun-bonnet, and a huge cane. She looked at the 
 Tunker suspiciously, yet seemed to retard her steps that he 
 might overtake her. 
 
 " My good woman," said the latter, coming up to her, " I am 
 not sure of my way." 
 
 Well, I am." 
 
 " I wish to go to the Pigeon Creek settlement " 
 
 " Then you ought to have kept the way when you had it." 
 
 " But, my good woman, I am a stranger in these parts. A 
 boy has directed me, but I feel uncertain. What do you do 
 when you lose your way ? " 
 
 " I don't lose it."
 
 INTRODUCED. 5 
 
 " But if you were " 
 
 " I'd just turn to the right, and keep right straight ahead 
 till I found it." 
 
 " True, true ; but this is a new country to me. I am one of 
 the Brethren." 
 
 "Ye be, be ye? I thought you were one of them land 
 agents. One of the Brethren. I'm proper glad. Who were 
 you lookin' for ? " 
 
 " Crawford's school." 
 
 " The college ? Am you're goin' there ? I go over there 
 sometimes to see him wallop the boys. We must all have 
 discipline in life, you know, and it is best to begin with the 
 young. Crawford does. They say that Crawford teaches clear 
 to the rule of three, whatever that may be. One added to one 
 is more than one, according to the Scriptur' ; now isn't it ? 
 One added to one is almost three. Is that what they call high 
 mathematics? I never got further than the multiplication- 
 table, though I am a friend to education. My name is Olive 
 Eastman. What's yourn ? " 
 
 " Jasper." 
 
 " You don't ? One of the old patriarchs, like. Well, I live 
 this way you go that. 'Tain't more'n half a mile to Craw- 
 ford's close to the meetin'-'ouse. Mebby you'll preach there, 
 and I'll hear ye. Glad I met ye now, and to see who you be. 
 They call me Aunt Olive sometimes, and sometimes Aunt 
 Indiana. I settled Pigeon Creek, or husband and I did. He 
 was kind o* weakly ; he's gone now, and I live all alone. I'd 
 be glad to have you come over and preach at the 'ouse, though 
 I might not believe a word on't. I'm a Methody ; most people
 
 6 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 are Baptist down here, like the Linkuns, but we is all ready to 
 listen to a Tunker. People are only responsible for what they 
 know ; and there are some good people among the Tunkers, I've 
 hern tell. Now don't go off into some by-path into the woods. 
 Tom Lincoln he see a bear there the other day, but he 
 wouldn't 'a' shot it if it had been an elephant with tusks of 
 ivory and gold. Some folks haven't no calculation. The 
 Lincolns hain't. Good-by." 
 
 The Tunker was a middle-aged man of probably forty-five 
 or more years. He had a benevolent face, large, sympathetic 
 eyes, and a patriarchal beard. His garments had hooks instead 
 of buttons. He carried a leather bag in which were a Bible 
 and a hymn-book, some German works of Zinzendorf, and his 
 cobbling-tools. We can not wonder that the boy stared after 
 him. He would have looked oddly anywhere. 
 
 My reader may not know who a Tunker was, as our wan- 
 dering schoolmaster was called. A Tunker, or Dunker, was 
 one of a sect of German Baptists or Quakers, who were for- 
 merly very numerous in Pennsylvania and Ohio. The order 
 numbered at one time some thirty thousand souls. They 
 called themselves Brethren, but were commonly known as 
 " Tunkards," or " Dunkards," from a German word mean- 
 ing to dip. At their baptisms they dip the body of a convert 
 three times ; and so in their own land they received the name 
 of Tunkers, or dippers, and this name followed them into 
 Holland and to America. A large number of the Brethren 
 settled in Germantown, Pa. Thence they wandered into Ohio, 
 Indiana, and Illinois, preaching and teaching and doing useful 
 work. Like the Quakers, they have now nearly disappeared.
 
 INTRODUCED. 7 
 
 Their doctrines were peculiar, but their lives were unselfish 
 and pure, and their influence blameless. They believed in 
 being led by the inner light; that the soul was a seat of 
 divine and spiritual authority, and that the Spirit came to 
 them as a direct revelation. They did not eat meat or drink 
 wine. They washed each other's feet after their religious 
 services, wore their beards long, and gave themselves new 
 names that they might not be tempted by any worldly ambi- 
 tions or rivalries. They thought it wrong to take oaths, to 
 hold slaves, or to treat the Indians differently from other men. 
 They would receive no payment for preaching, but held that it 
 was the duty of all men to live by what they earned by their 
 own labor. They traveled wherever they felt moved to go by 
 the inward monitor. They were a peculiar people, but the 
 prairie States owe much that was good to their influence. The 
 new settlers were usually glad to see the old Tunker when he 
 appeared among them, and to receive his message, and women 
 and children felt the loss of this benevolent sympathy when he 
 went away. He established no church, yet all people believed 
 in his sincerity, and most people listened to him with respect 
 and reverence. The sect closely resembled the old Jewish 
 order of the Essenes, except that they did not wear the gar- 
 ment of white, but loose garments without buttons. 
 
 The scene of the Tunker's journey was in Spencer County, 
 Indiana, near the present town of Gentryville. This county 
 was rapidly being occupied by immigrants, and it was to this 
 new people that Jasper the Parable believed himself to be 
 guided by the monitor within. 
 
 Early in the afternoon he passed several clearings and 

 
 8 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 cabins, where he stopped to receive directions to the school- 
 house and meeting-house. 
 
 The country was one vast wilderness. For the most part it 
 was covered with gigantic trees, though here and there a rich 
 prairie opened out of the timber. There were oaks gray with 
 centuries, and elms jacketed with moss, in whose high boughs 
 the orioles in summer builded and sang, and under which the 
 bluebells grew. There were black-walnut forests in places, 
 with timber almost as hard as horn. The woods in many 
 places were open, like colonnades, and carpeted with green 
 moss. There were no restrictions of law here, or very few. 
 One might pitch his tent anywhere, and live where he pleased. 
 The land, as a rule, was common. 
 
 Jasper came at last to a clearing with a rude cabin, near 
 which was a three-faced camp, as a house of poles with one 
 open side was called. Spencer County was near the Kentucky 
 border, and the climate was so warm that a family could live 
 there in a house of poles in comfort for most of the year. 
 
 As Jasper the Parable came up to the log-house, which 
 had neither hinged doors nor glass windows, a large, rough, 
 good-humored-looking man came out to the gate to meet him, 
 and stood there leaning upon a low gate-post. 
 
 " Howdy, stranger ? " said the hardy pioneer. " "What brings 
 you to these parts lookin' fer a place to settle down at?" 
 
 " No, my good friend I'm obliged to you for speaking so 
 kindly to a wayfarer peace be with you I am looking for the 
 school-house. Can you direct me there ? " 
 
 " I reckon. Then you be going to see the school ? Good for 
 ye. A great school that Crawford keeps. I've got a boy and a
 
 INTRODUCED. 9 
 
 girl in that there school myself. The boy, if I do say it now, 
 is the smartest fellow in all the country round and the laziest. 
 Smart at the top, but it don't go down. Euns all to larnin'. 
 Just reads and studies about all the time, speaks pieces, and 
 preaches on stumps, and makes poetry, and things. I don't 
 know what will ever become of him. He's a queer one. My 
 name is Linkem " (Lincoln) " Thomas Linkem. What's 
 yourn ? " 
 
 " They call me Jasper the Parable that is my new name. 
 I'm one of the Brethren. No offense, I hope just one of the 
 Brethren." 
 
 " Oh, you be a Tunker. "Well, we'll all be proper glad to 
 see you down here. I come from Kentuck. Where did you 
 come from ? " 
 
 " From Pennsylvania, here. I was born in Germany." 
 
 " Sho, you did ? From Pennsylvany ! And how far are you 
 going?" 
 
 " I'm going to meet Black Hawk. My good friend, I stop 
 and preach and teach and cobble along the way." 
 
 " What ! Black Hawk, the chief ? Is it him you're goin' to 
 see ? You're an Indian agent, perhaps, travelin' for the State 
 or the fur-traders ? " 
 
 " No, I am not a trader of any kind. I am going to meet 
 Black Hawk at Eock Eiver. He has promised me a young 
 Indian guide, who will show me all these paths and act as an 
 interpreter, and gain for me a passage among all the Indian 
 tribes. I have met Black Hawk before." 
 
 " You've been to Illinois, have ye ? Glad to hear ye say so. 
 What kind of a kentry is that, now ? I've sometimes thought
 
 10 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 of going there myself. It ain't over-healthy here. Say, 
 stranger, come back and stop with us after you've been to the 
 school. I haven't any great accommodations, as you see, but I 
 will do the best I can for you, and it will make my wife and 
 Abe and the gal proper glad to have a talk with a preacher. 
 Ye will, won't ye, now ? Say yes." 
 
 " Yes, yes, if it is so ordered, friend. Thank you, yes. I 
 feel moved to say that I will come back. You are very good, 
 my friend." 
 
 " Yes, yes, come back and see us all. I won't detain ye any 
 longer now. You see that there openin' ? Well, you just fol- 
 low that path as the crow flies, and you'll come to the 
 school-'ouse. Good-day, stranger good-day." 
 
 It was early spring, a season always beautiful in southern 
 Indiana. The buds were swelling ; the woodpeckers were tap- 
 ping the old trees, and the migrating birds were returning to 
 their old homes in the tree-tops. Jasper went along singing, 
 for his heart was happy, and he felt the cheerful influence of 
 the vernal air. The birds to him were prophets and choirs, 
 and the murmur of the south winds in the trees was a sermon. 
 A right and receptive spirit sees good in everything, and so 
 Jasper sang as he walked along the footpath. 
 
 The school-house came into view. It was built of round 
 logs, and was scarcely higher than a tall man's head. The 
 chimney was large, and was constructed of poles and clay, and 
 the floor and furniture were made of puncheons, as split logs 
 were called. The windows consisted of rough slats and oiled 
 paper. The door was open, and Jasper came up and stood be- 
 fore it. How strange the new country all seemed to him !
 
 INTRODUCED. H 
 
 The schoolmaster came to the door. He affected gentle- 
 manly and almost courtly manners, and bowed low. 
 
 " Is this Mr. Crawford, may I ask ? " said Jasper. 
 
 " Andrew Crawford. And whom have I the honor of meet- 
 ing?" 
 
 "My new name is Jasper. I am one of the Brethren. 
 They call me the Parable. I am on my way to Rock Island, 
 Illinois, to meet Black Hawk, the chief, who has promised 
 to assist me with a guide and interpreter for my missionary 
 journeys among the new settlements and the tribes. I have 
 come, may it please you, to visit the school. I am a teacher 
 myself." 
 
 " You do us great honor, and I assure you that you are 
 very welcome very welcome. Come in." 
 
 The scholars stared, and presented a very strange appear- 
 ance. The boys were dressed in buckskin breeches and linsey- 
 woolsey shirts, and the girls in homespun gowns of most 
 economical patterns. The furniture seemed all pegs and 
 puncheons. The one cheerful object in the room was the 
 enormous fireplace. The pupils delighted to keep this fed with 
 fuel in the chilly winter days, and the very ashes had cheerful 
 suggestions. It was all ashes now, for the sun was high, and 
 the spring falls warm and early in the forests of southern 
 Indiana. 
 
 It was past mid afternoon, and the slanting sun was glim- 
 mering in the tops of the gigantic forest-trees seen from the 
 open door. 
 
 " We have nearly completed the exercises of the day," said 
 Mr. Crawford. " I have yet to hear the spelling-class, and to
 
 12 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 conduct the exercises in manners. I teach manners. Shall I 
 go on in the usual way ? " 
 
 " Yes, yes, may it please you yes, in the usual way in the 
 usual way. You are very kind." 
 
 "You do me great honor. The class in spelling," said 
 Mr. Crawford, turning to the school. Five boys and girls 
 stood up, and came to an open space in front of the desk. 
 The recitation of this class was something most odd and 
 amusing to Jasper, and so it would seem to a teacher of 
 to-day. 
 
 " Incompatibility" said Mr. Crawford. " You may make 
 your manners and spell incompatibility, Sarah." 
 
 A tall girl with a high forehead and very short dress 
 gave a modest and abashed glance at the wandering visitor, 
 blushed, courtesied very low, and thus began the rhythmic 
 exercise of spelling the word in the old-time way : 
 
 " I-n, in ; there's your in. C-o-m, com, incom ; there's your 
 incom ; incom. P-a-t, pat, compat, incompat ; there's your in- 
 compat ; incompat. I-, pati, compati, incompati ; there's your 
 incompati ; incompati. B-i-1, bil ; ibil, patibil, compatibil, in- 
 compatibil ; there's your incompatibil ; incompatibil. I-, bili, 
 patibili, compatibili, incompatibili ; there's your incompatibili ; 
 incompatibili. T-y, ty, ity, bility, ibility, patibility, compatibil- 
 ity, incompatibility; there's your incompatibility; incompati- 
 bility^ 
 
 The girl seemed dazed after this mazy effort. Mr. Craw- 
 ford bowed, and Jasper the Parable looked serene, and re- 
 marked, encouragingly: 
 
 " Extraordinary ! I never heard a word spelled in that
 
 INTRODUCED. 13 
 
 way. This is an age of wonders. One meets with strange 
 things everywhere. I should think that that girl would make 
 a teacher one day ; and the new country will soon need teach- 
 ers. The girl did well." 
 
 " You do me great honor," said Mr. Crawford, bowing like 
 a courtier. " I appreciate it, I assure you ; I appreciate it, and 
 thank you. I have aimed to make my school the best in the 
 country. Your commendation encourages me to hope that I 
 have not failed." 
 
 But these polite and generous compliments were exchanged 
 a little too soon. The next word that Mr. Crawford gave out 
 from the " Speller " was obliquity. 
 
 " Jason, make your manners and spell obliquity. Take 
 your hands out of your pockets; that isn't manners. Take 
 your hands out of your pockets and spell obliquity." 
 
 Jason was a tall lad, in a jean blouse and leather breeches. 
 His hair was tangled and his ankles were bare. He seemed to 
 have a loss of confidence, but he bobbed his head for manners, 
 and began to spell in a very loud voice, that had in it almost 
 the sharpness of defiance. 
 
 " 0-b, ob; there's your ob; ob." He made a leer. "L-i-k, 
 lik, oblik ; there's your oblik " 
 
 " No," said Mr. Crawford, with a look of vexation and dis- 
 appointment. " Try again." 
 
 Jason took a higher key of voice. 
 
 " Wall, 0-b, ob ; there's your ob ; ain't it ? L-i-c-k, and 
 there's your lick " 
 
 " Take your seat ! " thundered Mr. Crawford. " I'll give you 
 a lick after school. Think of bringing obliquity upon the
 
 14 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 school in the presence of a teacher from the Old World ! 
 Next ! " 
 
 But the next pupil became lost in the mazes of the im- 
 proved method of spelling, and the class brought dishonor upon 
 the really conscientious and ambitious teacher. 
 
 The exercise in manners partly redeemed the disaster. 
 
 " Abraham Lincoln, stand up." 
 
 A tall boy arose, and his head almost touched the ceiling. 
 He was dressed in a linsey-woolsey frock, with buckskin 
 breeches which were much too short for him. His ankles 
 were exposed, and his feet were poorly covered. His face was 
 dark and serious. He did not look like one whom an unseen 
 Power had chosen to control one day the destiny of nations, to 
 call a million men to arms, and to emancipate a race. 
 
 " Abraham Lincoln, you may go out, and come in and be 
 introduced." 
 
 It required but a few steps to take the young giant out of 
 the door. He presently returned, knocking. 
 
 " James Sparrow, you may go to the door," said Mr. Craw- 
 ford. 
 
 The boy arose, went to the door, and bowed very properly. 
 
 " Good-afternoon, Mr. Lincoln. I am glad to see you. 
 Come in. If it please you, I will present you to my friends." 
 
 Abraham entered, as in response to this courtly parrot-talk. 
 
 " Mr. Crawford, may I have the honor of presenting to you 
 my friend Abraham Lincoln ? Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Crawford." 
 
 Mr. Crawford bowed slowly and condescendingly. Abra- 
 ham was then introduced to each of the members of the school, 
 and the exercise was a very creditable one, under the untoward
 
 THE TUNKER SCHOOLMASTER'S CLASS IN MANNERS.
 
 INTKODUCED. 15 
 
 circumstances. And this shall be our own introduction to one 
 of the heroes of our story, and, following this odd introduction, 
 we will here make our readers somewhat better acquainted with 
 Jasper the Parable. 
 
 He was born in Thuringia, not far from the Baths of Lie- 
 benstein. His father was a German, but his mother was of 
 English descent, and he had visited England with her in his 
 youth, and so spoke the English language naturally and per- 
 fectly. He had become an advocate of the plans of Pestalozzi, 
 the father of common-school education, in his early life. One 
 of the most intimate friends of his youth was Froebel, after- 
 ward the founder of the kindergarten system of education. 
 With Froebel he had entered the famous regiment of Lutzow ; 
 he had met Korner, and sang the " Wild Hunt of Lutzow," by 
 Von Weber, as it came from the composer's pen, the song which 
 is said to have driven Napoleon over the Ehine. He had mar- 
 ried, lost wife and children, become melancholy and despond- 
 ent, and finally fallen under the influence of the preaching of 
 a Tunker, and had taken the resolution to give up himself 
 entirely, his will and desires, and to live only for others, and to 
 follow the spiritual impression, which he believed to be the 
 Divine will. He was simple and sincere. His friends had 
 treated him ill on his becoming a Tunker, but he forgave them 
 all, and said : " You reject me from your hearts and homes. I 
 will go to the new country, and perhaps I may find there a bet- 
 ter place for us all. If I do, I will return to you and treat you 
 as Joseph treated his brethren. You are oppressed ; you have 
 to bear arms for years. I am left alone in the world. Some- 
 thing calls me over the sea."
 
 IQ IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 He lived near Marienthal, the Vale of Mary. It was a 
 lovely place, and his heart loved it and all the old German vil- 
 lages, with their songs and children's festivals, churches, and 
 graves. He bade farewell to Froebel. " I am going to study 
 life," he said, "in the wilderness of the New World." He 
 came to Pennsylvania, and met the Brethren there who had 
 come from Germany, and then traveled with an Indian agent 
 to Rock Island, Illinois, where he had met Black Hawk. Here 
 he resolved to become a traveling teacher, preacher, and mis- 
 sionary, after the usages of his order, and he asked Black 
 Hawk for an interpreter and guide. 
 
 " Return to me in May," said the chief, " and I will pro- 
 vide you with as noble a son of the forest as ever breathed 
 the air." 
 
 He returned to Ohio, and was now on his way to visit the 
 old chief again. 
 
 The country was a wonder to him. Coming from middle 
 Germany and the Rhine lands, everything seemed vast and 
 limitless. The prairies with their bluebells, the prairie islands 
 with their giant trees, the forests that shaded the streams, were 
 all like a legend, a fairy story, a dream. He admired the 
 heroic spirit of the pioneers, and he took the Indians to his 
 heart. In this spirit he began to travel over the unbroken 
 prairies of Indiana and Illinois.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES. 
 
 HE red sun was glimmering through the leafless 
 boughs of the great oaks when Jasper again 
 came to the gate of Thomas Lincoln's log cab- 
 in. Mr. Crawford had remained after school 
 with the tall boy who had brought " obliquity " 
 upon the spelling-class. Tradition reports that there was a 
 great rattling of leather breeches, and expostulations, and la- 
 mentations at such solemn, private interviews. Mr. Crawford, 
 who was "great on thrashing," no doubt did his duty as he 
 understood it at that private session at sundown. Sticks were 
 plenty in those days, and the will to use them strong among 
 most pioneer schoolmasters. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln and his sister accompanied Jasper to the 
 log-house. They heard the lusty cry for consideration and 
 mercy in the log school-house as they were going, and stopped 
 to listen. Jasper did not approve of this rugged discipline. 
 " I should not treat the boy in that way," said he philo- 
 sophically. 
 
 "You wouldn't?" said Abraham. "Why? Crawford is 
 a great teacher ; he knows everything. He can cipher as far 
 as the rule of three." 
 
 (17)
 
 18 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 "Yes, lad, but the true purpose of education is to form 
 character. Fear does not make true worth, but counterfeit 
 character. If education fails to produce real character, it fails 
 utterly. True education is a matter of the soul as much as of 
 the mind. It should make a boy want to do right because it 
 is the right thing to do right. Anything that fails to produce 
 character for its own sake, and not for a selfish reason, is a 
 mistake. But what am I doing criticising? Now, that is 
 wrong. I seemed to be talking with Froebel. Yes, Crawford 
 is a great teacher, all things considered. He does well who 
 does his best. You have a great school. It is not like the old 
 German schools, but you do well." 
 
 Jasper began a discourse about Pestalozzi and that great 
 thinker's views of universal education. But the words were 
 lost on the air. The views of Pestalozzi were not much dis- 
 cussed in southern Indiana at this time, though the idea of 
 common-school education prevailed everywhere. 
 
 Thomas Lincoln stood at the gate awaiting the return of 
 Jasper. 
 
 " I'm proper glad that you've come back to see us all," said 
 he. " Wife has been lookin' for ye. What did you think of 
 the school ? Great, isn't it ? That Crawford is a big man in 
 these parts. They say he can dpher to the rule of three, 
 whatever that may be. Indiana is going to be great on educa- 
 tion, in my opinion." 
 
 He was right. Indiana, with an investment of some ten 
 million of dollars for public education, and with an army of 
 well-trained teachers, leads the middle West in the excellence 
 of her schools. Her model school system, which to-day would
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES. 19 
 
 delight a Pestalozzi or a Froebel, had its rude beginning in 
 schools like Crawford's. 
 
 " Come, come in," said Thomas Lincoln, and led the way 
 into the log-house. 
 
 " This is my wife," said he to Jasper. 
 
 The woman had a serene and benevolent face. Her feat- 
 ures were open and plain, but there was heart-life in them. 
 It was a face that could have been molded only by a truly good 
 heart. It was strong, long-suffering, sympathetic, and self- 
 restrained. Her forehead was high and thoughtful, her eyes 
 large and expressive, and her voice loving and cheerful. Jas- 
 per felt at once that he was in the presence of a woman of de- 
 cision of character. 
 
 " Then you are a Tunker," she said. " I am a Baptist, too, 
 but not your kind. But such things matter little if the heart 
 is right." 
 
 " You have well said," answered Jasper. " The true life is 
 in the soul. We both belong to the same kingdom, and shall 
 have the same life and drink from the same fountain and eat 
 the same bread. Have you been here long ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Thomas Lincoln, " and we have seen some dark 
 days. We lived in the half-faced camp out yonder when I 
 first came here. My first wife died of milk-sickness here. 
 She was Abraham's mother. Ever heard of the milk-sickness, 
 as the fever was called ? It swept away a great many of the 
 early inhabitants. Those were dark, dark days. I shall never 
 forget them." 
 
 " So your real mother is dead," said Jasper to Abraham. 
 
 " I try to be a mother to him, poor boy," said Mrs. Lincoln.
 
 20 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 "Abraham is good to me and to everybody; one of the best 
 boys I ever knew, though I ought not to praise him to his face. 
 He does the best he can." 
 
 " Awful lazy. You didn't tell that/' said Thomas Lincoln ; 
 "all head and books. He is. I believe in tellin' the whole 
 truth." 
 
 " Oh, well," said Mrs. Lincoln, " some persons work with 
 their hands, and some with their heads, and some with their 
 hearts. Abraham's head is always at work he isn't like most 
 other boys. And as far as his heart Well, I do love that boy, 
 and I am his step-mother, too. He's always been so good to 
 me that I love to tell on't. His father, I'm thinkin', is rather 
 hard on him sometimes. Abe's heart knows mine and I know 
 his'n, and I couldn't think more on him if he was my own son. 
 His poor mother sleeps out there under the great trees ; but I 
 mean to be such a mother to him that he will never know no 
 difference." 
 
 "Yes," said Thomas Lincoln, "Abraham does middlin' 
 well, considerin'. But he does provoke me sometimes. He 
 would provoke old Job himself. Why, he will take a book 
 with him into the corn-field, and he reads and reads, and his 
 head gets loose and goes off into the air, and he puts the 
 pumpkin-seeds in the wrong hills, like as not. He is great on 
 the English Eeader. I'd just like for you to hear him recite 
 poetry out of that book. He's great on poetry ; writes it him- 
 self. But that isn't neither here nor there. Come, preacher, 
 we'll have some supper." 
 
 The Tunker lifted his hand and said grace, after which the 
 family sat down to the table.
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES. 21 
 
 "We used to eat off a puncheon when we first came to 
 these parts," said Mr. Lincoln. " We had no beds, and we 
 slept on a floor of pounded clay. My new wife brought all of 
 this grand furniture to me. That beereau looks extravagant 
 now don't it ? for poor folks, too. I sometimes think that she 
 ought to sell it. I am told that in a city place it would be 
 worth as much as fifty dollars." 
 
 There were indeed a few good articles of furniture in the 
 house. 
 
 The supper consisted of corn-bread of very rough meal, and 
 of bacon, eggs, and coffee. 
 
 "Do you smoke?" asked Mr. Lincoln, when the meal was 
 over. 
 
 " No," said Jasper. " I have given up everything of that 
 kind, luxuries, and even my own name. Let us talk about our 
 experiences. There is no news in the world like the news from 
 the soul. A man's inner life and experience are about all that 
 is worth talking about. It is the king that makes the crown." 
 
 But Thomas Lincoln was not a man of deep inward ex- 
 periences and subjective ideas, though his first wife had been 
 such a person, and would have delighted Jasper. Mr. Lincoln 
 liked best to talk about his family and the country, and was 
 more interested in the slow news that came from the new 
 settlements than in the revelations from a higher world. His 
 former wife, Abraham's mother, had been a mystic, but there 
 was little sentiment in him. 
 
 " You said that you were going to meet Black Hawk," said 
 Mr. Lincoln. "Where do you expect to find him? He's 
 everywhere, ain't he ? "
 
 00 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 iua 
 
 " I am going to the Sac village at Rock Island. It is a 
 long journey, but the Voice tells me to go." 
 
 " That is away across the Illinois, on the Mississippi Eiver, 
 
 isn't it?" 
 
 " Yes, the Sac village looks down on the Mississippi. It is 
 a beautiful place. The prairies spread around it like seas. I 
 love to think of it. It commands a noble view. I do not 
 wonder that the Indians love it, and made it the burial-place of 
 their race. I would love it myself. 
 
 " You favor the Indians, do you? " 
 
 " Yes. All men are my brothers. The field is the world. 
 
 1 am going to try to preach and teach among the Sacs and 
 Foxes, as soon as I can find an interpreter, and Black Hawk 
 has promised me one. He has sent for him to come down to 
 Rock Island and meet me. He lives at Prairie du Chien, far 
 away in the north, I am told." 
 
 " Don't you have any antipathy against the Indians, 
 preacher ? " 
 
 " No, none at all. Do you ? " 
 
 " My father was murdered by an Indian. Let me tell you 
 about it. Not that I want to discourage you you mean well ; 
 but I don't feel altogether as you do about the red-skins, 
 preacher. You and Abe would agree better on the subject 
 than you and I. Abe is tender-hearted takes after his 
 mother." 
 
 Thomas Lincoln filled his pipe. " Abe," as his oldest boy 
 was called, sat in the fireplace, " the flue," as it was termed. 
 By his side sat John Hanks, who had recently arrived from 
 Kentucky a rough, kindly-looking man.
 
 >'n 
 
 
 ./Js\ f> 
 
 0*00 
 
 ff 
 
 V 
 
 LINES WRITTEN BY LINCOLN ON THE LEAF OF HIS SCHOOL-BOOK 
 
 IN HIS FOURTEENTH YP:AR. 
 
 Preserved by his Step-mother. 
 
 Original in possession of J. W. Weik.
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES. 23 
 
 " Wait a minute," said great-hearted Mrs. Lincoln " wait a 
 minute before you begin." 
 
 " What are you going to do, mother (wife) ? " 
 
 " I'm just going to set these potatoes to roast before the fire, 
 so we can have a little treat all by ourselves when you have got 
 through your story. There, that is all." 
 
 The poor woman sat down by the table she had brought 
 the table to her husband on her marriage ; he probably never 
 owned a table and began to knit, saying : 
 
 " Abraham, you mind the potatoes. Don't let 'em burn." 
 
 " Yes, mother." 
 
 "Mother" the word seemed to make her happy. Her 
 face lighted. She sat knitting for an hour, silent and serene, 
 while Thomas Lincoln talked. 
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S STORY. 
 
 " My father," began the old story-teller, " came to Kentucky 
 from Virginia. His name was Abraham Lincoln. I have 
 always thought that was a good, solid name a worthy name 
 and so I gave it to my boy here, and hope that he will never 
 bring any disgrace upon it. I never can be much in this world ; 
 Abe may. 
 
 " This was in Daniel Boone's day. On our way to Ken- 
 tucky we began to hear terrible stories of the Indian attacks 
 on the new settlers. In 1780, the year that we emigrated from 
 Virginia, there were many murders of the settlers by the 
 Indians, which were followed by the battle of Lower Blue 
 Licks, in which Boone's son was wounded. 
 
 " I have heard my mother and the old settlers talk over that 
 3
 
 24 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 battle. When Daniel Boone found that his son \vas wounded, 
 he tried to carry him away. There was a river near, and he 
 lifted the boy upon his back and hurried toward it. As he 
 came to the river, the boy grew heavy. 
 
 " ' Father, I believe that I am dying,' said the boy. 
 
 " ' We will be across the river soon,' said Boone. * Hold on.' 
 
 " The boy clung to his father's neck with stiffening arms. 
 While they were crossing the river the son died. Oh, it was a 
 sight for pity now, wasn't it, preacher? Boone in the river, 
 with the dead body of his boy on his back. Our country has 
 known few scenes like that. How that father must 'a' felt ! 
 You f urriners little know these things. 
 
 " The Indians swam after him. He laid down the body of 
 his son on the ground and struck into the forest. 
 
 " It was in this war that Boone's little daughter was carried 
 away by the Indians. I must tell ye. I love to talk of old 
 times. 
 
 " She was at play with two other little girls outside of the 
 stockade at Boonesborough, on the Kentucky Eiver. There 
 was a canoe on the bank. 
 
 " ' Let us take the canoe and go across the river,' said one of 
 the girls, innocent-like. 
 
 " Well, they got into the boat and paddled across the run- 
 ning river to the opposite side. They reached shallow water, 
 when a party of Indians, who had been watching them, cun- 
 ning-like, stole out of the thick trees 'n' rushed down to the 
 canoe 'n' drew it to the shore. The girls screamed, and their 
 cries were heard at the fort. 
 
 " Night was falling. Three of the Indians took a little
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES. 25 
 
 girl apiece, and, looking back to the fort in the sunset, uttered 
 a shriek of defiance, such as would ha' made yer flesh creep, 
 and disappeared in the timber. 
 
 " That night a party was got together at the fort to pursue 
 the Indians and rescue the children. 
 
 " "Well, near the close of the next day the party came upon 
 these Indians, some forty miles from the fort. They ap- 
 proached the camp cautiously, coyote-like, V saw that the 
 girls were there. 
 
 " ' Shoot carefully, now,' said the leader. ' Each man bring 
 down an Indian, or the children will be killed before we can 
 reach them.' 
 
 " They fired upon the Indians, picking out the three who 
 were nearest the children. Not one of the Indians was hit, 
 but the whole party was terribly frightened, leaped up, 'n' 
 run like deer. The children were rescued unharmed 'n' taken 
 back to the fort. You would think them was pretty hard 
 times, wouldn't ye ? 
 
 "There was one event that happened at the time about 
 which I have heard the old folks tell, with staring eyes, and 
 I will never forget it. The Indians came one night to at- 
 tack a log-house in which were a man, his wife, and daughter, 
 named Merrill. They did not wish to burn the cabin, but 
 to enter it and make captives of the family; so they cut a 
 hole in the door, with their hatchets, large enough to crawl 
 through one at a time. They wounded Mr. Merrill out- 
 right. 
 
 " But Mrs. Merrill was a host in herself. Her only weapon 
 was an axe, and there never was fought in Kentucky, or any-
 
 26 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 where else in the world, I'm thinkin', such another battle as 
 that. 
 
 " The leader of the Indians put his head through the hole 
 in the door and began to crawl into the room, slowly slowly 
 so" 
 
 Mr. Lincoln put out his great arms, and moved his hands 
 mysteriously. 
 
 " Well," he continued, " what do you suppose happened ? 
 Mrs. Merrill she dealt that Indian a death-blow on the head 
 with the axe, just like that, and then drew him in slowly, 
 slowly. The Indians without thought that he had crawled 
 in himself, and another Indian followed him slowly, slowly. 
 That Indian received his death-blow on the head, and was 
 pulled in like the first, slowly. Another and another Indian 
 were treated in the same way, until the dark cabin floor pre- 
 sented an awful scene for the morning. 
 
 " Only one or two were left without. The women felt that 
 they were now the masters in the contest, and stood looking 
 on what they had done. There fell a silence over the place. 
 Still, awful still everywhere. What a silence it was ! The two 
 Indians outside listened. Why were their comrades so still? 
 What had happened ? Why was everything so still ? One of 
 them tried to look through the hole in the door into the 
 dark and bloody room. Then the two attempted to climb 
 down the chimney from the low roof of the cabin, but Mrs. 
 Merrill put her bed into the fireplace and set it on fire. 
 
 "Such were some of the scenes of my father's few years 
 of life in Kentucky ; and now comes the most dreadful mem- 
 ory of all. Oh, it makes me wild to think o' it! Preacher,
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES. ? 
 
 as I said, my father was killed by the Indians. You did not 
 know that before, did you? No; well, it was so. Abraham 
 Lincoln was shot by the red-skins. I was with him at the 
 time, a little boy then, and I shall never forget that awful 
 morning never, never ! Abraham, mind the potatoes ; you've 
 heard the story ahundred times." 
 
 Young Abraham Lincoln turned the potatoes and bright- 
 ened the fire. Thomas Lincoln bent over and rested his body 
 on his knees, and held his pipe out in one hand. 
 
 " Preacher, listen. One morning father looked out of the 
 cabin door, and said to mother : 
 
 " ' I must go to the field and build a fence to-day. I will 
 let Tommy go with me.' 
 
 " I was Tommy. I was six years old then. He loved me, 
 and liked to have me with him. It was in the year 1784 I 
 never shall forget the dark days of that year ! never, never. 
 
 " I had two brothers older than myself, Mordecai and Jo- 
 siah. "We give boys Scriptur' names in those days. They 
 had gone to work in another field near by. 
 
 " We went to the field where the rails were to be cut and 
 laid, and father began to work. He was a great, noble-looking 
 man, and a true pioneer. I can see him now. I was playing 
 near him, when suddenly there came a shot as it were out of 
 the air. My poor father reeled over and fell down dead. "What 
 must have been his last thoughts of my mother and her five 
 children? I have often thought of that what must have been 
 his last thoughts ? Well, Preacher, you listen. 
 
 " A band of Indians came leaping out of the bush howling 
 like demons. I fell upon the ground. I can sense the fright
 
 28 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 now. A tall, black Indian, with a face like a wolf, came and 
 stood over me, and was about to seize hold of me. I could hear 
 him breathe. There came a shot from the house, and the 
 Indian dropped down beside me, dead. My brother Mordecai 
 had seen father fall, V ran to the house V fired that shot that 
 saved my life. Josiah had gone to the stockade for help, and 
 he returned soon with armed men, and the Indians disappeared. 
 
 " Preacher, those were dark days, wasn't they ? Dark, 
 dark days ! You never saw such. They took up my father's 
 body what a sight ! and bore it into the cabin. You should 
 have seen my poor mother then. "What was to help us ? Only 
 the blue heavens were left us then. "What could we do ? My 
 mother and five children alone in the wilderness full of savages ! 
 
 " Preacher, I have seen dark days ! I have known what it 
 was to be poor and supperless and friendless ; but I never 
 sought revenge on the Indians, though Mordecai did. I'm glad 
 that you're going to preach among them. I couldn't do it, 
 with such memories as mine, perhaps ; but I'm glad you can, V 
 I hope that you will go and do them good. Heaven bless those 
 who seek to do good in this sinful world " 
 
 " Abraham, are the potatoes done ? " said a gentle voice. 
 
 " Yes, mother." 
 
 " Then pass them 'round. Give the preacher one first ; then 
 your father. I do not care for any." 
 
 The tall boy passed the roasted potatoes around as directed. 
 Jasper ate his potato in silence. The stories of the hardships 
 of this forest family had filled his heart with sympathy, and 
 Thomas Lincoln had acted the stories that he told in such a 
 way as to leave a most vivid impression on his mind.
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES. 29 
 
 " These stories make you sad," said Mrs. Lincoln to Jasper. 
 " They are heart-rendin', and I sometimes think it is almost 
 wrong to tell them. Do you think it is right to tell a story 
 that awakens hard and rebellious f eelin's ? ' Evil communica- 
 tions corrupt good manners,' the Good Book says. I sometimes 
 wish that folks would tell only stories that are good, and make 
 one the better for hearin' parables like." 
 
 " My heart feels for you all," said Jasper. " I feel for 
 everybody. This life is all new to me." 
 
 "Let us have something more cheerful now," said Mrs. 
 Lincoln. " Abraham, recite to the preacher a piece from the 
 English Header." 
 
 " Which one, mother?" 
 
 " The Hermit how would that do ? I don't know much 
 about poetry, but Abraham does. He makes it up. It is a 
 queer turn of mind he has. He learns all the poetry that he 
 can find, and makes it up himself out of his own head. He's 
 got poetry in him, though he don't look so. How he ever does 
 it, puzzles me. His mother was poetic like. It is a gift, like 
 grace. Where do you suppose it comes from, and what will he 
 ever do with it ? He ain't like other boys. He's kind o' 
 peculiar some. Come, Abraham, recite to us The Hermit. It 
 is a proper good piece." 
 
 The tall boy came out of " the flue " and stood before the 
 dying fire. The old leather-covered English Reader, which he 
 said in later life was the best book ever written, lay on the 
 table before him. He did not open it, however. He put his 
 hands behind him and raised his dark face as in a kind of 
 abstraction. lie began to recite slowly in a clear voice, full
 
 30 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 of a peculiar sympathy that gave color to every word. He 
 seemed as though he felt that the experience of the poet was 
 somehow a prophecy of his own life ; and it was. He himself 
 became a skeptical man in religious thought, but returned to 
 the simple faith of his ancestors amid the dark scenes of war. 
 
 The poem was a beautiful one in form and soul, an old 
 English pastoral, by Beattie. How grand it seemed, even to 
 unpoetic Thomas Lincoln, as it flowed from the lips of his 
 studious son ! 
 
 THE HERMIT. 
 
 At the close of the day, when the hamlet is still, 
 
 And mortals the sweets of forgetf ulness prove ; 
 When naught but the torrent is heard on the hill, 
 
 And naught but the nightingale's song in the grove : 
 'Twas thus, by the cave of the mountain afar, 
 
 While his harp rung symphonious, a hermit began ; 
 No more with himself or with Nature at war, 
 
 He thought as a sage, though he felt as a man : 
 
 " Ah, why, all abandoned to darkness and woe, 
 
 Why, lone Philomela, that languishing fall f 
 For spring shall return, and a lover bestow, 
 
 And sorrow no longer thy bosom inthrall. 
 But, if pity inspire thee, renew the sad lay, 
 
 Mourn, sweetest complainer, man calls thee to mourn ; 
 soothe him whose pleasures like thine pass away : 
 
 Full quickly they pass but they never return. 
 
 " Now gliding remote, on the verge of the sky, 
 
 The moon, half extinguished, her crescent displays : 
 But lately I marked when majestic on high 
 
 She shone, and the planets were lost in her blaze. 
 Roll on, thou fair orb, and with gladness pursue 
 
 The path that conducts thee to splendor again : 
 But man's faded glory what change shall renew ? 
 
 Ah, fool ! to exult in a glory so vain !
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES. 31 
 
 " 'Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more : 
 
 I mourn ; but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for you ; 
 For morn is approaching, your charms to restore, 
 
 Perfumed with fresh fragrance, and glitt'ring with dew. 
 Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn ; 
 
 Kind Nature the embryo blossom will save : 
 But when shall spring visit the moldering urn? 
 
 Oh, when shall day dawn on the night of the grave ? 
 
 " 'Twas thus by the glare of false science betrayed, 
 
 That leads to bewilder, and dazzles to blind ; 
 My thoughts wont to roam, from shade onward to shade, 
 
 Destruction before me, and sorrow behind. 
 ' Oh pity, great Father of light,' then I cried, 
 
 ' Thy creature who fain would not wander from thee ! 
 Lo, humbled in dust, I relinquish my pride: 
 
 From doubt and from darkness thou only canst free.' 
 
 " And darkness and doubt are now flying away ; 
 
 No longer I roam in conjecture forlorn : 
 So breaks on the traveler, faint and astray, 
 
 The bright and the balmy effulgence of morn. 
 See truth, love, and mercy, in triumph descending, 
 
 And Nature all glowing in Eden's first bloom ! 
 On the cold cheek of death smiles and roses are blending, 
 
 And beauty immortal awakes from the tomb." 
 
 Mrs. Lincoln used to listen to such recitations as this from 
 the English Readers and Kentucky Orators with delight and 
 wonder. She loved the boy with all her heart. In all the 
 biographies of Lincoln there is hardly a more pathetic incident 
 than one told by Mr. Herndon of his visit to Mrs. Lincoln 
 after the assassination and the national funeral. Mr. Herndon 
 was the law partner of Lincoln for many years, and we give the 
 incident here, out of place as it is. Mrs. Lincoln said to her 
 step-son's friend : 
 
 " Abe was a poor boy, and I can say what scarcely one
 
 32 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 woman a mother can say, in a thousand : Abe never gave 
 me a cross word or look, and never refused, in fact or appear- 
 ance, to do anything I requested him. I never gave him a 
 cross word in all my life. . . . His mind and my mind what 
 little I had seemed to run together. . . . He was here after 
 he was elected President." Here she stopped, unable to pro- 
 ceed any further, and after her grateful emotions had spent 
 themselves in tears, she proceeded : " He was dutiful to me 
 always. I think he loved me truly. I had a son, John, who 
 was raised with Abe. Both were good boys ; but I must say, 
 both being now dead, that Abe was the best boy I ever saw or 
 ever expect to see. I wish I had died when my husband died. 
 I did not want Abe to run for President, did not want him 
 elected ; was afraid, somehow felt it in my heart ; and when 
 he came down to see me, after he was elected President, I felt 
 that something would befall him, and that I should see him 
 no more." 
 
 Equally beautiful was the scene when Lincoln visited this 
 good woman for the last time, just before going to Washington 
 to be inaugurated President. 
 
 " Abraham," she said, as she stood in her humble back- 
 woods cabin, " something tells me that I shall never see you 
 again." 
 
 He put his hand around her neck, lifted her face to heaven 
 and said, " Mother ! "
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP AND THE MERRY STORY- 
 TELLERS. 
 
 JOHNNIE KONG APOD' S INCREDIBLE STORY. 
 
 HE country store, in most new settlements, is 
 the resort of story-tellers. It was not so here. 
 There was a log blacksmith-shop by the way- 
 side near the Gentryville store, overspread by 
 the cool boughs of pleasant trees, and having a 
 glowing forge and wide-open doors, which was a favorite re- 
 sort of the good-humored people of Spencer County, and here 
 anecdotes and stories used to be told which Abraham Lincoln 
 in his political life made famous. The merry pioneers little 
 thought that their rude stories would ever be told at great po- 
 litical meetings, to generals and statesmen, and help to make 
 clear practical thought to Legislatures, senates, and councils of 
 war. Abraham Lincoln claimed that he obtained his education 
 by learning all that he could of any one who could teach him 
 anything. In all the curious stories told in his hearing in this 
 quaint Indiana smithy, he read some lesson of life. 
 
 The old blacksmith was a natural story-teller. Young Lin- 
 coln liked to warm himself by the forge in winter and sun him- 
 self in the open door in summer, and tempt this sinewy man to 
 
 (33)
 
 34: IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 talk. The smithy was a common resort of Thomas Lincoln, 
 and of John and Dennis Hanks, who belonged to the family of 
 Abraham's mother. The schoolmaster must have liked the 
 place, and the traveling ministers tarried long there when they 
 brought their horses to be shod. In fact, the news-stand of 
 that day, the literary club, the lecture platform, the place of 
 amusement, and everything that stirred associated life, found its 
 common center in this rude old smithy by the wayside, amid 
 the running brooks and fanning trees. 
 
 The stories told here were the curious incidents and advent- 
 ures of pioneer life, rude in fact and rough in language, but 
 having pith and point. 
 
 Thomas Lincoln, on the afternoon of the next day, said to 
 Jasper : 
 
 " Come, preacher, let's go over to the smithy. I want ye to 
 see the blacksmith. We all like to see the blacksmith in these 
 parts ; he's an uncommon man." 
 
 They went to the smithy. Abraham followed them. The 
 forge was low, and the blacksmith was hammering over old 
 nails on the anvil. 
 
 " Hello ! " said Thomas Lincoln ; " not doin' much to-day. I 
 brought the preacher over to call on you he's a Tunker has 
 been to see the school he teaches himself thought you'd 
 want to know him." 
 
 " Glad you come. Here, sit down in the leather chair, and 
 make yourself at home. Been long in these new parts ? " 
 
 " No, my friend ; I have been to Illinois, but I have never 
 been here before. I am glad to see you." 
 
 " What do you think of the country? " said the blacksmith.
 
 STORY-TELLING AT THE SMITHY.
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 35 
 
 " Think it is a good place to settle in ? Hope that you have 
 come to cast your lot with us. We need a preacher ; we haven't 
 any goodness to spare. You come from foreign parts, I take it. 
 Well, well, there's room for a world of people out here in the 
 woods and prairies. I hope that you will like it, and get your 
 folks to come. We'll do all we can for you. We be men of 
 good will, if we be hard-looking and poor." 
 
 " My good friend, I believe you. You are great-hearted 
 men, and I like you." 
 
 " Brainy, too. Let me start up the forge." 
 
 " Preacher, come here," said Thomas Lincoln. " I haven't 
 had no edication to speak of, but I've invented a new system 
 of book-keepin' that beats the schools. There's one of them 
 there. The blacksmith keeps all of his accounts by it. I've 
 got one on a puncheon at home ; did you notice it ? This 
 is how it is ; you may want to use it yourself. Come and look 
 at it." 
 
 On a rough board over the forge Thomas Lincoln had 
 drawn a number of straight lines with a coal, as are sometimes 
 put on a blackboard by a singing-master. On the lower bars 
 were several cloudy erasures, and at the end of these bars were 
 initials. 
 
 " Don't understand it, do you ? Well, now, it is perfectly 
 simple. I taught it to Aunt Olive, and she don't know more 
 than some whole families, though she thinks that she knows 
 more than the whole creation. Seen such people, hain't ye ? 
 Yes. The woods are full of 'em. Well, that ain't neither here 
 nor there. This is how it works : A man comes here to have his 
 horse shod minister, may be ; short, don't pay. Nothin' to pay
 
 36 IS THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 with but funeral sermons, and you can't collect them all the 
 time. "Well, all you have to do is just to draw your finger 
 across one of them lines, and write his initials after it. And 
 when he comes again, rub out another place on the same lines." 
 
 " And when you have rubbed out all the places you could 
 along that line, how much would you be worth?" said the 
 blacksmith. 
 
 " I call that a new way of keeping accounts," continued 
 Thomas Lincoln, earnestly. " Did you ever see anything of 
 the kind before ? No. It's a new and original way. We do 
 a great lot o' thinkin' down here in winter-time, when we 
 haven't much else to do. I'm goin' to put one o' them new 
 systems into the mill." 
 
 The meetings of the pioneers at the blacksmith's shop 
 formed a kind of merry-go-round club. One would tell a story 
 in his own odd way, and another would say, " That reminds 
 me," and tell a similar story that was intended to exceed the 
 first in point of humor. One of Thomas Lincoln's favorite 
 stories was " GL-UK ! " or, as he sometimes termed it 
 
 "HOW ABRAHAM WENT TO MILL. 
 
 " It was a mighty curi's happenin'," he would say. " I don't 
 know how to account for it the human mind is a very strange 
 thing. We go to sleep and are lost to the world entirely, and 
 we wake up again. We die, and leave our bodies, and the soul- 
 memory wakes again ; if it have the new life and sense, it wakes 
 again somewhere. We're curi's critters, all on us, and don't 
 know what we are. 
 
 " When I first came to Indiana I made a mill of my own
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 37 
 
 Abe and I did. 'Twas just a big stone attached to a heavy pole 
 like a well-sweep, so as to pound heavy, up and down, up and 
 down. You can see it now, though it is all out of gear and 
 kilter. 
 
 " Then, they built a mill 'way down on the river, and I used 
 to send Abe there on horseback. Took him all day to go and 
 come : used to start early in the mornin', and, as he had to wait 
 his turn at the mill, he didn't use to get back until sundown. 
 Then came Gordon and built his mill almost right here among 
 us a horse-mill with a windlass, all mighty handy : just hitch 
 the horse to a windlass and pole, and he goes round and round, 
 and never gets nowhere, but he grinds the corn and wheat. 
 Something like me : I go round and round, and never seem to 
 get anywhere, but something will come of it, you may depend. 
 
 " Well, one day I says to Abraham : 
 
 " ' You must hitch up the horse and go to Gordon's to mill. 
 The meal-tub is low, and there's a storm a-brewin'.' 
 
 " So Abe hitched up the horse and started. That horse is 
 a mighty steady animal goes around just like a machine ; 
 hasn't any capers nor antics just as sober as a minister. I 
 should have no more thought of his kickin' than I should 
 have thought of the millstones a-hoppin' out of the hopper. 
 'Twas a mighty curi's affair. 
 
 " Well, Abe went to Gordon's, and his turn come to grind. 
 He hitched the horse to the pole, and said, as always, ' Get up, 
 you old jade ! ' I always say that, so Abe does. He didn't 
 mean any disrespect to the horse, who always maintained a very 
 respectable-like character up to that day. 
 
 " The horse went round and round, round and round, just
 
 38 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 as steady as clock-work, until the grist was nearly out, and the 
 sound of the grindin' was low, when he began to lag, sleepy- 
 like. Abe he run up behind him, and said, ' Get up, you old 
 jade ! ' then puckered up his mouth, so, to say ' Gluck.' "Tis a 
 word I taught him to use. Every one has his own horse-talk. 
 
 " He waved his stick, and said ' Gl ' 
 
 "Was the horse bewildered? He never did such a thing 
 before. In an instant, like a thunder-clap when the sun was 
 shinin', he h'isted up his heels and kicked Abraham in the 
 head, and knocked him over on the ground, and then stopped 
 as though to think on what he had done. 
 
 "The mill-hands ran to Abraham. There the boy lay 
 stretched out on the ground just as though he was dead. They 
 thought he was dead. They got some water, and worked over 
 him a spell. They could see that he breathed, but they thought 
 that every breath would be his last. 
 
 " ' He's done for this world,' said Gordon. ' He'll never 
 come to his senses again. Thomas Lincoln would be proper 
 sorry.' And so I should have been had Abraham died. Some- 
 times I think like it was the Evil One that possessed that horse. 
 It don't seem to me that he'd 'a' ever ha' kicked Abe of his own 
 self right in the head, too. You can see the scar on him now. 
 
 " "Well, almost an hour passed, when Abe came to him- 
 self consciousness they call it all at once, in an instant. And 
 what do you think was the first thing he said ? Just this 
 <uk!' 
 
 " He finished the word just where he left it when the horse 
 kicked him, and looked around wild-like, and there was the 
 critter standin' still as the mill-stun.' Now, where do you think
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 39 
 
 the soul of Abe was between ' Gl ' and ' uk ' ? I'd like to have 
 ye tell me that." 
 
 A long discussion would follow such a question. Abraham 
 Lincoln himself once discussed the same curious incident with 
 his law-partner Herndon, and made it a subject of the con- 
 tinuance of mental consciousness after death. 
 
 It was a warm afternoon. A dark cloud hung in the north- 
 ern sky, and grew slowly over the arch of serene and sunny blue. 
 
 " Goin' to have a storm," said the blacksmith. " Shouldn't 
 wonder if it were a tempest. "We generally get a tempest about 
 this time of year, when winter finally breaks up into spring. 
 Well, I declare ! there comes Johnnie Kongapod, the Kicka- 
 poo Indian from Illinois he and his dogs." 
 
 A tall Indian was seen coming toward the smithy, followed 
 by two dogs. The men watched him as he approached. He 
 was a kind of chief, and had accepted the teachings of the 
 early missionaries. He used to wander about among the new 
 settlements, and was very proud of himself and his own tribe 
 and race. He had an honest heart. He once composed an 
 epitaph for himself, which was well meant but read oddly, and 
 which Abraham Lincoln sometimes used to quote in his pro- 
 fessional career : 
 
 " Here lies poor Johnnie Kongapod, 
 Have mercy on him, gracious God, 
 As he would do if he was God, 
 And you were Johnnie Kongapod." 
 
 The Indian sat down on the log sill of the blacksmith's 
 shop, and watched the gathering cloud as it slowly shut out 
 
 the sky. 
 
 4
 
 40 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " Storm," said he. " Lay down, Jack ; lay down, Jim." 
 
 Jack and Jim were his two dogs. They eyed the naming 
 forge. One of them seemed tired, and lay down beside his 
 master, but the other made himself troublesome. 
 
 " That reminds me," said Dennis Hanks ; and he related a 
 curious story of a troublesome dog, perhaps the one which in 
 its evolutions became known as " SYKES'S DOG," though this 
 may be a later New Salem story. It was an odd and a coarse 
 bit of humor. Lincoln himself is represented as telling this, 
 or a like story, to General Grant after the Vicksburg campaign, 
 something as follows : 
 
 " ' Your enemies were constantly coming to me with their 
 criticisms while the siege was in progress, and they did not 
 cease their ill opinions after the city fell. I thought that the 
 time had come to put an end to this kind of criticism, so one 
 day, when a delegation called to see me and had spent a half- 
 hour, and tried to show me the great mistake that you had 
 made in paroling Pemberton's army, I thought I could get rid 
 of them best by telling the story of Sykes's dog. 
 
 " ' Have you ever heard the story of Sykes's dog ? ' I said to 
 the spokesman of the delegation. 
 
 "'No.' 
 
 " ' "Well, I must tell it to you. Sykes had a yellow dog that 
 he set great store by ; but there were a lot of small boys around 
 the village, and the dog became very unpopular among them. 
 His eye was so keen on his master's interests that there arose 
 prejudice against him. The boys counseled how to get rid of 
 him. They finally fixed up a cartridge with a long fuse, and 
 put the cartridge in a piece of meat, and then sat down on a
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 41 
 
 fence and called the dog, one of them holding the fuse in his 
 hand. The dog swallowed the meat, cartridge and all, and 
 stood choking, when one of them touched off the fuse. There 
 was a loud report. Sykes came out of the house, and found 
 the ground was strewed with pieces of the dog. He picked up 
 the biggest piece that he could find a portion of the back with 
 the tail still hanging to it and said : 
 
 " ' Well, I guess that will never be of much account again 
 as a dog." 1 ' I guess that Pemberton's forces will never amount 
 to much again as an army.' By this time the delegation were 
 looking for their hats." 
 
 Like stories followed among the merry foresters. One of 
 them told another " That reminds me " how that two boys 
 had been pursued by a small but vicious dog, and one of them 
 had caught and held him by the tail while the other ran up a 
 tree. At last the boy who was holding the dog became tired 
 and knew not what to do, and cried out : 
 
 "Jim!" 
 
 "What say?" 
 
 " Come down." 
 
 " What for ? " 
 
 " To help me let go of the dog." 
 
 This story, also, whatever may have been the date of it, 
 President Lincoln used to tell amid the perplexities of the war. 
 In the darkest times of his life at the White House his mind 
 used to return for illustration to the stories told at this back- 
 woods smithy, and at the country stores that he afterward came 
 to visit at Gentryville, Indiana, and New Salem, Illinois. 
 
 He delighted in the blacksmith's own stories and jokes.
 
 42 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 The man's name was John Baldwin. He was the Homer of 
 Gentryville, as the village portion of this vast unsettled por- 
 tion of country was called. Dennis Hanks, Abraham Lincoln's 
 cousin, who frequented the smithy, was also a natural story- 
 teller. The stories which had their origin here evolved and 
 grew, and became known in all the rude cabins. Then, when 
 Abraham Lincoln became President, his mind went back to 
 the quaint smithy in the cool, free woods, and to the country 
 stores, and he told these stories all over again. It seemed rest- 
 ful to his mind to wander back to old Indiana and Illinois. 
 
 The cloud grew. The air darkened. There was an occa- 
 sional rustle of wind in the tree-tops. 
 
 " It's comin','' said the blacksmith. " Now, Johnnie Konga- 
 pod, you tell us the story. Tell us how Aunt Olive frightened 
 ye when you went to pilot her off to the camp-meetin'." 
 
 " No," said Johnnie Kongapod. " It thunders. You must 
 get Aunt Olive to tell you that story." 
 
 " When you come to meet her," said the blacksmith to 
 Jasper. " Kongapod would tell it to you, but he's afraid of the 
 cloud. No wonder." 
 
 A vivid flash of lightning forked the sky. There followed 
 an appalling crash of thunder, a light wind, a few drops of 
 rain, a darker air, and all was still. The men looked out as the 
 cloud passed over. 
 
 " You will have to stay here now," said the blacksmith, 
 "until the cloud has passed. Our stories may seem rather 
 rough to you, edicated as you are over the sea. Tell us a story 
 a German story. Let me put the old leather chair up here 
 before the lire. If you will tell us one of those German
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 43 
 
 stories, may be I'll tell you how Johnnie Kongapod here and 
 Aunt Olive went to the camp-meetin', and what happened to 
 them on the way." 
 
 There was a long silence on the dark air. The blacksmith 
 enlivened the fire, which lit up the shop. Jasper sat down in 
 the leather chair, and said : 
 
 " Those Indian dogs remind me of scenes and stories unlike 
 anything here. The life of the dog has its lesson true, and 
 there is nothing truer in this world than the heart of a shep- 
 herd's dog. I am a shepherd's dog. I am speaking in parable ; 
 you will understand me better by and by. 
 
 " Let me tell you the story of * THE SHEPHEED DOG,' and 
 the story will also tell a story, as do all stories that have a soul ; 
 and it is only stories that have souls that live. The true story 
 gathers a soul from the one who tells it, else it is no story at all. 
 
 " There once lived on the borders of the Black Forest, Ger- 
 many, an old couple who were very poor. Their name was 
 Gragstein. The old man kept a shepherd dog that had been 
 faithful to him for many years, and that loved him more than 
 it did its own life, and he came to call him Faithful. 
 
 " One day, as the old couple were seated by the fire, Frau 
 Gragstein said : 
 
 " ' Hear the wind blow ! There is a hard winter comin', and 
 we have less in our crib than we ever had before. We must 
 live snugger than ever. We shall hardly have enough to keep 
 us two. It will be a long time before the birds sing again. 
 You must be more savin', and begin now. Hear the wind 
 howl. It is a warning.' 
 
 " ' What would you have me do ? ' asked Gragstein.
 
 44: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 "'There are three of us, and we have hardly store for 
 two.' 
 
 " ' But what would you have me do with Mm ? He is old, 
 and I could not sell him, or give him away.' 
 
 " ' Then I would take him away into the forest and shoot 
 him, and run and leave him. I know it is hard, but the pinch 
 of poverty is hard, and it has come.' 
 
 " ' Shoot Faithful ! Shoot old Faithful ! Take him out 
 - into the forest and shoot him ! Why, a man's last friends are 
 his God, his mother, and his dog. Would you have me shoot 
 old Faithful ? How could I ? ' 
 
 " At the words ' Shoot old Faithful,' the great dog had 
 started up as though he understood. He bent his large eyes 
 on the old woman and whined, then wheeled around once and 
 sank down at his master's feet. 
 
 " ' He acts as though he understood what you were saying.' 
 
 " * No, he don't,' said the old woman. ' You set too much 
 store by the dog, and imagine such things. He's too old to 
 ever be of service to us any more, and he eats a deal. The 
 storm will be over by morning. Hear the showers of the leaves ! 
 The fall wind is rending the forest. 'Tis seventy falls that we 
 have seen, and we will not see many more. We must live while 
 we do live, and the dog must be put out of the way. You must 
 take Faithful out into the forest in the morning and kill him.' 
 
 " The dog started up again. ' Take Faithful and kill him ! ' 
 He seemed to comprehend. He looked into his master's face 
 and gave a piteous howl, and went to the door and pawed. 
 
 " ' Let him go out,' said the old woman. ' What possesses 
 him to go out to-night into the storm ? But let him go, and
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 45 
 
 then I can talk easier about the matter. Did you see his eyes 
 as if he knew? He haunts me ! Let him go out.' 
 
 " The old man opened the door, and the dog disappeared in 
 the darkness, uttering another piteous howl. 
 
 " Then the old couple sat down and talked over the matter, 
 and Gragstein promised his wife that he would shoot the dog 
 in the morning. 
 
 " ' It is hard,' said the old woman, ' but Providence wills it, 
 and we must.' 
 
 " The wind lulled, and there was heard a wild, pitiful howl 
 far away in the forest. 
 
 " * What is that ? ' asked the old woman, starting. 
 
 " ' It was Faithful.' 
 
 " ' So far away ! ' 
 
 " ' The poor dog acted strange. There it is again, farther 
 away.' 
 
 " The morning came, but the dog did not return. He had 
 never stayed away from the old hut before. The next day he 
 did not come, nor the next. The old couple missed him, and 
 the old man bitterly reproached his wife for what she had ad- 
 vised him to do. 
 
 " Winter came, with pitiless storms and cold, and the old 
 man would go forth to hunt alone, wishing Faithful was with 
 him. 
 
 " ' It is not safe for me to go alone,' said he. ' I wish that 
 the dog would come back.' 
 
 " ' He will never come back,' said the old woman. ' He is 
 dead. I can hear him howl nights, far away on the hill. He 
 haunts me. Every night, when I put out the light, I can hear
 
 46 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 him howl out in the forest. 'Tis my tender heart that troubles 
 me. 'Tis a troubled conscience that makes ghosts.' 
 
 " The old man tottered away with his gun. It was a cold 
 morning after a snow. The old woman watched him from the 
 frosty window as he disappeared, and muttered : 
 
 " * It is hard to be old and poor. God pity us all ! ' 
 
 " Night came, but the old man did not return. The old 
 woman was in great distress, and knew not what to do. She 
 set the candle in the window, and went to the door and called 
 a hundred times, and listened, but no answer came. The silent 
 stars filled the sky, and the moon rose over the snow, but no 
 answer came. 
 
 " The next morning she alarmed the neighbors, and a com- 
 pany gathered to search for Gragstein. The men followed his 
 tracks into the forests, over a cliff, and down to a stream of 
 running water. They came to some thin ice, which had been 
 weakened by the rush of the current, and there the tracks were 
 lost. 
 
 " ' He attempted to cross,' said one, * and fell in. We will 
 find his body in the spring. I pity his poor old wife. What 
 shall we tell her ? What was that ? ' 
 
 " There was heard a pitiful howl on the other side of the 
 stream. 
 
 " ' Look ! ' said another. 
 
 " Just across the stream a great, lean shepherd dog came 
 out of the snow tents of firs. His voice was weak, but he 
 howled pitifully, as though calling the men. 
 
 " ' We must cross the stream ! ' said they all. 
 
 " The men made a bridge by pushing logs and fallen trees
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 47 
 
 across the ice. The dog met them joyfully, and they followed 
 him. 
 
 " Under the tents of firs they found Gragstein, ready to 
 perish with cold and hunger. 
 
 " ' Take me home ! ' said he. ' I can not last long. Take 
 me home, and call home the dog ! ' 
 
 " ' What has happened ? ' asked the men. 
 
 " ' I fell in. I called for help, and the dog came Faith- 
 ful. He rescued me, but I was numb. He lay down on me 
 and warmed me, and kept me alive. Faithful ! Call home the 
 dog!' 
 
 " The men took up the old man and rubbed him, and gave 
 him food. Then they called the dog and gave him food, but 
 he would not eat. 
 
 "They returned as fast as they could to the cottage. 
 Frau Gragstein came out to meet them. The dog saw her 
 and stopped and howled, dived into the forest, and disap- 
 peared. 
 
 " The old man died that night. They buried him in a few 
 days. The old woman was left all alone. The night after the 
 funeral, when she put out the light, she thought that she heard 
 a feeble howl in the still air, and stopped and listened. But 
 she never heard that sound again. The next morning she 
 opened the door and looked out. There, under a bench where 
 his master had often caressed him in the summer evenings of 
 many years, lay the body of old Faithful, dead. He had never 
 ceased to watch the house, and had died true. 'Tis the best 
 thing that we can say of any living creature, man or dog, he 
 was true-hearted.
 
 48 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 " Remember the story. It will make you better. The 
 storm is clearing." 
 
 The cloud had passed over, leaving behind the blue sky of 
 spring. 
 
 " That was an awful good dog to have," said John Hanks. 
 " There are human folks wouldn't 'a' done like that.'" 
 
 " I wouldn't," said one of the men. " But here, I declare, 
 comes the old woman. Been out neighborin', and got caught 
 in the storm, and gone back to Pigeon Creek. We won't have 
 to tell that there story about her and the wig, and Johnnie 
 Kongapod here. She'll tell it to you herself, elder she'll 
 tell it to you herself. She's a master-hand to go to meetin', and 
 sing, and tell stories, she is. Here, elder this is Aunt Olive." 
 
 The same woman that Jasper had met on his way to Pigeon 
 Creek came into the blacksmith's shop, and held her hands over 
 the warm fire. 
 
 " Proper smart rain spring tempest," said she. " Winter 
 has broke, and we shall have steady weather. Found your way, 
 elder, didn't you? Well, I'm glad. It's a mighty poor sign 
 for an elder to lose his way. You took my advice, didn't you? 
 turned to the right and kept straight ahead, and you got 
 there. Well, that's what I tell 'em in conference-meetin's 
 turn to the right and keep straight ahead, and they'll get there ; 
 and then I sing out, and shout, ' I'm bound for the kingdom ! ' 
 Come over and see me, elder. I'm good to everybody except 
 lazy people. Abraham Lincoln, what are you lazing around 
 here for ? And Johnnie Kongapod ! This ain't any place for 
 men in the spring of the year ! I've been neighborin'. I have 
 to do it just to see if folks are doin' as they oughter. There
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 49 
 
 are a great many people who don't do as they oughter in this 
 world. Now I am goin' straight home between the drops." 
 
 The woman hurried away and disappeared under the trees. 
 
 The cloud broke in two dark, billowy masses, and red sun- 
 set, like a sea, spread over the prairie, the light heightening 
 amid glimmerings of pearly rain. 
 
 Jasper went back to Pigeon Creek with Abraham. 
 
 " Isn't that woman a little queer ? " he asked " a little 
 touched in mind, may be ? " 
 
 "She does not like me," said the boy; "though most peo- 
 people like me. I seem to have a bent for study, and father 
 thinks that the time I spend in study is wasted, and Aunt 
 Olive calls me lazy, and so do the Crawfords I don't mean 
 the master. Most people like me, but there are some here that 
 don't think much of me. I am not lazy. I long for learning ! 
 I will have it. I learn everything I can from every one, and 
 I do all I can for every one. She calls me lazy, though I have 
 been good to her. They say I am a lively boy, and I like to be 
 thought well of here, and when I hear such things as that it 
 makes me feel down in the mouth. Do you ever feel down in 
 the mouth ? I do. I wonder what will become of me ? What- 
 ever happens, or folks may say, elder, I mean to make the best 
 of life, and be true to the best that is in me. Something will 
 come of it. Don't you think so, elder?" 
 
 They came to Thomas Lincoln's cabin, and the serene face 
 of Mrs. Lincoln met them at the door. A beautiful evening 
 followed the tempest gust, and the Lincolns and the old 
 Tunker sat down to a humble meal. 
 
 The mild spring evening that followed drew together
 
 50 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 another group of people to the lowly home of Thomas Lin- 
 coln. Among them came Aunt Olive, whose missionary work 
 among her neighbors was as untiring as her tongue. And 
 last among the callers there came stealing into the light of the 
 pine fire, like a shadow, the tall, brown form of Johnnie 
 Kongapod, or Konapod. 
 
 The pioneer story-telling here began again, and ended in 
 an episode that left a strange, mysterious impression, like a 
 prophecy, on nearly every mind. 
 
 " Let me tell you the story of my courtship," said Thomas 
 Lincoln. 
 
 " Thomas ! " said a mild, firm voice. 
 
 " Oh, don't speak in that tone to me," said the backwoods- 
 man to his wife, who had sought to check him. " Sally don't 
 like to hear that story, though I do think it is to her credit, if 
 simple honesty is a thing to be respected. Sally is an honest 
 woman. I don't believe that there is an honester creatur' in 
 all these parts, unless it was that Injun that Johnnie Konga- 
 pod tells about." 
 
 A loud laugh arose, and the dusky figure of Johnnie 
 Kongapod retreated silently back into a deep shadow near the 
 open door. His feelings had been wounded. Young Abraham 
 Lincoln saw the Indian's movement, and he went out and 
 stood in the shadow in silent sympathy. 
 
 "Well, good folks, Sally and I used to know each other 
 before I removed from Kentuck' to Indiany. After my first 
 wife died of the milk-fever I was lonesome-like with two young 
 children, and about as poor as I was lonesome, although I did 
 have a little beforehand. "Well, Sally was a widder, and used
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 51 
 
 to imagine that she must be lonesome, too ; and I thought at 
 last, after that there view of the case had haunted me, that I 
 would just go up to Kentucky and see. Souls kind o' draw 
 each other a long way apart ; it goes in the air. So I hitched 
 up and went, and I found Sally at home, and all alone. 
 
 " ' Sally,' said I, ' do you remember me ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes,' said she, ' I remember you well. You are Tommy 
 Liiiken. What has brought you back to Kentuck' ? ' 
 
 " ' Well, Sally,' said I, ' my wife is dead.' 
 
 " ' Is that so,' said she, all attention. 
 
 " ' Yes ; wife died more than a year ago, and a good wife she 
 was; and I've just come back to look for another.' 
 
 " She sat like a statue, Sally did, and never spoke a word. 
 So I said : 
 
 " ' Do you like me, Sally Johnson ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes, Tommy Linken.' 
 
 " ' You do ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes, Tommy Linken, I like you well enough to marry 
 you, but I could never think of such a thing at least not 
 now.' 
 
 " ' Why ? ' 
 
 " ' Because I'm in debt, and I would never ask a man who 
 had offered to marry me to pay my debts.' 
 
 " ' Let me hear all about it,' said I. 
 
 " She brought me her account-book from the cupboard. 
 Well, good folks, how much do you suppose Sally owed? 
 Twelve dollars ! It was a heap of money for a woman to owe 
 in those days. 
 
 " Well, I put that account-book straight into my pocket and
 
 52 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 run. When I came back, all of her debts were paid. I told 
 her so. 
 
 " ' Will you marry me now ? ' said I. 
 
 " * Yes,' said she. 
 
 " And, good folks all, the next morning at nine o'clock we 
 were married, and we packed up all her things and started on 
 our weddin' tour to Indiany, and here we be now. Now that 
 is what I call an honest woman. Johnnie Kougapod, can you 
 beat that? Come, now, Johnnie Kongapod." 
 
 The Indian still stood in the shadow, with young Abraham 
 beside him. He did not answer. 
 
 " Johnnie is great on telling stories of good Injuns," said 
 Mr. Lincoln, " and we think that kind o' Injuns have about 
 all gone up to the moonlit huntin'-grounds." 
 
 The tall form of the Indian moved into the light of the 
 doorway. His eyes gleamed. 
 
 " Thomas Linken, that story that I told you was true." 
 
 " What ! that an Injun up to Prairie du Chien was con- 
 demned to die, and that he asked to go home and see his family 
 all alone, and promised to return on his honor?" 
 
 " Yes, Thomas Linken." 
 
 " And that they let him go home all alone, and that he 
 spent his night with his family in weepin' and wailin', and re- 
 turned the next mornin' to be shot?" 
 
 " Yes, Thomas Linken." 
 
 " And that they shot him ?" 
 
 " Yes, Thomas Linken." 
 
 " Well, Johnnie, if I could believe that, I could believe any- 
 thing"
 
 THE OLD BLACKSMITH'S SHOP. 53 
 
 " An Injun has honor as well as a white man, Thomas 
 Linken." 
 
 " Who taught it to him ? " 
 
 " His own heart here. The Great Spirit's voice is in every 
 man's heart ; his will is born in all men ; his love and care are 
 over us all. You may laugh at my poetry, but the Great Spirit 
 will do by Johnnie Kongapod as he would have Johnnie 
 Kongapod do by him if Johnnie Kongapod held the heavens. 
 That story was true, and I know it to be true, and the Great 
 Spirit knows it to be true. Johnnie Kongapod is an honest 
 Injun." 
 
 " Then we have two honest folks here," said Aunt Olive. 
 " Three, mebby only Tom Linken owes me a dollar and a half. 
 So, Jasper, you see that you have come to good parts. You'll 
 see some strange things in your travels, way off to Eock Eiver. 
 Likely you'll see the Pictured Eocks on the Mississippi drag- 
 ons there. Who painted 'em ? Or Starved Eock on the Illinois, 
 where a whole tribe died with the water sparklin' under their 
 eyes. But if you ever come across any of the family of that 
 Indian that went home on his honor all alone to see his family, 
 and came back to be shot or hung, you just let us know^ I'd 
 like to adopt one of his boys. That would be something to be- 
 gin a Sunday-school with ! " 
 
 The company burst into another loud laugh. 
 
 Johnnie Kongapod raised his long arm and stood silent. 
 Aunt Olive stepped before him and looked him in the face. 
 The Indian's red face glowed, and he said vehemently : 
 " Woman, that story is true ! " 
 
 Sally Lincoln arose and rested her hand on the Indian's
 
 54: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 shoulder. "Johnny Kongapod, I can believe you Abraham 
 can." 
 
 There was a deep silence in the cabin, broken only by Aunt 
 Olive, who arose indignantly and hurried away, and flung back 
 on the mild air the sharp words " / don't ! " 
 
 The story of the Indian who held honor to be more than 
 life, as related by Johnnie Kongapod, had often been told by 
 the Indians at their camp-fires, and by traveling preachers and 
 missionaries who had faith in Indian character. Among those 
 settlers who held all Indians to be bad it was treated as a joke. 
 Old Jasper asked Johnnie Kongapod many questions about it, 
 and at last laid his hand on the dusky poet's shoulder, and said : 
 
 " My brother, I hope that it is true. I believe it, and I 
 honor you for believing it. It is a good heart that believes 
 what is best in life." 
 
 How strange all this new life seemed to Jasper ! How un- 
 like the old castles and cottages of Germany, and the cities 
 of the Ehine! And yet, for the tall boy by that cabin fire 
 new America had an opportunity that Germany could offer to 
 no peasant's son. Jasper little thought that that boy, so lively, 
 so rude, so anxious to succeed, was an uncrowned king ; yet 
 so it was. 
 
 And the legend ? A true story has a soul, and a peculiar 
 atmosphere and influence. Jasper saw what the Indian's story 
 was, though he had heard it only indirectly and in outline. It 
 haunted him. He carried it with him into his dreams.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 A BOY WITH A HEART. 
 
 [PRING came early to the forests and prairies of 
 southern Indiana. In March the maples began 
 to burn, and the tops of the timber to change, 
 and to take on new hues in the high sun and 
 lengthening days. The birds were on the wing, 
 and the banks of the streams were beginning to look like gar- 
 dens, as indeed Nature's gardens they were. 
 
 The woodland ponds were full of turtles or terrapins, and 
 these began to travel about in the warm spring air. 
 
 There was a great fireplace in Crawford's school, and, as fuel 
 cost nothing, it was, as we have said, well fed with logs, and 
 was kept almost continually glowing. 
 
 It was one of the cruel sports of the boys, at the noonings 
 and recesses of the school, to put coals of fire on the backs of 
 wandering terrapins, and to joke at the struggles of the poor 
 creatures to get to their homes in the ponds. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln from a boy had a tender heart, a horror 
 of cruelty and of everything that would cause any creature 
 pain. He was merciful to every one but the unmerciful, and 
 charitable to every one but the uncharitable, and kind to every- 
 one but the unkind. But his nature made war at once on any 
 5 ()
 
 56 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 one who sought to injure another, and he was especially severe 
 on any one who was so mean and cowardly as to disregard the 
 natural rights of a dumb animal or reptile. He had in this 
 respect the sensitiveness of a Burns. All great natures, as 
 biography everywhere attests, have fine instincts this chivalrous 
 sympathy for the brute creation. 
 
 Lincoln's nature was that of a champion for the right. He 
 was a born knight, and, strangely enough, his first battles in life 
 were in defense of the turtles or terrapins. He was a boy of 
 powerful strength, and he used it roughly to maintain his 
 cause. He is said to have once exclaimed that the turtles were 
 his brothers. 
 
 The early days of spring in the old forests are full of life. 
 The Sun seems to be calling forth his children. The ponds 
 become margined with green, and new creatures everywhere 
 stir the earth and the waters. Life and matter become, as it 
 were, a new creation, and one can believe anything when he 
 sees how many forms life and matter can assume under the 
 mellowing rays of the sun. The clod becomes a flower ; the 
 egg a reptile, fish, or bird. The cunning woodchuck, that looks 
 out of his hole on the awakening earth and blue sky, seems 
 almost to have a sense of the miracle that has been wrought. 
 The boy who throws a stone at him, to drive him back into the 
 earth, seems less sensible of nature than he. It is a pleasing 
 sight to see the little creature, as he stands on his haunches, 
 wondering, and the brain of a young "Webster would naturally 
 seek to let such a groundling have all his right of birth. 
 
 One day, when the blue spring skies were beginning to glow, 
 Abraham went out to play with his companions. It was one
 
 A BOY WITH A HEART. 57 
 
 of his favorite amusements to declaim from a stump. He 
 would sometimes in this way recite long selections from the 
 school Eeader and Speaker. 
 
 He had written a composition at school on the defense of 
 the rights of dumb animals, and there was one piece in the 
 school Eeader in which he must have found a sympathetic 
 chord, and which was probably one of those that he loved to 
 recite. It was written by the sad poet Cowper, and began thus : 
 
 " I would not enter on my list of friends 
 ( Though graced with polished manners and fine sense, 
 Yet wanting sensibility) the man 
 Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm. 
 An inadvertent step may crush the snail, 
 That crawls at evening in the public path ; 
 But he that has humanity, forewarned, 
 Will tread aside, and let the reptile live." 
 
 As Abraham and his companions were playing in the warm 
 sun, one said : 
 
 " Make a speech for us, Abe. Hip, hurrah ! You've only to 
 nibble a pen to make poetry, and only to mount a stump to be 
 a speaker. Now, Abe, speak for the cause of the people, or 
 anybody's cause. Give it to us strong, and we will do the 
 cheering." 
 
 Abraham mounted a stump in the school-grounds, on 
 which he had often declaimed before. He felt something 
 stirring within him, half -fledged wings of his soul, that waited 
 a cause. He would imitate the few preachers and speakers 
 that he had heard even an old Kentucky preacher named 
 Elkins, whom his own mother had loved, and whose teachings 
 the good woman had followed in her short and melancholy life.
 
 58 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 He began his speech, throwing up his long arms, and lifting 
 at proper periods his coon-skin cap. The scholars cheered as 
 he waxed earnest. In the midst of the speech a turtle came 
 creeping into the grounds. 
 
 " Hello ! " said one of the boys, " here's another turtle come 
 to school ! He, too, has seen the need of learning." 
 
 The terrapin crawled along awkwardly toward the house, his 
 head protruding from his shell, and his tail moving to and iro. 
 
 At this point young Abraham grew loud and dramatic. 
 The boys raised a shout, and the girls waved their hoods. 
 
 In the midst of the enthusiasm, one of the boys seized the 
 turtle by the tail and slung it around his head, as an evidence 
 of his delight at the ardor of the speaker. 
 
 " Throw it at him," said one of the scholars. " Johnson 
 once threw a turtle at him, when he was preachin' to his sister, 
 and it set him to runnin' on like a minister." 
 
 Abraham was accustomed to preach to the young members 
 of his family. He would do the preaching, and his sister the 
 weeping ; and he sometimes became so much affected by his own 
 discourses that he would weep with her, and they would have a 
 very " moving service," as such a scene was called. 
 
 The boy swung the turtle over his head again, and at last 
 let go of it in the air, so as to project it toward Abraham. 
 
 The poor reptile fell crushed at the foot of the stump and 
 writhed in pain. 
 
 Abraham ceased to speak. He looked down on the piti- 
 ful sight of suffering, and his heart yearned over the helpless 
 creature, and then his brain became fired, and his eyes flashed 
 with rage.
 
 A BOY WITH A HEART. 59 
 
 " Who did that ? " he exclaimed. " Brute ! coward ! wretch ! " 
 He looked down again, and saw the reptile trying to move away 
 with its broken shell. His anger turned to pity. He began to 
 expostulate against all such heartlessness to the animal world 
 as the scene exhibited before him. The poor turtle again tried 
 to move away, his head just protruding, looking for some way 
 out of the world that would deny him his right to the sunshine 
 and the streams. The young orator saw it all ; his lip curled 
 bitterly, and his words burned. He awakened such a sympathy 
 for the reptile, and such a feeling of resentment against the 
 hand which had ruined this little life, that the offender shrank 
 away from the scene, calling out defiantly : 
 
 " Come away, and let him talk. He's only chicken-hearted." 
 
 The scholars knew that there was no cowardice in the 
 heart of Lincoln. They felt the force of the scene. The boys 
 and girls of Andrew Crawford's school never forgot the pleas 
 that Abraham used to make for the animals and reptiles of 
 the woods and streams. 
 
 Nearly every youth exhibits his leading trait or character- 
 istic in his school-days. 
 
 " The tenor of our whole lives," said an English poet, " is 
 what we make it in the first five years after we become our 
 masters " ; and a wiser than he has said, " The thing that has 
 been is, and God requireth the past." Columbus on the quays 
 of Genoa ; Zinzendorf forming among his little companions the 
 order of the " Grain of Mustard-Seed " ; the poets who " lisped 
 in numbers " ; the boy statesmanship of Cromwell ; and the early 
 aspiration of nearly every great leader of mankind all showed 
 the current of the life-stream, and it is the current alone that
 
 60 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 knows and prophesies the future. When Abraham Lincoln 
 fell, the world uncovered its head. Thrones were sorrowful, 
 and humanity wept. Yet his earliest rostrum was a stump, 
 and his cause the natural rights of the voiceless inhabitants 
 of the woods and streams. The heart that throbbed for hu- 
 manity, and that won the heart of the world, found its first 
 utterance in defense of the principles of the birds'-nest com- 
 mandment. It was a beginning of self-education worthy of the 
 thought of a Pestalozzi. It was a prophecy. 
 
 As the young advocate of the rights and feelings of the 
 dumb creation was ending his fiery discourse, the buttonless 
 Tunker, himself a disciple of Pestalozzi, came into the school- 
 grounds and read the meaning of the scene. Jasper saw the 
 soul of things, and turned always from the outward expressions 
 of life to the inward motive. He read the true character of the 
 boy in buckskin breeches, human heart, and fluent tongue. He 
 sat down on the log step of the school-house in silence, and Mr. 
 Crawford presently came out with a quill pen behind his ear, 
 and sat down beside him. 
 
 " That boy has boen teaching what you and I ought first to 
 teach," said Jasper. 
 
 " What is that?" asked Mr. Crawford. 
 
 " The heart ! What is head-learning worth, if the heart is 
 left uneducated ? As Pestalozzi used to say, The soul is the true 
 end of all education. Religion itself is a failure, without right 
 character." 
 
 " But you wouldn't teach morals as a science, would you ? " 
 
 " I would train the heart to feel, and the soul to love to be 
 just and do right, and make obedience to the moral sense the
 
 A BOY WITH A HEAET. 61 
 
 habit of life. This can best be done at the school age, and I 
 tell you that this is the highest education. A boy who can 
 spell all the words in the spelling-book, and bound all the 
 countries in the world, and repeat all the dates of history, and 
 yet who could have the heart to crush a turtle, has not been 
 properly educated." 
 
 " Then your view is that the end of education is to make a 
 young person do right?" 
 
 " No, my good friend, pardon me if I speak plain. The end 
 of education is not to make young people do right, but to train 
 the young heart to love to do right ; to make right doing the 
 nature and habit of life." 
 
 " How would you begin ? " 
 
 " As that boy has begun. He has made every heart on the 
 ground feel for that broken-shelled turtle. That boy will one 
 day become a leader among men. He has a heart. The head 
 may make friends, but only the heart can hold them. It is the 
 heart-power that serves and rules. The best thing that can be 
 said of any one is, ' He is true-hearted.' I like that boy. He is 
 true-hearted. His first client a turtle, it may not be his last. 
 Train him well. He will honor you some day." 
 
 The boys took the turtle to the pond and left him on the 
 bank. Jasper watched them. He then turned to the back- 
 woods teacher, and said : 
 
 "That, sir, is the result of right education. First teach 
 character ; second, life ; third, books. Let education begin in 
 the heart, and everybody made to feel that right makes might."
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 JASPER COBBLES FOR AUNT OLIVE. HER QUEER STORIES. 
 
 TOT OLIVE EASTMAN had made herself a 
 relative to every one living between the two 
 Pigeon Creeks. She had formed this large ac- 
 quaintance with the pioneers by attending the 
 camp-meetings of the Methodists and the four- 
 
 days' meetings of the Baptists in southern Indiana, and the 
 school-house meetings everywhere. She was a widow, was full 
 of rude energy and benevolence, had a sharp tongue, a kindly 
 heart, and a measure of good sense. But she was " far from 
 perfect," as she used to very humbly acknowledge in the many 
 pioneer meetings that she attended. 
 
 " I make mistakes sometimes," she used to say, " and it is 
 because I am a fallible creatur'." 
 
 She was an always busy woman, and the text of her life was 
 " Work," and her practice was in harmony with her teaching. 
 
 " Work, work, my friends and brethren," she once said in 
 the log school-house meeting. " Work while the day is passin'. 
 We's all children of the clay. To-day we're here smart as 
 pepper-grass, and to-morrer we're gone like the cucumbers of 
 the ground. Up, and be doin' up, and be doin' ! " 
 
 One morning Jasper the Tunker appeared in the clear-
 
 JASPER COBBLES FOR AUNT OLIVE. 63 
 
 ing before her cabin. She stood in the door as he appeared, 
 shading her eyes with one hand and holding a birch broom 
 in the other. The sunset was flooding the swollen creek in the 
 distance, and shimmering in the tops of the ancient trees. 
 Jasper turned to the door. 
 
 "This is a lovely morning," said he. "The heavens are 
 blue above us. I hope that you are well." 
 
 " The top of the morning to you ! You are a stranger that 
 I met the other day, I suppose. I've been hopin' you'd come 
 along and see me. Where do you hail from, anyway? Come 
 in and tell me all about it." 
 
 " I am a German," said Jasper, entering. " I came from 
 Germany to Pennsylvania, and went from there to Ohio, and 
 now I am here, as you see." 
 
 "How far are you goin'? Or are you just goin' to stop 
 with us here ? Southern Injiany is a goodly country. 'Tis 
 all land around here, for millions of miles, and free as the air. 
 Perhaps you'll stop with us." 
 
 " I am going to Hock Island, on the Mississippi River, 
 across the prairie of the Illinois." 
 
 " Who are you now, may it please you ? What's your call- 
 in' ? Tell me all about it, now. I want to know." 
 
 " I am one of the Brethren, as I said. I preach and teach 
 and cobble. I came here now to ask you if you had any shoe- 
 making for me to do." 
 
 " One of the Tunkers a Tunker, one o' them. Don't be- 
 long to no sect, nor nothin', but just preaches to everybody as 
 though everybody was alike, and wanders about everywhere, as 
 if you owned the whole world, like the air. I've seen several
 
 (54. IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 Tuukers in my day. They are becomin' thick in these woods. 
 Well, I believe such as you mean well let's be charitable ; we 
 haven't long to live in this troublesome world. I'm fryin' 
 doughnuts; am just waitin' for the fat to heat. Hope you 
 didn't think that I was wastin' time, standin' there at the 
 door ? I'll give you some doughnuts as soon as the fat is hot 
 fresh ones and good ones, too. I make good doughnuts, just 
 such as Martha used to make in Jerusalem. I've fried dough- 
 nuts for a hundred ministers in my day, and they all say that 
 my doughnuts are good, whatever they may think of me. 
 Come in. I'm proper glad to see ye." 
 
 Jasper sat down in the kitchen of the cabin. The room 
 was large, and had a delightful atmosphere of order and neat- 
 ness. Over the fire swung an immense iron crane, and on the 
 crane were pot-hooks of various sizes, and on one of these hung 
 a kettle of bubbling fat. 
 
 The table was spread with a large dish of dough, a board 
 called a kneading-board, a rolling-pin, and a large sheet of 
 dough which had been rolled into its present form by the roll- 
 ing-pin, which utensil was white with flour. 
 
 " I knew you were comin'," said Aunt Olive. " I dropped 
 my rollin'-pin this mornin' ; it's a sure sign. You said that 
 you are goin' to Rock Island. The Injuns live there, don't 
 they ? What are ye goin' there for ? " 
 
 " Black Hawk has invited me. He has promised to let me 
 have an Indian guide, or runner, who can speak English and 
 interpret. I'm going to teach among the tribes, the Lord will- 
 ing, and I want a guide and an interpreter." 
 
 " Black Hawk ? He was born down in Kaskaskia, the old
 
 JASPER COBBLES FOR AUNT OLIVE. C5 
 
 Jesuit town, 'way back almost a century ago, wasn't lie ? Or 
 was it in the Sac village ? He was a Pottawattomie, I'm told, 
 and then I've heard he wasn't. Now he's chief of the Sacs 
 and Foxes. I saw him once at a camp-meetin'. His face is 
 black as that pot and these hooks and trummels. How he 
 did skeer me ! Do you dare to trust him ? Like enough he'll 
 kill ye, some day. I don't trust no Injuns. Where did 
 you stay last night ? " 
 
 " At Mr. Lincoln's/' 
 
 "Tom Linken's. Pretty poor accommodations you must 
 have had. They're awful poor folks. Mrs. Linken is a nice 
 woman, but Tom he is shiftless, and he's bringin' up that great 
 tall boy Abe to be lazy, too. That boy is good to his mother, 
 but he all runs to books and larnin', just as some turnips all 
 run to tops. You've seen 'em so, haven't ye ? " 
 
 " But the boy has got character, and character is everything 
 in this world." 
 
 " Did you notice anything peculiarsome about him ? His 
 cousin, Dennis Hanks, says there's something peculiarsome 
 about him. I never did." 
 
 " My good woman, do you believe in gifts ? " 
 
 " No, I believe in works. I believe in people whose two fists 
 are full of works. Mine are, like the Marthas of old." 
 
 Aunt Olive rolled up her sleeves, and began to cut the thin 
 layer of dough with a knife into long strips, which she twisted. 
 
 " I'm goin' to make some twisted doughnuts," she said, 
 " seein' you're a preacher and a teacher." 
 
 " I think that young lad Lincoln has some inborn gift, and 
 that he will become a leader among men. It is he who is will-
 
 66 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 ing to serve that rules, and they who deny themselves the most 
 receive the most from Heaven and men. He has sympathetic 
 wisdom. I can see it. There is something peculiar about him. 
 He is true." 
 
 " Oh, don't you talk that way. He's lazy, and he hain't got 
 any calculation, V he'll never amount to shucks, nor nothin'. 
 He's like his father, his head in the air. Somethin' don't come 
 of nothin' in this world ; corn don't grow unless you plant it ; 
 and when you add nothin' to nothin' it just makes nothin'. 
 
 " Well, preacher, you've told me who you are, and now I'll 
 tell ye who I am. But first, let me say, I'll have a pair of shoes. 
 I have my own last. I'll get it for you, and then you can be 
 peggin' away, so as not to lose any time. It is wicked to waste 
 time. ' "Work ' is my motto. That's what time is made for." 
 
 Aunt Olive got her last. The fat was hot by this time 
 " all sizzlin'," as she said. 
 
 " There, preacher, this is the last, and there is the board on 
 which husband used to sew shoes, wax and all. Now I will go 
 to fryin' my doughnuts, and you and I can be workin' away at 
 the same time, and I'll tell ye who I am. Work away work 
 away ! 
 
 " I'm a widder. You married ? A widower ? Well, that 
 ain't nothin' to me. Work away work away ! 
 
 " I came from old Hingham, near Boston. You've heard of 
 Boston ? That was before I was married. Our family came to 
 Ohio first, then we heard that there was better land in Injiany, 
 and we moved on down the Ohio Eiver and came here. There 
 was only one other family in these parts at that time. That 
 was folks by the name of Eastman. They had a likely smart
 
 JASPER COBBLES FOR AUNT OLIVE. 67 
 
 boy by the name of Polk Polk Eastman. He grew up and 
 became lonesome. I grew up and became lonesome, and so we 
 concluded that we'd make a home together here it is and 
 try to cheer each other. Listening be ye ? Yes ? Well, my 
 doughnuts are fryin' splendid. Work away work away ! 
 
 " A curious time we had of it when we went to get married. 
 There was a minister named Penney, who preached in a log 
 church up in Kentuck, and we started one spring mornin', 
 something like this, to get him to marry us. We had but one 
 horse for the journey. I rode on a kind of a second saddle 
 behind Polk, and we started off as happy as prairie plovers. A 
 blue sky was over the timber, and the bushes were all alive with 
 birds, and there were little flowers runnin' everywhere among 
 the new grass and the moss. It seemed as though all the 
 world was for us, and that the Lord was good. I've seen lots of 
 trouble since then. My heart has grown heavy with sorrow. It 
 was then as light as air. Work away ! 
 
 " Well, the minister Penney lived across the Kentuck, and 
 when we came to the river opposite his place the water was so 
 deep that we couldn't ford it. There had been spring freshets. 
 It was an evenin' in April. There was a large moon, and 
 the weather was mild and beautiful. We could see the pine- 
 knots burnin' in Parson Penney's cabin, so that we knew that 
 he was there, but didn't see him. 
 
 " ' What are we to do now ? ' Polk said he. ' We'll have to go 
 home again,' banterin'-like." 
 
 " ' Holler,' said I. ' Blow the horn ! ' We had taken a horn 
 along with us. He gave a piercin' blast, and I shouted out, 
 ' Elder Penney ! Elder Penney ! '
 
 68 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 "The door of the cabin over the river opened, and the 
 elder came out and stood there, mysterious-like, in the light of 
 the fire. 
 
 " ' Who be ye ? ' he called. * Hallo ! What is wanted ? ' 
 
 " ' We're comin' to be married ! ' shouted Polk. ' Comin' to 
 be married married I How shall we get across the river ? ' 
 
 "'The ford's too deep. Can't be done. Who be ye?' 
 shouted the elder. 
 
 " ' I'm Polk Eastman Polk Eastman ! ' shouted Polk. 
 
 "'I'm Olive Pratt Olive Pratt Olive !' shouted I. 
 
 " ' Well, you just stay where you be, and I'll marry you 
 there.' 
 
 " So he began shouting at the top of his voice : 
 
 " ' Do you, Olive Pratt, take that there man, over there on 
 the horse, to be your husband ? Hey ? ' 
 
 " I shouted back, ' Yes, sir ! ' 
 
 " ' Do you, Polk Eastman, take that there woman, over there 
 on the horse, to be your wife ? ' 
 
 " Polk shouted back, ' Yes, elder, that is what I came for ! ' 
 
 " ' Then,' shouted the minister, * join your right hands.' 
 
 " Polk put up his hand over his shoulder, and I took it ; and 
 the horse, seein' his advantage, went to nibblin' young sprouts. 
 The elder then shouted : 
 
 " ' I pronounce you husband and wife. You can go home 
 now, and I'll make a record of it, and my wife shall witness it. 
 Good luck to you ! Let us pray.' 
 
 " Polk hitched up the reins and the horse stood still. How 
 solemn it seemed ! The woods were still and shady. You 
 could hear the water rushing in the timber. The full moon
 
 AUNT OLIVE'S WEDDING.
 
 JASPER COBBLES FOR AUNT OLIVE. QQ 
 
 hung in the clear sky over the river, and seemed to lay on the 
 water like a sparkling boat. I was happy then. On our jour- 
 ney home we were chased by a bear. I don't think that the 
 bear would have hurt us, but the scent of him frightened the 
 horse and made him run like a deer. 
 
 " Well, we portaged a stream at midnight, just as the moon 
 was going down. We made our curtilage here, and here we 
 lived happy until husband died of a fever. I'm a middlin' good 
 woman. I go to all the meetin's round, and wake 'em up. I've 
 got a powerful tongue, and there isn't a lazy bone in my whole 
 body. Work away work away ! That's the way to get along 
 in the world. Peg away ! " 
 
 While Aunt Olive had been relating this odd story, John 
 Hanks, a cousin of the Lincolns, had come quietly to the door, 
 and entered and sat down beside the Tunker. He had come to 
 Indiana from Kentucky when Abraham was fourteen years of 
 age, and he made his home with the Lincolns for four years, 
 when he went to Illinois, and was enthused by the wonders of 
 prairie farming. It was Uncle John who gave to Abraham 
 Lincoln the name of rail- splitter. He loved the boy Lincoln, 
 and led his heart away to the rich prairies of Illinois a few 
 years after the present scenes. 
 
 " He and I," he once said of Abraham, " worked barefooted, 
 grubbed, plowed, mowed, and cradled together. When we 
 returned from the field, he would snatch a piece of corn-bread, 
 sit down on a chair, with his feet elevated, and read. He read 
 constantly." 
 
 This man had heard Aunt Olive Indiana, or " Injiany," 
 he called her relate her marriage experiences many times. He
 
 70 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 was not interested in the old story, but he took a keen delight 
 in observing the curiosity and surprise that such a novel tale 
 awakened in the mind of the Tunker. 
 
 " This is very extraordinary," said the Tunker, " very ex- 
 traordinary. We do not have in Germany any stories like that. 
 I hardly know what my people would say to such a story as 
 that. This is a very extraordinary country very extraor- 
 dinary." 
 
 " I can tell you a wedding story worth two o' that," said 
 Uncle John Hanks. " Why, that ain't nowhere to it. Now, 
 Aunt Injiany, you wait, and set still. I'm goin' to tell the 
 elder about the ' Two TURKEY-CALLS.' " 
 
 The Tunker only said, " This is all very extraordinary." 
 Uncle John crossed his legs and bent forward his long whisk- 
 ers, stretched out one arm, and was about to begin, when Aunt 
 Olive said : 
 
 " You wait, John Hanks you wait I'm goin' to tell the 
 elder that there story myself." 
 
 John Hanks never disputed with Aunt Olive. 
 
 " Well, tell it," said he, and the backwoods woman began : 
 
 "'Tis a master-place to get married out here. There's a 
 great many more men than women in the timber, and the men 
 get lonesome-like, and no man is a whole man without a wife. 
 Men ought not to live alone anywhere. They can not out here. 
 Well, well, the timber is full of wild turkeys, especially in the 
 fall of the year, but they are hard to shoot. The best way to 
 get a shot at a turkey is by a turkey-call. You never heard 
 one, did you ? You are not to blame for bein' ignorant. It is 
 like this"
 
 JASPER COBBLES FOR AUNT OLIVE. 71 
 
 Aunt Indiana put her hands to her mouth like a shell, and 
 blew a low, mysterious whistle. 
 
 " Well, there came a young settler from Kentucky and took 
 up a claim on Pigeon Creek ; and there came a widow from 
 Ohio and took a claim about three miles this side of him, and 
 neither had seen the other. Well, well, one shiny autumn 
 mornin' each of them took in to their heads to go out turkey- 
 huntin', aud curiously enough each started along the creek 
 toward each other. The girl's name was Nancy, and the man's 
 name was Albert. Nancy started down the creek, and Albert 
 up the creek, and each had a right good rifle. 
 
 " Nancy stood still as soon as she found a hollow place in 
 the timber, put up her hand so and made a turkey-call 
 so and listened. 
 
 " Albert heard the call in the hollow timber, though he was 
 almost a mile away, and he put up his hands so and an- 
 swered so. 
 
 " ' A turkey,' said Nancy, said she. ' I wish I had a turkey 
 to cook.' 
 
 " ' A turkey,' said Albert, said he. ' I wish I had some one 
 at home to cook a turkey.' 
 
 " Then each stole along slowly toward the other, through 
 the hollow timber. 
 
 " It was just a lovely mornin'. Jays were callin', and nuts 
 were fallin', and the trees were all yellow and red, and the air 
 put life into you, and made you feel as though you would live 
 forever. 
 
 " Well, they both of them stopped again, Nancy and Albert. 
 Nancy she called so and Albert so. 
 6
 
 72 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " * A turkey, sure,' said Nancy. 
 
 " ' A turkey, sure,' said Albert. 
 
 " Then each went forward a little, and stopped and called 
 again. 
 
 "They were so near each other now that each began to 
 hide behind the thicket, so that neither might scare the 
 turkey. 
 
 " Well, each was scootin' along with head bowed so gun in 
 hand so one wishin' for a husband and one for a wife, and 
 each for a good fat turkey, when what should each hear but a 
 voice in a tree ! It was a very solemn voice, and it said : 
 
 " ' Quit ! ' 
 
 " Each thought there was a scared turkey somewhere, and 
 each became more stealthy and cautious, and there was a long 
 silence. 
 
 " At last Nancy she called again so and Albert he answered 
 her so and each thought there was a turkey within shootin' 
 distance, and each crept along a little nearer each other. 
 
 " At last Nancy saw the bushes stir a few rods in front of 
 her, and raised her gun into position, still hiding in the tangle. 
 Albert discovered a movement in front of him, and he took the 
 same position. 
 
 " Nancy was sure she could see something dark before her, 
 and that it must be the turkey in the tangle. She put her finger 
 on the lock of the gun, when a voice in the air said : 
 
 " ' Quit ! ' 
 
 " ' It's a turkey in the tops of the timber,' thought she, ' and 
 he is watchin' me, and warnin' the other turkey.' 
 
 " Albert, too, was preparin' to shoot in the tangle when the
 
 JASPER COBBLES FOR AUNT OLIVE. 73 
 
 command from the tree-top came. Each thought it would be 
 well to reconnoiter a little, so as to get a better shot. 
 
 " Nancy kneeled down on the moss among the red-berry 
 bushes, and peeked cautiously through an openiu' in the tan- 
 gle. What was that ? 
 
 "A hat? Yes, it was a hat ! 
 
 " Albert he peeked through another openin', and his heart 
 sunk like a stone within him. What was that ? A bonnet ? 
 Yes, it was a bonnet ! 
 
 " Was ever such a thing as that seen before in the timber ? 
 Bears had been seen, and catamounts, and prairie wolves, but a 
 bonnet! He drew back his gun. Just then there came 
 another command from the tree-top : 
 
 " ' Quit ! ' 
 
 " Now, would you believe it ? Well, two guns were dis- 
 charged at that turkey in the tree, and it came tumblin' down, 
 a twenty-pounder, dead as a stone. 
 
 " Nancy run toward it. Albert run towards it. 
 
 " ' It's yourn,' said Nancy. 
 
 " ' It's yourn,' said Albert. 
 
 " Each looked at the other. 
 
 " Nancy looked real pink and pretty, and Albert he looked 
 real noble and handsome-like. 
 
 " ' I'm thinkin',' said Albert, ' it kind o' belongs to both 
 of us.' 
 
 " So I think, too,' said Nancy, said she. ' Come over to my 
 cabin and I'll cook it for ye. I'm an honest girl, I am.' 
 
 " The two went along as chipper as two squirrels. The 
 creek looked really pretty to 'em, and the prairie was all
 
 74: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 a-glitter with frost, and the sky was all pleasant-like, and you 
 know the rest. There, now. They're livin' there yet. Just like 
 poetry wasn't it, now ? " 
 
 "Very extraordinary," said the Tunker, "very! I never 
 read a novel like that. Very extraordinary ! " 
 
 A tall, lank, wiry boy came up to the door. 
 
 " Abe, I do declare ! " said Aunt Olive. " Come in. I'm 
 makin' doughnuts, and you sha'n't have one of them. I make 
 Scriptur' doughnuts, and the Scriptur' says if a man spends 
 his time porin' over books, of which there is no end, neither 
 shall he eat, or somethin' like that now don't it, elder ? But 
 seein' it's you, Abe, and you are a pretty good boy, after all, 
 when people are in trouble, and sick and such, I'll make you 
 an elephant. There ain't any elephants in Injiany." 
 
 Aunt Olive cut a piece of doughnut dough in the shape 
 of a picture-book elephant and tossed it into the fat. It 
 swelled up to enormous proportions, and when she scooped 
 it out with a ladle it was, for a doughnut, an elephant indeed. 
 
 " Now, Abe, there's your elephant. And, elder, here's a 
 whole pan full of twisted doughnuts. You said that you were 
 goin' to meet Black Hawk. Where does he live? Tell us 
 all about him." 
 
 " I will do so, my good woman," said Jasper. " I want you 
 to be interested in my Indian missions. When I come this 
 way again, I shall be likely to bring with me an Indian guide, 
 an uncommon boy, I am told. You shall hear my story."
 
 CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 JASPER GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF HIS VISIT TO BLACK 
 HAWK. AUNT INDIANA'S WIG. 
 
 UNT INDIANA, Jasper, John Hanks, and 
 young Abraham Lincoln sat between the dying 
 logs in the great fireplace and the open door. 
 The company was after a little time increased 
 for Thomas Lincoln came slowly into the clear- 
 ing, and saying, " How-dy?" and " The top of the day to ye 
 all," sat down in the sunshine on the log step ; and soon after 
 came Dennis Hanks and dropped down on a puncheon. 
 
 " I think that you are misled," said Jasper, " when you say 
 that Black Hawk was born at Kaskaskia. If I remember 
 rightly, he said to me : 'I was born in this Sac village. Here I 
 spent my youth ; my fathers' graves are here, and the graves of 
 my children, and here where I was born I wish to die.' Eock 
 Island, as the northern islands, rapids, and bluffs of the Missis- 
 sippi are called, is a very beautiful place. Black Hawk clings 
 to the spot as to his life. ' I love to look down,' he said, ' upon 
 the big rivers, shady groves, and green prairies from the graves 
 of my fathers,' and I do not wonder at this feeling. His blood 
 is the same and his rights are the same as any other king, and 
 he loves Nature and has a heart. 
 
 " It is my calling to teach and preach among the Indians 
 
 (76)
 
 76 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 and new towns of Illinois. This call came to me in Pennsyl- 
 vania. God willed it, and I had no will but to obey. I heard 
 the Voice within, just as I heard it in Germany on the Ehine. 
 TJiere it said, ' Go to America.' In Pennsylvania it said, ' Go 
 to the Illinois.' 
 
 " I went. I have walked all the way, teaching and preach- 
 ing in the log school-houses. I sowed the good seed, and left 
 the harvest to the heavens. Why should I be anxious in regard 
 to the result? I walk by faith, and I know what the result will 
 be in God's good time, without seeking for it. Why should I 
 stop to number the people ? I know. 
 
 " I wanted an Indian guide and interpreter, and the inward 
 Voice told me to go to Black Hawk and secure one from the 
 chief himself. So I went to the bluffs of the Mississippi, and 
 told Black Hawk all my heart, and he let me preach in his 
 lodges, and I made some strong winter shoes for him, and tried 
 to teach the children by signs. So I was fed by the ravens of 
 the air. He had no interpreter or runner such as he would 
 trust to go with me ; but he told me if I would return in the 
 May moon, he would provide me one. He said that it would be 
 a boy by the name of Waubeno, whose father was a noble 
 warrior and had had a strange and mysterious history. The 
 boy was then traveling with an old uncle by the name of Main- 
 Pogue. These names sound strange to German ears : Waubeno 
 and Main-Pogue ! I promised to return in May. I am on my 
 way. 
 
 "If I get the boy Waubeno and the Voice within tells 
 me that I will I intend to travel a circuit, round and round, 
 round and round, teaching and preaching. I can see my circuit
 
 JASPER GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF HIS VISIT. 77 
 
 now in my mind. This is the map of it : From Rock Island to 
 Fort Dearborn (Chicago) ; from Fort Dearborn to the Ohio, 
 which will bring me here again ; and from the Ohio to the 
 Mississippi, and back to Rock Island, and so round and round, 
 round and round. Do you see ? " 
 
 The homely travels of Thomas Lincoln and the limited 
 geography of Andrew Crawford had not prepared Jasper's 
 audience to see even this small circuit very distinctly. Thomas 
 Lincoln, like the dwellers in the Scandinavian valleys, doubt- 
 less believed that there "are people beyond the mountains, 
 also" but he knew little of the world outside of Kentucky and 
 Illinois. Mrs. Eastman was quite intelligent in regard to New 
 England and the Middle States, but the West to her mind was 
 simply land " oceans of it," as she expressed herself " where 
 every one was at liberty to choose without infringm' upon 
 anybody." 
 
 "Don't you ever stop to build up churches?" said Mrs. 
 Eastman to Jasper. 
 
 " No." 
 
 " You just baptize 'em, and let 'em run. That's what I can't 
 understand. I can't get at it. What are you really doin' ? 
 Now, say ? " 
 
 " I am the Voice in the wilderness, preparing the way." 
 
 " No family name ? " 
 
 " No. What have I to do with a name? " 
 
 " No money ? " 
 
 " Only what I earn." 
 
 " That's queerer yet. Well, you are just the man to preach 
 to the uninhabited places of the earth. Tell us more about
 
 78 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 Black Hawk. I want to hear of him, although we all are 
 wastin' a pile of time when we all ought to be to work. Tell us 
 about Black Hawk, and then we'll all up and be doin'. My fire 
 is goin' out now." 
 
 " He's a revengeful critter, that Black Hawk," said Thomas 
 Lincoln, "and you had better be pretty wary of him. You 
 don't know Indians. He's a flint full of fire, so people say that 
 come to the smithy. You look out." 
 
 " He has had his wrongs," said Jasper, " and he has been led 
 by his animal nature to try to avenge them. Had he listened to 
 the higher teachings of the soul, it might have been different. 
 We should teach him." 
 
 " What was it that set him against white folks ? " asked Mrs. 
 Eastman. 
 
 " He told me .the whole story," said Jasper, " and it made 
 my heart bleed for him. He's a child of Nature, and has a 
 great soul, but it needs a teacher. The Indians need teachers. 
 I am sent to teach in the wilderness, and to be fed by the birds 
 of the air. I am sent from over the sea. But listen to the tale 
 of Black Hawk. You complain of your wrongs, don't you ? 
 Why should not he ? 
 
 " Years ago Black Hawk had an old friend whom he dearly 
 loved, for the friendships of Indians are ardent and noble. 
 That friend had a boy, and Black Hawk loved this boy and 
 adopted him as his own, and became as a father to him, and 
 taught him to hunt and to go to war. When Black Hawk 
 joined the British he wished to take this boy with him to Canada ; 
 but his own father said that he needed him to care for him in 
 his old age, to fish and to hunt for him. He said, moreover,
 
 JASPER GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF HIS VISIT. 79 
 
 that he did not like his boy to fight against the Americans, who 
 had always treated him kindly. So Black Hawk left the boy 
 with his old father. 
 
 " On his return to Hock River and the bluffs of the Missis- 
 sippi, after the war on the lakes, and as he was approaching 
 his own town in the sunset, he chanced to notice a column 
 of white smoke curling from a hollow in one of the bluffs. 
 He stepped aside to see what was there. As he looked over 
 the bluff he saw a fire, and an aged Indian sitting alone on a 
 prayer-mat before it, as though humbling himself before the 
 Great Spirit. He went down to the place and found that the 
 man was his old friend. 
 
 " ' How came you here ? ' asked Black Hawk. But, although 
 the old Indian's lip moved, he received no answer. 
 
 " ' What has happened ? ' asked Black Hawk. 
 
 " There was a pitiful look in the old man's eyes, but this 
 was his only reply. The old Indian seemed scarcely alive. 
 Black Hawk brought some water to him. It revived him. His 
 consciousness and memory seemed to return. He looked up. 
 With staring eyes he said, suddenly : 
 
 " ' Thou art Black Hawk ! Black Hawk, Black Hawk, my 
 old friend, he is gone ! ' 
 
 "'Who has gone?' 
 
 " ' The life of my heart is gone, he whom you used to love. 
 Gone, like a maple-leaf. Gone ! Listen, Black Hawk, lis- 
 ten. 
 
 " ' After you went away to fight for the British, I came 
 down the river at the request of the pale-faces to winter there. 
 When I arrived I found that the white people had built a fort
 
 80 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 there. I went to the fort with my son to tell the people that 
 we were friendly." 
 
 " ' The white war-chief received me kindly, and told us that 
 we might hunt on this side of the Mississippi, and that he 
 would protect us. So we made our camp there. We lived 
 happy, and we loved to talk of you, Black Hawk ! 
 
 " ' We were there two moons, when my boy went to hunt 
 one day, unsuspicious of any danger. We thought the white 
 man spoke true. Night came, and he did not return. I could 
 not sleep that night. In the morning I sent out the old woman 
 to the near lodges to give an alarm, and say that my boy must 
 be sought. 
 
 " ' There was a band formed to hunt for him. Snow was 
 on the ground, and they found his tracks my boy's tracks. 
 They followed them, and saw that he had been pursuing a deer 
 to the river. They came upon the deer, which he had killed 
 and left hanging on the branch of a tree. It was as he had 
 left it. 
 
 " ' But here they found the tracks of the white man. The 
 pale-faces had been there, and had taken our boy prisoner. 
 They followed the tracks and they found him. Black Hawk ! 
 he was dead my boy ! The white men had murdered him for 
 killing the deer near the fort; and the land was ours. His 
 face was all shot to pieces. His body was stabbed through and 
 through, and they had torn the hair from his head. They had 
 tied his hands behind him before they murdered him. Black 
 Hawk, my heart is dead. What do the hawks in the sky say ? ' 
 
 " The old Indian fell into a stupor, from which he soon ex- 
 pired. Black Hawk watched over his body during the night,
 
 JASPER GIVES AN ACCOUNT OP HIS VISIT. 81 
 
 and the next day he buried it upon the bluff. It was at that 
 grave that Black Hawk listened to the hawks in the sky, and 
 vowed vengeance against the white people forever, and sum- 
 moned his warriors for slaughter." 
 
 " He's a hard Indian," said Thomas Lincoln. " Don't you 
 trust Black Hawk. You don't know him." 
 
 " Hard ? Yes, but did not your brother Mordecai make the 
 same vow and follow the same course after the murder of your 
 father by the Indians ? A slayer of man is a slayer of man 
 whoever and wherever he may be. May the gospel bring the 
 day when the shedding of human blood will cease ! But the 
 times are still evil. The world waits still for the manifestation 
 of the sons of God ; as of old it waits. I have given all I am to 
 the teaching of the gospel of peace. The Indians need it ; you 
 need it, all of you. You do the same things that the savages 
 do." 
 
 " Just hear him ! " said Aunt Indiana. " Who are you 
 preachin' to, elder ? Callin' us savages ! I'm an exhorter my- 
 self, I'd like to have you know. I could exhort you. Savages ? 
 "We know Indians here better than you do. You wait." 
 
 " Let me tell you a story now," said Thomas Lincoln. 
 
 "Of course you will," said Aunt Indiana. " Thomas Lin- 
 coln never heard a story told without telling another one to 
 match it ; and Abe, here, is just like him. The thing that has 
 been, is, as the Scriptur' says." 
 
 AN ASTONISHED INDIAN. 
 
 " Well," said Thomas Lincoln, " I hain't no faith at all, elder, 
 in Injuns. I once knew of a woman in Kentuck, in my father's
 
 32 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 day, who knew enough for 'em, and the way that she cleared 
 'em out showed an amazin' amount of spirit. "Women was 
 women in Daniel Boone's time, in old Kentuck. The Injuns 
 found 'em up and doin', and they learned to sidle away pretty 
 rapid-like when they met a sun-bonnet. 
 
 " Well, as I was sayin', this was in my father's time. The 
 Injuns were prowlin' about pretty plenty then, and one day 
 one of 'em came, all feathers and paint, and whoops and 
 prancin's, to a house owned by a Mr. Daviess, and found that 
 the man of the house was gone. 
 
 " But the wimmin-folks were at home Mrs. Daviess and 
 the children. Well, the Injun came on like a champion, 
 swingin' his tommyhawk and liftin' his heels high. The only 
 weapon that the good woman had was a bottle of whisky. 
 
 " Well, whisky is a good weapon sometimes there's many 
 a man that has found it a slow gunpowder. Well, this woman, 
 as I was sayin', had her wits about her. What do you think 
 that she did ? 
 
 " Well, she just brought out the whisky-bottle, and held it 
 up before him so. It made his eyes sparkle, you may be sure 
 of that ! 
 
 " * Fire- water,' said she, 'mighty temptin'. 
 
 " * Ugh ! ' said the Indian, all humps and antics and eyes. 
 
 " Ugh ! Did you ever hear an Injun say that ' Ugh ? ' 
 
 " ' Have some ? ' said she. 
 
 " Have some? Of course he did. 
 
 "She got a glass and put it on the table, and then she 
 uncorked the bottle and handed it to him to pour out the 
 whisky. He lost his wits at once.
 
 JASPER GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF HIS VISIT. 83 
 
 " He set down his gun to pour out a dram, all giddy, when 
 Mrs. Daviess seized the shooter and lifted it up quick as a flash 
 and pointed to his head. 
 
 " ' Set that down, or I'll fire ! Set that bottle down ! ' 
 
 " The poor Injun's jaw dropped. He set down the bottle, 
 looked wild, and begged for his life. 
 
 " ' Set still,' said she ; and he looked at the whisky-bottle 
 and then slunk all up in a heap and remained silent as a dead 
 man until Mr. Daviess came home, when he was allowed to 
 crawl away into the forest. He gave one parting look at the 
 bottle, but he never wanted to see a white woman again, I'll be 
 bound." 
 
 " You ridicule the Indian for his love of whisky," said the 
 Tunker, " but who taught him to love it ? Woe unto the world 
 because of offenses." 
 
 " Hello ! " said John Hanks, starting up. " Here comes 
 Johnnie Kongapod again, from the Illinois. I like to see any 
 one from Illinois, even if he is an Indian. I'm goin' there 
 myself some day. I've a great opinion of that there prairie 
 country hain't you, elder ? " 
 
 " Yes, it is a garden of wild flowers that seems as wide as 
 the sky. It can all be turned into green, and it will be some 
 day." 
 
 Aunt Indiana greeted the Indian civilly, and the Tunker 
 held out his hand to him. 
 
 " Elder," said Aunt Indiana, " I must tell you one of my 
 own experiences, now that Johnnie Kongapod has come the 
 one that they bantered me about over to the smithy. Johnnie 
 and I are old friends. I used to be a kind of travelin' preacher
 
 84- IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 myself ; I am now I go to camp-meetin's, and I always do 
 my duty. 
 
 "Well, a few years ago, durin' the Injun troubles, there 
 was goin' to be a camp-meetin' on the Illinois side, and I 
 wanted to go. Now, Johnnie Kongapod is a good Injun, and 
 I arranged with him that he should go with me. 
 
 " You didn't know that I wore a wig, did ye, elder ? No ? 
 Well, most people don't. I have had to wear a wig ever since I 
 had the scarlet fever, when I was a girl. I'm kind o' ashamed 
 to tell of it, I've so much nateral pride, but have to speak of it 
 when I tell this story. 
 
 " Johnnie Kongapod never saw a wig before I showed him 
 mine, and I never showed it to him until I had to. 
 
 " Well, he came over from Illinois, and we started off to- 
 gether to the camp-meetin'. It was a lovely time on the prairies. 
 The grass was all ripe and wavin', and the creeks were all alive 
 with ducks, and there were prairie chickens everywhere. I felt 
 very brisk and chipper. 
 
 " We had two smart horses, and we cantered along. I sang 
 hymns, and sort o' preached to Johnnie, when all at once we 
 saw a shadow on the prairie like a cloud, and who should come 
 ridin' up but three Injuns ! I was terribly frightened. I 
 could see that they were hostile Injuns Sacs, from Black 
 Hawk. One of them swung his tommyhawk in the air, 
 and made signs that he was goin' to scalp me. Johnnie be- 
 gan to beg for me, and I thought that my last hour had 
 come. 
 
 " The Injun wheeled his pony, rode away, then turned and 
 came dashin' towards me, with tommyhawk lifted.
 
 JASPER GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF HIS VISIT. 85 
 
 " ' Me scalp ! ' said he, as he dashed by me. Then he 
 turned his horse and came plungin' towards me again. 
 
 " Elder, what do you think I did ? I snatched off my 
 bonnet and threw it upon the ground. Then I grabbed my wig, 
 held it up in the air, and when the Injun came rushin' by I 
 held it out to him. 
 
 " There it is,' said I. 
 
 " Well would you believe it ? that Injun gave one glance 
 at it, and put spurs to his horse, and he never stopped runnin' 
 till he was out of sight. The two other Injuns took one look 
 at my wig as I held it out in my hand. 
 
 " ' Scalped herself ! ' said one. 
 
 " ' Took her head off ! ' said the other. ' She conjur's ! ' 
 
 " They spurred their horses and flew over the prairie like 
 the wind. And and must I say it? Johnnie Kongapod 
 he ran too ; and so I put on my wig, picked up my sun-bonnet, 
 and turned and came home again. 
 
 " There are some doughnuts, Johnnie Kongapod, if you did 
 desert me. 
 
 " Elder, this is a strange country. And don't you believe any 
 stories about honest Injuns that the law condemns, and that 
 go home to see their families overnight and return again ; you 
 will travel a long way, elder, before you find any people of that 
 kind, Injuns or white folks. I know. I haven't lived fifty 
 years in this troublesome world for nothin'. People who live 
 up in the air, as you do, elder, have to come down. I'm sorry. 
 You mean well ! " 
 
 Johnnie Kongapod arose, lifted his brown arm silently, and, 
 bending his earnest face on Jasper, said :
 
 86 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 " That story is true. You will know. Time tells the truth. 
 Wait!" 
 
 " Eeturn in the morning to be shot ! " said Aunt Olive. 
 " Injuns don't do that way here. When I started for Injiany 
 I was told of a mother-in-law who was so good that all her 
 daughters' husbands asked her to come and live with them. 
 They said she moved to Injiany. Now, I have traveled about 
 this State to all the camp-meetin's, and I never found her 
 anywhere. Stands to reason that no such story as that is true. 
 You'll have to travel a long way, elder, before you find any 
 people of that kind in these parts." 
 
 Whom was Jasper to believe the confident Indian or the 
 pioneers ?
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE EXAMINATION AT CRAWFORD'S SCHOOL. 
 
 XAMIXATION-DAY is an important time in 
 country schools, and it excited more interest 
 seventy years ago than now. Andrew Crawford 
 was always ambitious that this day should do 
 credit to his faithful work, and his pupils 
 caught his inspiration. 
 
 There were great preparations for the examination at Craw- 
 ford's this spring. The appearance of the German school- 
 master in the place who could read Latin was an event. Years 
 after, when the pure gold of fame was no longer a glimmering 
 vision or a current of fate, but a wonderful fact, Abraham 
 Lincoln wrote of such visits as Jasper's in the settlement a 
 curious sentence in an odd hand in an autobiography, which we 
 reproduce here: 
 
 With such a " wizard " as Jasper in the settlement, who 
 
 would certainly attend the examination, it is no wonder that 
 7 (87)
 
 88 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 this special event excited the greatest interest in all the cabins 
 between the two Pigeon Creeks of southern Indiana. 
 
 " May we decorate the school-house ? " asked a girl of Mr. 
 Crawford, before the appointed day. "May we decorate the 
 school-house out of the woods ? " 
 
 " I am chiefly desirous that you should decorate your minds 
 out of the spelling-book," said Mr. Crawford ; " but it is a com- 
 mendable thing to have an eye to beauty, and to desire to pre- 
 sent a good appearance. Yes, you may decorate the house out 
 of the woods." 
 
 The timber was green in places with a vine called creeping 
 Jenney, and laurels whose leaves were almost as green and 
 waxy as those of the Southern magnolia. The creeping 
 Jenney could be entwined with the laurel-leaves in such a way 
 as to form long festoons. The boys and girls spent the morn- 
 ings and recesses for several days in gathering Jenney, and in 
 twining the vines with the laurel and making decorative fes- 
 toons. 
 
 They hung these festoons about the wooden walls of the 
 low building and over the door. Out of the tufts of boxberry 
 leaves and plums they made the word " Welcome," which they 
 hung over the door. They covered the rude chimney with 
 pine-boughs, and in so doing filled the room with a resinous 
 odor. They also covered the roof with boughs of evergreen. 
 
 The spelling-book was not neglected in the preparations of 
 the eventful week. There was to be a spelling-match on the 
 day, and, although it was already felt that Abraham Lincoln 
 would easily win, there was hard study on the part of all. 
 
 One afternoon, after school, in the midst of these heroic
 
 THE EXAMINATION AT CRAWFORD'S SCHOOL. 89 
 
 preparations, a party of the scholars were passing along the 
 path in the timber. A dispute arose between two boys in re- 
 gard to the spelling of a word. 
 
 " I spelled it just as Crawford did," said one. 
 
 " No, you didn't. Crawford spelled it with a i" 
 
 " He spelled it with a y, and that is just the way I spelled 
 it." 
 
 " He didn't, now, I know ! I heard Crawford spell it him- 
 self." 
 
 " He did ! " 
 
 " Do you mean to tell me that I lie ? " 
 
 " You do it don't need telling." 
 
 " I won't be called a liar by anybody. I'll make you ache 
 for that ! " 
 
 " We'll see about that. You may ache yourself before this 
 thing is settled. I've got fists as well as you, and I will not 
 take such words as that from anybody. Come on ! " 
 
 The two backwoods knights rushed toward each other with 
 a wounded sense of honor in their hearts and with uplifted 
 arms. 
 
 Suddenly a form like a giant passed between them. It took 
 one boy under one of its arms and the other under the other, 
 and strode down the timber. 
 
 " He called me a liar," said one of the boys. " I won't stand 
 that from any man." 
 
 " He sassed me," said the other, " and I won't stand any 
 sassin', not while my fists are alive." 
 
 " You wouldn't be called a liar," said the first. 
 
 " Nor take any sassin'," said the second.
 
 90 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 The tall form in blue-jean shirt and leather breeches strode 
 on, with the two boys under its arms. 
 
 " I beg ! " at last said one of the boys. 
 
 " I beg ! " said the other. 
 
 " Then I'll let you go, and we'll all be friends again ! " 
 
 " Yes, Abraham, I'll give in, if he will." 
 
 " I will. Let me go." 
 
 The tall form dropped the two boys, and soon all was peace 
 in the April-like air. 
 
 "Abraham Lincoln will never allow any quarrels in our 
 school," said another boy. " Where he is there has to be peace. 
 It wouldn't be fair for him to use his strength so, only he's 
 always right ; and when strength is right it is all for the best." 
 
 The boy had a rather clear perception of the true principles 
 of human government. A will to do right and the power to 
 enforce it, make nations great as well as character powerful. 
 
 The eventful day came, with bluebirds in the glimmering 
 timber, and a blue sky over all. People came from a distance 
 to attend the examination, and were surprised to find the 
 school-house changed into a green bower. 
 
 The afternoon session had been assigned to receiving com- 
 pany, and the pupils awaited the guests with trembling expec- 
 tation. It was a warm day, and the oiled paper that served for 
 panes of glass in the windows had been pushed aside to admit 
 the air and make an outlook, and the door had been left open. 
 
 i 
 
 The first to arrive was Jasper. The school saw him coming ; 
 but he looked so kindly, benevolent, and patriarchal, that the 
 boys and girls did not stand greatly in awe of him. They 
 seemed to feel instinctively that he was their friend and was
 
 ABRAHAM AS A PEACE-MAKER.
 
 THE EXAMINATION AT CRAWFORD'S SCHOOL. 91 
 
 with them. But a different feeling came over them when 
 'Squire Gentry, of Gentryville, came cantering on a horse that 
 looked like a war-charger. 'Squire Gentry was a great man in 
 those parts, and filled a continental space in their young minds. 
 The faces of all the scholars were turned silently and defer- 
 ently to their books when the 'Squire banged with his whip- 
 handle on the door. Aunt Olive was next seen coming down 
 the timber. She was dressed in a manner to cause solicitude 
 and trepidation. She wore knit mits, had a lofty poke bonnet, 
 and a " checkered " gown gay enough for a valance, and, 
 although it was yet very early spring, she carried a parasol over 
 her head. There was deep interest in the books as her form 
 also darkened the festooned door. 
 
 Then the pupils breathed freer. But only for a moment. 
 Sarah Lincoln, Abraham's sister, looked out of the window, 
 and beheld a sight which she was not slow to communicate. 
 
 " Abe," she whispered, " look there ! " 
 
 " Blue-nose Crawford," whispered the tall boy, " as I live ! " 
 
 In a few moments the school was all eyes and mouths. 
 Blue-nose Crawford bore the reputation of being a very hard 
 taskmaster, and of holding to the view that severe discipline 
 was one of the virtues that wisdom ought to visit upon the 
 youth. He once lent to Abraham Lincoln Weems's " Life of 
 Washington." The boy read it with absorbing interest, but 
 there came a driving storm, and the rain ran in the night 
 through the walls of the log-cabin and wet and warped the 
 cover of the book. Blue-nose Crawford charged young Lincoln 
 seventy-five cents for the damage done to the book. "Abe," 
 as he was called, worked three days, at twenty-five cents a day,
 
 92 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 pulling fodder, to pay the fine. He said, long after this hard 
 incident, that he did his work well, and that, although his feel- 
 ings were injured, he did not leave so much as a strip of fodder 
 in the field. 
 
 " The class in reading may take their places," said Andrew 
 Crawford. 
 
 It was a tall class, and it was provided with leather-covered 
 English Readers. One of the best readers in the class was a 
 Miss Roby, a girl of some fifteen years of age, whom young 
 Lincoln greatly liked, and whom he had once helped at a spell- 
 ing match, by putting his finger on his eye (i) when she had 
 spelled defied with a y. This girl read a selection with real 
 pathos. 
 
 " That gal reads well," said Blue-nose Crawford, or Josiah 
 Crawford, as he should be called. " She ought to keep school. 
 We're goin' to need teachers in Indiana. People are comin' 
 fast." 
 
 Miss Roby colored. She had indeed won a triumph of 
 which every pupil of Spencer County might be proud. 
 
 " Now, Nathaniel, let's hear you read. You're a strappin' 
 feller, and you ought not to be outread by a gal." 
 
 Nathaniel raised his book so as to hide his face, like one 
 near-sighted. He spread his legs apart, and stood like a drum- 
 major awaiting a word of command. 
 
 " You may read Section V in poetry," said Mr. Crawford, 
 the teacher. "Verses supposed to be written by Alexander 
 Selkirk. Speak up loud, and mind your pauses." 
 
 He did. 
 
 " I am monarch of all I survey," he began, in a tone of
 
 THE EXAMINATION AT CRAWFORD'S SCHOOL. 93 
 
 vocal thunder. Then he made a pause, a very long one. Josiah 
 Crawford turned around in great surprise; and Aunt Olive 
 planted the chair in which she had been sitting at a different 
 angle, so that she could scrutinize the reader. 
 
 The monarch of all he surveyed, which in the case of the 
 boy was only one page of the English Reader, was diligently 
 spelling out the next line, which he proceeded to pronounce 
 like one long word with surprising velocity : 
 
 "My-right-there-is-none-to-dispute." 
 
 There was another pause. 
 
 " Hold down your book," said the master. 
 
 " Yes, hold down your book," said Josiah Crawford. " "What 
 do ye cover yer face for ? There's nuthin' to be ashamed of. 
 Now try again." 
 
 Nathaniel lowered the book and revealed the singular strug- 
 gle that was going on in his mind. He had to spell out the 
 words to himself, and in doing so his face was full of the most 
 distressing grimaces. He unconsciously lifted his eyebrows, 
 squinted his eyes, and drew his mouth hither and thither. 
 
 " From the cen-t-e-r, center ; center, all round to the sea, 
 I am lord of the f-o-w-1 aw^-the-brute." 
 
 The last line came to a sudden conclusion, and was followed 
 by a very long pause. 
 
 " Go on," said Andrew Crawford, the master. 
 
 " Yes, go on," said Josiah. " At the rate you're goin' now 
 you won't get through by candle-light." 
 
 Nathaniel lifted his eyebrows and uttered a curiously ex- 
 citing 
 
 "
 
 94- IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " That boy'll have a fit," said Aunt Olive. " Don't let him 
 read any more, for massy sake ! " 
 
 What's that word, master? S-o-l-i-t-u-d-e, so-li- 
 tu-de. So-li-tu-de." 
 
 "0 Solitude, where are the charms?" read Mr. Andrew 
 Crawford, 
 
 " That sages have seen in thy face ? 
 Better dwell in the midst of alarms 
 Than reign in this horrible place." 
 
 Nathaniel followed the master like a race-horse. He went 
 on smoothly until he came to " this horrible place," when his 
 face assumed a startled expression, like one who had met with 
 an apparition. He began to spell out horrible, h-o-r-, hor 
 there's your hor, hor ; r-i-b-, there's your rib, horrib " 
 
 " Don't let that boy read any more," said Aunt Olive. 
 
 Nathaniel dropped his book by his side, and cast a far-away 
 glance into the timber. 
 
 "I guess I ain't much of a reader," he remarked, dryly. 
 
 " Stop, sir ! " said the master. 
 
 Poor Nathaniel ! Once, in attempting to read a Bible story, 
 he read, " And he smote the Hittite that he died" " And he- 
 smote him Hi-ti-ti-ty, that he did," with great emphasis and 
 brief self -congratulation. 
 
 In wonderful contrast to Nathaniel's efforts was the reading 
 in concert by the whole class. Here was shown fine prepara- 
 tion for a forest school. The reading of verses, in which " sound 
 corresponded to the signification," was smoothly, musically, and 
 admirably done, and we give some of these curious exercises 
 here:
 
 THE EXAMINATION AT CRAWFORD'S SCHOOL. 95 
 
 Felling trees in a wood. 
 
 Loud sounds the axe, redoubling strokes on strokes ; 
 On all sides round the forest hurls her oaks 
 Headlong. Deep echoing groan the thickets brown, 
 Then rustling, crackling, crashing, thunder down. 
 
 Sounds of a low-string. 
 
 The string let fly 
 Twanged short and sharp, like the shrill swallow's cry. 
 
 The pheasant. 
 
 See ! from the brake the whirring pheasant springs, 
 And mounts exulting on triumphant wings. 
 
 Scylla and Charybdis. 
 
 Dire Scylla there a scene of horror forms, 
 And here Charybdis fills the deep with storms. 
 When the tide rushes from her rumbling caves, 
 The rough rock roars ; tumultuous boil the waves. 
 
 Boisterous and gentle sounds. 
 
 Two craggy rocks projecting to the main, 
 The roaring winds' tempestuous rage restrain : 
 Within, the waves in softer murmurs glide, 
 And ships secure without their hawsers ride. 
 
 Laborious and impetuous motion. 
 
 With many a weary step, and many a groan, 
 Up the high hill he heaves a huge round stone : 
 The huge round stone resulting with a bound, 
 Thunders impetuous down, and smokes along the ground. 
 
 Regular and slow movement. 
 
 First march the heavy mules securely slow ; 
 O'er hills, o'er dales, o'er crags, o'er rocks they go.
 
 96 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 Motion slow and difficult. 
 
 A needless Alexandrine ends the song, 
 
 That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length along. 
 
 A rock torn from the ~broiu of a mountain. 
 
 Still gath'ring force, it smokes, and urged amain, 
 Whirls, leaps, and thunders down impetuous to the plain. 
 
 Extent and violence of the leaves. 
 
 The waves behind impel the waves before, 
 Wide-rolling, foaming high, and tumbling to the shore. 
 
 Pensive numbers. 
 
 In these deep solitudes and awful cells, 
 Where heav'nly pensive contemplation dwells, 
 And ever-musing melancholy reigns. 
 
 Battle. 
 
 Arms on armor clashing brayed 
 Horrible discord ; and the madding wheels 
 Of brazen fury raged. 
 
 Sound imitating reluctance. 
 
 For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey, 
 
 This pleasing anxious being e'er resigned ; 
 Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, 
 
 Nor cast one longing, ling'ring look behind? 
 
 A spelling exercise followed, in which the pupils spelled for 
 places, or for the head. Abraham Lincoln stood at the head 
 of the class. He was regarded as the hest speller in Spencer 
 County. He is noted to have soon exhausted all that the three 
 teachers whom he found there could teach him. Once, in after 
 years, when he was asked how he came to know so much, he
 
 THE EXAMINATION AT CRAWFORD'S SCHOOL. 97 
 
 answered, " By a willingness to learn of every one who could 
 teach me anything." 
 
 " Abraham," said Master Crawford, "you have maintained 
 your place at the head of the class during the winter. You 
 may take your place now at the foot of the class, and try 
 again." 
 
 The spelling for turns, or for the head, followed the method 
 of the old Webster's " Speller," that was once so popular in 
 country schools : 
 
 ail, to be in trouble. al-tar, a place for offerings. 
 
 ale, malt liquor. al-ter, to change. 
 
 air, the atmosphere. ant, a little insect. 
 
 Tteir, one who inherits. awnt, a sister to a parent. 
 
 all, the whole. ark, a vessel. 
 
 awl, an instrument. arc, part of a circle. 
 
 All went correctly and smoothly, to the delight and satis- 
 faction of Josiah Crawford and Aunt Olive, until the word 
 drachm was reached, when all the class failed except Abraham 
 Lincoln, who easily passed up to the head again. 
 
 The writing-books, or copy-books, were next shown to the 
 visitors. The writing had been done on puncheon-desks 
 with home made ink. Abraham Lincoln's copy-book showed 
 the same characteristic hand that signed the Emancipation 
 Proclamation. In one corner of a certain page he had written 
 an odd bit of verse in which one may read a common ex- 
 perience in the struggles of life after what is better and higher. 
 Emerson said, "A high aim is curative." Poor backwoods 
 Abe seemed to have the same impression, but he did not write 
 it down in an Emersonian way, but in this odd rhyme :
 
 98 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " Abraham Lincoln, 
 
 His hand and pen, 
 He will be good, 
 But God knows when." 
 
 The exercises ended with a grand dialogue translated from 
 Fenelon between Dionysius, Pythias, and Damon, in which 
 fidelity in friendship was commended. After this, each of the 
 visitors, Aunt Olive included, was asked to make a " few re- 
 marks." Aunt Olive's remarks were "few," but to the point: 
 
 " Children, you have read well, and spelled well, and are good 
 arithme^'c&ers, but you ain't sot still. There ! " 
 
 Josiah Crawford thought the progress of the school had 
 been excellent, but that more of the rod had been needed. 
 
 (Where had all the green bushes gone in the clearing, but 
 to purposes of discipline ?) 
 
 Then good Brother Jasper was asked to speak. The 
 " wizard " who could speak Latin arose. The pupils could see 
 his great heart under his face. It shone through. His fine 
 German culture did not lead him away from the solid merits 
 of the forest school. 
 
 " There are purposes in life that we can not see," he began, 
 " but the secret comes to those who listen to the beating of the 
 human heart, and at the doors of heaven. Spirits whisper, as 
 it were. The soul, a great right intention, is here ; and there is 
 a conscience here which is power ; and here, for aught we can 
 say, may be some young Servius Tullius of this wide republic." 
 
 Servius Tullius ? Would any one but he have dreamed that 
 the citizens of Rome would one day delight to honor an 
 ungainly pupil of that forest school ?
 
 THE EXAMINATION AT CRAWFORD'S SCHOOL. 
 
 99 
 
 One day there came to "Washington a present to the Liber- 
 ator of the American Republic. It looked as follows, and bore 
 the following inscription : 
 
 " To Abraham Lincoln, President, for the second time, of the American 
 Republic, citizens of Rome present this stone, from the wall of Servius 
 Tullius, by which the memory of each of those brave assertors of liberty 
 may be associated. Anno 1865." 
 
 It is said that the modest President shrank from receiving 
 such a compliment as that. It was too much. He hid away the 
 stone in a storeroom of the capital, in the basement of the White 
 House. It now constitutes a part of his monument, being one 
 of the most impressive relics in the Memorial Hall of that 
 structure. It is twenty-four hundred years old, and it trav- 
 eled across the world to the prairies of Illinois, a tribute from 
 the first advocate of the rights of the people to the latest de- 
 fender of all that is sacred to the human soul.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE PARABLE PREACHES IN THE WILDERNESS. 
 
 | HE house in which young Abraham Lincoln 
 attended church was simple and curious, as 
 were the old forest Baptist preachers who con- 
 ducted the services there. It was called simply 
 the " meeting-house." It stood in the timber, 
 whose columns and aisles opened around it like a vast cathedral, 
 where the rocks were altars and the birds were choirs. It was 
 built of rude logs, and had hard benches, but the plain people 
 had done more skillful work on this forest sanctuary than on 
 the school-house. The log meeting-house stood near the log 
 school-house, and both revealed the heart of the people who 
 built them. It was the Prussian school-master, trained in the 
 moral education of Pestalozzi, that made the German army vic- 
 torious over France in the late war. And it was the New 
 England school-master that built the great West, and made 
 Plymouth Rock the crown-stone of our own nation. The world 
 owes to humble Pestalozzi what it never could have secured 
 from a Napoleon. It is right ideas that march to the conquest, 
 that lift mankind, and live. 
 
 It had been announced in the school-house that Jasper the 
 Parable would preach in the log church on Sunday. The 
 
 (100)
 
 THE PARABLE PREACHES IN THE WILDERNESS. 101 
 
 school-master called the wandering teacher " Jasper the Par- 
 able," but the visitor became commonly known as the " Old 
 Tunker " in the community. The news flew for miles that " an 
 old Tunker " was to preach. No event had awakened a greater 
 interest since Elder Elkins, from Kentucky, had come to the 
 settlement to preach Xancy Lincoln's funeral sermon under 
 the great trees. On that occasion all the people gathered 
 from the forest homes of the vast region. Every one now 
 was eager to visit the same place in the beautiful spring 
 weather, and to " hear what the old Tunker would have to 
 say." 
 
 Among the preachers who used to speak in the log meeting- 
 house and in Thomas Lincoln's cabin were one Jeremiah Cash, 
 and John Kichardson, and young Lamar. The two latter 
 preachers lived some ten miles distant from the church ; but ten 
 miles was not regarded as a long Sabbath-day journey in those 
 days in Indiana. When the log meeting-house was found too 
 small to hold the people, such preachers would exhort under 
 the trees. There used to be held religious meetings in the 
 cabins, after the manner of the present English cottage prayer- 
 meetings. These used to be appointed to take place at " early 
 candle-lighting," and many of the women who attended used 
 to bring tallow dips with them, and were looked upon as the 
 " wise virgins " who took oil in their lamps. 
 
 It was a lovely Sunday in April. The warm sunlight filled 
 the air and bird-songs the trees. The notes of the lark, the 
 sparrow, and the prairie plover were bells 
 
 " To call me to duty, while birds in the air 
 Sang anthems of praise as I went forth to prayer,"
 
 102 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 as one of the old hymns used to run. The buds on the trees 
 were swelling. There was an odor of walnut and " sassaf rax " 
 in the tides of the sunny air. Cowslips and violets margined 
 the streams, and the sky over all was serene and blue, and 
 bright with the promise of the summer days. 
 
 The people began to gather about the meeting-house at an 
 early hour. The women came first, in corn-field bonnets which 
 were scoop-shaped and flaring in front, and that ran out like 
 horns behind. On these funnel-shaped, cornucopia-like head- 
 gears there might now and then be seen the vanity of a ribbon. 
 The girls carried their shoes in their hands until they came in 
 sight of the meeting-house, when they would sit down on some 
 mossy plat under an old tree, "bein' careful of the snakes," 
 and put them on. All wore linsey-woolsey dresses, of which 
 four or five yards of cloth were an ample pattern for a single 
 garment, as they had no use for any superfluous polonaises in 
 those times. 
 
 Long before the time for the service the log meeting-house 
 was full of women, and the yard full of men and horses. Some 
 of the people had come from twenty miles away. Those who 
 came from the longest distances were the first to arrive as is 
 usual, for in all matters in life promptness is proportioned to 
 exertion. 
 
 "When the Parable came, Thomas Lincoln met him. 
 
 " You can't preach here," said he. " Half the people 
 couldn't hear you. You have a small voice. You don't holler 
 and pound like the rest of 'em, I take it. Suppose you preach 
 out under the trees, where all the people can hear ye. It looks 
 mighty pleasant there. With our old sing-song preachers it
 
 THE PARABLE PREACHES IN THE WILDERNESS. 1Q3 
 
 don't make so much difference. We could hear one of them 
 if you were to shut him up in jail. But with you it is differ- 
 ent. You have been brought up different among those big 
 churches over there. What do you say, preacher ? " 
 
 " I would rather preach under the trees. I love the trees. 
 They are the meeting-house of God." 
 
 " Say, preacher, would you mind goin' over and preachin' 
 at Nancy's grave ? Elder Elkins preached there, and the other 
 travelin' ministers. Seems kind o' holy over there. Nancy 
 was a good woman, and all the people liked her. She was 
 Abraham's mother. The trees around her grave are beau- 
 tiful." 
 
 " I would like to preach there, by that lonely grave in the 
 wilderness." 
 
 " The Tunker will preach at Nancy's grave," said Thomas 
 Lincoln in a loud voice. He led the way to the great cathedral 
 of giant trees, which were clouded with swelling buds and old 
 moss, and a long procession of people followed him there. 
 
 Among them was Aunt Olive, with a corn-field bonnet of 
 immense proportions, and her hymn-book. She was a lively 
 worshiper. At all the meetings she sang, and at the Method- 
 ist meetings she shouted ; and after all religious occasions she 
 " tarried behind," to discuss the sermon with the minister. 
 She usually led the singing. Her favorite hymns were, " Am 
 I a soldier of the Cross," " Come, thou Fount of every bless- 
 ing," and " My Bible leads to glory." The last hymn and 
 tune suited her emotional nature, and she would pitch it upon 
 a high key, and make the woods ring with the curious musical 
 exhortation of the chorus :
 
 104 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN.' 
 
 " Sing on, pray on, 
 Ye followers of Emmanuel." 
 
 At the early candle-meetings at Thomas Lincoln's cabin 
 and other cabins, she sang hymns of a more persuasive charac- 
 ter. These were oddly appropriate to the hard-working, weary, 
 yet hopeful community. One of these began thus : 
 
 " Come, my brethren, let us try, 
 
 For a little season, 
 Every burden to lay by 
 
 Come, and let us reason. 
 What is this that easts you down t 
 
 What is this that grieves you f 
 Speak, and let the worst be known 
 
 Speaking may relieve you." 
 
 The music was weird and in a minor key. It was sung 
 often with a peculiar motion of the body, a forward-and-back- 
 ward movement, with clasped hands and closed eyes. Another 
 of the pioneer hymns began : 
 
 " Brethren, we have met for worship, 
 
 And to adore the Lord our God : 
 Will you pray with all your power, 
 
 While we wait upon the Lord f 
 All is vain unless the Spirit 
 
 Of the Holy One comes down ; 
 Brethren, pray, and heavenly manna 
 
 Will be showered all around. 
 
 " Sisters, will you join and help us t 
 Moses' sister help-ed him," etc. 
 
 The full glory of a spring day in Indiana shone over the 
 vast forests, as the Tunker rose to speak under the great trees. 
 It was like an Easter, and, indeed, the hymn sung at the open-
 
 THE PARABLE PREACHES IN THE WILDERNESS. 105 
 
 ing of the service was much like an Easter hymn. It related 
 
 how 
 
 " On this lovely morning my Saviour was rising, 
 The chains of mortality fully despising ; 
 His sufferings are over, he's done agonizing 
 This morning my Saviour will think upon me" 
 
 The individuality of the last line seemed especially comfort- 
 ing to many of the toiling people, and caused Aunt Olive to 
 uplift her voice in a great shout. 
 
 " Come with me," said Jasper ; " come with me this morn- 
 ing, and we will walk beside the Sea of Galilee together. Gali- 
 lee ! I love to think of Galilee far, far away. The words 
 spoken on the shores of Galilee, and on the mountains over- 
 looking Galilee, are the hope of the world. They are the final 
 words of our all-loving Father to his children. Times may 
 change, but these words will never be exceeded or superseded ; 
 nothing can ever go beyond these teachings of the brotherhood 
 of man, and the way that the heart may find God, and become 
 conscious of the presence of God, and know its immortality, 
 and the everlasting truth. What did the great Teacher say on 
 Galilee?" 
 
 The Parable began to repeat from memory the Sermon on 
 the Mount and the Galilean teachings. The birds came and 
 sang in the trees during the long recitations, and the people 
 sank down on the grass. Once or twice Aunt Olive's corn-field 
 bonnet rose up, and out of it came a shout of " Glory ! " One 
 enthusiastic brother shouted, at one point of the quotations : 
 " That's right, elder ; pitch into 'em, and give it 'em they 
 need it. "We're all sinners here ; a good field to improve upon ! 
 Go on ! "
 
 106 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 It was past high noon when Jasper finished his quotations 
 from the Gospels. He then paused, and said : 
 
 " Do you want to know who I am, and why I am here, and 
 what has sent me forth among the speckled birds of the for- 
 est? I will tell you. A true life has no secrets it needs none ; 
 it is open to all like the revelations of the skies, and the sea, 
 and the heart of Nature what is concealed in the heart is 
 what should not be. 
 
 " I had a teacher. He is living now an old, broken man 
 a name that will sound strange to your ears. He gave up his 
 life to teach the orphans made by the war. He studied with 
 them, learned with them, ate with them ; he saw with their 
 eyes and felt with their hearts. He taught after the school of 
 Nature; as Nature teaches the child within, so he taught, 
 using outward objects. 
 
 " He once said to me : 
 
 " ' For thirty years my life has been a struggle against pov- 
 erty. For thirty years I have had to forego many of the barest 
 necessities of life, and have had to shun the society of my fel- 
 low-men for want of decent clothes. Many and many times I 
 have gone without a dinner, and eaten in bitterness a dry crust 
 of bread on the road, at .a time when even the poorest were 
 seated around a table. All this I have suffered, and am suffer- 
 ing still to-day, and with no other object than to realize my 
 plan for helping the poor.' 
 
 " When I heard him say that, I loved him. It made me 
 ashamed of my selfish life. Then I heard the Dunkards 
 preach, and tell of America over the sea. I began to study the 
 words of the Teacher of Galilee. I, too, longed to teach. My
 
 THE PARABLE PREACHES IN THE WILDERNESS. 107 
 
 wife died, and my two children. Then I said : ' I will live for 
 the soul. That is all that has any lasting worth. I will give 
 up everything for the good of others, and go over the sea, and 
 teach the children of the forest.' I am now on my way to see 
 Black Hawk, who has promised to send out with me an inter- 
 preter and guide. I have given up my will, my property, and 
 my name, and I am happy. Good-by, my friends. I have 
 nothing, and am happy." 
 
 At this point Aunt Olive's corn-field bonnet rose up, and 
 her voice rang out on the air : 
 
 " My brother, I wish you well ! 
 My brother, I wish you well ! 
 When my Lord calls, I hope I shall 
 Be mentioned in the promised land. 
 
 " My sister, I wish you well ! " etc. 
 " Poor sinners, I wish you well ! " etc. 
 
 Galilee! There was one merry, fun-making boy in that 
 sacred place, to whom, according to tradition, that word had a 
 charm. He used to love to mimic the old backwoods preach- 
 ers, and he became very skeptical in matters of Christian faith 
 and doctrine, but he never forgot the teachings of the Teacher 
 of Galilee. In the terrible duties that fell to his lot the prin- 
 ciples of the Galilean teachings came home to his heart, and 
 he came to know in experience what he had not accepted from 
 the mouths of men. He is said to have said, just before his 
 death, which bowed the nation : " When the cares of state are 
 over, I want to go to Galilee," or words of like meaning. The 
 legend is so beautiful that we could wish it to be true.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 AUNT INDIANA'S PROPHECIES. 
 
 ASPER heard the local stories at the smithy and 
 at Aunt Indiana's with intense interest. To 
 him they furnished a study of the character of 
 the people. They were not like stories of beau- 
 tiful spiritual meaning that he had been accus- 
 tomed to hear at Marienthal, at Weimar, and on the Rhine. 
 The tales of Richter, Haupt, Hoffman, and Baron Fouque 
 could never have been created here. These new settlements 
 called for the incident or joke that represented a practical 
 fact, and not the soul-growth of imagination. The one ques- 
 tion of education was. " Can you cipher to the rule of 
 three ? " and of religion, " Have you found the Lord ? " 
 The favorite tales were of Indians, bears, and ghosts, and the 
 rough hardships that overcome life. Jasper heard these tales 
 with a sympathetic heart. 
 
 The true German story is a parable, a word with a soul. 
 Jasper loved them, for the tales of a people are the heart of a 
 people, and express the progress of culture and opinion. 
 
 One day, as Jasper was cobbling at Aunt Olive's, he sought 
 to teach her a lesson of contentment by a German household 
 story. Johnnie Kongapod had come in, and the woman was 
 complaining of her hard and restricted life. 
 
 (108)
 
 AUNT INDIANA'S PROPHECIES. 109 
 
 " Aunt Indiana," said Jasper, " do you have fairies here ? " 
 
 " Never have seen any. We don't spin air here in Amer- 
 ica." 
 
 " We have fairies in Germany. All the children there pass 
 through fairy-land. There once came a fairy to an old couple 
 who were complaining, like you." 
 
 " Like me ? I'm the contentedest woman in these parts. 
 "Tis no harm to wish for what you haven't got." 
 
 " There came a fairy to them, and said : 
 
 " ' You may have three wishes. Wish.' 
 
 " The old couple thought : 
 
 " ' We must be very wise,' said the woman, ' and not make 
 any mistake, since we can only wish three times. I wish I had 
 a pudding.' 
 
 " Immediately there came a pudding upon the table. The 
 poor woman was greatly surprised. 
 
 " ' There, you see what you have done by your foolish 
 wishing ! ' said the man. 
 
 " ' One of our opportunities has gone,' said the woman. ' We 
 have but two chances left. We must be wiser. 1 
 
 "They sat and looked into the fire. The fairy had dis- 
 appeared from the hearth, and there were only embers and 
 ashes there. 
 
 " The man grew angry that his wife had lost one of their 
 opportunities. 
 
 "'Nothin' but a pudding!' said he. 'I wish that that 
 miserable pudding were hung to your nose ! ' 
 
 " The pudding leaped from the table and hung at tho end 
 of the old woman's nose.
 
 HO IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " ' There ! ' said she, * now you see what you have done by 
 your foolish wishing.' 
 
 " The old man sighed. ' "We have but one wish left. "We 
 must now be the wisest people in all the world.' 
 
 " They watched the dying embers, and thought. As they 
 did so, the pudding grew heavy at the end of the old woman's 
 nose. At last she could endure it no longer. 
 
 " ' Oh ! ' she said, ' how I wish that pudding was off again ! ' 
 
 "The pudding disappeared, and the fairy was gone." 
 
 " Tain't true," said Aunt Indiana. 
 
 " Yes," said Jasper, " what is true to life is true. Stories 
 are the alphabet of life." 
 
 Johnnie Kongapod had listened to the tale with delight. 
 Aunt Indiana knew that no fairy would ever appear on her 
 hearth, but Johnnie was not so sure. 
 
 " I've seen 'em," said he. 
 
 " You what ? "What have you seen ? I'd like to know," 
 said Aunt Indiana. 
 
 " Fairies" 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 " When I've been asleep." 
 
 " There never was any fairies in my dreams," said Aunt 
 Indiana. 
 
 No, there were not. The German Tunker and the prairie 
 Indian might see fairies, but the hard-working Yankee pioneer 
 had no faculties for creative fancy. Her fairy was the plow 
 that breaks the ground, or the axe that fells the timber. Yet 
 the German soul-tale seemed to haunt her, and she at last said : 
 
 "I wish that we had more such stories as that. It is
 
 AUNT INDIANA'S PROPHECIES. HI 
 
 pleasant talk. Abe Lincoln tells such things out of the 
 Pilgrim's Progress. He's all imagination, just like you and 
 the Indians. People who don't have much to do run to such 
 things. I suppose that he has read that Pilgrim's Progress 
 over a dozen times." 
 
 " I have observed that the boy had ideals," said Jasper. 
 
 " What's them ? " said Aunt Indiana. 
 
 " People build life out of ideals," said Jasper. " A cathe- 
 dral is an ideal before it is a form. So is a house, a glass 
 everything. He has the creative imagination." 
 
 " Yes that's what I said : always going around with a book 
 in his hand, as though he was walking on the air." 
 
 " His step-mother says that he's one of the best of boys. He 
 does everything that he can for her, and he has never given her 
 an unkind word. He loves his step-mother like an own mother, 
 and he forgets himself for others. These are good signs." 
 
 " Signs signs ! Stop your cobblin', elder, and let me proph- 
 esy ! That boy just takes after his father, and he will never 
 amount to anything in this world or any other. His mother 
 what is dead was a good woman an awful good woman ; 
 but she was sort o' visionary. They say that she used to see 
 things at camp-meetin's, and lose her strength, and have far- 
 away visions. She might have seen fairies. But she was an 
 awful good woman good to everybody, and everybody loved 
 her ; and we were all sorry when she died, and we all love her 
 grave yet. It is queer, but we all seem to love her grave. A 
 sermon goes better when it is preached there under the 
 great trees. Some folks had rather hear a sermon preached 
 there than at the meetin'-house. Some people leave a kind o'
 
 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 influence ; Miss Linken did. The boy means well his heart 
 is all right, like his poor dead mother's was but he hasn't got 
 any head on 'im, like as I have. He hasn't got any calcula- 
 tion. And now, elder, I'm goin' to say it, though I'm sorry to : 
 he'll never amount to shucks ! There, now ! Josiah Crawford 
 says so, too." 
 
 " There is one very strong point about Abraham," said 
 Jasper. " He has a keen sense of what is right, and he is al- 
 ways governed by it. He has faith that right is might. Didn't 
 you ever notice it ? " 
 
 " Yes, I'll do him justice. I never knew him to do a thing 
 that he thought wrong never. He couldn't. He takes after 
 his mother's folks, and they say that there is Quaker blood in 
 the Linkens." 
 
 " But, my good woman, a fool would be wise if he always 
 did right, wouldn't he ? There is no higher wisdom than to 
 always do right. And a boy that has a heart to feel for every 
 one, and a conscience that is true to a sense of right, and that 
 loves learning more than anything else, and studies continu- 
 ally, is likely to find a place in the world. 
 
 " Now, I am going to prophesy. This country is going to 
 need men to lead them, and Abraham Lincoln will one day 
 become a leader among men. He leads now. His heart leads ; 
 his mind leads. I can see it. The world here is going to need 
 men of knowledge, and it will select the man of the most learn- 
 ing who has the most heart, the most sympathy with the 
 people. It will select him. I have a spiritual eye, and I can 
 see." 
 
 " A leader of the people Abe Lincoln ! You have said it
 
 AUNT INDIANA'S PROPHECIES. H3 
 
 now. I would as soon think of Johnnie Kongapod ! A leader 
 of the people! Are you daft? When the prairies leap into 
 corn-fields and the settlements into banks of gold, and men can 
 travel a mile a minute, and clodhoppers become merchants and 
 Congressers, and as rich as Spanish grandees, then Abraham 
 Lincoln may become a leader of the people, but not till then ! 
 No, elder, you are no Samuel, that has come down here among 
 the sons of Jesse to find a shepherd-boy for a king. You ain't 
 no Samuel, and he ain't no shepherd-boy. He all runs to books 
 and legs, and I tell you he ain't got no calculation. Now, I've 
 prophesied and you've prophesied." 
 
 " Time tells the truth about all things," said Jasper. " We 
 shall meet, if I make my circuits, and we will talk of our 
 prophecies in other years, should Providence permit. My soul 
 has set its mark on that boy : wait, and we will see if the voice 
 within me speaks true. It has always spoken true until now." 
 
 At the close of this prophetic dialogue the subject of it 
 appeared at the door. He was a tall boy, with a dark face, 
 homely, ungainly, awkward. He wore a raccoon-skin cap, a 
 linsey-woolsey shirt, and leather breeches, and was barefooted, 
 although the weather was yet cool. He did not look like one 
 who would ever cause the thrones of the world to lean and 
 listen, or who would find in the Emperor of all the Eussias 
 the heart of a brother. 
 
 "Abe," said Aunt Indiana, "the Tunker here has been 
 speakin' well of you, though you don't deserve it. He just 
 says as how you are goin' to be somebody, and make somethin' 
 in the world. I hope you will, though you're a shaky tree to 
 hang hopes on. I ain't got nothin' ag'in ye. He says that
 
 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 you'll become a leader among men. What do you think o' 
 that, Abe? Don't stand there gawkin'. Come in and sit 
 down." 
 
 " It helps one to have some one believe in him," said the 
 tall boy. " One tries to fulfill the good prophecies made about 
 him. I wish I was good. Thank ye, elder, for your good 
 opinion. I wonder if I will ever make anything ? I sometimes 
 think I will. I look over toward mother's grave there, and 
 think I will ; but you can't tell. Crawford the schoolmaster 
 he thinks good of me, but the other Crawford Josiah he's 
 ag'in me. But if we do right, we'll all come out right." 
 
 " Yes, my boy," said Jasper, " have faith that right is might. 
 This is what the Voice and the Being within tells me to preach 
 and to teach. Let us have faith that right is might, and do 
 our duty, and the Spirit of God will give us a new nature, and 
 make us new creatures, and the rebirth of the spiritual life into 
 the eternal kingdom." 
 
 The prairie winds breathed through the trees. A robin 
 came and sang in the timber. 
 
 The four sat thoughtful the Tunker, the Indian, the 
 pioneer woman, and the merry, sad-faced boy. It was a com- 
 mon-place scene in the Indiana timber, and that one lonely 
 grave is all that is left to recall such scenes to-day the grave 
 of the pioneer mother.
 
 CHAPTEE X. 
 THE INDIAN RUNNER. 
 
 HE young May moon was hanging over the 
 Mississippi on the evening when Jasper came 
 to the village of the Sacs and Foxes. This 
 royal town, the head residence of the two 
 tribes, and the ancient burying-ground of the 
 Indian race, was very beautifully situated at the junction of 
 the Eock Eiver with the Mississippi. The Father of Waters, 
 which is in many places turbid and uninteresting, here be- 
 comes a clear and impetuous stream, flowing over beds of rock 
 and gravel, amid high and wooded shores. The rapids the 
 water-ponies of the Indians here come leaping down, surging 
 and foaming, and are checked by monumental islands. The 
 land rises from the river in slopes, like terraces, crowned with 
 hills and patriarchal trees. From these hills the sight is glo- 
 rious. On one hand rolls the mighty river, and on the other 
 stretch vast prairies, flower-carpeted, sun-flooded, a sea of vege- 
 tation, the home of the prairie plover and countless nesters of 
 the bright, warm air. It is a park, whose extent is bounded by 
 hundreds of miles. 
 
 Water-swept and beautiful lies Eock Island, where on a 
 parapet of rock was built Fort Armstrong in the days of the 
 later Indian troubles. 
 
 (115)
 
 116 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 The royal town and burying-ground was a place of remark- 
 - able fertility. The grape-vine tangled the near woods, the wild 
 honeysuckle perfumed the air, and wild plums blossomed white 
 in May and purpled with fruit in summer. If ever an Indian 
 race loved a town, it was this. The Indian mind is poetic. 
 Nature is the book of poetry to his instinct, and here Nature 
 was poetic in all her moods. 
 
 The Indians venerated the graves of their ancestors. Here 
 they kept the graves beautiful, and often carried food to them 
 and left it for the dead. 
 
 The chant at these graves was tender, and shows that the 
 human heart everywhere is the same. It was like this : 
 
 " Where are you, my father f 
 
 Oh, where are you now ? 
 I'm longing to see thee ; 
 I'm wailing for thee. 
 
 (WaU.) 
 
 " Are you happy, my father! 
 
 Are you happy now ? 
 
 I'm longing to see thee ; 
 
 I'm wailing for thee. 
 
 (Wail.) 
 
 " Spring comes to the river. 
 
 But where, then, art thou f 
 I'm longing to see thee ; 
 I'm wailing for thee. 
 
 (Wail.) 
 
 " The flowers come forever ; 
 
 I'll meet thee again ; 
 I'm longing to see thee 
 Time bears me to thee ! " 
 
 (WaU.)
 
 THE INDIAN RUNNER. H7 
 
 As Jasper ascended the high bluffs of the lodge where 
 Black Hawk dwelt, he was followed by a number of Indians 
 who came out of their houses of poles and bark, and greeted 
 him in a kindly way. The dark chief met him at the door of 
 the lodge. 
 
 "You are welcome, my father. The new moon has bent 
 her bow over the waters, and you have come back. You have 
 kept your promise. I have kept mine. There is the boy." 
 
 An Indian boy of lithe and graceful form came out of the 
 lodge, followed by an old man, who was his uncle. The boy's 
 name was Waubeno, and his uncle's was Main-Pogue. The 
 latter had been an Indian runner in Canada, and an interpreter 
 to the English there. He spoke English well. The boy Wau- 
 beno had been his companion in his long journeys, and, now 
 that the interpreter was growing old, remained true to him. 
 The three stood there, looking down on the long mirror of the 
 Mississippi Black Hawk, Main-Pogue, and Waubeno and 
 waiting for Jasper to speak. 
 
 " I have come to bring .you peace," said Jasper " not the 
 silence of the hawk or the bow-string, but peace here." 
 
 He laid his hand on his breast, and all the Indians did the 
 same. 
 
 " I am a man of peace," continued Jasper. " If any one 
 should seek to slay me, I would not do him any harm. I would 
 forgive him, and pray that his blindness might go from his 
 soul, and that he might see a better life. You welcome me, 
 you are true to me, and, whatever may happen, I will be true 
 to your race." 
 
 The black chief bowed, Main-Pogue, and the boy Waubeno.
 
 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " I believe you," said Black Hawk. " Your face says 'yes' 
 to your words. The Indian's heart is always true to a friend. 
 Sit down ; eat, smoke the peace-pipe, and let us talk. Sit 
 down. The sky is clear, and the night-bird cries for joy on 
 her wing. Let us all sit down and talk. The river rolls on 
 forever by the graves of the braves of old. Let us sit down." 
 
 The squaws brought Jaspef some cakes and fish, and Black 
 Hawk lighted some long pipes and gave them to Main-Pogue 
 and Waubeno. 
 
 " I have brought the boy here for you," said Black Hawk. 
 " He comes of the blood of the brave. Let me tell you his 
 story. It will shame the pale-face, but let me tell you the 
 story. You will say that the Indian can be great, like the pale- 
 face, when I tell you his story. It will smite your heart. 
 Listen." 
 
 A silence followed, during which a few puffs of smoke 
 curled into the air from the black chief's pipe. He broke his 
 narrative by such silences, designed to be impressive, and to 
 offer an opportunity for thought on what had been said. 
 
 Strange as it may seem to the reader, the story that fol- 
 lows is substantially true, and yet nothing in classic history or 
 modern heroism can surpass in moral grandeur the tale that 
 Black Hawk was always proud to tell : 
 
 " Father, that is the boy. He knows all the ways from the 
 Great Lakes to the long river, from the great hills to Kaskaskia. 
 You can trust him ; he knows the ways. Main-Pogue knows 
 all the ways. Main-Pogue was a runner for the pale-face. He 
 has taught him the ways. Their hearts are like one heart, 
 Main-Pogue's and Waubeno's.
 
 BLACK HAWK TELLS THE STORY OF WAUBENO.
 
 THE INDIAN RUNNER. 119 
 
 " His father is dead, Waubeno's. Main-Pogue has been a 
 father to him. They would die for each other. Main-Pogue 
 says that Waubeno may run with you, if I say that he may run. 
 I say so, Main-Pogue and Waubeno are true to me. 
 
 " The boy's father is dead, I said. Who was the father of 
 that boy ? Waubeno, stand up." 
 
 The boy arose, like a tall shadow. There was a silence, and 
 Black Hawk puffed his pipe, then laid it beside his blanket. 
 
 " Who was the father of Waubeno ? He was a brave, a 
 warrior. He wore the gray plume, and honor to him was more 
 than life. He would not lie, and they put him to death. He 
 was true as the stars, and they killed him." 
 
 There followed another silence. 
 
 " Father, you teach. You teach the head ; you teach the 
 heart: to live a true life, is the thing to teach the thing 
 you call conscience, soul, those are the right things to teach. 
 What are books to the head, if the soul is not taught to be 
 true ? 
 
 " Father, the father of Waubeno could teach the pale-face. 
 In the head ? No, in the heart ? No, in the soul, which is the 
 true book of the Great Spirit that you call God. You came to 
 us to teach us God. It is good. You are a brother, but God 
 came to us before. He has written the law of right in the soul 
 of every man. The right will find the light. You teach the 
 way you bring the Word of him who died for mankind. It is 
 good. I've got you a runner to run with you. It is good. 
 You help the right to find the light. 
 
 " Father, listen. I am about to speak. Before the great 
 war with the British brother (1812) that boy's father struck 
 9
 
 120 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 down to the earth a pale-face who had done him wrong. The 
 white man died. He who wrongs another does not deserve the 
 sun. He died, and his soul went to the shadows. The Brit- 
 ish took the red warrior prisoner for killing this man who 
 had wronged him. Waubeno was a little one then, when they 
 took his father prisoner. 
 
 " The British told the old warrior that they had condemned 
 him to die. 
 
 " ' I am not afraid to die,' said the warrior. ' Let me go to 
 the Ouisconsin (Wisconsin) and see my family once more, and 
 whisper my last wish in the ear of my boy, and I will return to 
 you and die. I will return at the sunrise.' 
 
 " ' You would never return,' said the commander of the 
 stockade. 
 
 " The warrior strode before him. 
 
 " ' Can a true man lie ? ' 
 
 " The commander looked into his face, and saw his soul. 
 
 " ' Well, go,' said he. * I would like to see an Indian who 
 would come back to die.' 
 
 " The warrior went home, under the stars. He told his 
 squaw all. He had six little children, and he hugged them all. 
 Waubeno was the oldest boy. He told him all, and pressed him 
 to his heart. He whispered in his ear. What was it he said, 
 Waubeno?" 
 
 The shadowy form of the boy swayed in the dim light, as he 
 answered. He said : 
 
 "'Avenge my death! Honor my memory. The Great 
 Spirit will teach you how.' That is what my father said to me, 
 and I felt the beating of his heart."
 
 THE INDIAN RUNNER. 
 
 There was a deep silence. Then Black Hawk said : 
 
 " The warrior looked down on the Ouisconsin under the 
 stars. He looked up to heaven, and cried, ' Lead thou my 
 boy ! ' Then he set his face toward the stockades of Prairie du 
 Chien. 
 
 "He strode across the prairie as the sun was rising; he 
 arrived in time, and Father, listen ! " 
 
 There was another silence, so deep that one might almost 
 hear the puffing smoke as it rose on the air. 
 
 " They shot him I That is his boy, Waubeno." 
 
 Jasper stood silent ; he thought of Johnnie Kongapod's 
 story, and the night-scene at Pigeon Creek. 
 
 " I shall teach him a better way," said Jasper, at last. " I 
 will lead him to honor the memory of his great father in a way 
 that he does not now know. The Great Spirit will guide us 
 both. His father was a great man. I will lead him to become 
 a greater." 
 
 " Father," said the boy, coming forward, " I will always be 
 true to you, but I have sworn by the stars." 
 
 Jasper stood like one in a dream. Could such a tale as 
 this be true among savages? Honor like this only needed the 
 gospel teaching to do great deeds. Jasper saw his opportunity, 
 and his love of mankind never glowed before as it did then. 
 He folded his hands, closed his eyes, and his silent thoughts 
 winged upward to the skies.
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 THE CABIN NEAR CHICAGO. 
 
 AS PER and "Waubeno crossed the prairies to 
 Lake Michigan. It was June, the high tide of 
 the year. The long days poured their sunlight 
 over the seas of flowers. The prairie winds 
 were cool, and the new vegetation was alive 
 with insects and birds. 
 
 The first influence that Jasper tried to exert on Waubeno 
 was to induce him to forego the fixed resolution to avenge his 
 father's death. 
 
 " The first thing in education," he used to say, " is con- 
 science, the second is the heart, and the third is the head." 
 
 He had planned to teach Waubeno while the Indian boy 
 should be teaching him, and he wished to follow his own theory 
 that a new pupil should first learn to be governed by his moral 
 sense. 
 
 " Waubeno," he said, in their long walk over the prairie, 
 " I wish to teach you and make you wise, but before I can 
 do you justice you must make a promise. Will you, Wau- 
 beno?" 
 
 " I will. You would not ask me to do what is wrong." 
 
 " It may be a hard thing, but, Waubeno, I wish you to 
 
 (128)
 
 THE CABIN NEAR CHICAGO. 123 
 
 promise me that you will never seek to avenge your father. 
 Will you, Waubeno ? " 
 
 " Parable, I will promise you any right thing but that. I 
 have made another promise about that thing it must hold." 
 
 " Waubeno, I can not teach you as I would while you carry 
 malice in your heart. The soul does not see clearly that is 
 dark with evil. Do you see ? I wish it for your good." 
 
 " The white man punishes his enemies, does he not ? Why 
 should not I avenge a wrong ? The white fathers at Maiden " 
 (the trade-post on Lake Erie) " avenge every wrong that is 
 done them by the Indians, do they not ? " 
 
 " Christ died for his enemies. He forgave them, dying. 
 You have heard." 
 
 *' Then why do his followers not do the same ? " 
 
 " They do." 
 
 " I have never seen one who did." 
 
 " Not one ? " 
 
 " No, not one." 
 
 " Then they are false to the cross. Waubeno, I love you. 
 I am seeking your good. Trust me. I would make you any 
 promise that I could. Make me this promise, and then we will 
 be brothers. Your vow rises between us like a cloud." 
 
 " Parable, listen. I will promise, on one condition." 
 
 " What, Waubeno ? " 
 
 "You say that right is might, Parable?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " When I find a single white man who defends an Indian to 
 his own hurt because it is right, I will promise. I have known 
 many white men who defended the Indian because they
 
 124: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 thought that it was good for them to do it good for their 
 pockets, good for their church, good for their souls in another 
 world but never one to his own harm, because it was right ; 
 listen, Parable never one to his own harm because it was 
 right. When I meet one such a one I will promise you what 
 you ask. Parable, my folks did right because it was right." 
 
 " Waubeno, I once knew a boy who defended a turtle to his 
 own harm, because it was right. The boys laughed at him, but 
 his soul was true to the turtle." 
 
 " I would like to meet that boy," Waubeno said. " He and 
 I would be brothers. But I have never seen such a boy, Para- 
 ble. I have never seen any man who had the worth of my own 
 father, and, till I do, I shall hold to my vow to him ! God 
 heard that vow, and he shall see that I prove true to a man 
 who died for the truth ! " 
 
 The two came in sight of blue Lake Michigan, where the 
 old Jesuit explorer had had a vision of a great city ; and where 
 Point au Sable, the San Domingo negro, for a time settled, hop- 
 ing to be made an Indian king. Here he found the hospitable 
 roofs of John Kinzie, the pioneer of Chicago, the Eomulus of 
 the great mid-continent city, where storehouses abounded with 
 peltries and furs. 
 
 John Kinzie (the father of the famous John H. Kinzie) 
 was a grand pioneer, like the Pilgrim Fathers of the elder day. 
 He dealt honestly with the Indians, and won the hearts of the 
 several tribes. He settled in Chicago in 1804, at which time a 
 block-house was built by the Government as a frontier house or 
 garrison. This frontier house stood near the present Eush 
 Street Bridge. Mr. Kinzie's house stood on the north side of
 
 THE CABIN NEAR CHICAGO. 125 
 
 the Chicago Eiver, opposite the fort. The storm-beaten block- 
 house was to be seen in Chicago as late as 1857, and the place 
 of Mr. Kinzie's home will ever be held as sacred ground. The 
 frontier house was known as Fort Dearborn. A little settle- 
 ment grew around the fort and the hospitable doors of Mr. 
 Kinzie, until in 1830 it numbered twelve houses. Twelve 
 houses in Chicago in 1830 ! Pass the bridge of sixty years, and 
 lo ! the rival city of the Western world, with its more than a 
 million people more than fulfilling the old missionary's dream ! 
 
 For twenty years John Kinzie was the only white man not 
 connected with the garrison and trading-post who lived in 
 northern Illinois. He was a witness of the Indian massacre of 
 the troops in 1812, when he himself was driven from his home 
 by the lake. 
 
 He saw another and different scene in August, 1821 a 
 scene worthy of a poet or painter the Great Treaty, in which 
 the Indian chiefs gave up most of their empire east of the Mis- 
 sissippi. There came to this decisive convocation the plumes 
 of the Ottawas, Chippewas, and Pottawattamies. General Cass 
 was there, and the old Indian agents. The chiefs brought with 
 them their great warriors, their wives and children. There the 
 prairie Indians made their last stand but one against the 
 march of emigration to the Mississippi. 
 
 Me-te-nay, the young orator of the Pottawattamies, was 
 there, to make a poetic appeal for his race. But the counsels 
 of the white chiefs were too persuasive and powerful. A treaty 
 was concluded, which virtually gave up the Indian empire east 
 of the Mississippi. 
 
 Then the chiefs and the warriors departed, their red plumes
 
 126 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 disappearing over the prairie in the sunset light. Before them 
 rolled the Mississippi. Behind them lay the blue seas of the 
 lakes. It was a sorrowful procession that slowly faded away. 
 Some twelve years after, in August, 1835, another treaty was 
 concluded with the remaining tribes, and there occurred the 
 last dance of the Pottawattamies on the grounds where the 
 city of Chicago now stands. 
 
 Five thousand Indians were present, and nearly one thou- 
 sand joined in the dance. The latter assembled at the council- 
 house, on the place where now is the northeast corner of North 
 Water and Rush Streets, and where the Lake House stands. 
 Their faces were painted in black and vermilion; their hair 
 was gathered in scalp-locks on the tops of their heads, and 
 was decorated with Indian plumes. They were led by drums 
 and rattles. They marched in a dancing movement along the 
 river, and stopped before each house to perform the grotesque 
 figures of their ancient traditions. 
 
 They seemed to be aware that this was their last gathering 
 on the lake. The thought fired them. Says one who saw 
 them : 
 
 " Their eyes were wild and bloodshot. Their muscles stood 
 out in great, hard knots, as if wrought to a tension that must 
 burst them. Their tomahawks and clubs were thrown and 
 brandished in every direction." 
 
 The dance was carried on in a procession through the 
 peaceful streets, and was concluded at Fort Dearborn in 
 presence of the officers and soldiers of the garrison. It was the 
 last great Indian gathering on the lake. 
 
 A new civilization began in the vast empire of the inland
 
 THE CABIN NEAR CHICAGO. 127 
 
 seas with the signing of the Treaty of Chicago and these con- 
 cluding rites. Around the home of pastoral John Kinzie were 
 to gather the new emigrations of the nations of the world, and 
 the Queen City of the Lakes was to rise, and Progress to make 
 the seat of her empire here. Never in the history of mankind 
 did a city leap into life like this, which is now setting on her 
 brow the crown of the Columbus domes. 
 
 On the arrival of Jasper and Waubeno at Fort Dearborn, 
 an incident occurred which affords a picture of the vanished 
 days of the prairie chiefs and kings. There came riding up to 
 the trading-houses a middle-aged chief named Shaubena. 
 
 This chief may be said to have been the guardian spirit of 
 the infant city of Chicago. He hovered around her for her 
 good for a half-century, and was faithful to her interests from 
 the first to the end of his long life. If ever an Indian merited 
 a statue or an imperishable memorial in a great city, it is 
 Shaubena. 
 
 He was born about the year 1775, on the Kankakee River. 
 His home was on a prairie island, as a growth of timber sur- 
 rounded by a prairie used to be called. It was near the head- 
 waters of Big Indian Creek, now in De Kalb County. This 
 grove, or prairie island, still bears his name. 
 
 Here were his corn-fields, his sugar-camps, his lodges, and 
 his happy people. In his youth he had been employed by two 
 Ottawa priests, or prophets, to instruct the people in the 
 principles of their religion, and so he had traveled extensively 
 in the land of the lakes, and spoke English well. The old 
 Methodist circuit-riders used to visit him on his prairie island, 
 and his family was brought under their influence and accepted
 
 IX THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 their faith. When, in 1812, Indian runners from Tecumseh 
 visited the tribal towns of the Illinois Biver to tell the warriors 
 that war had been declared between the United States and 
 England, and to counsel them to unite with the English, 
 Shaubena endeavored to restrain his people from such a course, 
 and to prevent a union of the tribes against the American 
 settlers. When he found that the Indians were marching 
 against Chicago, he followed them on his pony. 
 
 He arrived too late. A scene of blood met his eyes. Along 
 the lake, where the blue waves rolled in the sun, lay forty-two 
 dead bodies, the remains of white soldiers, women, and children. 
 These bodies lay on the prairie for four years, until the rebuild- 
 ing of Fort Dearborn in 1816, with the exception of the muti- 
 lated remains of Captain Wells, which Black Partridge buried. 
 
 John Kinzie and his family had been saved, largely by the 
 influence of Shaubena. Black Partridge summoned his warriors 
 to protect the house. Shaubena rushed up to the porch- steps 
 and set his rifle across the doorway. The rooms were occupied 
 by Mrs. Kinzie, her children, and Mrs. Helm A party of 
 excited Indians rushed upon the place and forced their way 
 into the house, to kill the women. The intended massacre was 
 delayed by the friendly Indians. 
 
 In the mean time a half-breed girl, who had been employed 
 by good John Kinzie, and who was devoted to his family, had 
 stolen across the prairie to Sauganash, or Billy Caldwell, the 
 friendly chief. This warrior seized his canoe and came pad- 
 dling down the waters, plumed with eagle-feathers, with a rifle 
 in his hand. He rose up in his canoe, in the dark, as he came 
 to the shore.
 
 THE CABIN NEAR CHICAGO. 129 
 
 " Who are you ? " asked Black Partridge. 
 
 " I am Sauganash." 
 
 " Then save your white friends. You only can save them." 
 
 The chief came to the house. 
 
 " Go ! " he said to the Indians. " I am Sauganash ! " 
 
 John Kinzie was not only ever after grateful to Sauganash 
 and the half-breed girl for what they had done to save him and 
 his family, but he saw that he had found a faithful heart iu 
 Shaubena. So when, to-day, Shaubena came riding up to his 
 door from his prairie island on his little pony, he said, 
 heartily : 
 
 " Shaubena, thou art welcome ! " 
 
 Jasper and Waubeno joined John Kinzie and the prairie 
 chief. 
 
 " Thou, too art welcome," said John Kinzie. " Whence do 
 you come ? " 
 
 Jasper told again his simple story : how that he was a 
 Tunker, traveling to preach to every one, and to hold schools 
 among the Indians ; how that he had been to Black Hawk for 
 an interpreter and guide, and how Black Hawk had sent out 
 Waubeno as his companion. 
 
 Jasper and Waubeno built a cabin of logs, bark, and bushes, 
 in view of the lake, a little distance above the fort. They spent 
 several days on the rude structure. 
 
 " There are many Indian children who come to the trading- 
 post," said Jasper, " and I may be able to begin here my first 
 Indian school. You will do all you can for me, will you not, 
 Waubeno?" 
 
 " Parable, listen ! You love my people, and I will do all
 
 130 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 that this arm, this heart, and this head can do for you. "What- 
 ever may happen, I will be true to you. If it costs my life, I 
 will be true to you ! You may have my life. Do you not be- 
 lieve Waubeno ? " 
 
 " Yes, I believe you, Waubeno. You hold honor dearer than 
 life. You say that I love your people. You know that I would 
 do right by your people, to my own harm. Then why will you 
 not make to me the promise I sought from you on the prairie ? " 
 
 " I have not seen you tried. We know not any one until he 
 is tried. My father was tried. He was true. I would talk 
 with the boy that was laughed at for defending the turtle. He 
 was tried. He did right because it was right. We will know 
 each other better by and by. But Waubeno will always be true 
 to you while you are true to Waubeno." 
 
 The school opened in the new cabin about the time that the 
 troops were withdrawn from the fort and the place left in the 
 charge of the Indian agent. Waubeno was the teacher, and 
 Jasper his only pupil. After a time Jasper secured a few pupils 
 from the post-trading Indians. But these remained but for a 
 short time. They did not like the confinement of instruction. 
 
 One day a striking event occurred. The Indian agent came 
 to visit the school. He was interested in the Indian boys, and 
 especially in the progress of Waubeno, who was quick to learn. 
 Before leaving, he said : 
 
 " I have a medal in my hand. It was given to me by the 
 general of Michigan. On one side of it is the Father of his 
 Country see him with his sword Washington, the immortal 
 Washington." 
 
 He held up the medal and paused.
 
 THE CABIN NEAE CHICAGO. 131 
 
 " On the other side is an Indian chief. He is burying his 
 hatchet. I was given the medal as a reward, and I will give it 
 at the end of three weeks to the boy in this school who best 
 learns his lessons. Jasper shall decide who it shall be." 
 
 " I am glad you have said that," said Jasper. " That is the 
 education of good-will. I am glad." 
 
 The Indian boys studied well, but Waubeno excelled them 
 all. At the end of three weeks the Indian agent again ap- 
 peared, and Jasper hoped to gain the heart of Waubeno by the 
 award of the medal. 
 
 " To whom shall I give the medal ? " asked the agent, at 
 the end of the visit. 
 
 Jasper looked at his boy. 
 
 " It has been won by Waubeno," said Jasper. " I would be 
 unjust not to say that all have been faithful, but Waubeno has 
 been the most faithful of all." 
 
 Waubeno sat like a statue. He did not lift his eyes. 
 
 " Waubeno," said the agent, " you have heard what your 
 teacher has said. The medal is yours. Here it is. You have 
 reason to be proud of it. Waubeno, arise." 
 
 Waubeno arose. The agent held out the medal to him. 
 
 " Will you let me look at the medal ? " said the boy. 
 
 The medal was handed to him. He examined it. He did 
 not smile, or show any emotion. His look was indifferent and 
 stoical. What was passing in his mind ? 
 
 " The Indian chief is burying his hatchet, in the picture on 
 this side of the medal," he said, slowly. 
 
 " Yes," said the Indian agent, " he is a good chief." 
 
 " The picture on this side represents Washington, you say ? "
 
 132 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " Yes "Washington, the Father of his Country." 
 
 " He has a sword by his side, general, has he not ? See." 
 
 " Yes, "Waubeno, he has a sword by his side." 
 
 " He is a good chief, too? " 
 
 " Yes, Waubeuo." 
 
 " Then why does he not bury his sword? I do not want the 
 medal. What is good for the red chief should be as good for 
 the white chief. I would be unlike my father to take a mean 
 thing like that." 
 
 He stood like a statue, with curled lip and a fiery eye. The 
 agent looked queerly at Jasper. He had nothing more to say. 
 He took back the medal and went away. When he had gone, 
 Waubeno said to Jasper : 
 
 " Pardon, brother ; he is not the man my promise to my 
 father holds. They teach well, but they do not do well : it is 
 the doing that speaks to the heart. The chief that buried his 
 hatchet is a plumb fool, else the white chief would do so too. 
 I have spoken ! " 
 
 He sat down in silence and looked out upon the lake, on 
 which the waves were breaking into foam in the purple dis- 
 tances. His face had an injured look, and his eyes glowed. 
 
 He arose at last and raised his hand, and said : 
 
 " I will pay them all some day ! " 
 
 Then he turned to Jasper and marked his disappointed 
 face, and added : 
 
 " I will be true to you. Waubeno will be true to you."
 
 CHAPTEE XII. 
 THE WHITE INDIAN OF CHICAGO. 
 
 NE morning, as Jasper threw aside the curtain 
 of skins that answered for a door to his cabin, 
 a strange sight met his eyes. In the clearing 
 between the cabin and the lake stood the tall 
 form of an Indian. It was the most noble and 
 beautiful form that he had ever seen, and the Indian's face 
 and hands were white. 
 
 Jasper stood silent. The white Indian bent his eyes upon 
 him, and the two looked in surprise at each other. 
 
 The Indian's eyes were dark, and like the eyes of the native 
 races ; but his nose was Roman, and his skin English, with a 
 slight brown tinge. His hair was long and curly, and tinged 
 with brown. 
 
 " Waubeno," said Jasper, "who is that?" 
 Waubeno came to the entrance of the cabin, and said : 
 " The white Indian. They bring good. Speak to him. It 
 is a good sign." 
 
 " They ? " said Jasper. " I never knew that there were 
 white Indians, Waubeno. Where do they live ? Where do they 
 come from ? " 
 
 " From the Great River. They come and go, and come and 
 
 (133)
 
 134: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 go, and they are unlike other Indians. They know things that 
 other Indians do not know. They have a book that talks to 
 them. It came from heaven." 
 
 Jasper stepped out on to the clearing, and "Waubeno fol- 
 lowed him. The white Indian awaited their approach. 
 
 " "Welcome, stranger," said Jasper. " "Where are you jour- 
 neying from ? " 
 
 "From the Great River (Mississippi) to the land of the 
 lakes. They are coming, coming, my brothers from over the 
 sea, as the prophet said. I have not seen you here before. I 
 am glad that you have come." 
 
 " Where do you live ? " asked Jasper. 
 
 " My tribe is few, and they wander. They wander till the 
 brothers come. We are not like other people here, though all 
 the tribes treat us well and give us food and shelter. We are 
 wanderers. We have lived in the country many years, and we 
 have often visited Kaskaskia. You will hear of us there. When 
 the French came, we thought they were brothers. Then the 
 English came, and we felt that they were brothers. The white 
 people are our brothers." 
 
 " Come in," said Jasper, " and breakfast with us. You are 
 strange to me. I never heard of you. You seem like a visitant 
 from another world. Tell me, my brother, how came you to be 
 white?" 
 
 " I beg your pardon, stranger, but I ask you the same ques- 
 tion, How came you to be white ? The same Power that made 
 your face like the cloud and the snow, made mine the same. 
 There is kindred blood in our veins, but I know not how it is 
 we do not know. Our ancestors had a book that told us of
 
 THE WHITE INDIAN OF CHICAGO. 135 
 
 God, but it was lost when the French raised the cross at Kas- 
 kaskia. We had a legend of the cross, and of armies marching 
 under the cross, and when the bell began to ring over the 
 praise house there, we found that we, too, had ancient tales of 
 the bell. More I can not tell. All the tribes welcome us, and 
 we belong to all the tribes, and we have wandered for years and 
 years. Our fathers wandered." 
 
 " This is all very strange," said Jasper. " Tell us more." 
 
 " I expected your coming," said the white Indian. " I was 
 not surprised to see you here. I expected you. I knew it. 
 There are more white brothers to come many. Let me tell 
 you about it all. 
 
 " We had a prophet once. He said that we came from over 
 the sea, and that we would never return, but that we must 
 wander and wander, and that one day our white brothers would 
 come from over the sea to us. They are coming ; their white 
 wagons are crossing the plains. Every day they are coming. I 
 love to see them come and pass. The prophet spoke true. 
 
 " The French say that we came from a far-away laud called 
 Wales. The French say that a voyager, whose name was 
 Modoc, set sail for the West eight hundred years ago, and was 
 never heard of again in his own land ; that his ships drifted 
 West, and brought our fathers here. That is what the French 
 say. I do not know, but I think that you and I are brothers. 
 I feel it in my heart. You have treated me like a brother, and 
 I kiss you in my heart. I love the English. They are my 
 friends. I am going to Maiden. There will be more white 
 faces here when I come again." 
 
 He took breakfast in the cabin, and went away. Jasper 
 10
 
 136 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 hardly comprehended the visit. He sought the Indian agent, 
 and described to him the appearance of the wandering stranger, 
 and related the story that the man had told. 
 
 " There are white crows, white blackbirds, white squirrels, 
 and white Indians," said the agent, " strange as it may seem. 
 I know nothing about the origin of any of them only that they 
 do exist. Ever since the French and Indians came to the lakes 
 white Indians have been seen. So have white crows and black- 
 birds. The French claim that these white Indians are of Welsh 
 origin, and are the descendants of a body of mariners who were 
 driven to our shores in the twelfth century by some accident of 
 navigation or of weather. If so, the Welsh are the second dis- 
 coverers of America, following the Northmen. But I put no 
 faith in these traditions. I only know that from time to time 
 a white-faced Indian is seen in the Mississippi Valley. There 
 are many tales and traditions of them. It is simply a mystery 
 that will never be solved." 
 
 " But what am I to think of the white Indian's story ? " 
 
 " Simply that he had been taught by the French romancers, 
 and that he believed it himself. Black faces have strangely 
 appeared among white peoples, and Nature alone, could she 
 speak, could explain her laws in these cases. The Indians have 
 various traditions of the white Indian's appearance in the 
 regions about Chicago : they regard him as a medicine-man, or 
 a prophet, or a kind of good ghost. It is thought to be good 
 fortune to meet him." 
 
 " Why does he come here ? " said Jasper. 
 
 " To see the white people. He believes that the white 
 people are his kindred, and that they are coming, 'coming,'
 
 THE WHITE INDIAN OF CHICAGO. 137 
 
 and one day that they will flock here in multitudes. The 
 French have told him this. He is a mythical character. 
 Somehow he has white blood in his veins. I can not tell 
 how. The Welsh tradition may be true, but it is hardly 
 probable." 
 
 Years passed. The white Indian appeared again. The 
 fort had become a town. The Indian races were disappear- 
 ing. He saw the white wagons crossing the prairies, and the 
 reluctant Pottawattomies making their way toward the Great 
 Eiver and the lands of the sunset. He went away, solitary as 
 when he came, and was never seen again. 
 
 Who may have been these mysterious persons whose white 
 faces for generations haunted the lakes and the plains ? They 
 appeared at Kaskaskia, their canoes glided mysteriously along 
 the Mississippi, and they were often seen at the hunting-camps 
 of the North. They sought the French and the English as 
 soon as these races began to make settlements, and they seemed 
 to be strangely familiar with English tones, sounds, and words. 
 
 Jasper loved to look out from his cabin on the blue lake, 
 and to dream of the old scenes of the Prussian war, of Korner, 
 Von Weber, of Pestalozzi, and his friend Froebel, and contrast 
 them with the rude new life around him. The past was there, 
 but the future was here, and here was his work for the future. 
 It is not what a man has that makes him happy, but what he 
 is; not his present state, but the horizon of the future around 
 him that imparts glow to life, and Jasper was at peace with 
 himself in the sense of doing his duty. Heaven to him was 
 bright with the smile of God, and he longed no more for the 
 rose-gardens of Marienthal or the castles of the Ehine.
 
 138 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 The appearance of the white Indian filled the mind of 
 Waubeno with pride and hope. 
 
 " We will be happy now," he said. " You will be happy 
 now ; nothing happens to them who see the white Indian ; all 
 goes well. I know that you are good within, else he would not 
 come ; only they whose beings within are good see the white 
 Indian, and he brings bright suns and moons and calumets of 
 peace, and so the days go on forever. I now know that you 
 speak true. And Waubeno has seen him ; he will do well ; he 
 has seen the white crow among the black crows, and he will do 
 well. Happy moons await Waubeno." 
 
 The lake was glorious in these midsummer days. The 
 prairie roses hung from the old trees in the groves, and the 
 air rang with the joyful notes of the lark and plover. In- 
 dians came to the fort and went away. Pottawattomies en- 
 camped near the place and visited the agency, and white 
 traders occasionally appeared here from Maiden and Fort 
 Wayne. 
 
 But these were uneventful days of Fort Dearborn. The 
 stories of Mrs. John Kinzie are among the most interesting 
 memories of these days of general silence and monotony. The 
 old Kinzie house was situated where is now the junction of 
 Pine and Xorth Water Streets. The grounds sloped toward 
 the banks of the river. It had a broad piazza looking south, 
 and before it lay a green lawn shaded by Lombardy poplars 
 and a cottonwood tree. Across the river rose Fort Dearborn, 
 amid groves of locust trees, the national flag blooming, as it 
 were, above it. 
 
 The cottonwood tree in the yard was planted by John Kin-
 
 THE WHITE INDIAN OF CHICAGO. 139 
 
 zie, and lived until Chicago became a great city, in Long John 
 Wentworth's day. 
 
 The old residents of Chicago will ever recall the beauty of 
 the outlook from the south piazza. At the dull period of the 
 agency, only an Indian canoe, perhaps from Mackinaw, dis- 
 turbed the peace of the river. 
 
 It was on this piazza that on a June morning was heard the 
 chorus of Moore's Canadian Boat Song on the Chicago Eiver, 
 and here General Lewis Cass presently appeared. The great 
 men of the New West often gathered here after that. Here 
 the best stories of the lake used to be told by voyagers, and 
 Mark Beaubien, we may well suppose, often played his violin. 
 
 The scene of the lake and river from the place was changed 
 by moonlight into romance. 
 
 Amid such scenes the old Chief Shaubena related the 
 legends of the tribes, and Mrs. Kinzie the thrilling episodes 
 of the massacre of 1812. Jasper, we may imagine, joined the 
 company, with the beautiful spiritual tales of the Ehine, and 
 Waubeno added his delightful wonder-tale of the white Indian, 
 whose feet brought good fortune. No one then dreamed that 
 John Kinzie's home stood for two millions of people who would 
 come there before the century should close, or that the cool 
 cottonwood tree would throw its shade over some of the grand- 
 est scenes in the march of the world.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA THE STATELY MINUET. 
 
 ASPER made the best use of the story-telling 
 method of influence in his school in the little 
 cabin on the lake near Chicago River. He 
 sought to impart moral ideas by the old Roman 
 fables and German folk-lore stories. He often 
 told the tale of the poor girl who went out for a few drops of 
 water for her dying mother, in the water famine, and how 
 her dipper was changed into silver, gold, and diamonds, as she 
 shared the water with the sufferers on her return. But 
 neither ^Esop nor fairy lore so influenced the Indian boys as 
 his story of the Indiana boy who defended the turtles and 
 pitied the turtle with the broken shell. 
 
 " I would like to meet him," said Waubeno, one day when 
 the story had been told. " What is his name, Parable ? 
 What do you call him by ? " 
 
 " Lincoln," said Jasper, " Abraham Lincoln." 
 " Where does he live, Parable? " 
 " On Pigeon Creek, in Indiana." 
 " Is the place far away ? " 
 
 " Yes, very far away by water, and a hard journey by land. 
 Pigeon Creek is far away, near the Ohio River ; south, Wau- 
 beno far away to the south." 
 
 (140)
 
 LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA THE STATELY MINUET. 
 
 " Will you ever go there again ? " 
 
 " Yes I hope to go there again, and to take you along 
 with me," said Jasper. "I have planned to go down the 
 Illinois in the spring, in a canoe, to the Mississippi, and down 
 the Mississippi to the Ohio, and visit Kaskaskia, and thence 
 along the , Ohio to the Wabash, and to the home where the 
 boy lives who defended the turtles. It will be a long journey, 
 and I expect to stop at many places, and preach and teach 
 and form schools. I want you to go with me and guide my 
 canoe. All these rivers are beautiful in summer. They are 
 shaded by trees, and run through prairies of flowers. The 
 waters are calm, and the skies are bright, and the birds sing 
 continually. Waubeno, this is a beautiful world to those 
 who use it rightly a beautiful, beautiful world ! " 
 
 " Me will go," said Waubeno. " Me would see that boy. I 
 want to see a story boy, as you say." 
 
 The attempt to establish an Indian school on the Chicago 
 was not wholly successful. The pupils did not remain long 
 enough to receive the intended influence. They came from 
 encampments that were never stable. The Indian village was 
 there one season, and gone the next. The Indians who 
 came in canoes to the agency soon went away again. Jasper, 
 in the spring of 1825, resolved to carry out the journey that 
 he had described to Waubeno, and with the first warm winds 
 he and the Indian boy set out for Kaskaskia by the way of 
 the Illinois to the Mississippi, and by the Mississippi to the 
 Kaskaskia. 
 
 It was a long journey. Jasper stopped often at the Indian 
 encampments and the new settlements. Waubeno was a faith-
 
 142 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 ful friend, and he came to love him for true-heartedness, 
 sympathy, and native worth of soul. He often tried to teach 
 him by stories, but as often as he said, " Now, Waubeno, we 
 will talk," he would say, " Tell me the one with broken shell " 
 meaning the story. There was some meaning behind this 
 story of the turtle with the broken shell that had completely 
 won the heart of Waubeno. The boy Abraham Lincoln was 
 his hero. Again and again, after he had listened to the simple 
 narrative, he asked : 
 
 " Is the story boy alive ? " 
 
 " Yes, Waubeno." 
 
 " And we will meet him ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " That is good. I feel for him here," and he would lay his 
 hand on his heart. " I love the story boy." 
 
 They traveled slowly. After a long journey down the 
 Illinois, the Mississippi rolled before them in the full tides 
 of early spring. They passed St. Louis, and one late April 
 evening found them before the once royal town of Kaskaskia. 
 
 The bell was ringing as they landed, the bell that had been 
 cast in fair Eochelle, and that was the first bell to ring be- 
 tween the Alleghanies and the Mississippi. Most of the black- 
 robed missionaries were gone, as had the high-born French 
 officers, with their horses, sabers, and banner-plumes, who once 
 sought treasure and fame in this grand town of the Mississippi 
 Valley. The Bourbon lilies had fallen from old Fort Chartres 
 a generation ago, and the British cross had come down, and 
 to-day all the houses, new and old, were decked with the stars 
 and stripes. It was not a holiday. What did it mean ?
 
 LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA THE STATELY MINUET. 143 
 
 Jasper and "Waubeno entered the old French town, and 
 gazed at the brick buildings, the antique roofs, the high dormer 
 windows, and the faded houses of by-gone priest and nun. The 
 tavern was covered with flags, French and American, as were 
 the grand house of William Morrison and the beautiful Edgar 
 mansion. The house once occupied by the French command- 
 ant was wrapped in the national colors. It had been the first 
 State House of Illinois. A hundred years before just one 
 hundred years Kaskaskia Commons had received its grand 
 name from his most Christian Majesty Louis XV, and it 
 then seemed likely to become the capital of the French mid- 
 continent empire in the New World. The Jesuits flocked 
 here, zealous for the conversion of the Indian races. Here 
 came men of rank and military glory, and Fort Chartres rose 
 near it, grand and powerful as if to awe the world. But 
 there was a foe in the fort of the French heart, and the 
 boundless empire faded, and the old French town went to the 
 American pioneer, and the fort became a ruin, like Louisburg 
 at Cape Breton. 
 
 As Jasper and Waubeno passed along the broad streets they 
 noticed that the town was filled with country people, and that 
 there were Indians among them. 
 
 One of these Indians approached Waubeno, and said : 
 
 " She yonder see Mary Panisciowa daughter of the 
 Great Chief Mary Panisciowa." 
 
 Waubeno followed with his eye the daughter of the Chief 
 of the Six Nations. He went forward with the crowd and 
 came to the house that she was making her home, and asked to 
 meet her. Jasper had followed him.
 
 144: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 They turned aside from the street, which was full of excited 
 people excited Jasper knew not why. The door of the house 
 where Mary Panisciowa was visiting stood open, and they were 
 asked to enter. 
 
 She looked a queen, yet she had the graces of the English 
 and French people. She was a most accomplished woman. 
 She spoke both English and French readily, her education hav- 
 ing been conducted by an American agent to whom she had 
 been commended by her father. 
 
 " This is good news," she said. 
 
 " What ? " said Jasper. " Good news comes from God. Yet 
 all events are news from heaven. The people seem greatly 
 exercised. What has happened ? " 
 
 " Lafayette, the great Lafayette have you not heard ? the 
 marquis he is on his way to Kaskaskia, and that is why I am 
 here. My father fought under him, and the general sent him 
 a letter thanking him for his services in the American cause. 
 It was written forty years ago. I have brought it. I hope to 
 meet him. Would you like to see it? a letter from the great 
 Lafayette." 
 
 Mary Panisciowa took from her bosom a faded letter, and 
 said : 
 
 " My father fought for the new people, and I have taken up 
 their religion and customs. I suppose that you have done the 
 same," she said to Waubeno. 
 
 " No ; that can not be, for me." 
 
 " Why ? I supposed that you were a Christian, as you travel 
 with the Tunker."
 
 LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA THE STATELY MINUET. 145 
 
 " Mary Panisciowa knows how my father died. I am his 
 son. I swore to be true to his name. The Tunker says that I 
 must forswear myself to become a Christian. That I shall 
 never do. I respect the teachings of your new religion, and 
 I love the Tunker and shall always be true to him, but I 
 shall be true to the memory of my father. Mary Paniscio- 
 wa, think how he died, and of the men who killed him. 
 They claimed to be Christians. Think of that ! I am not 
 a Christian. Mary Panisciowa, there is a spot that burns 
 in my heart. I do not dissemble. I do not deceive. But 
 that fire will burn there till I have kept my vow, and I shall 
 do it." 
 
 " Waubeno," said the woman, " listen to better counsels. 
 Revenge only spreads the fires of evil. Forgiveness quenches 
 them. That is a noble letter," she said to Jasper. 
 
 " Yes, a noble letter, and the marquis is an apostle of hu- 
 man liberty, a friend of all men everywhere. What brings him 
 here?" 
 
 " The old French and new English families. His visit is 
 unexpected. The people can not receive him as they ought 
 to, but he is to dine at the tavern, and there are to be two 
 grand receptions at the great houses, one at Mr. Edgar's. I 
 wish I could see him and show him this letter. I shall try. 
 But they have not invited me. They are proud people, and 
 they will not invite me ; but I shall try to see him. It would 
 be the happiest hour of my life if I could take the hand of the 
 great Lafayette." 
 
 Mary Panisciowa was thrilled with her desire to meet Gen- 
 eral Lafayette.
 
 146 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 Cannons boomed, drums and fifes played, and all the people 
 hurried toward the landing. The marquis came in the steamer 
 Natchez from St. Louis. When Mary Panisciowa heard the old 
 bell ringing she knew that the marquis was coming, and she 
 hid the faded old letter in her bosom and wept. She sent a 
 messenger to the tavern, who asked Lafayette if he would 
 meet the daughter of Panisciowa, and receive a message from 
 her. 
 
 Just at night she looked out of the door, and saw an officer 
 in uniform and a party of her own people coming toward the 
 house. The officer appeared before the door, touched his head 
 and bowed, and said : 
 
 " Mary Panisciowa, I am told." 
 
 " My father was Panisciowa." 
 
 " He fought under General Lafayette ? " 
 
 " Yes, he fought under Lafayette, and I have a letter from 
 the general here, written to him more than forty years ago. 
 Will you read it?" 
 
 The officer took the letter, read it, and said : 
 
 " You should meet the general." 
 
 " You are very kind, sir." I want to meet him ; but how ? 
 There is to be a reception at the Morrisons, but I am not in- 
 vited. The Governor is to be there. But they would not in- 
 vite me." 
 
 " Come to the reception at the Morrisons. I will be re- 
 sponsible. The marquis will welcome you. He is a gentleman. 
 To say that a man is a gentleman, is to cover all right conduct. 
 Bring your letter, and he will receive you. I will speak to 
 Governor Coles about you. You will come ? "
 
 LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA THE STATELY MINUET. 
 
 " May my friend Waubeno come with me ? I am the 
 daughter of a chief, and he is the son of a warrior. It would 
 be befitting that we should come together. I wish that he 
 might see the great Lafayette." 
 
 " As you like," said the officer, hurrying away with uncov- 
 ered head. 
 
 Mary Panisciowa prepared to go to the grand reception. 
 Early in the evening she and Waubeno, followed by Jasper, 
 came up to the Morrison mansion, where a kind of court recep- 
 tion was to be held. 
 
 The streets were full of people. The houses were every- 
 where illuminated, and people were hurrying to and fro, or 
 listening to the music in the hall. 
 
 Lafayette was now nearly threescore and ten years of age, 
 the beloved hero of France and America, and the leader of 
 human liberty in all lands. He had left Havre on July 12th, 
 1824, and had arrived in New York on the 15th of August. 
 He was accompanied by his son, George Washington Lafayette, 
 and his private secretary, M. Levasseur. His passage through 
 the country had been a triumphal procession, under continuous 
 arches of flags, evergreens, and flowers, bearing the words, 
 " Welcome, Lafayette." Forty years had passed since he was 
 last in America. The thirteen States had become twenty- 
 four. He had visited Joseph Bonaparte, the grave of Wash- 
 ington, and the battle-field of Yorktown. His reception in 
 the South had been an outpouring of hearts. And now he 
 had turned aside from the great Mississippi to see Kaskaskia, 
 the romantic town of the vanished French empire of the Miss- 
 issippi.
 
 14:8 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 Mary and Waubeno waited outside of the door. The 
 Indian woman listened for a time to the gay music, and 
 watched the bright uniforms as they passed to and fro under 
 the glittering astrals. At last an American officer came down 
 the steps, lifted his hat, and said to the two Indians and to 
 Jasper : 
 
 " Follow me." 
 
 Lafayette had already received the public men of the place. 
 Airy music arose, and the officials and their wives and guests 
 were going through the form of the old court minuet. 
 
 The music of Mozart's Don Giovanni minuet has been 
 heard in a thousand halls of state and at the festivals of many 
 lands. We may imagine the charm that such music had here, 
 in this oaken room of the forest and prairie. At the head of 
 the plumed ladies and men in glittering uniforms stood the 
 Marquis of France, whom the world delighted to honor, and led 
 the stately obeisances to the picturesque movement of the music 
 under the flags and astrals. A remnant of the old romantic 
 French families were there, soldiers of the Revolution, the 
 leaders of the new order of American life, Governor Coles and 
 his officers, and rich traders of St. Louis. As the music swayed 
 these stately forms backward and forward with the fascinating 
 poetry of motion that can hardly be called a dance, the two In- 
 dian faces caught the spirit of the scene. "Waubeno had never 
 heard the music of the minuet before, and the strains entranced 
 him as they rose and fell.
 
 LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA THE STATELY MINUET. 149 
 
 Allegretto. 
 
 iHinttet from UJon (Bnotmnni. 
 
 BY MOZART. ARR. BY CARL ERICH. 
 Published by the permission of Arthur P. Schmidt. 
 
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 Copyright, 1880, by Carl Prflfer.
 
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 LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA THE STATELY MINUET. 153 
 
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 After the minuet, Lafayette and Governor Coles received 
 the towns-people, and among the first to be presented to the 
 marquis was Mary Panisciowa. 
 
 She bowed modestly, and told him her simple tale. The 
 marquis listened at first with courtly interest, then with pro- 
 found emotion. She drew from her bosom the letter that he 
 had written to her father, the chief. His own writing brought 
 before him the scenes of almost a half-century gone, the 
 struggle for liberty in the new land to which he had given his 
 young soul. He remembered the old chief, and the forest 
 scenes of those heroic years ; Washington, and the generals he 
 had loved, most of whom were gone, arose again. His heart 
 filled with emotion, and he said : 
 
 "Nothing in my visit here has affected me so much as
 
 154 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 this. I thank you for seeking me. I welcome you with all 
 my heart. Let me spend as much time as I may in your 
 company. Your father was a hero, and your presence fills 
 my heart with no common pleasure and delight. Stay with 
 me." 
 
 The marquis welcomed Waubeno cordially, and expressed 
 his pleasure at meeting him here. At the romantic festival no 
 people were more warmly met than the chief's daughter and 
 her escort. 
 
 " The French have always been true to the Indians," said 
 Waubeno, on leaving the general, " and the Indians have been 
 as true to the French." 
 
 " Never did rulers have better subjects," said the gen- 
 eral. 
 
 " Never did subjects have better rulers," said Waubeno, 
 almost repeating the scene of Dick Whittington, thrice Lord 
 Mayor of London, by virtue of his wonderful cat, to King 
 Henry. 
 
 The Indians withdrew amid the gay strains of national 
 music, the stately minuet haunting Waubeno and ringing in 
 his ears. 
 
 He tried to hum the rhythms of the beautiful air of the 
 courts. Jasper saw how the music had affected him, and that 
 he was happy and susceptible, and said : 
 
 " Waubeno, you have met a man to-night who would forget 
 his own position and pleasure to do honor to the Indian 
 girl." 
 
 " Yes, I am sure of that." 
 
 " Yon are your best self to-night in your best mood ; the
 
 LAFAYETTE AT KASKASKIA THE STATELY MINUET. 155 
 
 music has awakened your better soul. You remember your 
 promise ? " 
 
 " Yes, but, Brother Jasper " 
 
 " What, Waubeno ? " 
 
 " Lafayette is a Frenchman, and a gentleman. The In- 
 dians and French do not spill each other's blood. Why ? "
 
 CHAPTEE XIV. 
 WAUBENO AND YOUNG LINCOLN. 
 
 leafy afternoon in May, Jasper and "Waubeno 
 came to Aunt Olive's, at Pigeon Creek. South- 
 ern Indiana is a glory of sunshine and flowers 
 at this season of the year, and their journey had 
 been a very pleasant one. 
 They had met emigrants on the Ohio, and had seen the 
 white sail of the prairie schooner in all of the forest ways. 
 
 " The world seems moving to the west," said Jasper, " as in 
 the white Indian's dream. There is need of my work more 
 and more. Every child that I can teach to read will make better 
 this new empire that is being sifted out of the lands. Every 
 school that I can found is likely to become a college, and I am 
 glad to be a wanderer in the wilderness for the sake of my 
 fellow-men." 
 
 In the open door, under the leafing vines, stood Aunt In- 
 diana, in cap, wig, and spectacles. She arched her elbow over 
 all to shade her eyes. 
 
 " The old Tunker, as I live, come again, and brought his 
 Indian boy with him ! " said she. " Well, you are welcome to 
 Pigeon Creek. You left a sight of good thoughts here when 
 you were here before. You're a good pitcher, if you are a little 
 
 (156)
 
 WAUBENO AND YOUNG LINCOLN. 157 
 
 cracked, with the handle all one side. Come in, and welcome. 
 Take a chair and sit down 
 
 ' 'Tis a long time since I see you. 
 How does your wife and children do ? ' 
 
 as the poet sings." 
 
 " I am well, and am glad to be toiling for the bread that 
 does not fail in the wilderness. How are the people of 
 Pigeon Creek how are my good friends the Lincolns ? " 
 
 " The Linkens ? Well, Tom Linken makes out to hold to- 
 gether after a fashion all dreams and expectations. 'The 
 thing that hath been is,' the Scriptur' says, and Thomas Lin- 
 ken is just as he always was, and always will be to the end 
 of the chapter. He's got to the p'int after which there is no 
 more to be told, long ago. The life of such as he repeats 
 itself over and over, like a buzzin' spinnin'-wheel. And Miss 
 Linken, she is as patient as ever ; 'tis her mission just to be 
 patient with old Tom." 
 
 " And Abraham ? " 
 
 " That boy Abe the one that we prophesied about ! Well, 
 elder, I do hate to say, 'cause it makes you out to be no 
 prophet, and you mean well, goin' about tryin' to get a little 
 larnin' into the skulls of the people in this new country ; but 
 that boy promises pretty slim, though I ain't nothin' to say 
 agin' him. In the first place, he's grown up to be a giant, 
 all legs and ears, mouth and eyes. Why, he is the tallest 
 young man in this part of Indiana ! 
 
 " Then, his head's off. He goes about readin' books, just 
 as he did when you were here last this book, and that book, 
 and the other book ; and then he all runs to talk, which
 
 158 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 some folks takes for wisdom. He tells stories that makes 
 everybody laugh, and he seems very chipper and happy, but 
 they do say that he has melancholy spells, and is all down in 
 the mouth at times. But he's good-hearted, and speaks the 
 truth, and helps poor folks, and there's many a wuss one than 
 Abraham Linken now. They didn't invite him to the great 
 weddin' of the Grigsbys, cos he's so homely, and hadn't any- 
 thin' to wear but leather breeches, and they only come 
 down a little below his knees. Queer-lookin' he'd 'a' been to 
 a weddin' ! 
 
 "He felt orful bad at not bein' invited, and made some 
 poetry about 'em. When I feel poetic I talk prose, and give 
 people as good as they send. I don't write no poetry. 
 
 "You are welcome to stay here, elder. You needn't go 
 to the Linkens'. I have a prophet's chamber in my house 
 though you ain't a prophet and you can always sleep there, 
 and your Indian boy can lay down in the kitchen ; and I can 
 cook, elder now you know that and I won't ask ye to cobble ; 
 your time is too valuable for that." 
 
 Jasper, who was not greatly influenced by Aunt Indiana's 
 unfavorable views of her poor neighbor, went to see Thomas 
 Lincoln. "Waubeno went with him. Here the young Indian 
 mst with a hearty greeting from both Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln. 
 
 " I am glad that you have come again," said poor Mrs. 
 Lincoln to Jasper. " You comforted me and encouraged me 
 when you were here last. I want to talk with you. Abe has 
 all grown up, and wants to make a new start in life ; and I 
 wish to see him started right. There's so much in gettin' 
 started right; a right start is all the way, sometimes. We
 
 WAUBENO AND YOUNG LINCOLN. 159 
 
 don't travel twice over the same years. I want you to talk 
 with him. You have seen this world, and we haven't, but 
 you kind o' brought the world to us when you were here 
 last. Elder, you don't know how much good you are 
 doin'." 
 
 " Where is Abraham ? " asked Jasper. 
 
 " He's gone to the store for the evenin'. He's been keep- 
 in' store for Jones, in Gentryville, and he spends his evenin's 
 there. There ain't many places to go to around here, and 
 Abe he's turned the store into a kind of debatin' club. He 
 speaks pieces there. There's goin' to be a debate there to- 
 night. He's great on debatin'. I do hope you'll go. The 
 subject of the debate to-night is, ' Which has the greater 
 cause for complaint, the negro or the Indian ? ' ' 
 
 " I'm goin' over to the store to-night myself, elder," said 
 Thomas Lincoln. " You must go along with me and hear 
 Abraham talk, and then come back and spend the night here. 
 The old woman has been hopin' that you would come. It 
 pleased her mightily, what you said good about Abraham when 
 you was here last. She sets her eyes by Abraham, and he does 
 by her. Abraham and I don't get along none too well. The 
 fact is, he all runs to books, and is kind o' queer. He takes 
 after his mother's folks they all had houses in the air, and 
 lived in 'em. Abe might make somethin'; there's somethin' 
 in him, if larnin' don't spile him. I have to warn him against 
 larnin' all the time, but it all goes agin the grain, and I de- 
 clare sometimes I do get all out of patience, and clean dis- 
 couraged. Why, elder, he even takes a book out when he goes 
 to shuck corn, and he composes poetry on the wooden shovel,
 
 160 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 and planes it out with my plane, and wears the shovel all up. 
 There, now, .look there ! could you stand it? " 
 
 Thomas Lincoln took up a large wooden fire-shovel, and 
 held it before the eyes of the Tunker. On the great howl of 
 the shovel were penned some lines in coal. 
 
 " What does that read, elder? I can't tell. I ain't got no 
 larnin' to spare. What does it read, elder?" 
 
 Jasper scanned the writing on the surface of the back of 
 the shovel. The writing was clear and plain. Mrs. Lincoln 
 came and looked over his shoulder. 
 
 " Writ it himself, likely as not," said she. " Abe writes 
 poetry; he can't help it sometimes it's a gift. Head it, 
 elder." 
 
 Jasper read slowly : 
 
 " ' Time ! what an empty vapor 'tis ! 
 And days, how swift they are ! 
 Swift as an arrow speed our lives, 
 
 Swift as the shooting star. 
 The present moment ' " 
 
 "He didn't finish it, did he, elder? I think it is real 
 pooty don't you ? " 
 
 Mrs. Lincoln turned her broad, earnest face toward the 
 Tunker. 
 
 "Real pooty, ain't it?" 
 
 " Yes," said Jasper. " He'll be likely to do some great 
 work in life, and leave it unfinished. It comes to me so." 
 
 " Don't say so, elder. His father don't praise him much, 
 but he's real good to me, and I hope no evil will ever happen 
 to him. I set lots of store by Abe. I don't know any differ-
 
 A QUEER PLACE TO WRITE POETRY.
 
 WAUBENO AND YOUNG LINCOLN. 
 
 ence between him and my own son. His poor, dead mother, 
 that lies out there all alone under the trees, knows that I have 
 done by him as if he were my own. You know, the guardian 
 angels of children see the face of the Father, and I kind o' 
 think that she is his guardian ; and if she is, now, I hain't any- 
 thing to reflect upon." 
 
 " Only you're spilin' him that's all," said Mr. Lincoln. 
 " Some women are so good that they are not good for anything, 
 and between me and Sarah and his poor, dead mother, Abra- 
 ham has never had the discipline that he ought to have had. 
 But Andrew Crawford, the schoolmaster, and Josiah Crawford, 
 the farmer, did their duty by him. Come, elder, let us go up 
 to Jones's store, and talk politics a while. Jones, he's a Jack- 
 son man. He sets great store by Abe, and thinks, like you and 
 Sarah, that the boy will make somethin' some day. Well, I 
 hope he will can't tell." 
 
 Mr. Jones's store was the popular resort of Gentryville. 
 Says one of the old pioneers, Dougherty : " Lincoln drove a team, 
 and sold goods for Jones. Jones told me that Lincoln read all 
 of his books, and I remember the History of the United States 
 as one. Jones afterward said to me that Lincoln would make 
 a great man one of these days had said so long before to other 
 people, and so as fai back as 1828 and 1829." 
 
 The store was full of men and boys when Thomas Lincoln 
 and Jasper and Waubeno arrived. Dennis Hanks was there, 
 and the Grigsbys. Josiah Crawford, who had made Abraham 
 pull fodder for three days for allowing a book that he had lent 
 him to get wet one rainy night, was seated on a barrel. His 
 nose was very long, and he had a high forehead, and wide look
 
 162 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 across the forehead. He looked very wise and thought himself 
 a Solomon. 
 
 The men and boys all seemed to be glad to see the Tunker, 
 and they greeted Waubeno kindly, though curiously, and plied 
 him with civil questions about Black Hawk. 
 
 There was to be a debate that evening, and Mr. Jones 
 called the men to order, and each one mounted a barrel and lit 
 his pipe or all except Abraham and Waubeno, who did not 
 smoke, but who stood near each other, almost side by side. 
 
 " Abraham," said Thomas Lincoln, " you'll have to argue 
 the p'int for the Indian well to-night, or there he is!" 
 pointing to Waubeno " he'll answer ye." 
 
 The debate went slowly at first, then grew exciting. When 
 Abraham Lincoln's turn came to speak, all the store grew still. 
 The subject of the debate was, as Thomas Lincoln had said : 
 " Which has the greater cause for complaint, the Indian or 
 the negro ? " 
 
 Abraham Lincoln claimed the Indian was more wronged 
 than the negro, and his homely face glowed as with a strange 
 fire as he pictured the red man's wrongs. He towered above 
 the men like a giant, and moved his arms as though they 
 possessed some invisible power. 
 
 Waubeno fixed his eyes on him, and felt the force and 
 thrust of his every word. 
 
 " If I were a negro," said Lincoln, " I would hope that 
 some redeemer and deliverer would arise, like Moses of old. 
 But if I were an Indian, what would I have to hope for, if I 
 fell under the avarice of the white man ? Let the past answer 
 that."
 
 WAUBENO AND YOUNG LINCOLN. 
 
 " Let the heavens answer that," said Waubeno, " or let 
 their gates be ever closed." 
 
 Thomas Lincoln started. 
 
 " Waubeno, you have come from Black Hawk. He slays 
 men, and we know him. An Indian killed my father." 
 
 " An Indian killed your father and what did you do ? " 
 
 " My brother Mordecai avenged his death, and caused many 
 Indians to bite the dust." 
 
 " White brother," said Waubeno, " a white man killed my 
 father. What ought / to do ? " 
 
 The men held their pipes in silence. 
 
 " My father was an innocent man," said the pioneer. 
 
 " My father was an honorable warrior," said Waubeno, " and 
 defended his own rights rights as dear to him as your father's, 
 or your's, or mine. W'h'at ought I to do ? " He turned to 
 young Lincoln. " What would you do ? " 
 
 " I hold that in all things right is might, and I defend the 
 right of an Indian as I would the rights of a white man, but 
 I never would shed any man's blood for avarice or malice. 
 Waubeno, I would defend you in a cause of right against the 
 world. I would rather have the approval of Heaven than the 
 praise of all mankind." 
 
 " Brother," said Waubeno, " I believe that you speak true ? 
 but I do not know. If I only knew that you spoke true, I 
 would not do as Mordecai did. I would forgive the white 
 man." 
 
 The candles smoked, and the men talked long into the 
 night. At last Thomas Lincoln and Jasper and Waubeno 
 went home, where Mrs. Lincoln was awaiting them. They
 
 164: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 expected Abraham to follow them. They sat up that night 
 late, and talked about the prairie country, and the prospects 
 of the emigrants to Illinois. 
 
 " Now you had better go to rest, v said Sarah Lincoln. " I 
 will sit up until Abe comes. I do not see why he is so late 
 to-night, when the Tunker is here, too, and the Indian boy." 
 
 " He's with the Grigsbys, I guess," said Mr. Lincoln. 
 
 The two men went to their beds, and Waubeno laid down 
 on a mat on the floor. Hour after hour passed, and Mrs. Lin- 
 coln went again and again to the door and listened, but Abra- 
 ham did not return. It was midnight when she laid down, but 
 even then it was to listen, and not to sleep. 
 
 In the morning Abraham returned. His eyes were sunken 
 and his cheeks were white. 
 
 " Get me some coffee, mother," he said. " I have not slept 
 a wink to-night." 
 
 " Why, where have you been, Abraham ? " 
 
 " Watchin' watchin' with a frozen drunken man. I found 
 him on the road, and carried him to Dennis's on my back. 
 He seemed to be dead, but I rubbed him all night long, and 
 he breathed again." 
 
 " Why did you not get some one to help you ? " 
 
 " The boys all left me. They said that old Holmes was not 
 worth revivin', even if he had any life left in him ; that it 
 would be better for himself and everybody if he were left to 
 perish." 
 
 " Holmes ! Did you carry that man on your back, Abra- 
 ham?" 
 
 " Yes. I could not leave him by the road. He is a human
 
 WAUBENO AND YOUNG LINCOLN. 165 
 
 being, and I did by him as I would have him do by me if I 
 lost my moral senses. They told me to leave him to his fate, 
 but I couldn't, mother. I couldn't." 
 
 Waubeno gazed on the young giant as he drank his coffee, 
 and sank into a deep slumber on a mat in the room. He 
 watched him as he slept. 
 
 When he woke, Jasper said to him : 
 
 " Abraham, I wish you to know this Indian boy. I think 
 there is a native nobility in him. Do you remember Johnnie 
 Kongapod's story, at which the people all used to laugh ? " 
 
 " Yes, elder." 
 
 "Abraham Lincoln, I can believe that story was true. I 
 have faith in men. You do. Your faith will make you great."
 
 CHAPTEE XV. 
 THE DEBATING SCHOOL. 
 
 HEEE were some queer people in every town 
 and community of the new West, and these 
 were usually active at the winter debating 
 school. These schools of the people for the 
 discussion of life, politics, literature, were, on 
 the whole, excellent influences ; they developed what was origi- 
 nal in the thought and character of a place, and stimulated 
 reading and study. If a man was a theorist, he could here 
 find a voice for his opinions ; and if he were a genius, he could 
 here uncage his gifts and find recognition. Nearly all of the 
 early clergymen, lawyers, congressmen, and leaders of the peo- 
 ple of early Indiana and Illinois were somehow developed and 
 educated in these so-called debating schools. 
 
 Among the odd people sure to be found in such rural 
 assemblies were the man with visionary schemes for railroads, 
 canals, and internal improvements, the sanguine inventor, the 
 noisy free-thinker, the benevolent Tunker, the man who could 
 preach without notes by "direct inspiration," the man who 
 thought that the world was about to come to an end, and the 
 patriot who pictured the American eagle as a bird of fate and 
 divinity. The early pioneer preacher learned to talk in public 
 
 (166)
 
 THE DEBATING SCHOOL. 167 
 
 in the debating school. The young lawyer here made his first 
 pleas. 
 
 The frequent debates in Jones's store led to the formation 
 of a debating school in Gentryville and Pigeon Creek. In 
 this society young Abraham Lincoln was the leader, and his 
 cousin Dennis Hanks and his uncle John were prominent dis- 
 putants. The story-telling blacksmith furnished much of the 
 humor, and Josiah Crawford, or " Blue-Nose Crawford," as he 
 was called, was regarded as the man of hard sense on such 
 occasions as require a Solomon, or a Daniel, or a Portia, and 
 he was very proud to be so regarded. 
 
 There was a revival of interest in the cause of temperance 
 in the country at this time, and the noble conduct of Abraham 
 Lincoln, in carrying to his cousin Dennis's the poor drunkard 
 whom he had found in the highway on the chilly night after 
 the debate at Jones's store, may have led to a plan for a great 
 debate on the subject of the pledge, which was appointed to 
 take place in the log school-house at Pigeon Creek. The plan 
 was no more than spoken of at the store than it began to 
 excite general attention. 
 
 " "We must debate this subject of the temperance pledge,*' 
 said Thomas Lincoln, " and get the public sense. New times 
 are at hand. On general principles, I'm a temperance man ; 
 and if nobody drank once, then nobody would drink twice, and 
 the world would all go dry. But there's the corn-huskin's, and 
 the hoe-down, and the mowin' times, and the hog-killin's, and 
 the barn-raisin's. It is only natural that men should wet their 
 whistles at such times as these. In the old Scriptur' times 
 people who wanted to get great spiritual power abstained from 
 12
 
 168 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 strong drink; but you can't expect no such people as those 
 down here at Pigeon Creek." 
 
 " But Abe is a teinperancer, and I want the debate to come off 
 in good shape, so that all you uns can hear what he has to say." 
 
 It was decided by the leading debaters that the subject for 
 the debate should be, " Ought temperance people to sign the 
 temperance pledge ? " and that Abraham Lincoln should sus- 
 tain the affirmative view of the question. 
 
 The success of young Lincoln as a debater had greatly 
 troubled Aunt Indiana. 
 
 " It's all like the rattlin' of a pea-pod in the blasts o' 
 ortum," she said. " It don't signify anything. He just rains 
 words upon ye, and makes ye laugh, and the first thing ye 
 know he's got ye. Beware beware ! his words are just like 
 stool-pigeons, what brings you down to get shot. It's amazin' 
 what a curi'us gift of talk that boy has ! " 
 
 "When she heard of the plan of the debate, and the part 
 assigned to young Lincoln, she said : 
 
 " 'Twill be a great night for Abe, unless I hinder it. I'm 
 agin the temperance pledge. Stands to reason that a man's 
 no right to sign away his liberty. And I'm agin Abe Linkern, 
 because he's too smart for anythin', and lives up in the air 
 like a kite ; and outthinks other people, because he sits round 
 readin' and turkey-dreamin' when he ought to be at work. I 
 shall work agin him." 
 
 And she did. She first consulted upon the subject with 
 Josiah Crawford "the Esquire," as she called him and he 
 promised to give the negative of the question all the weight of 
 his ability.
 
 THE DEBATING SCHOOL. 169 
 
 There was a young man in G entry ville named John Short, 
 who thought that he had had a call to preach, and who often 
 came to Aunt Indiana for theological instruction. 
 
 " Don't run round the fields readin' books, like Abraham 
 Linkern," she warned him. " He'll never amount to a hill o' 
 beans. The true way to become a preacher is to go into the 
 desk, and open the Bible, and put yer fingers on the first 
 passage that you come to, and then open yer mouth, and the 
 Lord will fill it. I do not believe in edicated ministers. 
 They trust in chariots and horses. Go right from the plow 
 to the pulpit, and the heavens will help ye." 
 
 John Short thought Aunt Indiana's advice sound, and he 
 resolved to follow it. He once made an appointment to preach 
 after this unprepared manner in the school-house. He could 
 not read very well. He had once read at school, "And he 
 smote the Hittite that he died " " And he smote the Hi-ti- 
 ti-ty, that he did," and he opened the Bible at random for a 
 Scripture lesson on this trying occasion. His eye fell upon 
 the hard chapters in Chronicles beginning "Adam, Sheth, 
 Enoch." He succeeded very well in the reading until he came 
 to the generations of Japheth and the sons of Gomer, which 
 were mountains too difficult to pass. He lifted his eyes and 
 said, " And so it goes on to the end of the chapter, without 
 regard to particulars." 
 
 " That chapter was given me to try me," he said, as a kind 
 of commentary, "and, my friends, I have been equal to it. 
 And now you shall hear me preach, and after that we'll take 
 up a contribution for the new meetin'-house." 
 
 The sermon was a short one, and began amid much mental
 
 170 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 confusion. " A certain man," he began, " went down from 
 Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieves ; and the thieves 
 sprang up and choked him ; and he said, ' Who is my neigh- 
 bor ? ' You all know who your neighbors are, my friends." 
 Here followed a long pause. He added : 
 
 " Always be good to your neighbors. And now we will pass 
 around the contribution-box, and after that we'll all talk." 
 
 This beginning of his work as a speaker did not look prom- 
 ising, but he had conducted " a meetin'," and that fact made 
 John Short a shining light in Aunt Indiana's eyes. To this 
 young man the good woman went for a champion of her ideas 
 in the great debate. 
 
 But, notwithstanding her theory, she proceeded to instruct 
 him as to what he should say on the occasion. 
 
 " Say to 'em, John, that he who comes to ye with a tem- 
 perance pledge insults yer character. It is like askin' ye to 
 promise not to become a jackass ; and what would ye think of 
 a man who would ask ye to sign a paper like that ? or to sign 
 the Ten Commandments ? or to promise that ye'd never lie any 
 more 9 It's one's duty to maintain one's dignity of character, 
 and, John, I want ye to open yer mouth in defense of the 
 rights of liberty on the occasion ; and do yer duty, and bring 
 down the Philistine with a pebble-stun, and 'twill be a glori- 
 ous night for Pigeon Creek." 
 
 The views of Aunt Olive Eastman on preaching without 
 preparation and on temperance were common at this time in 
 Indiana and Illinois. By not understanding a special direction 
 of our Lord to his disciples as to what they should do in times 
 of persecution, many of the pioneer exhorters used to speak from
 
 THE DEBATING SCHOOL. 171 
 
 the text on which their eyes first rested on opening the Bible. 
 They seemed to think that this mental field needed no planting 
 or culture no training like Paul's in the desert of Arabia, and 
 that the pulpit stood outside of the universal law. The moral 
 education of the pledge of Father Matthew was just beginning 
 to excite attention. Strange as it may seem, the thoughts and 
 plans of the Irish apostle of temperance and founder of the Or- 
 der of St. Vincent de Paul seemed to have come to Abraham 
 Lincoln in his early days much as original inspiration. His 
 first public speech was on this subject. It was made in Spring- 
 field, Illinois, in 1842, and advocated the plan which Father 
 Matthew was then originating in Ireland, the education of the 
 public conscience by the moral force of the temperance pledge. 
 
 It was a lengthening autumn evening when the debate took 
 place in the school-house in the timber. The full moon rose 
 like a disk of gold as the sun sank in clouds of crimson fire, 
 and the light of the day became a mellowed splendor during 
 half of the night. The corn-fields in the clearings rose like 
 armies, bearing food on every hand. Flocks of birds dark- 
 ened the sunset air, and little animals of the woods ran to 
 and fro amid the crisp and fallen leaves. The air was vital 
 with the coolness that brings the frost and causes the trees 
 to unclasp their countless shells, barks, and burrs, and let the 
 ripe nuts fall. 
 
 The school-room filled with earnest faces early in the even- 
 ing. The people came over from Gentryville, among them 
 Mr. Gentry himself and Mr. Jones the store-keeper. Women 
 brought tallow dips for lights, and curious candlesticks and 
 snuffers.
 
 172 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 Aunt Indiana and Josiah Crawford came together, an 
 imposing-looking couple, who brought with them the air of 
 special sense and wisdom. Aunt Indiana wore a bonnet of 
 enormous proportions, which distinguished her from the other 
 women, who wore hoods. She brought in her hand a brass 
 candlestick, which the children somehow associated with the 
 ancient Scripture figures, and which looked as though it might 
 have belonged to the temples of old. She was tall and stately, 
 and the low room was too short for her soaring bonnet, but she 
 bent her head, and sat down near Josiah Crawford, and set the 
 candle in the shining candlestick, and cast a glance of con- 
 scious superiority over the motley company. 
 
 The moderator rapped for order and stated the question 
 for debate, and made some inspiring remarks about " parlia- 
 mentary " rules. John Short opened the debate with a plea 
 for independence of character, and self-respect and personal 
 liberty. 
 
 " What would you think," he asked, " of a man who would 
 come to you in the night and ask you to sign a paper not to lie 
 any more? What? You would think that he thought you 
 had been lying. Would you sign that paper? No! You 
 would call out the dogs of retribution, and take down your 
 father's sword, and you would uplift your foot into the indig- 
 nant air, and protect your family name and honor. Who 
 would be called a liar, in a cowardly way like that ? And who 
 would be called a drunkard, by being asked to sign the paper of 
 a tee-totaler? Who?" 
 
 Here John Short paused. He presently said : 
 
 "Hoo?" which sounded in the breathless silence like
 
 THE DEBATING SCHOOL. 173 
 
 the inquiries of an owl. But his ideas had all taken wings 
 again and left him, as on the occasion when he attempted to 
 preach without notes or preparation. 
 
 Aunt Indiana looked distressed. She leaned over toward 
 Josiah Crawford, and said : 
 
 " Say somethin'." 
 
 But Josiah hesitated. Then, to the great amusement of all, 
 Aunt Indiana rose to the ceiling, bent her generously bonneted 
 head, stretched forth her arm, and said : 
 
 " He is quite right quite right, Josiah. Is he not, Josiah ? " 
 
 " Quite right," said Josiah. 
 
 " People do not talk about what is continuous what goes 
 right along. Am I not right, Josiah ? " 
 
 " Quite right ! quite right ! " 
 
 " If a man tells me he is honest, he is not honest. If he 
 tells me that he is pure, he isn't pure. If he were honest or 
 pure he says nothing about it. Am I not right, Josiah ? " 
 
 " Quite right ! quite right ! " 
 
 " Nobody tells about his stomach unless it is out of order ; 
 and no one puts cotton into keyholes unless he himself is peek- 
 ing through keyholes. Am I not right, Josiah?" 
 
 " Quite right ! quite right !" 
 
 " And no one asks ye to sign a temperance pledge unless 
 he's been a drunkard himself, or thinks ye are one, or likely 
 to be. Ain't I right, Josiah ? " 
 
 " Quite right ! " 
 
 " The best way to support temperance is to live temperately 
 and say nothin' about it. There, now ! If I had held my peace, 
 the stones would have cried out. Olive Eastman has spoken,
 
 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 and Josiah says that I am right, and I'm agin the temperance 
 pledge, and there's nothin' more to be said about it." 
 
 Aunt Indiana sat down amid much applause. Then Jasper 
 rose, and showed that intemperance was a great evil, and that 
 public sentiment should be educated against it. 
 
 " This education should begin in childhood," he said, " in 
 habits of self-respect and self-restraint. The child should be 
 first instructed to say " No " to himself." 
 
 He proceeded to argue for the temperance pledge from his 
 point of view. 
 
 " The world is educated by pledges," he said. " The patriot 
 is kept in his line of march by the pledge ; the business man 
 makes a pledge when he signs a note ; and the Christian takes 
 pledges when he joins the Church. We should be willing to 
 take any pledge that will make life better. If eating meat 
 cause my brother to stumble and offend, then I will not eat 
 meat. I will sacrifice myself always to that which will help the 
 world and honor God. I am sorry to differ from the good 
 woman who has spoken, but I am for the use of the pledge. I 
 never drank strong drink, and this hand shall sign any pledge 
 that will help a poor tempted brother by my example." 
 
 Tall Abraham Lincoln arose. 
 
 " There ! he's goin' to speak I knew he'd been preparin'," 
 whispered Aunt Indiana to Josiah Crawford. " Wonder what 
 he'll have to say. You'll have to answer him. He's just a 
 regular Philistine, and goes stalkin' through the land, and 
 turns people's heads ; and he's just Tom Linkern's son, who is 
 shiftless and poor, and I'm goin' agin him." 
 
 The tall young man stood silent. The people were silent.
 
 THE DEBATING SCHOOL. 175 
 
 Aunt Indiana gave her puncheon seat a push to break the 
 force of that silence, and whispered to Josiah : 
 
 " There ! they are all ears. I told ye 'twould be so. You 
 must answer him." 
 
 Young Lincoln spoke slowly, and after this manner : 
 
 " My friends : When you pledge yourself to enforce a princi- 
 ple, you identify yourself with that principle, and give it power." 
 
 There was a silence. Then the people filled the little room 
 with applause. He continued most impressively in the words 
 of grand oration : * 
 
 " The universal sense of mankind on any subject is an 
 argument, or at least an influence, not easily overcome. The 
 success of the argument in favor of the existence of an over- 
 ruling Providence mainly depends upon that sense ; and men 
 ought not, in justice, to be denounced for yielding to it in any 
 case, or giving it up slowly, especially when they are backed by 
 interest, fixed habits, or burning appetites. 
 
 " If it be true that those who have suffered by intemper- 
 ance personally and have reformed are the most powerful and 
 efficient instruments to push the reformation to ultimate suc- 
 cess, it does not follow that those who have not suffered have 
 no part left them to perform. Whether or not the world 
 would be vastly benefited by a total and final banishment 
 from it of all intoxicating drinks seems to me not now an 
 open question. Three fourths of mankind confess the affirma- 
 tive with their tongues ; and, I believe, all the rest acknowl- 
 edge it in their hearts. 
 
 * We use here some of the exact sentences which young Lincoln em- 
 ployed on a similar occasion at Springfield.
 
 176 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " But it is said by some, that men will think and act for 
 themselves ; that none will disuse spirits or anything else be- 
 cause his neighbors do ; and that moral influence is not that 
 powerful engine contended for. Let us examine this. Let 
 me ask the man who could maintain this position most stiffly, 
 what compensation he will accept to go to church some Sunday 
 and sit during the sermon with his wife's bonnet upon his 
 head ? Not a trifle, I'll venture. And why not ? There would 
 be nothing irreligious in it, nothing immoral, nothing uncom- 
 fortable then why not? Is it not because there would be 
 something egregiously unfashionable in it? Then, it is the 
 influence of fashion. And what is the influence of fashion but 
 the influence that other people's actions have on our own 
 actions the strong inclination each of us feels to do as we 
 see all our neighbors do? Nor is the influence of fashion 
 confined to any particular thing or class of things. It is just 
 as strong on one subject as another. Let us make it as un- 
 fashionable to withhold our names from the temperance pledge 
 as for husbands to wear their wives' bonnets to church, and 
 instances will be just as rare in the one case as in the other." 
 
 The people saw the moral point clearly. They felt the force 
 of what the young orator had said. No one was willing to fol- 
 low him. 
 
 " Have you anything to say, Mr. Crawford ? " said the mod- 
 erator. 
 
 Josiah merely shook his head. 
 
 " He don't care to put on his wife's bonnet agin public 
 opinion," said the blacksmith.
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE SCHOOL THAT MADE LINCOLN PRESIDENT. 
 
 HILE teaching and preaching in Decatur, Jas- 
 per heard of the new village of Salem, Illinois, 
 on the Sangamon. He thought that the little 
 town might offer him a chance to exert a new 
 influence, and he resolved to visit it, and to 
 preach and to teach there for a time should 
 the people receive him kindly. 
 
 The village was a small one, consisting of a community 
 store, a school-house, a tavern, and a few houses ; and Jasper 
 knew of only one friend there at the time, a certain Mr. Dun- 
 can, who lived some two miles from the main street and the 
 store. 
 
 One afternoon, after a long journey over prairie land, Jas- 
 per came to Mrs. Duncan's door, and was met cordially by the 
 good woman, and invited by her to make his home there for 
 a time. 
 
 The family gathered around the story-telling missionary 
 after supper, and listened to his tales of the Khine, all of 
 which had some soul-lesson in his view, and enabled him to 
 preach by parables. No stories better served this peculiar 
 mission than Baron Fouque's, and this night he related Thi- 
 odolf, the Icelander. 
 
 (177)
 
 178 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 There came a rap at the door. 
 
 " Who can that be ? " said Mrs. Duncan in alarm. 
 
 She opened the door, and a tall, dark-faced young man 
 stood before her. 
 
 " Why, Abe," said Mrs. Duncan, " what has brought you 
 here at this late hour ? I hope that nothing has happened ! " 
 
 " That bill of yours. You paid me two dollars and six cents, 
 did you not? It was not right." 
 
 " Isn't it ? Well, I paid you all that you asked me, like an 
 honest woman, so I am not to blame for any mistake. How 
 much more do you want ? If it isn't too much I'll pay it, for 
 I think that you mean well." 
 
 " More ! That isn't it, Mrs. Duncan ; you paid me six cents 
 too much you overpaid me. It was my fault." 
 
 " Your fault ! and honest Abe Lincoln, you have walked 
 two miles out of your way to pay me that six cents ! Why 
 didn't you wait until to-morrow ? " 
 
 " I couldn't." 
 
 " Why, what is going to happen ? " 
 
 "I can't sleep with a thing like that on my conscience. 
 Now I feel light and free again." 
 
 " Come in, if it is late. We've got company a Tunker 
 teaches, preaches, and works. May be you have met him be- 
 fore. He's been traveling down in Indiana and middle 
 Illinois." 
 
 Abraham came in, and Jasper rose to receive him. 
 
 " Lincoln," said the wandering school-master, " it does my 
 heart good to see you. I see that you have grown in body and 
 in soul. What brought you here ? I have been telling stories
 
 THE SCHOOL THAT MADE LINCOLN PRESIDENT. 179 
 
 for hours. Sit down, and tell us about what has happened to 
 you since we met last." 
 
 The tall young man sat down. 
 
 " He's clark down to Orf utt's store now," said Mrs. Duncan, 
 " and his word is as good as gold, and his weights are as true as 
 the scales of the Judgment Day. Why, one day he made a 
 wrong weight of half a pound, and as soon as he found it out 
 he shut up the shop and went shivering through the village 
 with that half-pound of tea as though the powers of the air 
 were after him. He's schooled his conscience so that he 
 couldn't be dishonest if he were to try. I do believe a dis- 
 honorable act would wither him and drive him crazy." 
 
 " Character, which is the habit of obedience to the univer- 
 sal law of right, is the highest school of life," said Jasper. 
 " That is what I try to teach everywhere. But Abraham 
 has heard me say that before. Where have you been since 
 I saw you last? Tell me, what has been your school of 
 life ? " 
 
 " I have been to New Orleans in a flat-boat. I went for 
 Mr. Orfutt, who now keeps the store in this place. When I 
 came back he gave me a place in his store here. I have been 
 here ever since." 
 
 " What did you see in New Orleans ? " 
 
 " Slavery men sold in the market like cattle. Jasper, it 
 made me long to have power to control men and congresses 
 and armies. If I only had the power, I would strike that 
 institution hard. I said that to John Hanks, and he thought 
 that slavery wasn't in any danger from anything that I would 
 be likely to do. It don't look so, does it, elder? I have one
 
 180 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 vote, and I shall always cast that against wrong as long as I 
 live. That is my right to do. 
 
 " Elder, listen. I want to tell you what I saw there one 
 day, in a slave-pen. I saw a handsome young girl, with white 
 blood in her, brought forward by a slave-driver and handled 
 and struck with a whip like a horse. I had heard of such 
 things before, but it did not seem possible that they could be 
 true. Then I saw the same girl sold at auction, and purchased 
 by a man who carried the face of a brute. When she saw 
 who had purchased her, she wrung her hands and cried, but 
 she was helpless and hopeless ; and I turned my face toward the 
 sky and vowed to give my soul against a system like that. 
 I'm a Free-Soiler in my heart, and I have faith that right 
 is might, and that the right in this matter will one day pre- 
 vail." 
 
 Jasper remained with Mrs. Duncan for some days, and then 
 formed a small school in the neighborhood, on the road to the 
 town of Springfield, Illinois. 
 
 "While teaching here he could not but notice the growth of 
 Orfutt's clerk in the confidence of all the people. In all the 
 games, he was chosen umpire or referee ; in most cases of 
 dispute he was consulted, and his judgment was fpllowed. 
 Long before he became a lawyer, people were accustomed to 
 say, in a matter of casuistry : 
 
 " Take the case to Lincoln. He will give an opinion that 
 will be fair." 
 
 Amid this growing reputation for character, a test hap- 
 pened which showed how far this moral education and disci- 
 pline had gone.
 
 THE SCHOOL THAT MADE LINCOLN PRESIDENT. 181 
 
 A certain Henry McHenry, a popular man, had planned a 
 horse-race, and applied to young Lincoln to go upon the racing 
 stand as judge. 
 
 " The people have confidence in you," he said to Lincoln. 
 
 " I must not, and I will not do it," said Lincoln. " This 
 custom of racing is wrong." 
 
 The man showed him that he was under a certain obligation 
 to act as judge on this occasion. 
 
 " I will do it," he said ; " but be it known to all that I will 
 never appear at a horse-race again ; and were I to become a 
 lawyer, I would never accept a case into which I could not take 
 an honest conscience, no matter what the inducements might 
 be." 
 
 There was a school-master in New Salem who knew more 
 than the honest clerk had been able to learn. This man, whose 
 name was Graham, could teach grammar. 
 
 Abraham went to him one day, and said : 
 
 " I have a notion to study grammar." 
 
 " If you ever expect to enter public life, you should do so," 
 said Mr. Graham. " Why not begin now and recite to me ? " 
 
 " Where shall I secure a book ? " asked the student of this 
 hard college of the wood. 
 
 " There is a man named Vaner, who lives six miles from 
 here, who has a grammar that I think he will be willing to 
 sell." 
 
 " If it be possible, I will secure it," said Lincoln. 
 
 He made a long walk and purchased the book, and so made 
 a grammar-school, a class of one, of his leisure moments in 
 Orfutt's store.
 
 182 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 While he thus was studying grammar, the men whom he 
 thirty or more years afterward made Cabinet ministers, gen- 
 erals, and diplomats were enjoying the easy experiences of 
 schools, military academies, and colleges. Not one of them 
 ever dreamed of such an experience of soul-building and 
 mind-building as this ; and some of them, had they met him 
 then, would have felt that they could not have invited him 
 to their homes. Orfutt's store and that one grammar were 
 not the elms of Yale, or the campus of Harvard, or the great 
 libraries or bowery streets of English Oxford or Cambridge. 
 Yet here grew and developed a soul which was to tower above 
 the age, and hold hands with the master spirits not only of 
 the time but the ages. 
 
 Years passed, and one day that sad-faced boy, who was 
 always seeking to make others cheerful amid the clouds of his 
 own gloom, stood before a grim council of war. He had de- 
 termined to call into the field of arms five hundred thousand 
 men. 
 
 " If you do that thing," said a leader of the council, " you 
 can not expect to be elected again President of the United 
 States." 
 
 The dark form rose to the height of a giant and poured 
 forth his soul, and he said : 
 
 " It is not necessary for me to be re-elected President of the 
 United States, but it is necessary for the soldiers at the front to 
 be re-enforced by five hundred thousand men, and I shall call 
 for them ; and if I go down under the act, I will go down like 
 the Cumberland, with my colors flying." 
 
 It required a high school of experience to train a soul to
 
 THE SCHOOL THAT MADE LINCOLN PRESIDENT. 183 
 
 an utterance like that ; and that fateful declaration began in 
 those moral syllables that defended the rights of the animals 
 of the woods, that said " No " to a horse-race, that refused from 
 the first to accept an unjust case at law, and that from the 
 first declared that right is might. 
 
 13
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 THOMAS LINCOLN MOVES. 
 
 AS PER taught school for a time in Boonesville, 
 Indiana, and preached in the new settlements 
 along the Wabash. While at Boonesville, 
 he chanced to meet young Lincoln at the 
 court house, under circumstances that filled 
 his heart with pity. 
 
 It was at a trial for murder that greatly excited the people. 
 The lawyer for the defense was John Breckinridge, a man of 
 great reputation and ability. 
 
 Jasper saw young Lincoln among the people who had come 
 to hear the great lawyer's plea, and said to him : 
 
 " You have traveled a long distance to be here to-day." 
 " Yes," said the tall young man. " There is nothing that 
 leads one to seek information of the most intelligent people 
 like a debating society. "We, who used to meet to discuss ques- 
 tions at Jones's store, have formed a debating society, and I 
 want to learn all I can of law for the sake of justice, and I 
 owed it to myself and the society not to let this great occasion 
 pass. I have walked fifteen miles to be here to-day. Did you 
 know that father was thinking of moving to Illinois ? " 
 " No. Will you go with him ? " 
 
 (184)
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN MOVES. 185 
 
 " Yes, I shall go with him and see him well settled, and 
 then I shall strike out for myself in the world. Father hasn't 
 the faculty that mother has. you know. I can do some things 
 better than he, and it is the duty of one member of the family 
 to make up when he can for what another member lacks. ' We 
 all have our own gifts, and should share them with others. I 
 can split rails faster than father can, and do better work at 
 house-building than he, and I am going with him and do for 
 him the best I can at the start. I shall seek first for a roof for 
 him, and then a place for myself." 
 
 The great lawyer arrived. The doors of the court-house 
 were open, and the people filled the court-room. 
 
 The plea was a masterly one, eloquent and dramatic, and it 
 thrilled the young soul of Lincoln. Full of the subject, the 
 young debater sought Mr. Breckinridge after the court ad- 
 journed, and extended his long arm and hand to him. 
 
 The orator was a proud man of an aristocratic family, and 
 thought it the proper thing to maintain his dignity on all 
 occasions. He looked at the boy haughtily, and refused to 
 take his hand. 
 
 " I thank you," said Lincoln. " I wish to express my 
 gratitude." 
 
 " Sir ! " 
 
 "With a contemptuous look Breckinridge passed by, and the 
 slight filled the heart of the young man with disappointment 
 and mortification. The two met again in Washington in 1862. 
 The backwoods boy whose hand the orator had refused to take 
 had become President of the United States. He extended his 
 hand, and it was accepted.
 
 186 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " Sir," said the President, " that plea of yours in Boones- 
 ville, Indiana, was one of the best that I ever heard." 
 
 " In Boonesville, Indiana ? " 
 
 How like a dream to the haughty lawyer the recollection 
 must have been! Such things as this hurt Lincoln to the 
 quick. He was so low-spirited at times in his early manhood 
 that he did not dare to carry with him a pocket-knife, lest 
 he should be overcome in some dark and evil moment to end 
 his own life. There were times when his tendencies were so 
 alarming that he had to be watched by his friends. But 
 these dark periods were followed by a great flow of spirits and 
 the buoyancy of hope. 
 
 In the spring of 1830, Jasper and "Waubeno came to Gentry- 
 ville, and there met James Gentry, the leading man of the 
 place. 
 
 "Are the Linkens still living in Spencer County?" he 
 asked. 
 
 " Yes," said Mr. Gentry, " but it has been a hard winter 
 here, and they are about to move. The milk sickness has been 
 here again and has carried off the cattle, and the people have 
 become discouraged, and look upon the place as unhealthy. I 
 have bought Thomas Linken's property. The man was here 
 this morning. You will find him getting ready to go away 
 from Indiana for good and all." 
 
 " Where is he going ? " asked Jasper. 
 
 " Off to Illinois." 
 
 " So I thought," said Jasper. " I must go to see him. 
 How is that bright boy of his ? " 
 
 "Abe?"
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN MOVES. 187 
 
 " Yes. I like that boy. I am drawn toward him. There 
 is something about him that doesn't belong to many people 
 a spiritual graft that won't bear any common fruit. I can see 
 it with my spiritual eye, in the open vision, as it were. You 
 don't understand those things I see you don't. I must see 
 him. There are not many like him in soul, if he is ungainly 
 in body. I believe that he is born to some higher destiny than 
 other men. I see that you do not understand me. Time will 
 make it plain." 
 
 "I'm a trader, and no prophet, and I don't know much 
 about such matters as these. But Abe Linken's, he's grown 
 up now, and up it is, more than six feet tall. He's a giant, a 
 great, ungainly, awkward, clever, honest fellow, full of jokes 
 and stories, though down at times, and he wouldn't do a wrong 
 thing if it were for his right hand, and couldn't do an unkind 
 one. He comes up to the store here often and tells stories, and 
 sometimes stays until almost midnight, just as he used to do at 
 Jones's. Everybody likes him here, and we shall all miss him 
 when he goes away." 
 
 Jasper and Waubeno left the little Indiana town, and went 
 toward the cabin of the Lincolns. On the way Jasper turned 
 aside to pay a short visit to Aunt Olive. 
 
 The busy woman saw the preacher from her door, and came 
 out to welcome him. 
 
 " I knew it was you," was her salutation, " and I am right 
 glad that you have come. It has been distressin' times in these 
 parts. Folks have died, and cattle have died, and we're all 
 poor enough now, ye may depend. Where are ye goin' ? " 
 
 " To see the Lincolns."
 
 188 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 " Sho' ! goin' to see them again. Well, ye 're none too 
 soon. They're gettin' ready to move to Illinois. Thomas 
 Linken's always movin.' Moved four times or more already, 
 and I 'magine he'll just keep movin' till he moves into his 
 grave, and stops for good. He just lives up in the air, that man 
 does. He always is imaginin' that it rains gold in the next 
 State or county, but it never rains anythin' but rain where he 
 is ; and if it rained puddin' and sugar-cane, his dish would be 
 bottom upward, sure. Elder, what does make ye take such 
 an interest in that there family? " 
 
 " Mrs. Lincoln is a very good woman, an uncommon one ; 
 and Abraham " 
 
 " Yes, elder, I knew ye were goin' to say somethin' good 
 of Abraham. Yer heart is just set on that boy. I could see 
 it when ye were here. I remember all that ye prophesied 
 about him. I ain't forgot it. Well, I am a very plain-spoken 
 woman. Ye ain't much of a prophet, in my opinion. He 
 hain't got anywhere yet now, has he ? He's just a great, 
 tall, black, jokin' boy ; awful lazy, always readin* and talkin' ; 
 tellin' stories and makin' people laugh, with his own mind 
 as blue as my indigo-bag behind it all. That is just what 
 he is, elder, and he'll never amount to anythin' in this 
 world or any other. It's all just as I told ye it would be. 
 There, now, elder, that's as true as preachin', and the plain 
 facts of the case. You wait and see. Time tells the 
 truth." 
 
 " His opportunity is yet to come ; and when it does, he will 
 have the heart and mind to fill it," said Jasper. " A soul that 
 is true to what is best in life, becomes a power among men at
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN MOVES. 189 
 
 last it is spiritual gravitation. 'Tis current leads the river. 
 You do not see." 
 
 " No, I do not understand any such things as those ; but 
 when you've been over to see the Linkens, you come back 
 here, and I'll make ye some more doughnuts. Come back, 
 won't ye, and bring yer Indian boy ? I'm a plain woman, and 
 live all alone, and I do love to hear ye talk. It gives me some- 
 thin' to think about after ye're gone ; and there ain't many 
 preachers that visit these parts." 
 
 Jasper moved on under the great trees, and came to the 
 simple Lincoln cabin. 
 
 " You have come back, elder," said Thomas Lincoln. 
 " Travelin' with your Indian boy ? I'm glad to see you, though 
 we are very poor now. We're goin' to move away we and 
 some other families. "We're all off to Illinois. You've traveled 
 over that kentry, preacher ? " 
 
 " Yes, I've been there." 
 
 " Well, what do you think of the kentry ? " 
 
 " It is a wonderful country, Mr. Lincoln. It can produce 
 grain enough to feed the world. The earth grows gold. It 
 will some day uplift cities it will be rich and happy. I like 
 the prairie country well." 
 
 " There ! let me tell my wife. Mother, here's the preacher. 
 What do you think he says about the prairie kentry ? Says the 
 earth grows gold." 
 
 Poor Mrs. Lincoln looked sad and doubtful. She had 
 heard such things before. But she welcomed Jasper heartily, 
 and the three, with Waubeno, sat down to a meal of plain 
 Indian pudding and milk, and talked of the sorrowful winter
 
 190 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 that had passed and the prospects of a better life amid the 
 flowery prairies of Illinois. 
 
 A little dog played around them while they were thus eat- 
 ing and talking. 
 
 " It is not our dog," said Mrs. Lincoln, u but he has taken 
 a great liking to Abraham. The boy is away now, but he will 
 be back by sundown. The dog belongs to one of the family, 
 and is always restless when Abraham has gone away. Abraham 
 wants to take him along with us, but it seems to me that we've 
 got enough mouths to feed without him. We are all so poor ! 
 and I don't see what good he would do. But if Abraham says 
 so, he will have to go." 
 
 " How is Abraham ? " asked Jasper. 
 
 " Oh, he is well, and as good to me as ever, and he studies 
 hard, just as he used to do." 
 
 " And is as lazy as ever," said Thomas Lincoln. " At the 
 lazy folks' fair he'd take the premium." 
 
 " You shouldn't say that," said Mrs. Lincoln. " Just think 
 how good he was to everybody during the sickness ! He never 
 thought of himself, but just worked night and day. His own 
 mother died of the same sickness years ago, and he's had a 
 feelin' heart for the sufferers in this calamity. I tell you, elder, 
 that he's good to everybody, and if he does not take hold 
 to work in the way that father does, his head and heart are 
 never idle. I am sorry that he and father do not see more 
 alike. The boy is goin' to do well in the world. He begins 
 right." 
 
 When Abraham returned, there was one heart that was 
 indeed glad to see him. It was the little dog. The animal
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN MOVES. 191 
 
 bounded heels over head as soon as he heard the boy's step, and 
 almost leaped upon his tall shoulder as he met him. 
 
 " Humph ! " said Mr. Lincoln. 
 
 " Animals know who are good to them," said Mrs. Lincoln. 
 "Abraham, here is the preacher." 
 
 How tall, and dark, and droll, and yet how sad, the boy 
 looked ! He was full grown now, uncouth and ungainly. Who 
 but Jasper would have seen behind the features of that young, 
 sinewy backwoodsman the soul of the leader and liberator ? 
 
 It was a busy time with the Lincolns. Their goods were 
 loaded upon a rude and very heavy ox-wagon, and the oxen 
 were given into the charge of young Abraham to drive. 
 
 The young man's voice might have been heard a mile as he 
 swung his whip and called out to the oxen on starting. They 
 passed by the grave under the great trees where his poor 
 mother's body lay. and left it there, never to be visited again. 
 There were some thirteen persons in the emigrant party. 
 
 Emigrant wagons were passing toward Illinois, the " prairie 
 country," as it was called, over all the roads of Indiana. The 
 " schooners," as these wagons were called, were everywhere to 
 be seen on the great prairie sea. It was the time of the great 
 emigration. Jasper had never dreamed of a life like this be- 
 fore. He looked into one prairie wagon, whose young driver 
 had gone for water. He turned to Waubeno, and said : 
 
 " What do you think I saw ? " 
 
 " Guns to destroy the Indians ; trinkets and trifles to cheat 
 us out of our lands ; whisky for tent-making." 
 
 " No, Waubeno. There was an old grandmother there, a 
 sick woman, and a little coffin. This is a sad world sometimes.
 
 192 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 I pity everybody, and I would that all men were brothers. Go, 
 look into the wagon, Waubeno." 
 
 The Indian went, and soon returned. 
 
 " Do you pity them, Waubeno ? " 
 
 " Yes ; but" 
 
 " What, Waubeno ? " 
 
 " I pity the Indian mother too. Your people drove her 
 from her corn-fields at Eock Island, and she left the graves of 
 her children behind her." 
 
 There was a shadow of sadness in the hearts of the Lincoln 
 family as they turned away forever from the grave of Nancy 
 Lincoln under the trees. The poor woman who rested there in 
 the spot soon to be obliterated, little thought on her dying bed 
 that the little boy she was leaving to poverty and adventure 
 would be one day ranked with great men of the ages with Ser- 
 vius Tullius, Pericles, Cincinnatus, Cromwell, Hampden, Wash- 
 ington, and Bolivar ; that he would sit in the seat of a long line 
 of illustrious Presidents, call a million men to arms, or that 
 his rude family features would find a place among the grand 
 statues of every liberated country on earth. 
 
 Poor Nancy Hanks ! Every one who knew her had felt 
 the warmth of her kindness and marked her sadness. She 
 was an intellectual woman, was deeply religious, and is believed 
 to have been a very emotional character in the old Methodist 
 camp-meetings. Her family, the Hankses, were among the 
 best singers and loudest shouters at the camp-meetings, and 
 she was in sympathy with them. 
 
 Her heart lived on in Abraham. When she fell sick of the 
 epidemic fever, Abraham, then a boy of ten years of age, waited
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN MOVES. 193 
 
 upon her and nursed her. There was no doctor within twenty- 
 five miles. She was so slender, and had been so ill-sustained 
 that the fever-fires did their work in a week. Finding her end 
 near, she called Abraham and his little sister to her, and said : 
 
 " Be good to one another." 
 
 Her face looked into Abraham's for the last time. 
 
 " Live," she said, " as I have taught you. Love your kin- 
 dred, and worship God." 
 
 She faded away, and her husband made her coffin with a 
 whip-saw out of green wood, and on a changing October day 
 they laid her away under the trees. They were leaving her 
 grave now, the humblest of all places then, but a shrine to-day, 
 for her son's character has glorified it. 
 
 He must have always remembered the hymns that she used 
 to sing. Some of them were curious compositions. In the 
 better class of them were ; " Am I a soldier of the cross," "Alas ! 
 and did my Saviour bleed," and " How tedious and tasteless 
 the hour." The camp-meeting melodies were simple, mere 
 movements, like the negro songs. 
 
 Abraham swung his whip lustily over the oxen's heads on 
 that long spring journey, and directed the way. The wheels of 
 the cart were great rollers, and they creaked along. Here and 
 there the roads were muddy, but the sky was blue above, and 
 the buds were swelling, and the birds were singing, and the 
 little dog that belonged to the party kept close to his heels, and 
 the poor people journeyed on under the giant timber, and out 
 of it at times along the ocean-like prairies of the Illinois. The 
 world was before them an expanse of forest and prairie that in 
 fifty years were to be changed by the axe and plowshare into
 
 194: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 prosperous farms and homesteads, and settled by the restless 
 nations of the world. 
 
 The journey was long. There were spells of wintry weather, 
 for the spring advanced by degrees even here. Streams over- 
 flowing their banks lay across their way, and these had to be 
 forded. 
 
 One morning the party came to a stream covered with thin 
 ice. The oxen and horses hesitated, but were forced into the 
 cold water. After a dreary effort the hardy pilgrims passed 
 over and mounted the western bank. A sharp cry was heard 
 on the opposite side. 
 
 " You have left the dog, Abe," said one. " Good riddance 
 to him ! I am glad that we are quit of him at last." 
 
 The dog's pitiable cry rang out on the crisp, cool air. He 
 was barking to Abraham, and the teamster's heart recognized 
 that the animal's call was to him. 
 
 " See him run, and howl ! " said another. " Whip up, Abe, 
 and we will soon be out of sight." 
 
 Young Lincoln looked behind. The little animal would go 
 down to the water, and try to swim across, but the broken ice 
 drove him back. Then he set up a cry, as much as to say : 
 
 " Abe, Abe, you will not leave me ! " 
 
 " Drive on," said one of the men. " He'll take care of him- 
 self. He'd no business to lag behind. What do we want of 
 the dog, anyway ? " 
 
 The animal cried more and more piteously and lustily. 
 
 " Whoa ! " said Lincoln. 
 
 " What are you going to do, Abe ? " 
 
 " To do as I would be done by. I can't stand that."
 
 THOMAS LINCOLN MOVES. 195 
 
 Lincoln plunged into the frozen water and waded across. 
 The dog, overjoyed, leaped into his arms. Lincoln returned, 
 having borne the little dog in his arms across the stream. He 
 was cold and dripping, and was censured for causing a needless 
 delay. But he. had a happy face and heart. 
 
 Referring to this episode of the journey a long time after- 
 ward, Lincoln said to a friend : 
 
 " 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 
 arms. His frantic leaps of joy, and other evidences of grati- 
 tude, repaid me for all the exposure I had undergone."
 
 CHAPTEE XVIII. 
 MAIN-POGUE. 
 
 ASPER taught for a time near New Salem, then 
 made again his usual circuit, after which he 
 made his home for a time at Springfield, Illi- 
 nois. "When Jasper was returning from this 
 last circuit of his self-appointed mission the 
 Black Hawk war had begun again. He came one day, after 
 long wanderings, to Bushville, in Schuyler County, Illinois, 
 and found the place in a state of great excitement. The 
 town was filling with armed men, and among them were 
 many faces that he had seen at New Salem, when Waubeno 
 was his companion. 
 
 He recognized a Mr. Green, whom he had known in Xew 
 Salem, and said to him : 
 
 " My friend, what does this armed gathering mean ? " 
 " Black Hawk has crossed the Mississippi and is making 
 war on the settlers. The Governor has called for volunteers to 
 defend the State." 
 
 "What has led to this new outbreak?" said Jasper, al- 
 though few knew the cause better than he. 
 
 " Oh, sentiment Indian sentiment. Black Hawk wants the 
 old Indian town on the bluff again. He says it is sacred to his 
 
 (196)
 
 MAIN-POGUE. 197 
 
 race ; that his ancestors are buried there, and that there is no 
 place like it on earth, or none that can take its place in his soul. 
 He claims that the chiefs had been made drunk by the white 
 men when they signed the treaty that gave up the town; that 
 he never sold his fathers' graves. His heart is full of revenge, 
 and he and all his tribe cling to that old Sac village with the 
 grasp of death." 
 
 " The trouble has been gathering long ? " 
 
 " Yes. The settlers came up, under the treaty, to occupy the 
 best lands around the Sac town and compel the Indians to 
 live west of the Mississippi. Then the Indians and settlers 
 began to dispute and quarrel. The settlers brought whisky, 
 and Black Hawk demanded that it should not be sold to his 
 people. He violently entered a settler's claim, and stove in 
 a barrel of whisky before the man's eyes. Then the Indians 
 went over the Mississippi sullenly, and left their cabins and 
 corn-fields. But hard weather came, and the women would 
 come back to the old corn-fields, which they had planted the 
 year before, to steal corn. They said that the corn was theirs, 
 and that they were starving for their own food. Some of 
 them were killed by the settlers. Black Hawk had become 
 enraged again. He has been trying to get the Indian tribes 
 to unite and kill all of the whites. He has violated the old 
 Indian treaty, and is murdering people on every hand, and 
 the Governor has asked for volunteers to protect the lives 
 and property of the settlers. He had to do it. Either the 
 whites or the Indians must perish. The settlers came here 
 under a legal treaty; they must be protected. It is no time 
 for sentiment now."
 
 193 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " Are nearly all of the men of New Salem here ? " said 
 Jasper. 
 
 " Yes ; Abraham Lincoln was the first to enlist, and he is 
 our leader. He ought to be a good Indian fighter. His grand- 
 father was killed by the Indians." 
 
 " So I have heard." 
 
 " But Lincoln himself is not a hard man ; there's nothing 
 revengeful about him. He would be more likely to do a good 
 act to an Indian than a harmful one, if he could. His pur- 
 pose is not to kill Indians, but to protect the State and save 
 the lives of peaceful, inoffensive people." 
 
 The men from the several towns in the vicinity gathered in 
 the open space, and proceeded to elect their officers. 
 
 The manner of the election was curious. There were the 
 two candidates for captain of the company. They were Abra- 
 ham Lincoln and a man by the name of Fitzpatrick. Each 
 volunteer was asked to put himself in the line by the side of 
 the man of his choice. 
 
 One by one they stepped forward and arranged themselves 
 by the side of Lincoln, until Lincoln stood at the head of a 
 larger part of the men. 
 
 " Captain Lincoln ! " said one, when he saw how the elec- 
 tion was going. " Three cheers for Honest Abe ! He is our 
 man." 
 
 There arose a great shout of " Captain Lincoln ! " 
 
 Jasper marked the delight which the election had given his 
 old New Salem friends. Lincoln himself once said that that 
 election was the proudest event of his life. 
 
 The New Salem Company went into camp at Beardstown,
 
 MAIN-POGUE. 199 
 
 and was disbanded at Ottawa thirty days after, not having met 
 the enemy. Lincoln, feeling that he should be true to his 
 country and the public safety at the hour of peril, enlisted 
 again as a common private, served another thirty days, and 
 then, the war not being over, he enlisted again. The war ter- 
 minated with the battle of Bad Axe and the capture of Black 
 Hawk, who became a prisoner of state. 
 
 One day, when the volunteers were greatly excited by the 
 tales of Indian murders, and were beset by foes lurking in am- 
 bush and pirogue, a remarkable scene occurred in Lincoln's 
 camp. 
 
 The men, who had been talking over a recent massacre by 
 the Indians, were thirsting to avenge the barbarities, when sud- 
 denly the withered form of an Indian appeared before them. 
 
 They started, and an officer demanded : 
 
 " Who are you ? " 
 
 " Main-Pogue." 
 
 " How came you here ? " 
 
 " I am a friend to the white man. I'm going to meet my 
 son, a boy whom I have made my own." 
 
 " You are a spy ! " 
 
 " I am not a spy. I am Main-Pogue. I am hungry ; I am 
 old. I am no spy. Give an old Indian food, and I will serve 
 you while you need. Then let me go and find my boy." 
 
 " Food ! " said one. " You are a spy, a plotter. There is 
 murder in your heart. We will make short work with you. 
 That is what we are sent out to do." 
 
 " I never did the white man harm," said the old man, draw- 
 ing his blanket around him. 
 14
 
 200 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " You shall pay for this, you old hypocrite ! " said another 
 officer. " Men, what shall we do with this spy? " 
 
 " Kill him ! " said one. 
 
 " Shoot him ! " said another. 
 
 " Torture him, and make him confess ! " said a third. 
 
 The old Indian stood bent and trembling. 
 
 " I am a wandering beggar, looking for my boy," said the 
 Indian. " I never did the white man harm. Hear me." 
 
 " You belong to Black Hawk's devils," said an officer, 
 "and you are plotting our death. You shall be shot. Seize 
 him ! " 
 
 The old Indian trembled as the men surrounded him bent 
 on his destruction. 
 
 There came toward the excited company a tall young offi- 
 cer. All eyes were bent upon him. He peered into the face of 
 the old Indian. The men rushed forward to obey the officer. 
 
 " Halt ! " said the tall captain. " This Indian must not be 
 killed by us." 
 
 That speaker was Abraham Lincoln. The men jeered at 
 him, but he stood between the Indian and them, like a form of 
 iron. 
 
 The Indian gave his protector a grateful look, and there 
 dropped from his hand a passport, which in his confusion he 
 had failed to give the officer. It was a certificate saying that 
 he had rendered good service to the Government, and it was 
 signed by General Cass. 
 
 " Why should you wish to save him ? " asked a volunteer of 
 young Lincoln. " Your grandfather was killed by an Indian. 
 You are a coward ! "
 
 MAIN-POGUE. 201 
 
 " I would do what is right by any man," said Lincoln, 
 fiercely. " Who says I am a coward ? I will meet him here in 
 an open contest. Now, let the man who says I am a coward 
 meet me face to face and hand to hand." 
 
 He stood over the cowering Indian, dark, self-confident and 
 defiant. 
 
 " I stand for justice. Let him come on. I stand alone for 
 right. Let him come on. Main-Pogue, go ! " 
 
 Out of the camp hobbled the Indian, with the long, strong 
 arm of Abraham Lincoln lifted over him. The eyes of the men 
 followed him in anger, disappointment, and scorn. Hard 
 words passed from one to the other. He felt for the first time 
 in his life that he stood in this matter utterly alone. 
 
 " Jeer on," he said. " I would shield this Indian at the cost 
 of my life. I would not be a true soldier if I failed in my duty 
 to this old man. In every event of life it is right that makes 
 might ; and the rights of an Indian are as sacred as those of any 
 other man, and I would defend them, at whatever cost, as those 
 of a white man. Main-Pogue, go hence ! Here will I stand 
 between you and death." 
 
 " Heaven bless you for protecting a poor old man ! I have 
 been a runner for the whites for many years, but I have never 
 met a man like you. I will tell my boy of this. Your name is 
 Lincoln ? " 
 
 " Yes Abraham Lincoln, though the name matters noth- 
 ing."
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 THE FOREST COLLEGE. 
 
 ELL, how time flies, and the clock of the year 
 does go round ! Here's the elder again ! It's 
 a bright day that brings ye here, though I 
 shouldn't let ye sleep in the prophet's cham- 
 ber, if I had one, 'cause ye ain't any prophet 
 at all. But ye are right welcome just the same. Where is 
 yer Indian boy?" 
 
 " He's gone to his own people, Aunt Olive." 
 " To whet his tommyhawk, I make no doubt. Oh, elder, 
 how ye have been deceived in people ! Ye believe that every 
 one is as good as one can be, or can be grafted to bear sweet 
 fruit, but, hoe-down-hoe, elder, 'taint so. Yer Aunt Indiana 
 knows how desperately wicked is the human heart. If ye 
 don't do others, others will do ye, and this world is a warfare. 
 Come in; I've got somethin' new to tell ye. It's about the 
 Linkens' Abe." 
 
 The Tunker entered the cheerful cabin in the sunny clear- 
 ing of the timber. 
 
 "I've been savin' up the news to tell ye when ye came. 
 Abe's been to war ! " 
 
 " He has not been hurt, has he ? " 
 
 (302)
 
 THE FOREST COLLEGE. 203 
 
 " Hurt ! No, he hasn't been hurt. A great Indian fighter 
 he proved ! The men were all laughin' about it. He'll live to 
 fight another day, as the say in' goes, and so will the enemy. 
 Well, I always thought that there was no need of killin' 
 people. Let them alone, and they will all die themselves ; and 
 as for the enemy, let them alone, and they will come home 
 waggin' their tails behind them, as the ditty says. "Well, I 
 must tell ye. Abe's been to war. He didn't see the enemy, 
 nor fight, nor nothin'. But a wild Indian came right into 
 his camp, and the soldiers started up to kill him, and what do 
 ye suppose Abe did ? " 
 
 " I think he did what he thought to be right." 
 
 " He let him go ! There ! what do you think of that ? 
 He just went to fightin' his own company to save the Indian. 
 There's a warrior for ye ! And that wasn't all. He talked in 
 such a way that he frightened his own men, and he just gave 
 the Indian some bread and cheese, and let him off. And the 
 Indian went off blessin' him. Abe will never make a soldier 
 or handle armies much, after all yer prophecies. Suck a sol- 
 dier as that ought to be rewarded a pinfeather." 
 
 " His conduct was after the Galilean teaching was it not ? 
 and produced the result of making the Indiaii. a friend. 
 "Was not that a good thing to do ? "Who was the Indian ? " 
 
 " It was old Main-Pogne. He was uncle, or somethin', to 
 that boy who used to travel about with you, teachin' you the 
 language "Waubeno ; the old interpreter for General Cass's 
 men. He'll go off and tell Waubeno. I wonder if Main-Pogue 
 knew who it was that saved him, and if he will tell Waubeno 
 that?"
 
 204 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 " Lincoln did a noble act." 
 
 " Oh, elder, ye've got a good heart, but ye're weak in yer 
 upper story. That ain't all I've got to tell ye. Abe has failed, 
 after all yer prophecies, too. He and another man went to 
 keepin' store up in New Salem, and he let his partner cheat 
 him, and they failed ; and now he's just workin' to pay up 
 his debts, and his partner's too." 
 
 "And his partner's too? That shows that he saved an 
 honest purpose out of losses. The greatest of all losses is a loss 
 of integrity of purpose. I'm glad to hear that he has not lost 
 that." 
 
 " Oh, elder, ye've allus somethin' good to say of that boy. 
 But I'm not agin him. He's Tom Linken's son, just as I told 
 ye ; and he'll never come to anythin' good. He all runs to 
 books and gabble, and goes 'round repeatin' poetry, which is 
 only the lies of crazy folks. I haven't any use for poetry, ex- 
 cept hymns. But he's had real trouble of late, besides these 
 things, and I'm sorry for that. He's lost the girl what he was 
 goin' to marry. She was a beautiful girl, and her death made 
 him so downhearted that they had to shut him up and watch 
 him to keep him from committin' suicide. They say that he 
 has very melancholy spells. He can't help that, I don't sup- 
 pose. His mother what sleeps over yonder under the timber 
 was melancholy. How are all the schools that you set to goin' 
 on the Wabash ? " 
 
 " They are all growing, good woman, and it fills my heart 
 with delight to see them grow. They are all growing like gar- 
 dens for the good of this great country. It does my heart good, 
 and makes my soul happy, to start these Christian schools. It's
 
 THE FOREST COLLEGE. 205 
 
 my mission. And I try to start them right character first, true 
 views of things next, and books last; but the teaching of young 
 children to think and act right spiritually is the highest educa- 
 tion of all. This is best done by telling stories, and so I travel 
 and travel telling stories to schools. You do not see my plan, 
 but it is the true seed that I am planting, and it will bear fruit 
 when I am gone to a better world than this." 
 
 " Oh, ye mean well," said Aunt Olive, " but ye don't know 
 more than some whole families pardon my plainness of speech. 
 I don't doubt that ye are doin' some good, after a fashion ; but 
 don't prophesy yer prophecies in regard to Abe have failed 
 already. He'll never command the American army, nor run 
 the nation, nor keep store. Yer Aunt Indiana can read 
 character, and her prophecies have proved true so far." 
 
 " Wait time tells the whole truth ; and worth is worth, and 
 passes for the true gold of life in time." 
 
 " Ye don't think that there's any chance for him yet, do 
 ye, elder, after lettin' the Indian go, and failin', and havin' 
 that melancholy spell ? " 
 
 " Yes, I do. My spiritual sense tells me so." 
 
 "Yer spiritual sense! Elder, ye ought to go to school. 
 Ye are nothin' but a child yerself. And let me advise ye 
 never to have anythin' more to do with that there Indian boy. 
 Fishes don't swim on rocks, nor hawks go to live in a cage. 
 An Indian is an Indian, and, mark my words, that boy will have 
 yer scalp some day. He will, now he will. I saw it in his 
 eye." 
 
 The Tunker journeyed toward the new town of Springfield, 
 Illinois, along the fragrant timber and over the blooming
 
 206 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 prairies. Everywhere were to be seen the white prairie schooner 
 and the little village of people that followed it. 
 
 Springfield was but a promising village at this time, in a very 
 fertile land. Probably no one ever thought that it would become 
 a capital city of an empire of population, the hub of that great 
 wheel of destiny rimmed by the Wabash, the Mississippi, Rock 
 River, and the Lake ; and still less did any one ever dream 
 that it would be the legislative influence of that tall, laughing, 
 sad-faced boy, Lincoln, who would produce this result. 
 
 Jasper preached at Springfield, and visited the log school- 
 house, and told stories to the little school. He then started to 
 walk to New Salem, a distance of some eighteen or twenty 
 miles. 
 
 It was a pleasant country, and all things seemed teeming 
 with life, for it was now the high tide of the year. The prai- 
 ries were billows of flowers, and the timber was shady and cool, 
 carpeted with mosses, tangled with vines, with its tops bright 
 with sunshine and happy with the songs of birds. 
 
 About half-way between the two towns Jasper saw some 
 lofty trees, giants of the forest, that spread out their branches 
 like roofs of some ancient temple. There were birds' nests 
 made of sticks in their tops, and a cool stream ran under 
 them. He sought the place for rest. 
 
 As he entered the great shadow, he saw a tall young man 
 seated on a log, absorbed in reading a book. He approached 
 him, and recognized him as young Lincoln. 
 
 " I am glad to meet you here, in this beautiful place," he 
 said. 
 
 " This is my college," said Lincoln.
 
 THE FOREST COLLEGE. 207 
 
 " What are you studying, my friend ? " 
 
 " Oh, I am trying my hand at law a little. Stuart, the 
 Springfield lawyer, lends me his law-books, and I walk over 
 there from New Salem to get them, and when I get as' far back 
 as this I sit down on this log and study. I can study when I 
 am walking. I once mastered forty pages of Blackstone in a 
 walk. But I love to stop and study on this log. It is rather a 
 long walk from New Salem to Springfield almost twenty 
 miles and when I get as far back as this I feel tired. These 
 trees are so grand that they look like a house of Nature, and 
 I call them my college. I can't have the privileges of better- 
 off young men, who can go to Philadelphia, New York, or 
 Boston to study law, and so I do the best I can here. I get 
 discouraged sometimes, but I believe that right is might, and 
 do my best, and there is something that is leading me on." 
 
 " I am glad to find you here, Abraham Lincoln. I love you 
 in my heart, and I wish that I might help you in your studies. 
 But I have never studied law." 
 
 " But you do help me." 
 
 "How?" 
 
 " By your faith in me. Elder, I have been having a hard 
 row to hoe, and am an unlucky fellow. Have been keeping 
 a grocery, and we have failed failed right at the beginning 
 of life. It hurt my pride, but, elder, it has not hurt my honor. 
 I've worked and paid up all my debts, and now I am going to 
 pay his. I might make excuses for not paying his part of the 
 debts, but, elder, it would not leave my name clear. I must 
 live conscience free. People call me a fool, but they trust me. 
 They have made me postmaster at New Salem, though that
 
 208 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 ain't much of an office. The mail comes only once a week, and 
 I carry it in my hat. They'll need a new post-office by and by." 
 
 " My friend, you are giving yourself a moral self-education 
 that has more worth than all the advantages of wealth or a 
 famous name or the schools of Boston. The time will come 
 when this growing people will need such a man as you to lead 
 them, and you will lead them more grandly than others who 
 have had an easier school. You have learned the first prin- 
 ciples of true education it is, the habit that can not do wrong 
 without feeling the flames of torment within. Every sacrifice 
 that you have made to your conscience has given you power. 
 That power is a godlike thing. You will see all one day, as 
 I do now." 
 
 " Elder, they call me a merry-maker, but I carry with me 
 a sad heart. I wish to tell you, for I feel that you are my true 
 friend. I loved Ann Kutledge. She was the daughter of 
 James Rutledge, the founder of our village and the owner of 
 the mill on the Sangamon. She was a girl of a loving heart, 
 gentle blood, and her face was lovely. You saw her at the 
 tavern. I loved her I loved her very name ; and she is dead. 
 It has all happened since you were here, and I have wished to 
 meet you again and tell you all. Such things as these make 
 me melancholy. - A great darkness comes down upon me at 
 times, and I am tempted to end all the bright dream that we 
 call life. But I rise above the temptation. Elder, you don't 
 know how my heart has had to struggle. I sometimes think of 
 my poor mother's grave in the timber in Indiana, and I always 
 think of Tier grave Ann Rutledge's and then it comes over 
 me like a cloud, that there is no place for me in the world.
 
 THE FOREST COLLEGIE. 209 
 
 Do you want to know what I do in those hours, elder? I 
 repeat a long poem. I have said it over a hundred times. It 
 was written by some poet who felt as I do. I would like to 
 repeat it to you, elder. I tell stories they only make me more 
 melancholy but this poem soothes my mind. It makes me 
 feel that other men have suffered before, and it makes me will- 
 ing to suffer for others, and to accept my lot in life, whatever 
 it may be." 
 
 " I wish to hear the poem that has so moved you," said 
 the Tunker. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln stood up and leaned against the trunk of 
 one of the giant trees. The sunlight was sifting through the 
 great canopy of leaves, boughs, and nests overhead, and afar 
 gleamed the prairies like gardens of the sun. He lifted his 
 long arm, and, with a sad face, said : 
 
 " Elder, listen. 
 
 " ' 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 leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade, 
 Be scattered around, and together be laid ; 
 And the young and the old, and the low and the high, 
 Shall molder to dust, and together shall lie. 
 
 " ' The infant a mother attended and loved, 
 
 The mother that infant's affection who proved, 
 The husband that mother and infant who blest 
 Each, all, are away to their dwellings of rest. 
 
 " ' [ The maid on whose cheek, on whose brow, in whose eye, 
 Shone beauty and pleasure, her triumphs are by ;
 
 210 IN THE EOT HOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 And the memory of those who loved her and praised, 
 Are alike from the minds of the living erased.] 
 
 " ' The hand of the king that the scepter hath borne, 
 The brow of the priest that the miter hath worn, 
 The eye of the sage, and the heart of the brave, 
 Are hidden and lost in the depths of the grave. 
 
 " ' The peasant whose lot was to sow and to reap, 
 
 The herdsman who climbed with his goats up the steep, 
 The beggar who wandered in search of his bread, 
 Have faded away like the grass that we tread. 
 
 " ' [The saint who enjoyed the communion of Heaven, 
 The sinner who dared to remain unforgiven, 
 The wise and the foolish, the guilty and just, 
 Have quietly mingled their bones in the dust.] 
 
 " ' So the multitude goes, like the flower or the weed 
 That withers away to let others succeed ; 
 So the multitude comes, even those we behold, 
 To repeat every tale that has often been told. 
 
 " ' For we are the same our fathers have been ; 
 We see the same sights our fathers have seen ; 
 We drink the same stream, we view the same sun, 
 And run the same course our fathers have run. 
 
 " ' The thoughts we are thinking our fathers would think ; 
 From the death we are shrinking our fathers would shrink ; 
 To the life we are clinging they also would cling ; 
 But it speeds from us all like a bird on the wing. 
 
 " ' They loved, but the story we can not unfold ; 
 
 They scorned, but the heart of the haughty is cold ; 
 They grieved, but no wail from their slumber will come ; 
 They joyed, but the tongue of their gladness is dumb. 
 
 "'They died, ay, they died: we things that are now, 
 That walk on the turf that lies over their brow, 
 And make in their dwellings a transient abode, 
 Meet the things that they met on their pilgrimage road.
 
 THE FOREST COLLEGE. 211 
 
 " ' Yea, hope and despondency, pleasure and pain, 
 Are mingled together in sunshine and rain ; 
 And the smile and the tear, the song and the dirge, 
 Still follow each other like surge upon surge. 
 
 " ' ' Tis the wink of an eye, 'tis the draught of a breath, 
 From the blossom of health to the paleness of death, 
 From the gilded saloon to the bier and the shroud 
 Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud ? ' " 
 
 He stood there in moody silence when he had finished the 
 recitation, which was (unknown to him) from the pen of a 
 pastoral Scotch poet. The Tunker looked at him, and saw 
 how deep were his feelings, and how earnest were his desires to 
 know the true way of life and to do well his mission, and go 
 on with the great multitude, whose procession comes upon the 
 earth and vanishes from the scenes. But he did not dream of 
 the greatness of the destiny for which that student was pre- 
 paring in the hard college of the woods. 
 
 " My education must always be defective," said the young 
 student. " I can riot read law in great law-offices, like other 
 young men, but I can be just I can do right ; and I would 
 never undertake a case of law, for any money, that I did not 
 think right and just. I would stand for what I thought was 
 right, as I did by the old Indian, and I think that the people 
 in time would learn to trust me." 
 
 " Abraham Lincoln, to school one's conscience to the habit 
 of right, so that it can not do wrong, is the first and the high- 
 est education. It is what one is that makes him a knight, and 
 that is the only true knighthood. The highest education is 
 that of the soul. Did you know that the Indian whom you 
 saved was Maiu-Posrue ? "
 
 212 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "And that Main-Pogue is the uncle and foster-father of 
 my old guide, Waubeno ? " 
 
 "No. "Waubeno was the boy who came with you to the 
 Wabash?" 
 
 " Waubeno's father was killed by the white people. He was 
 condemned to death. He asked to go home to see his family 
 once more, and returned upon his honor to die. That old story 
 is true. Does it seem possible that an English soldier could 
 ever take the life of an Indian like that ? " 
 
 " No, it does not. Will Main-Pogue tell Waubeno that it 
 was I who saved him ? " 
 
 " Does Main-Pogue know you by name? I hope he does." 
 
 " He may have forgotten. I would like for him to remem- 
 ber it, because the Indian boy liked me, and an Indian killed 
 my grandfather. I liked that Indian boy, and I would do jus- 
 tice, if I could, by all men, and any man." 
 
 " Lincoln, I came to love and respect that Indian boy. 
 There was a native nobility in him. But my efforts to make 
 him a Christian failed, for he carried revenge in his heart. 
 I wish that he could know that it was you who did that deed ; 
 your character might be an influence that would strike an 
 unknown cord in the boy's heart, for Waubeno has a noble 
 heart Waubeno is noble. I wish he knew who it was that 
 spared Main-Pogue. Acts teach where words fail, and the 
 true teacher is not lips, but life. The boy once said to me that 
 he would cease to seek to avenge his father's death if he could 
 find a single white man who would defend an Indian to his 
 own harm, because it was right. Now, Lincoln, you have done
 
 THE FOREST COLLEGE. 213 
 
 just the act that would change his heart. But he has gone 
 with the winds. How will he ever hear of it? How will he 
 ever know it ? 
 
 " When Main-Pogue meets him, if he ever does again, he 
 may tell him all. But does Main-Pogue understand the rela- 
 tions that exist between you and me, and us and that boy ? 
 Waubeno, Waubeno, I would that you might hear of this ! " 
 
 He thought, and added : " He will hear of it, somehow, in 
 some way. Providence makes golden keys of deeds like yours. 
 They unlock the doors of mystery. Let me see, what was it 
 Waubeno said his exact words ? ' When I find a single white 
 man who defends an Indian to his own hurt, because it is 
 right, I will promise.' Lincoln, he said that. You are that 
 man. Lincoln, may God bless you, and call you into his serv- 
 ice when he has need of a man ! "
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 MAKING LINCOLN A "SON OF MALTA." 
 
 HEN Jasper, some years later, again met Aunt 
 Eastman, she had a yet more curious story to 
 tell about Abraham. 
 
 It was spring, and the cherry-trees were in 
 bloom and musical with bees. In the yard a 
 single apple-tree was red with blooms, which made fragrant 
 the air. 
 
 "And here comes Johnnie Apple-seed ! " said Aunt Olive. 
 " Heaven bless ye ! I call ye Johnnie Apple-seed because ye 
 remind me so much of that good man. He was a good man, if 
 he had lost his wits ; and ye mean well, just as he did. Smell 
 the apple-blossoms ! I don't know but it was liim that planted 
 that there tree." 
 
 To explain Aunt Olive's remarks, we should say that there 
 once wandered along the banks of the Ohio, a poor wayfaring 
 man who had a singular impression of duty. He felt it to be 
 his calling in life to plant apple-seeds. He would go to a 
 farmer's house, ask for work, and remain at the place a few 
 days or weeks. After he had gone, apple-seeds would be found 
 sprouting about the farm. His journeys were the beginnings 
 of many orchards in the Middle, West, and prairie States. 
 
 (214)
 
 MAKING LINCOLN A "SON OF MALTA." 215 
 
 " I love to smell apple-blossoms," said Aunt Olive. " It re- 
 minds me of old New England. I can almost hear the bells 
 ring on the old New England hills when I smell apple-blooms. 
 They say that Johnnie Apple-seed is dead, and that they filled 
 his grave with apple-blooms. I don't know as it is so, but it 
 ought to be. I sometimes wish that I was a poet, because a 
 poet fixes things as they ought to be makes the world all over 
 right. But, la ! Abe Linken was a poet. Have ye heard the 
 news?" 
 
 " No. What ? nothing bad, I hope ? " 
 
 " He's hung out his shingle." 
 
 " Where ? " 
 
 " In Springfield." 
 
 " In Springfield ? " 
 
 "Yes, elder, I've seen it. I have traveled a good deal 
 since I saw you 'round to camp-meetin', and fairs, rightin' 
 things, and doin' all the good I can. I've seen it. And, elder, 
 they've made a mock Mason on him." 
 
 In the pioneer days of Illinois the making of mock Masons, 
 or pseudo Sons of Malta, was a popular form of frolic, now 
 almost forgotten. Young people formed mock lodges or secret 
 societies, for the purpose of initiating new members by a series 
 of tricks, which became the jokes of the community. 
 
 " Yes," said Aunt Olive, " and what do ye think they did ? 
 Well, in them societies they first test the courage of those who 
 want to be new members. There's Judge Ball, now; when 
 they tested his courage, what do you think ? They blindfolded 
 him, and turned up his blue jean trousers about the ankles, and 
 said, ' Now let out the snakes ! ' and they took an elder-bush 
 15
 
 216 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 squirt-gun and squirted water over his feet ; and the water was 
 cold, and he thought it was snakes, and he jumped clear up to 
 the cross-beams on the chamber floor, and screamed and 
 screamed, and they wouldn't have him." 
 
 Jasper had never heard of these rude methods of making 
 jokes and odd stories in the backwoods. 
 
 " What did they do to test Abraham's courage ? " he asked. 
 
 " I don't know blindfolded him and dressed him up like a 
 donkey, and led him up to a lookin'-glass, and made him prom- 
 ise that he would never tell what he saw, and then owbandaged 
 his eyes or something of that kind. His courage stood the 
 test. Of course it did ; no matter what they might have done, 
 no one could frighten Abe. But he got the best o' them." 
 
 "How?" 
 
 " He took up a collection for a poor woman that he had met 
 on the way, and proposed to change the society into a commit- 
 tee for the relief of the poor and sufferin'." 
 
 " That shows his heart again." 
 
 " I knew that you would say that, elder." 
 
 " Everything that I hear of Lincoln shows how that his 
 character grows. It is my daily prayer that "Waubeno may 
 hear of how he saved Main-Pogue. It would change the heart 
 of Waubeno. He will know of it some day, and then he will 
 fulfill his promise to me." 
 
 The Tunker sat down in the door under the blooming 
 cherry-trees, and Aunt Olive brought a tray of food, and they 
 ate their supper there. 
 
 Afar stretched the prairies. The larks quivered in the air, 
 happy in the May-time, and gurgling with song. In the sunny
 
 SARAH BUSH LINCOLN, ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S STEP-MOTHER. 
 
 After photograph taken in 1865.
 
 MAKING LINCOLN A "SON OF MALTA." 217 
 
 outlines were seen a train of prairie schooners winding over 
 the plain. 
 
 These were rude times, when all things were new. Men 
 were purchasing the future by hardship and toil. But the two 
 religious enthusiasts presented a happy picture as they sat un- 
 der the cherry-trees and talked of camp- meetings, and the 
 inner light, and all they had experienced, and ate their frugal 
 meal. Odd though their views and beliefs and habits may 
 seem in some respects, each had a definite purpose of good ; 
 each lived in the horizon of bright prospects here and here- 
 after, and each was happy.
 
 CHAPTER XXL 
 PRAIRIE ISLAND. 
 
 HE beautiful country between Lake Michigan, 
 or old Fort Dearborn, and the Mississippi, or 
 Rock Island, was once a broad prairie, a sea of 
 flowers, birds, and bright insects. The buffa- 
 loes roamed over it in great herds, and the 
 buffalo-birds followed them. The sun rose over it as over a 
 sea, and the arched aurora rose red above it like some far gate 
 of a land of fire. Here the Sacs and Foxes roamed free ; the 
 lowas and the tribes of the North. It was one vast sunland, 
 a breeze-swept brightness, almost without a dot or shadow. 
 
 Almost, but not quite. Here and there, like islands in a 
 summer sea, rose dark groves of oak and vines. These spots 
 of refreshment were called prairie islands, and in one of these 
 islands, now gone, a pioneer colony made their homes, and built 
 a meeting-house, which was also to be used as a school-house. 
 Six or more of these families were from Germantown, Penn- 
 sylvania, and were Tunkers. The other families were from the 
 New England States. 
 
 To this nameless village, long ago swept away by the prairie 
 fires, went Jasper the Parable, with his cobbling-tools, his 
 stories, and his gospel of universal love and good-will. The 
 
 (218)
 
 PRAIRIE ISLAND. 219 
 
 Tunkers welcomed him with delight, and the emigrants from 
 New England looked upon him kindly as a good and well- 
 meaning man. There were some fifteen or twenty children 
 in the settlement, and here the peaceful disciple of Pestalozzi, 
 and friend of Froebel, applied for a place to teach, and the 
 school was by unanimous consent assigned to him. 
 
 So began the school at Prairie Island a school where the 
 first principles of education were perceived and taught, and 
 that might furnish a model for many an ambitious institution 
 of to-day. 
 
 " It is life that teaches," the Parable used to say, quoting 
 Pestalozzi. " The first thing to do is to form the habits that 
 lead to character ; the next thing is to stamp the young mind 
 with right views of life; then comes book-learning words, 
 figures, and maps but stories that educate morally are the 
 primer of life. Christ taught spiritual truths by parables. 
 I teach formative ideas by parables. The teacher should be 
 a story-teller. In my own country all children go through 
 fairy-land. Here they teach the young figures first, as though 
 all of life was a money-market. It is all unnatural and wrong. 
 I must teach and preach by stories." 
 
 The school-house was a simple building of logs and prairie 
 grass, with oiled paper for windows, and a door that opened 
 out and afforded a view of the vast prairie-sea to the west. 
 Jasper taught here five days in a week, and sang, prayed, and 
 exhorted on Sunday afternoons, and led social meetings on 
 Sunday evenings. The little community were united, peaceful, 
 and happy. They were industrious, self-respecting people, who 
 were governed by their moral sense, and their governing prin-
 
 220 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 ciple seemed to be the faith that, if a person desired and sought 
 to follow the divine will, he would have a revelation of spiritual 
 light, which would be like the opening of the gates of heaven 
 to him. Nearly every man and woman had some special expe- 
 rience of the soul to tell ; and if ever there was a community of 
 simple faith and brotherhood, it was here. 
 
 Jasper's school began in the summer, when the sun was 
 high, the cool shadows of the oaks grateful, and the bluebells 
 filled the tall, wavy grasses, and the prairie plover swam in the 
 air. 
 
 Jasper's first teaching was by the telling of stories that 
 leave in the young mind right ideas and impressions. 
 
 " My children, listen," said the gracious old man, as he sat 
 down to his rude desk, " and let me tell you some stories like 
 those Pestalozzi used to tell. Still, now ! " 
 
 He lifted his finger and his eyebrows, and sat a little while 
 in silence. 
 
 " Hark ! " he said. " Hear the birds sing in the trees ! 
 Nature is teaching us. When Nature is teaching I listen. 
 Nature is a greater teacher than I, or any man." 
 
 The little school sat in silence and listened. They had 
 never heard the birds sing in that way before. Presently there 
 was a hush in the trees. 
 
 " Now I will begin," said he. 
 
 PESTALOZZPS STORIES. 
 
 " Did you ever see a mushroom ? Yes, there are mushrooms 
 under the cool trees. Once, in the days when the plants and 
 flowers and trees all talked they talk now, but we have ceased
 
 PRAIRIE ISLAND. 221 
 
 to hear them, a little mushroom bowed in the winds, and said 
 to the grass : 
 
 "' See how I grow ! I came up in a single night. I am smart.' 
 
 " ' Yes,' said the grass, waving gently. 
 
 " ' But you,' said the smart little mushroom, ' it takes you a 
 whole year to grow.' 
 
 " The grass was sorry that it took so long for it to grow, and 
 hung its head, and thought, and thought. 
 
 " ' But,' said the grass, ' you spring up in the night, and in 
 a day or two you are gone. It takes me a year to grow, 
 but I outlive a hundred crops of mushrooms. I will have 
 patience and be content. Worth is of slow growth.' 
 
 " In a week the boastful little mushroom was gone, but the 
 grass bloomed and bore seed, and left a lovely memory behind 
 it. Hark ! hear the breeze in the trees ! Nature is teaching 
 now. Listen ! 
 
 " Now I will tell you another little story, such as I used to 
 hear Pestalozzi relate. I am going to tell this story to myself, 
 but you may listen. I have told a story to you, but now I will 
 talk to myself. 
 
 " There once was a king, who had been riding in the sun, 
 and he saw afar a lime-tree, full of cool, green leaves. Oh, how 
 refreshing it looked to him ! So he rode up to the lime-tree, 
 and rested in the shadow. 
 
 u The leaves all clung to the branches, and the winds whis- 
 pered among them, but did not blow them away. 
 
 " Then the king loved the tree, and he said : 
 
 " ' tree, would that my people clung to me as thy leaves do 
 to thy branches ! '
 
 222 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " The tree was pleased, and spoke : 
 
 " ' Would you learn from me wisdom to govern thy peo- 
 ple?' 
 
 " ' Yes, lime-tree ! Speak on." 
 
 " ' Would you know, then, what makes my leaves so cling 
 to my branches ? ' 
 
 " Yes, Lime Tree ! Speak on.' 
 
 " ' I carry to them the sap that nourishes them. 'Tis he 
 that gives himself to others that lives in others, and is safe and 
 happy himself. Do that, and thy kingdom shall be a lime- 
 tree.'" 
 
 A child brought iuto the room a bunch of harebells and 
 laid them upon the teacher's desk. 
 
 " Look ! " said Jasper, " Nature is teaching. Let us be quiet 
 a little and hear what she has to say. The harebells bring us 
 good-will from the sun and skies. There is goodness every- 
 where, and for all. Let us be grateful. 
 
 " Now I will give you another little Pestalozzian story, told 
 in my own way, and you may tell it to your fathers and moth- 
 ers and neighbors when you go home. 
 
 " There was once a man who had two little ponies. They 
 were pretty creatures, and just alike. He sold one of them to 
 a hard-hearted man, who kicked him and beat him ; and the 
 pony said : 
 
 " ' The man is my enemy. I will be his, and become a cun- 
 ning and vicious horse.' 
 
 " So the pony became cunning and vicious, and threw his 
 rider and crippled him, and grew spavined and old, and every 
 one was glad when he was dead.
 
 PRAIRIE ISLAND. 223 
 
 " The man sold the other pony to a noble-hearted man, who 
 treated him kindly and well. Then the pony said : 
 
 " ' I am proud of my master. I will become a good horse, 
 and my master's will shall be my own.' 
 
 " Like the master became the horse. He became strong 
 and beautiful. They chose him for the battle, and he went 
 through the wars, and the master slept by his side. He bore 
 his master at last in a triumphal procession, and all the people 
 were sorry when he came to die. Our minds here are one of 
 the little colts. 
 
 " So we will all work together. The lesson is ended. You 
 have all the impressions that you can bear for one day. Now 
 we will go out and play." 
 
 But the play-ground was made a field of teaching. 
 
 " There are plays that form right ideas," said Jasper, " and 
 plays that lead to an evil character. I teach no plays that lead 
 to cruelty or deception. I would no sooner withhold amuse- 
 ments from my little ones than water, but my amusements, like 
 the water, must be healthy and good." 
 
 There was one odd play that greatly delighted all the chil- 
 dren of the Prairie Island school. The idea of it was evolved 
 in the form of a popular song many years afterward. In it the 
 children are supposed to ask an old German musician how 
 many instruments of music he could play, and he acts out in 
 pantomime all of the instruments he could blow or handle. 
 We think it was this merriment that became known in America 
 as the song of Johnnie Schmoker in the minstrel days. 
 
 Not the children only, but the parents also all delighted to 
 see Jasper pretend to play all the instruments of the German
 
 224 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 band. Often at sunset, when the settlers came in from the 
 corn-fields and rested under the great trees, Jasper would de- 
 light the islanders, as they called themselves, with this odd 
 play. 
 
 " The purpose of education," Jasper used to repeat over and 
 over to his friends in this sunny island of the prairie sea, " is 
 not to teach the young how to make money or get wealth by 
 a cunning brain, but how to live for the soul. The soul's best 
 interests are in life's highest interest, and there is no poverty 
 in the world that is like spiritual poverty. In the periods of 
 poetry a nation is great ; and when poetry fails, the birds 
 cease to sing and the flowers to bloom, and divinities go away, 
 and the heart turns to stone." 
 
 There was one story that he often repeated to his little 
 school. The pupils liked it because there was action in it, as 
 in the play-story of the German musician. He called it 
 " CHINK, CHINK, CHINK " though we believe a somewhat 
 similar story is told in Germany under the name of " The 
 Stone-cold Heart." 
 
 He would clasp his hands together and strike them upon 
 his knee, making a sound like the jingling of silver coin. Any 
 one can produce this curious sound by the same action. 
 
 " Chink, chink, chink," he would say. " Do you hear it ? 
 Chink, chink, chink. Listen, as I strike my hands on my 
 knees. Money ? Now I will open my hands. There is no 
 money in them ; it was fool's gold, all. 
 
 " There lived in a great German forest a poor woodman. 
 He was a giant, but he had a great heart and a willing 
 arm, and he worked contentedly for many years.
 
 PRAIRIE ISLAND. 225 
 
 " One day lie chanced to go with some foresters into the 
 city. It was a festival day. He heard the jingle of money, 
 just like that " (striking his clasped hands on his knee). 
 "He saw what money would buy. He thought it would 
 buy happiness. He did not know that it was fool's gold, 
 all. 
 
 " He went back to his little hut in the forest feeling very 
 unhappy. His wife kissed him on his return, and his chil- 
 dren gathered around him to hear him tell the adventures of 
 the day, but his downcast spirit made them all sad. 
 
 " ' What has happened ? ' asked his wife. ' You always 
 seemed happy until to-night.' 
 
 '"And I was always happy until to-day. But I have 
 seen the world to-day, and now I want that which will buy 
 everything.' 
 
 " * And what is that ? ' asked his wife. 
 
 " ' Listen ! It sounds like that,' and he struck his clasped 
 hands on his knee chink, chink, chink. ' If I had that, I 
 would bring to you and the little ones the fine things I saw 
 in the city, and you would be happy. You are contented 
 now because you do not know.' 
 
 " ' But I would rather that you would bring to me a happy 
 face and loving heart,' said his wife. 'You know that the 
 Book says that " a man's life consisteth not in the abundance 
 of the things which he possesseth." Love makes happiness, 
 and gold is in the heart.' 
 
 " The forester continued to be sad. He would sit outside 
 of his door at early evening and pound his hands upon his 
 knees so chink, chink, chink and think of the gay city.
 
 226 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 Then he would strike his hands on his knees again. He did 
 not know that it was fool's gold, all. 
 
 " He grew more and more discontented with his simple lot. 
 One day he went out into the forest alone to cut wood. When 
 he had become tired he sat down by a running stream to hear 
 the birds sing and to strike his hands on his knees. 
 
 " A shadow came gliding across the mosses of the stream. 
 It was like the form of a dark man. Slowly it came on, and 
 as it did so the flowers on the banks of the stream withered. 
 The woodman looked up, and a black giant stood before him. 
 
 " * You look unhappy to-day,' said the black giant. ' You 
 did not use to look that way. What is wanting ? ' 
 
 " The woodman looked down, clasped his hands, and struck 
 them on his knees chink, chink, chink. 
 
 " ' Ah, I see money ! The world all wants money. Selfish- 
 ness could not thrive without money. I will give you all the 
 money that you want, on one condition.' 
 
 " ' Name it.' 
 
 " ' That you will exchange your heart.' 
 
 " ' What will you give me for my heart ? ' 
 
 " ' Your heart is a human heart, a very simple human heart. 
 I will put in its place a heart of stone, and then all your wishes 
 shall turn to gold. Whatever you wish you shall have.' 
 
 "'Shall I be happy?' 
 
 " ' Happy ! Ha, ha, ha ! are not people happy who have 
 their wishes ? ' 
 
 " ' Some are, and some are happy who give up their wishes 
 and wills and desires." 
 
 " The woodman leaned his face upon his hands for a while,
 
 PRAIRIE ISLAND. 227 
 
 and seemed in great doubt and distress. He thought of his 
 wife, who used to say that contentment was happiness, and that 
 one could be rich by having a few wants. Then he thought of 
 the city. The vision rose before him like a Vanity Fair. He 
 clasped his hands again, and struck them on his knees chink, 
 chink, chink and said, ' I will do it.' 
 
 " Suddenly he felt a heart within him as cold as stone. He 
 looked up to the giant, and saw that he held his own good, true 
 heart in his hands. 
 
 " ' I will put it away in a glass jar in my house,' he said, 
 ' where I keep the hearts of the rich. Now, listen. You have 
 only to strike your locked hands on your knees three times 
 chink, chink, chink whenever you want for gold, and wish, 
 and you will find your pockets full of money.' 
 
 " The woodman struck his palms on his knees and wished, 
 then felt in his pockets. Sure enough, his pockets were full of 
 gold. 
 
 " He thought of his wife, but his thought was a cold one ; 
 he did not love her any more. He thought of his little ones, 
 but his thoughts were frozen ; he did not care to meet them any 
 more. He thought of his parents, but he only wished to meet 
 them to excite their envy. The stream no longer charmed 
 him, nor the flowers, nor the birds, nor anything. 
 
 " ' I will dissemble,' he said. He hurried home. His wife 
 met him at the door. He kissed her. She started back, and 
 said : 
 
 " ' Your lips are cold as death ! What has happened? ' 
 
 " His children kissed him, but they said : 
 
 " ' Father, your cheeks are cold.'
 
 228 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 " He tried to pray at the meal, but his sense of God was 
 gone ; he did not love God, or his wife, or his children, or any- 
 thing any more he had a stone-cold heart. 
 
 " After the evening meal he told his wife the events of the 
 day. She listened with horror. 
 
 " ' In parting with your heart you have parted with every- 
 thing that makes life worth having,' said she. But he an- 
 swered : 
 
 " ' I do not care. I do not care for anything but gold now. 
 I have a stone-cold heart.' 
 
 " ' But will gold make you happy ? ' she asked. 
 
 " He started. He went forth to work the next day, but he 
 was not happy. So day by day passed. His gold did not make 
 his family happy, or his friends, or any one, but he would not 
 have cared for all these, for he had a stone-cold heart. Had it 
 made him happy? He saw the world all happy around him, 
 and heavier and heavier grew his heart, and at last he could 
 endure it no longer. 
 
 " One day he was sitting in the same place in the woods as 
 before, when he saw the shadowy figure stealing along the 
 mosses of the stream again. He looked up and beheld the 
 giant, and exclaimed : 
 
 " ' Give me back my heart ! ' " 
 
 " Have you learned the lesson ? "
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 THE INDIAN PLOT. 
 
 sultry August night a party of Sac and Fox 
 Indians were encamped in a grove of oaks op- 
 posite Rock Island, on the western side of the 
 Mississippi. Among them were Main-Pogue 
 and Waubeno. 
 
 The encampment commanded a view of the burial hills and 
 bluffs of the abandoned Sac village. 
 
 As the shadow of night stole over the warm, glimmering 
 twilight, and the stars came out, the lights in the settlers' 
 cabins began to shine ; and as the Indians saw them one by 
 one, their old resentment against the settlers rose and bitter 
 words passed, and an old warrior stood up to rehearse his 
 memories of the injustice that his race had suffered in the old 
 treaties and the late war. 
 
 "Look," he said, "at the eyes of the cabins that gleam 
 from yonder shore. The waters roll dark under them, but the 
 lights of the canoes no more haunt the rapids, and the women 
 and children may no more sit down by the graves of the braves 
 of old. Our lights have gone out ; their lights shine. Their 
 lights shine on the bluffs, and they twinkle like fireflies along 
 the prairies, and climb the cliffs in what was once the Red 
 
 (229)
 
 230 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 Man's Paradise. Like the fireflies to the night the white 
 settlers came. 
 
 " Rise up and look down into the water. There where the 
 stream runs dark they shot our starving women there, for 
 crossing the river to harvest their own corn. 
 
 " Look again there where the first star shines. She, 
 the wife of Wabono, floated there dead, with the babe on her 
 breast. Here is the son of Wabono. 
 
 " Son of "Wabono, you ride the pony like the winds. What 
 are you going to do to avenge your mother ? You have nour- 
 ished the babe ; you are good and brave ; but the moons rise 
 and fall, and the lights grow many on the prairie, and the 
 smoke-wreaths many along the shore. Speak, son of Wa- 
 bono." 
 
 A tall boy arose, dressed in yellow skins and painted and 
 plumed. 
 
 " Father, it is long since the rain fell." 
 
 " Long." 
 
 " And the prairies are yellow." 
 
 " Yellow." 
 
 " And they are food for fire." 
 
 " Food for fire." 
 
 " I would touch them with fire in the east, in the west, in 
 the north, and in the south. The lights will go out in the 
 cabins, and the white woman will wander homeless, and the 
 white man will hunger for corn. They shot our people for 
 harvesting our corn. I would give their corn-fields to the 
 flames, and their families to the famine in the moons of 
 storms."
 
 THE INDIAN PLOT. 231 
 
 "Waubeno, you have heard "Wabono. What would you 
 do?" 
 
 " I would punish those only who have done wrong. The 
 white teacher taught so, and the white teacher was right." 
 
 " Waubeno, you speak like a woman." 
 
 " Those people should not suffer for what others have done. 
 You should not be made to bear the punishments of others." 
 
 " Would you not fire the prairies ? " 
 
 "No. I may have friends there. The Tunker may be 
 there. He who spared Maiu-Pogue may be there. Would I 
 burn their cabins ? No ! " 
 
 " Waubeno, who was your father ? " 
 
 " I am the son of Alknomook." 
 
 He died." 
 
 "Yes, father." 
 
 "There was neither pity nor mercy in the white man's 
 heart for him. You made your vow to him. What was that 
 vow, Waubeno ? " 
 
 " To avenge his enemies not our friends." 
 
 " Brothers, listen. The white men grow many, and we are 
 few. In war we are helpless only one weapon remains to us 
 now. It is the thunderbolt it is fire. 
 
 " Warriors, listen. The moon grows. Who of you will 
 cross the river and ride once more into the Eed Man's Paradise, 
 and give the prairies to the flames ? The torch is all that is 
 left us now." 
 
 Every Indian raised his arm except Main-Pogue and Wau- 
 beno, and signified his desire to unite in the plan for the deso- 
 lation of the prairies. 
 16
 
 232 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 "Main-Pogue, will you carry your torch in the night of 
 fire?" 
 
 " I have been saved by the hand of a white man, and I will 
 not turn my hand against the white man. I could not do it if 
 I were young. But I am old my people are gone. Leave me 
 to fall like the leaf." 
 
 " Son of Alknomook, what will you do ? " 
 
 " I will follow your counsel for my father's sake, but I will 
 spare my friends for the sake of the arm that was stretched 
 out over the head of Main-Pogue." 
 
 " Then you will go." 
 
 " I would that I were dead. I would that I could live as 
 the white teacher taught me in peace with every one. I would 
 that I had not this blood of fire, and this memory of darkness, 
 and this vow upon my head. The white teacher taught me 
 that all people were brothers. My brain burns " 
 
 Late in the evening "Waubeno went to Main-Pogue and 
 sat down by his side under the trees. The river lay before 
 them with its green islands and rapid currents, serene and 
 beautiful. The lights had gone out on the other shore, and 
 the world seemed strangely voiceless and still. 
 
 " How did he look, Waubeno ? " 
 
 "Who look?" 
 
 " That man who saved you stretched his arm over you." 
 
 " His arm was long. His face was as sad as an Indian's ; 
 and he was tall. He was a head taller than other men; he 
 rose over them like an oak over the trees. The men laughed at 
 him ; then his face looked as though it was set against the 
 people he looked like a chief and the men cowered, and
 
 THE INDIAN PLOT. 233 
 
 jeered, and cowered. I can see how he looked, but I can not 
 tell it I can see it in my mind. I told him that I would tell 
 Waubeno, and he seemed to know your name. Did you never 
 meet such a man ? " 
 
 "Yes, in the Indiana country. He was journeyed from 
 the Wabash." 
 
 The Indians, after the council we have described, began to 
 cross the Mississippi by night, and to make stealthy journeys 
 into the Eock River country, once known as the Eed Man's 
 Paradise. Eock Eiver is a beautiful stream of the prairies. 
 It comes dashing out of a bed of rocks, and runs a distance 
 of some two hundred miles to the Mississippi. Here once 
 roamed the deer and came the wild cattle in herds. Here 
 rose great cliffs, like ruins of castles, which were then, as 
 now, cities of the swallows. Eagles built their nests upon 
 them, and wheeled from over the flowers of the prairies. The 
 banks in summer were lined with wild strawberries and wild 
 sunflowers. Here and there were natural mounds and park- 
 like woods, and oaks whose arms were tangled with grape- 
 vines. 
 
 Into this country ran Black Hawk's trail, and not far from 
 this trail was Prairie Island, with its happy settlers and new 
 school. The German school-master might well love the place. 
 Margaret Fuller (Countess Ossoli) came to the region in 1843, 
 and caught its atmosphere and breathed it forth in her Sum- 
 mer in the Lakes. Here, in this territory of the Eed Man's 
 Paradise, " to me enchanting beyond any I have ever seen," 
 where " you have only to turn up the sod to find arrow-heads," 
 she visited the bluff of the Eagles' Nest on the morning of the
 
 234: IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 Fourth of July, and there wrote "Ganymede to his Eagle," 
 one of her grandest poems. 
 
 " How happy," says this gifted soul, " the Indians must have 
 been here ! I do believe Rome and Florence are suburbs com- 
 pared to this capital of Nature's art." 
 
 Black Hawk's trail ran from this region of perfect beauty to 
 the Mississippi ; and long after the Sacs and Foxes were com- 
 pelled to live beyond the Mississippi, the remnants of the 
 tribes loved to return and visit the scenes of the land of their 
 fathers. 
 
 The Indians who had plotted the firing of the prairies made 
 two stealthy journeys along the Rock River and over the old 
 trail under the August moon. In one of these they rode round 
 Prairie Island, and encamped one night upon the bluff of the 
 Eagles' Nest, under the moon and stars. Waubeno went with 
 them, and gazed with sad eyes upon the scenes that had passed 
 forever from the control of his people. 
 
 He saw the new cabins and corn-fields, the prairie wagons 
 and the emigrants. One evening he passed Prairie Island, and 
 saw the lights glimmering among the trees, and heard the sing- 
 ing of a hymn in the school-house, where the people had met 
 to worship. He wished that his own people might be taught 
 these better ways of living. He reined up his pony and listened 
 to the singing. He wished that he might join the little com- 
 pany, though he did not know that Jasper was there. 
 
 He rode away amid the stacks and corn-fields. He saw that 
 the fields were dry as powder. 
 
 Out on the prairie he turned and looked back on the lights 
 of the settlement as they glimmered among the trees. Could
 
 THE INDIAN PLOT. 235 
 
 he apply the torch to the dry sea of grasses around the peace- 
 ful homes? 
 
 Once, revenge would have made it a delight to his eyes to see 
 such a settlement in flames. But Jasper's teaching had created 
 a new view of life and a new conscience. He felt what the 
 Tunker taught was true, and that the young soldier who had 
 spared Main-Pogue had done a nobler deed than any act of 
 revenge. What was that young man's motive ? He pondered 
 over these things, and gave his pony a loose rein, and rode on 
 under the cool cover of the night under the moon and stars.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE. 
 
 HE prairie is on fire ! " So cried a horseman, 
 as he rode by the school. 
 
 It was a calm, glimmering September day. 
 Prairie Island rose with red and yellow and 
 crisping leaves, like a royal tent amid a dead 
 sea of flowers. The prairie grass was dry, though still mingled 
 with a green undergrowth. Prairie chickens were everywhere, 
 quails, and plover. 
 
 At midday a billowy cloud of smoke began to wall the east- 
 ern horizon, and it slowly rolled forward, driven by the current 
 of the air. 
 
 " 0-o-oh ! " said one of the scholars ! " Look ! look ! "What 
 the man said is true the prairie is on fire ! " 
 
 Jasper went to the door. The blue sky had turned to an 
 ashy hue, and the sun was a dull red. An unnatural wind had 
 arisen like a draft of air. 
 
 "Teacher, can we go out and look?" asked several voices. 
 " Yes," said Jasper, " the school may take a recess." 
 The pupils went to the verge of the trees, and watched the 
 billowy columns of smoke in the distance. 
 
 The world seemed to change. The air filled with flocks of 
 
 (236)
 
 FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE. 237 
 
 frightened birds. The sky became veiled, and the sun was as 
 red as blood. 
 
 Since the great snow of 1830 but few buffaloes had been seen 
 on the prairie. But a dark cloud of flesh came bounding over 
 the prairie grass, bellowing, with low heads and erect tails. The 
 children thought that they were cattle at first, but they were 
 buffaloes. They rushed toward the trees of Prairie Island, 
 turned, and looked behind. Then the leader pawed the earth, 
 and the herd rushed on toward the north. 
 
 The fire spread in a semicircle, and seemed to create a wind 
 which impelled it on with resistless fury. 
 
 " 0-o-oh, look ! look ! " exclaimed another scholar. " See 
 the horses and the cattle droves of them ! Look at the sky 
 see the birds ! " 
 
 There were droves of cattle hurrying in every direction. 
 The men in the fields near Prairie Island came hurrying 
 home. 
 
 " The prairie is on fire ! " said each one, not knowing what 
 else to say. 
 
 " Will it reach us ? " asked Jasper of the harvesters. 
 
 " What is to hinder it ? The wind is driving it this way. 
 It has formed a wall of fire that almost surrounds us." 
 
 "What can we do?" asked Jasper. The harvesters con- 
 sidered. 
 
 " We are safer here than elsewhere, let what will come," said 
 one. " If the fire sweeps the prairie, it would overtake us be- 
 fore we could get to any great river, and the small creeks are 
 dry." 
 
 The afternoon grew darker and darker. The sun went out ;
 
 238 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 under the black smoke rolled a red sea whose waves grew 
 nearer and nearer. The children began to cry and the women 
 to pray. An old man came hobbling out to the arch of the 
 trees. 
 
 " I foretold it," said he. " The world is on fire. The Day 
 of Judgment has come ! A time and times time, and a half." 
 
 He had been a Millerite. 
 
 " It will be here in an hour," said a harvester. 
 
 But there arose a counter- wind. The wall of fire seemed 
 to be stayed. The smoke columns rose to the heavens like 
 Babel towers. 
 
 Afar, families were seen fleeing on horseback toward the 
 bed of a creek which they hoped to find flowing, but which 
 had run dry. 
 
 " This is awful ! " said Jasper. " It looks as though the 
 heavens were in flames." 
 
 He shaded his hands and looked into the open space. 
 
 "What is that? "he asked. 
 
 A black horse came running toward the island, bounding 
 through the grass as though impelled by spurs. As he leered, 
 Jasper saw the form of a human being stretched at his side. 
 Was the form an Indian ? 
 
 On came the horse. He leered again, exposing to view a 
 yellow body and a plumed head. 
 
 " It's an Indian," said Jasper. 
 
 The fire flattened and darkened for a time, and then rolled 
 on again. Animals were fleeing everywhere, plunging and 
 bellowing, and the air was wild and tempestuous with the cries 
 of birds. The little animals could be seen leaping out of the
 
 FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE. 239 
 
 prairie grass. The earth, air, and sky seemed alive with ter- 
 ror. 
 
 The black horse came plunging toward the island. 
 
 " How can a horse run that way and live ? " asked Jasper. 
 " He is bearing a messenger. It is friendly or hostile Indian 
 that is clinging to his side." 
 
 Jasper bent his eyes on the plunging animal to see him 
 leer, for whenever the sidling motion was made it brought to 
 view the tawny horizontal form that seemed to be clinging to 
 the bridle, as if riding for life. Suddenly there arose a cry 
 from the islanders : 
 
 " Look ! look ! Who has done it ? There is a counter-fire 
 ahead. They will all perish ! " 
 
 A mile or more in front of the island, and in the opposite 
 direction from the other fire, another great billow of smoke 
 arose spirally into the air. The people and animals who had 
 been fleeing toward the creek, which they thought contained 
 water, but which was dry, all turned and came running toward 
 the island grove. Even the birds came beating back. 
 
 " That fire was set by the Indians," said the harvesters. " It 
 is started across the track of the other fire to destroy us all. 
 An Indian set the fires." 
 
 " That is an Indian skirting around us on the back of a 
 horse," said another. " He is holding on to the horse by the 
 mane with his hands, and by the flanks with his feet. The 
 Indians have done this ! " 
 
 " The other fire will run back, though against the wind. 
 The prairie is so dry that the fire will run everywhere. We 
 must set a counter-fire."
 
 240 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 "Set a counter-fire ! " exclaimed many voices. 
 
 The purpose of the counter-fire was to destroy the dry grass, 
 so that when the other fires should reach the place it would 
 find nothing to burn. 
 
 "But the people!" said Jasper. "See them! They are 
 hurrying here ; a counter-fire would drive them away ! " 
 
 An awful scene followed. Horses, cattle, animals of many 
 kinds came panting to the island. Many of them had been 
 fleeing for miles, and sank down under the trees as if ready to 
 perish. There was one enormous bison among them. The tops 
 of the trees filled were with birds, cawing and uttering a chaos 
 of cries. The air seemed to rain birds, and the earth to pour 
 forth animals. The sky above turned to inky blackness. Men, 
 women, and children came rushing into the trees from every 
 direction, some crying on Heaven for mercy, some begging 
 for water, all of them exhausted and seemingly ready to die. 
 The island grove was like a great funeral pyre. 
 
 Jasper lifted his hands and called the school and the people 
 around him, knelt down, and prayed for help amid the cries of 
 distress that rose on every hand. He then looked for the black 
 horse and the plumed rider again. 
 
 They were drawing near in the darkening air. The figure 
 of the rider was more distinct. The people saw it, and cried, 
 " An Indian ! " Some said, " It is a scout ! " and others, " It is 
 he who set the fire ! " 
 
 The wind rose and changed, caused by the heated air in the 
 distance. The currents ran hither and thither like drafts 
 in a room of open doors. One of these unnatural drafts caused 
 a new terror to spread among the people and animals and
 
 IWni^pM'c- 
 
 THE APPROACH OF THE MYSTERIOUS INDIAN.
 
 FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE. 241 
 
 birds. It drew up into the air a great column of sparks and, 
 scattered them through the open space, and a rain of fire filled 
 the sky and descended upon the grove. 
 
 It was a splendid but terrible sight. 
 
 " The end of all things is at hand," said the old Millerite. 
 " The stars are beginning to fall." 
 
 But the rain of fire lost its force as it neared the earth, and 
 it fell in cinders and ashes. 
 
 " An Indian ! an Indian ! " cried many voices. 
 
 The black horse came plunging into near view, and rushed 
 for the trees and sank down with foaming sides and mouth. 
 The people shouted. There rolled from his side the lithe and 
 supple form of a young Indian, plumed, and dressed in yellow 
 buckskin. What did it mean ? The Indian lay on the ground 
 like one dead. The people gathered around him, and Jasper 
 came to him and bent over him, and parted the black hair from 
 his face. Suddenly Jasper started back and uttered a cry. 
 
 " What is it ? " asked the people. 
 
 " It is my old Indian guide it is Waubeno. Bring him 
 water, and we will revive him, and he will tell us what to do. 
 Waubeno ! Waubeno ! " 
 
 The Indian seemed to know that voice. He revived, and 
 looked around him, and stared at the people. 
 
 " Give him water," said Jasper. 
 
 A boy brought a cup of water and offered it to the Indian. 
 The latter started up, and cried : 
 
 " Away ! I am here to die among you. My tongue burns, 
 but I did not come here to drink. I came here to die. The 
 white man killed my father, and I have come back with the
 
 24:2 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 avengers, and we have brought with us the Judgment Day." 
 He stood and listened to the cries of distress. 
 
 " Hear the trees cry for help all the birds of the prairie 
 but they cry for naught. My father hears them cry. The cry 
 is sweet to his ears. He is waiting for me. We are all about 
 to die. When the wheat-fields blaze and the stacks take fire, 
 and the houses crackle, then we shall all die. So says Waube- 
 no." He listened again. 
 
 " Hear the earth cry all the animals. My father hears 
 his soul hears. This is the day that I have carried in my soul. 
 My spirit is in the fire." 
 
 He listened again. The prairie roared with the hot air, 
 the flames, and the clouds of smoke. There fell another rain 
 of fire, and women shrieked for mercy, and children cried on 
 their mothers' breasts. 
 
 " Hear the people cry ! I have waited for that cry for a 
 hundred moons. I have paid my vow. We have kindled the 
 fire of the anger of the heavens it is coming. I will die with 
 you like the son of a warrior. The souls of the warriors are 
 gathering to see me die. I am Waubeno." 
 
 The people pressed upon him, and glared at him. 
 
 " He set the fire ! " they cried. " The Indian fiend ! " 
 
 " I set the fire," he said ; " I and Black Hawk's men. 
 They have escaped. I have done my work, and I want to 
 die." 
 
 Jasper lifted his hat, and with bared head stood forth in the 
 view of the Indian. 
 
 " Waubeno, do you want to see me die? " 
 
 He started with a cry of pain. His eyes burned.
 
 FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE. 243 
 
 " My father I did not know that you were here. Heaven 
 pity Waubeno now ! " 
 
 " Waubeno, this is cruel ! " 
 
 " Cruel ? This country was once called the Red Man's Para- 
 dise. Cruel ? The white man made the red man drunk with 
 fire-water, and made him sign a false treaty, and then drove 
 him away. Cruel ? Think of the women the whites shot in 
 the river for coming back to their own corn-fields starving to 
 gather their own corn. Cruel ? Why is the Eed Man's Para- 
 dise no longer ours? Cruel? The Rock River flows for us 
 no more; the spring brings the flowers to these prairies for 
 us no more ; the bluff rises in the summer sky, but the red 
 man may no longer sit upon it. Cruel? Think how your 
 people murdered my father. Is it more cruel for the Indian 
 to do these things than for the white man to do them ? You 
 have emptied the Red Man's Paradise, and Waubeno has ful- 
 filled the vow that he made to his father. The clouds are on 
 fire. I would have saved you had I known, but you must 
 perish with your people. I shall die with you. I am Waubeno. 
 I am proud to be Waubeno. I am the avenger of my race. 
 
 " But, white brother, listen. I tried to prevent it. I re- 
 membered your teaching, and I tried to prevent it by our 
 council-fires over the Mississippi. Main-Pogue tried to pre- 
 vent it. I thought of the man who saved him in the war, and 
 I wondered who he was, and tried to prevent it for his sake. 
 
 " Then said they to me : * We go to avenge the loss of our 
 country, the Red Man's Paradise. The grass is feathers. We 
 go to burn. Waubeno, remember your father's death. You 
 are the son of Alknomook ! '
 
 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " White brother, I have come. I tried to "prevent it, but 
 this hand has obeyed the voice of my people. I have kindled 
 the fires of the woe. The world is on fire. I tried to prevent 
 it, but it has come." 
 
 " Waubeno, do you remember Lincoln 9 " 
 
 "Lincoln? The Indians killed his father's father. I have 
 often thought of that. He said that he would do right by an 
 Indian. I have thought of that. I love that man. I would 
 die for such a man." 
 
 " Waubeno, who saved the life of Main-Pogue ? " 
 
 " I don't know, father. I would die for that man." 
 
 " Did Main-Pogue not tell you ? " 
 
 " He told me 'twas a white captain saved him. Is the white 
 captain here ? " 
 
 " No. Waubeno, listen. That white captain was Lincoln." 
 
 " Lincoln ? Whose father's father the red man killed ? Was 
 it he who saved Main-Pogue ? Lincoln ? He forced his men 
 to do right. He did himself harm." 
 
 " Yes, he did himself harm to do right. Waubeno, do you 
 remember your promise that you made to me ? You said that 
 you would never avenge the death of your father, if you could 
 find one white man who would do himself harm for the sake 
 of an Indian." 
 
 Waubeno leaped upon his feet, and his black eye swept the 
 clouds, and the circle of fire, and the distressed people on every 
 hand. 
 
 " Father, I can save you now. I know how. I will do it 
 for Lincoln's sake" 
 
 " Ho ! ho ! " he cried. " Kill me an ox, and Waubeno will
 
 FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE. 245 
 
 save you. Kill me six oxen, and Waubeno will save you. Give 
 me raw hides, and do as I do, and Waubeno will save you. Ho ! 
 ho ! The gods have spoken to Waubeno. A voice comes from 
 the sky to Waubeno. It has spoken here. Ho ! ho ! " 
 
 He put his hand upon his heart, then rushed in among the 
 oxen. A company of men followed him. 
 
 He slew an ox with his knife, and quickly removed the hide. 
 The people looked upon him with horror ; they thought him de- 
 mented. What was he doing ? What was he going to do ? 
 
 He tied the great hide to his horse's neck, so that the raw 
 side of it would drag flat upon the ground, and, turning to 
 Jasper, he said : 
 
 " That will smother fire. Ho ! ho ! How ? " 
 
 The fire was fast approaching some stacks of wheat on the 
 edge of the settlement. Waubeno saw the peril, and leaped 
 upon his horse. 
 
 " Kill more cattle. Get more hides for Waubeno/' he said. 
 
 He rode away toward the stacks, guiding the horse in such 
 a way that the raw hide swept the ground. The people watched 
 him. He seemed to ride into the fire. 
 
 " He is riding to death ! " said the people. " He is mad ! " 
 
 But as he rode the fire was stayed, and a rim of black smoke 
 rose in its stead. Near the stacks the fire stopped. 
 
 " He is the Evil One himself," said the old Millerite. " That 
 Indian boy is no human form. " 
 
 Out of the black came the horse plunging, bearing the boy* 
 who waved his hands to the people. Then the horse plunged 
 away, as though wild, toward the outer edge of the great sea of 
 fire.
 
 246 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 The horse and rider rushed into the flames, and the same 
 strange effects followed. The running flame and white cloud 
 changed into black smoke, and the destruction was arrested. 
 
 The people watched the boy as he rode half hidden in roll- 
 ing smoke, his red plumes waving above the verge of the flam- 
 ing sea. What a scene it was as he rode there, round and round, 
 like the enchanted form of a more than human deliverer ! But 
 the effect of his movements at last ceased. 
 
 " He is coming back," said the people. 
 
 Out of the fire rushed the horse and rider toward the island 
 grove again. 
 
 " Give me new hides ! " he cried, as, singed and blackened, 
 he swept into the trees. " The hide is dead and shriveled. 
 Give me new hides. Ho ! ho ! " 
 
 New hides were provided by killing oxen. He tied two to- 
 gether like a carpet, with the raw side upon the earth. He 
 attached them by a long rope to the horse's neck, and dashed 
 forth again, crying : 
 
 " Do the same, and follow me." 
 
 The horse seemed maddened again. It flew toward the fire 
 as if drawn by a spell, and plunged into it like a bather into 
 the sea. Waubeno tried to deaden the fire in the whole circle. 
 Kound and round the island he rode, in the tide of the advanc- 
 ing flames. The people understood his method now, and the 
 men secured new hides and attached them to horses, and fol- 
 lowed him. He led them, crying and waving his hands. 
 Round and round he led them, round and round, and where 
 they rode the white smoke changed into black smoke and the 
 fire died.
 
 FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE. 247 
 
 The people secured raw hides by killing the poor cattle, and 
 came out to the verge of the fiery sea and checked the progress 
 of the flames in places. In the midst of the excitement a roll 
 of thunder was heard in the sky. 
 
 " 'Tis the trumpet of doom," said the old Millerite. 
 
 The people heard it with terror, and yet with hope. It 
 might be an approaching shower. If it were, they were 
 saved. 
 
 The fire in front of them was checked. Not the great sea, 
 but the current that was rolling toward the island grove. The 
 fire at the north was rushing forward, but it moved backward 
 toward the place slowly. The women began to soak blankets 
 and clothing in water, and so prepared to help the men fight 
 the flames. An hour passed. In the midst of the crisis the 
 riding men, the hurrying women, the encircling fire, the bil- 
 lows of smoke, a flame came zigzagging down from the sky. 
 The people stood still. Had the last day indeed come ? 
 
 Then followed a crash of thunder that shook the earth. 
 The people fell upon their knees. The sky darkened, and 
 great drops of rain began to fall. 
 
 Waubeno had checked the current of the flame that would 
 have destroyed the settlement in an hour, and had taught the 
 men how to arrest an advancing tide of flame. The people 
 began to have hope. All was now activity on the part of the 
 people. Smoke filled the sky. 
 
 " There is a cloud above the smoke," said many. " God 
 will save us all." 
 
 Waubeno came flying back again to the grove. 
 
 " It thunders," he cried. " The Bain-god is coming. If I 
 17
 
 248 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 can keep back the fire an hour, the Eain-god will come. 
 Hides ! hides ! Quick, more hides ! Ho ! ho ! " 
 
 New hides were provided, and he swept forth again. 
 
 The island grove was now like a vast oven. The air was 
 stifling. The animals laid down and rolled their tongues from 
 their mouths. But the fire in front did not advance. It 
 seemed deadened. The river of flame forked and ran in other 
 directions, but it was stayed in front of the grove, houses, corn- 
 fields, and stacks, and it was the hand that had set flames that 
 had broken its force in the road to the settlements. 
 
 There were sudden dashes of rain, and the smoke turned 
 into blackness everywhere. Another flash of lightning smote 
 the gloom, followed by a rattling of thunder that seemed as if 
 the spirit of the storm was driving his chariot through the air. 
 Then it poured as though a lake was coming down. In an , 
 hour the fire was dead. The cloud parted, the slanting sun 
 came out, revealing a prairie as black as ink. 
 
 The people fled to the shelter of the houses and sheds at the 
 approach of the rain. The animals crowded under the trees, 
 and the birds hid in the boughs. After the rain-burst the 
 people gathered together again, and each one asked ; 
 
 " "Where is the Indian boy ? " 
 
 He was not among them. 
 
 Had he perished ? 
 
 A red sunset flamed over the prairies and the birds filled 
 the tree-tops with the gladness of song. It seemed to all as if 
 the earth and sky had come back again. 
 
 In the glare of the sunset-fire a horse and rider were seen 
 slowly approaching the island grove.
 
 FOR LINCOLN'S SAKE. 249 
 
 " It is Waubeno," said one to the other. " The horse is dis- 
 abled." 
 
 The people went out to meet the Indian boy. The horse 
 was burned and blind, and staggered as he came on. And the 
 rider ! He had drawn the flames into his vitals ; he had been 
 internally burned, and was dying. 
 
 He reeled from his blind horse, and fell before the people. 
 Jasper laid his hand upon him. 
 
 " Father, I have drunk the cup of fire. I have kept my 
 promise. I am about to die. The birds are happy. They are 
 singing the death-song of Waubeno." 
 
 His flesh quivered as he lay there, and Jasper bent over him 
 in pity. 
 
 " Waubeno, do you suffer ? " 
 
 " The stars do not complain, white brother. The clouded 
 sun does not complain. The winds complain, and the waters, 
 and women and children. Waubeno does not complain." 
 
 A spasm shook his frame. It passed. 
 
 " White brother, go beyond the Mississippi and teach my 
 people. You do pity them. This was once their paradise. 
 They loved it. They struggled. Go to them with the Book of 
 God." 
 
 " Waubeno, I will go." 
 
 " The sun sets over the Mississippi. 'Tis sunset there. You 
 will go to the land of the sunset ? " 
 
 " Yes, Waubeno. I feel in my heart the call to go. I love 
 and pity your people." 
 
 " Pour water upon me ; I am burning. I shall go when the 
 moon comes up, when the moon comes up into the shady sky.
 
 250 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 My father suffered, but he did not complain. Waubeno does 
 not complain. Don't pity me. Pity my poor people. I love 
 my people. Teach my people, and cover me forever with a 
 blanket of the earth." 
 
 He lay on the cool grass under the trees for several hours in 
 terrible agony, and the people watched by his side. 
 
 " When the moon rises," he said, " I shall go. I shall never 
 see the Eed Man's Paradise again. Tell me when the moon 
 rises. I am going to sleep now." 
 
 The great moon rose at last, its disk hanging like a wheel of 
 dead gold on the verge of the horizon in the smoky air. 
 
 " Waubeno," said Jasper, " the moon is rising." 
 
 He opened his eyes, and said ; 
 
 " We kindled the fire for our fathers' sake, and I smote it for 
 him who protected Main-Pogue. What was his name, father? 
 Say it to me." 
 
 " Lincoln." 
 
 " Yes, Lincoln. He had come for revenge, but he did what 
 was right. He forgave. I forgive everybody. I drank the fire 
 for Lincoln's sake." 
 
 The moon burned along the sky ; the stars came out ; and 
 at midnight all was still. Waubeno lay dead under the trees, 
 and the people with timid steps vanished hither and thither 
 into the cabins and sheds. 
 
 They killed the poor blind horse in the morning, and laid 
 Waubeno to rest in a blanket, in a grave under the trees.


 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 "OUR LINCOLN IS THE MAN." 
 
 IFTEEN years have passed since the events de- 
 scribed in the last chapter. It is the year 1860. 
 A great political crisis is upon the country, and 
 Abraham Lincoln has been selected to lead one 
 great party of the people, because he had faith 
 in the principle that right is might. The time came, as the 
 Tunker had prophesied, when the people wanted a man of in- 
 tegrity for their leader a man who had a heart that could be 
 trusted. They elected him to the Legislature when he was 
 almost a boy and had not decent clothes to wear. The young 
 legislator walked over the prairies of Illinois to the Capitol to 
 save the traveling fare. As a legislator he had faith that right 
 is might, and was true to his convictions. 
 
 " He has a heart that we can trust," said the people, and 
 they sent him to Congress. He was true in Washington, as in 
 Illinois. 
 
 " He has a heart we can trust," said the people ; " let us 
 send him to the Senate." 
 
 He failed of an election, but it was because his convictions 
 of right were in advance of the public mind at the time ; but 
 he who is defeated for a principle, triumphs. The greatest 
 
 (251)
 
 252 !N THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 victors are those who are vanquished in the cause of truth, 
 justice, and right; for the cause lives, and they live in the 
 cause that must prevail. 
 
 Again the people wanted a leader all the people who repre- 
 sented a great cause and Illinois said to the people : 
 
 " Make our Lincoln your leader ; he has a heart that we 
 can trust," and Lincoln was made the heart of the people in 
 the great cause of human rights. Lincoln, who had defended 
 the little animals of the woods. Lincoln, who had been true 
 to his pioneer father, when the experience had cost him years 
 of toilsome life. Lincoln, who had pitied the slave in the New 
 Orleans market, and whose soul had cried to Heaven for the 
 scales of Justice. Lincoln, who had protected the old Indian 
 amid the gibes of his comrades. Lincoln, who had studied by 
 pine-knots, made poetry on old shovels, and read law on lone- 
 ly roads. Lincoln, who had had a kindly word and pleasant 
 story for everybody, pitied everybody, loved everybody, and 
 forgave everybody, and yet carried a sad heart. Lincoln, who 
 had resolved that in law and politics he would do just 
 right. 
 
 John Hanks had brought some of the rails that the candi- 
 date for the presidency had split into the Convention of Illi- 
 nois, and the rails that represented the hardships of pioneer 
 life became the oriflamme of the leader from the prairies. 
 He who is true to a nation is first true to his parents and 
 home. 
 
 That was an ever-to-be-remembered day when, in August, 
 1860, the people of the great "West with one accord arranged 
 to visit Abraham Lincoln, the candidate for the presidency, at
 
 "OUR LINCOLN IS THE MAN." 253 
 
 Springfield, Illinois. Seventy thousand strangers poured into 
 the prairie city. They came from Indiana, Iowa, and the 
 lakes. Thousands came from Chicago. Men came in wagons, 
 bringing their wives and children. They brought tents, camp- 
 kettles, and coffee-pots. Says a graphic writer who saw the 
 scene : 
 
 " Every road leading to the city is crowded for twenty miles 
 with vehicles. The weather is fine, and a little overwarm. 
 Girls can dress in white, and bare their arms and necks without 
 danger; the women can bring their children. Everything 
 that was ever done at any other mass-meeting is done here. 
 Locomotive-builders are making a boiler; blacksmiths are 
 heating and hammering their irons ; the iron-founders are 
 molding their patterns ; the rail-splitters are showing the peo- 
 ple how Uncle Abe used to split rails ; every other town has its 
 wagon-load of thirty-one girls in white to represent the States ; 
 bands of music, numerous almost as those of McClellan on 
 Arlington Heights in 1862, are playing ; old men of the War of 
 1812, with their old wives, their children, grandchildren, and 
 great-grandchildren, are here: making a procession of human 
 beings, horses, and carriages not less than ten miles in length. 
 And yet the procession might have left the town and the 
 people would scarcely be missed. 
 
 " There is an immense wigwam, with galleries like a thea- 
 tre ; but there are people enough not in the procession to fill 
 a dozen like it. Half an hour is long enough to witness the 
 moving panorama of men and women, horses, carriages, rep- 
 resentatives of trades, mottoes, and burlesques, and listen to 
 the bands."
 
 254: E* THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 And among those who came to see the great procession, 
 the rail-splitters, and the sights, were the Tunker from the 
 Indian schools over the Mississippi, and Aunt Indiana from 
 Indiana. 
 
 There was a visitor from the East who became the hero 
 of the great day. He is living now (1891) in Chelsea, Mass., 
 near the Soldiers' Home, to which he often goes to sing, and is 
 known there as " Father Locke." He was a natural minstrel, 
 and songs of his, like " Down hy the Sea," have been sung all 
 over the world. One of his songs has moved thousands of 
 hearts in sorrow, and pictures his own truly loving and beauti- 
 ful soul : 
 
 " There's a fresh little mound near the willow, 
 
 Where at evening I wander and weep ; 
 There's a dear vacant spot on my pillow, 
 
 Where a sweet little face used to sleep. 
 There were pretty blue eyes, but they slumber 
 
 In silence, beneath the dark mold, 
 And the little pet lamb of our number 
 
 Has gone to the heavenly fold." 
 
 This man, with the approval of President Lincoln, went as 
 a minstrel to the Army of the Potomac. We think that he was 
 the only minstrel who followed our army, like the war-singers 
 of old. In a book published for private use, entitled Three 
 Years in Camp and Hospital, " Father Locke " thus tells the 
 story of his interview with President Lincoln at the White 
 House : 
 
 " Giving his hand, and saying he recollected me, he asked 
 what he could do for me. 
 
 " * I want no office, Mr. President. I came to ask for one, but
 
 "OUR LINCOLN IS THE MAN." 255 
 
 have changed my mind since coming into this house. When it 
 comes to turning beggar, I shall shun the places where all the 
 other beggars go. I am going to the army to sing for the sol- 
 diers, as the poets and balladists of old sang in war. Our sol- 
 diers must take as much interest in songs and singing as did 
 those of ancient times. I only wished to shake hands with you, 
 and obtain a letter of recommendation to the commanding 
 officers, that they may receive and treat me kindly.' 
 
 " ' I will give you a letter with pleasure, but you do not 
 need one ; your singing will make you all right.' 
 
 " On my rising to leave, he gave his hand, saying : ' God 
 bless you ; I am glad you do not want an office. Go to the 
 army, and cheer the men around their camp-fires with your 
 songs, remembering that a great man said, " Let me but make 
 the songs of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws." ' " 
 
 The President then told him how to secure a pass into the 
 lines of the army, and the man went forth to write and to sing 
 his inspirations, like a balladist of old. 
 
 His songs were the delight of many camps of the Army of 
 the Potomac in the first dark year of the war. They were sung 
 in the camp, and they belonged to the inside army life, but 
 were little known outside of the army. They are still fondly 
 remembered by the veterans, and are sung at reunions and 
 camp-fires. 
 
 We give one of these songs and its original music here. It 
 has the spirit of the time and the events, and every note is a 
 pulse-beat :
 
 256 
 
 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 tOe are #lard)ing on to tUctjmonb. 
 
 WORDS AND Music BY E. W. LOCKE. 
 
 Published by the permission of the Composer. 
 
 m 
 
 >: 
 
 1. Our knapsacks sling and blithely sing, We're marching on to 
 
 2. Our foes are near.their drums we hear, They're camped a- bout in 
 
 1 ' 
 
 Z_2 
 
 
 
 PN 
 
 
 \- 
 
 A s p-; 
 
 k 
 
 fe5=r: 
 
 
 -9 f 
 
 L- y 
 
 
 a 
 
 [ s '* /'-..-] 
 
 Rich-mond; With weap-ons bright, and hearts so light, We're 
 Rich-rnond ; With pick - ets out, to tell the route Our 
 
 . 
 
 -A ^^ v-q 
 
 ?=3=tt 
 
 march-ing on to Rich-mond; Each wea - ry mile with 
 Ar - my takes to Rich-mond ; We've craft - y foes to 
 
 -* =- 
 
 * ! 9r 
 
 song be-guile, We're marching on to Richmond; The roads are 
 meet our blows, No doubt they 11 fight for Richmond; The brave may 
 
 rough, but smooth e-nough To take us safe to Richmond, 
 die, but nev - er fly, We'll cut our way to Richmond. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 \=* 
 
 '-: 
 
 Then tramp a - way while the bu - gles play, We're 

 
 OUR LINCOLN IS THE MAN." 
 
 257 
 
 a=^^_z==t-=^=^^--|=rfi 
 
 &=+ F =te^r=*^-tt 
 
 -N N- 
 
 march-ing on to Rich-mond; Our flag shall gleam in the 
 
 /r> 
 
 
 
 N y v-= \-F is v s- . * 
 
 --j 1- 5 H 3 \H -v is- ^^ 1 - ^- 
 
 -^ i f^f$=$=t=^ 
 
 i 
 
 morn- ing beam, From man -j a spire in Rich-mond. 
 
 
 i=3 
 
 ^ 
 
 3. 
 
 " But yesterday, in murderous fray, 
 
 While marching on to Richmond, 
 "We parted here from comrades dear, 
 
 While marching on to Richmond ; 
 With manly sighs and tearful eyes, 
 
 While marching on to Richmond, 
 We laid the braves in peaceful graves, 
 
 And started on to Richmond. 
 
 " Our friends away are sad to-day, 
 
 Because we march to Richmond ; 
 With loving fear they shrink to hear 
 
 About our march to Richmond ; 
 The pen shall tell that they who fell 
 
 While marching on to Richmond, 
 Had hearts aglow and face to foe, 
 
 And died in sight of Richmond.
 
 258 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 " Our thoughts shall roam to scenes of home, 
 
 While marching on to Richmond ; 
 The vacant chair that's waiting there, 
 
 While we march on to Richmond ; 
 'Twill not be long till shout and song 
 
 We'll raise aloud in Richmond, 
 And war's rude blast will soon be past, 
 
 And we'll go home from Richmond." 
 
 This song-writer had brought a song to the great Spring- 
 field assembly. He sang it when the people were in a recep- 
 tive mood. It voiced their hearts, and its influence was 
 electric. As he rose before the assembly on that August day 
 under the prairie sun, and sang : " Hark ! hark ! a signal-gun is 
 heard," a stillness came over the great sea of the people. The 
 figures of the first verse filled the imagination, but the chorus 
 was like a bugle-call : 
 
 "THE SHIP OF STATE. 
 " (Sung at the Springfield Convention.) 
 
 " Hark ! hark ! a signal-gun is heard, 
 
 Just out beyond the fort ; 
 The good old Ship of State, my boys, 
 
 Is coming into port. 
 With shattered sails, and anchors gone, 
 
 1 fear the rogues will strand her ; 
 She carries now a sorry crew, 
 
 And needs a new commander. 
 
 " Our Lincoln is the man 1 
 Our Lincoln is the man ! 
 With a sturdy mate 
 From the Pine-Tree State, 
 Our Lincoln is the man !
 
 "OUR LINCOLN IS THE MAN." 259 
 
 " Four years ago she put to sea, 
 
 With prospects brightly beaming ; 
 Her hull was strong, her sails new-bent, 
 
 And every pennant streaming ; 
 She loved the gale, she plowed the waves, 
 
 Nor feared the deep's commotion ; 
 Majestic, nobly on she sailed, 
 
 Proud mistress of the ocean. 
 
 " There's mutiny aboard the ship ; 
 
 There's feud no force can smother ; 
 Their blood is up to fever-heat ; 
 
 They're cutting down each other. 
 Buchanan here, and Douglas there, 
 
 Are belching forth their thunder, 
 While cunning rogues are sly at work 
 
 In pocketing the plunder. 
 
 " Our ship is badly out of trim ; 
 
 'Tis time to calk and grave her ; 
 She's foul with stench of human gore ; 
 
 They've turned her to a slaver. 
 She's cruised about from coast to coast, 
 
 The flying bondman hunting, 
 Until she's strained from stem to stern, 
 
 And lost her sails and bunting. 
 
 " Old Abram is the man ! 
 Old Abram is the man ! 
 
 And he'll trim her sails, 
 
 As he split the rails. 
 Old Abram is the man ! 
 
 " We'll give her what repairs she needs 
 
 A thorough overhauling ; 
 Her sordid crew shall be dismissed, 
 
 To seek some honest calling. 
 Brave Lincoln soon shall take the helm, 
 
 On truth and right relying ; 
 In calm or storm, in peace or war, 
 
 He'll keep her colors flying.
 
 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 " Old Abram is the man I 
 Old Abrain is the man I 
 With a sturdy mate 
 From the Pine-Tree State, 
 Old Abram is the man ! " 
 
 These words seem commonplace to-day, but they were 
 trumpet-notes then. " Our Lincoln is the man ! " trembled on 
 every tongue, and a tumultuous applause arose that shook the 
 air. The enthusiasm grew ; the minstrel had voiced the people, 
 and they would not let him stop singing. They finally mounted 
 him on their shoulders and carried him about in triumph, like 
 a victor bard of old. Ever rang the chorus from the lips of the 
 people, " Our Lincoln is the man ! " " Old Abram is the man ! " 
 
 Lincoln heard the song. He loved songs. One of his 
 favorite songs was "Twenty Years ago." But this was the 
 first time, probably, that he had heard himself sung. He was 
 living at that time in the plain house in Springfield that has 
 been made familiar by pictures. The song delighted him, but 
 he, of all the thousands, was forbidden .by his position to express 
 his pleasure in the song. He would have liked to join with the 
 multitudes in singing " Our Lincoln is the man ! " had not the 
 situation sealed his lips. But after the scene was over, and the 
 great mass of people began to melt away, he sought the min- 
 strel, and said : 
 
 " Come to my room, and sing to me the song privately. / 
 want to hear you sing it." 
 
 So he listened to it in private, while it was being borne over 
 the prairies on tens of thousands of lips. Did he then dream 
 that the nations would one day sing the song of his achieve- 
 ments, that his death would be tolled by the bells of all lands,
 
 "OUR LINCOLN IS THE MAN." 261 
 
 and his dirge fill the churches of Christendom with tears ? It 
 may have been that his destiny in dim outline rose before him, 
 for the events of his life were hurrying. 
 
 Aunt Indiana was there, and she found the Tunker. 
 
 "The land o' sakes and daisies!" she said. "That we 
 should both be here ! "Well, elder, I give it up ! I was agin 
 Lincoln until I heard all the people a-singin' that song ; then 
 it came over me that I was doin' just what I hadn't ought to, 
 and I began to sing ' Old Lincoln is the man ! ' just as though 
 it had been a Methody hymn written by "Wesley himself." 
 
 " I am glad that you have changed your mind, and that I 
 have lived to see my prophecy, that Lincoln would become the 
 heart of the people, fulfilled." 
 
 " Elder, I tell you what let's we do." 
 
 " What, my good woman ? " 
 
 " Let's we each get a rail, and go down before Abe's win- 
 der, and I'll sing as loud as anybody : 
 
 " ' Old Abram is the man ! 
 Old Abram is the man ! 
 
 And he'll trim her sails 
 
 As he split the rails. 
 Old Abram is the man ! ' 
 
 111 do it, if you will. I've been all wrong from the first. Why, 
 even the Grigsbys are goin' to vote for him, and I'm goin' to 
 do the right thing myself. Abe always had a human heart, 
 and it is that which is the most human that leads off in this 
 world." 
 
 Aunt Indiana found a rail. The streets of Springfield were 
 full of rails that the people had brought in honor of Lincoln's
 
 262 IN THE BOYHOOD OF LINCOLN. 
 
 hard work on his father's barn in early Illinois. She also found a 
 flag. Flags were as many as rails on this remarkable occasion. 
 She set the flag into the top of the rail, and started for the 
 street that led past Lincoln's door. 
 
 " Come on, elder ; we'll be a procession all by ourselves." 
 The two arrived at the house where Lincoln lived, the 
 Tunker in his buttonless gown, and Aunt Indiana with her 
 corn-bonnet, printed shawl, rail, and flag. The procession of 
 two came to a halt before the open window, and presently, 
 framed in the open window, like a picture, the face of Abra- 
 ham Lincoln appeared. That face lighted up as it fell upon 
 Aunt Indiana. 
 
 She made a low courtesy, and lifted the rail and the flag, 
 and broke forth in a tone that would have led a camp-meet- 
 ing : 
 
 " ' Our Abram is the man ! 
 Our Abram is the man ! 
 
 With a sturdy mate 
 
 From the Pine-Tree State, 
 Our Abram is the man ! ' 
 
 " Elder, you sing, and we'll go over it again." 
 Aunt Indiana waved the flag and sang the refrain again, 
 and said : 
 
 " Abe Lincoln, I'm goin' to vote for ye, though I never 
 thought I should. But you shall have my vote with all the 
 rest. Lawdy sakes and daisies, elder I forgot ; I can't vote, 
 can I ? I'm just a woman. I've got all mixed up and carried 
 away, but 
 
 " ' Our Abram is the man ! ' "
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 From a photograph by Alexander Hester, Chicago, 185S.
 
 "OUR LINCOLN IS THE MAN." 263 
 
 Six years have passed. The gardens of "Washington are 
 bursting into bloom. The sky is purple under a clear sun. It 
 is Wednesday morning, the 19th of April, 1865. 
 
 All the bells are tolling, and the whole city is robed in 
 black. At eleven o'clock some sixty clergymen enter the "White 
 House, followed by the governors of the States. At noon 
 comes the long procession of Government officers, followed by 
 the diplomatic corps. 
 
 In the sable rooms rises a dark catafalque, and in it lies a 
 waxen face. 
 
 Toll ! the bells of Washington, Georgetown, and Alexan- 
 dria ! Minute-guns boom. Around that dead face the repre- 
 sentatives of the nation, and of all nations, pass, and tears fall 
 like rain. 
 
 A funeral car of flowers moves through the streets. Abra- 
 ham Lincoln has done his work. He is on his journey back 
 to the scenes of his childhood ! The boy who defended the 
 turtles, the man who stretched out his arm over the defenseless 
 Indian in the Black Hawk War, and who freed the slave ; the 
 man of whom no one ever asked pity in vain he is going 
 back to the prairies, to sleep his eternal sleep among the 
 violets. 
 
 Toll! The bells of all the cities and towns of the loyal 
 nation are tolling. In every principal church in all the land 
 people have met to weep and to pray. Half-mast flags every- 
 where meet the breeze. 
 
 They laid the body beneath the rotunda of the Capitol, 
 amid the April flowers and broken magnolias. 
 
 Then homeward through Baltimore, robed in black; 
 18
 
 264 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 through Philadelphia, through New York, Cleveland, Indi- 
 anapolis, and Chicago. The car rolls on, over flowers and 
 under black flags, amid the tolling of the bells of cities and 
 the bells of the simple country church-towers. All labor 
 ceases. The whole people stop to wonder and to weep. 
 
 The dirges cease. The muffled drums are still. The 
 broken earth of the prairies is wrapped around the dead 
 commoner, the fallen apostle of humanity, the universal 
 brother of all who toil and struggle. 
 
 The courts of Europe join in the lamentation. Never yet 
 was a man wept like this man. 
 
 His monument ennobles the world. He stands in eternal 
 bronze in a hundred cities. And why? Because he had a 
 heart to feel; because to him all men had been brothers of 
 equal blood and birthright ; and because he had had faith that 
 
 "RIGHT MAKES MIGHT."
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 AT THE LAST. 
 
 EOM the magnolias to the Northern orchards, 
 from the apple-blooms to the prairie violets ! 
 The casket was laid in the tomb. Twilight 
 came ; the multitudes had gone. It was ended 
 now, and night was falling. 
 Two forms stood beside the closed door of the tomb ; one 
 was an old, gray-haired woman, the other was a patriarchal- 
 looking man. 
 
 The woman's gray hairs blew about her white face like 
 silver threads, and she pushed it back with her withered 
 hand. 
 
 " Sister Olive," said the old man, " he loved others better 
 than himself ; and it is not this tomb, but the great heart of 
 the world, that has taken him in. I felt that he was called. I 
 felt it years ago." 
 
 " Heaven forgive a poor old woman, elder ! I misjudged that 
 man. See here." 
 
 She held up a bunch of half-withered prairie violets tha 
 she had carried about with her all the day, and then went and 
 laid them on the tomb.
 
 266 IN THE BOYHOOD OP LINCOLN. 
 
 " For Lincoln's sake ! for Lincoln's sake ! " she said, crying 
 like a child. 
 
 The two went away in the shadows, talking of all the past, 
 and each has long slept under the violets of the prairies. 
 
 THE E5TD.
 
 C 
 
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 " The book gives an excellent description of the battle of Lake Champlain, told in 
 such interesting style, and so well blended with personal adventure, tha^ every boy will 
 delight to read it, and will unavoidably remember its main features." Springfield 
 Union. 
 
 " The story is told in a breery, pleasant style that can not fail to capture the fancy 
 of young readers, and imparts much historical knowledge at the same time, while the 
 illustrations will help the understanding of the events described. It is an excellent 
 book for boys, and even the girls will be interested in it." Brooklyn Standard-Union. 
 
 " The author knows how to tell her stories to captivate the boys, and the character 
 of her young heroes is such as to elevate and ennoble the reader." Hartford Even- 
 ing Post. 
 
 " Young Paulding is a striking character, and his story is fascinating and inspiring. 
 The work has a historical basis, and is as instructive as it is entertaining." Indian- 
 apolis Sentinel. 
 
 ITTLE JARVIS. The story of the heroic mid- 
 shipman of -the frigate "Constellation." By MOLLY ELLIOT 
 SEAWELL. With Six full-page Illustrations by J. O. DAVID- 
 SON and GEORGE WHARTON EDWARDS. 8vo. Bound uni- 
 formly with " Midshipman Paulding." $i.OO. 
 
 " Founded on a true incident in our naval history. ... So well pictured as to 
 bring both smiles and tears upon the faces that are bent over the volume. It is in ex- 
 actly the spirit for a boy's book." New York Home Journal. 
 
 " Little Jarvis was a manly, jolly little midshipman on board the good ship ' Con- 
 stellation,' in the year 1800 ; so full of pranks that he spent most of his time in the 
 cross-trees and lived prepared for this inevitable fate, with a book in one pocket and a 
 piece of hard-tack in the other. . . . His boyish ambition was to smell powder in a real 
 battle, to meet and conquer a live French man-of-war. It would be unfair to the reader 
 to tell how Little Jarvis conducted himself when at length the ' Constellation ' grappled 
 with the frigate ' Vengeance ' in deadly combat " Providence Journal. 
 
 " The author makes the tale strongly and simply pathetic, and has given the world 
 what will make it better." Hartford Courant. 
 
 "Not since Dr. Edward Everett Hate's classic, 'The Man without a Country,' 
 has there been published a more stirring lesson in patriotism." Boston Beacon. 
 
 " It is what a boy would call ' a real boy's book." Charleston News and Courier. 
 
 "This is the stoty which received the prize of five hundred dollars offered by 
 the Youth's Companion. It was worthy the distinction accorded it." Philadelphia 
 Telegraph. 
 
 " It is well to multiply such books, that we may awaken in the youth that read 
 them the spirit of devotion to duty of which Little Jarvis is a type. We shall some 
 day have need of it all." Army and Navy Journal. 
 
 _ " Any one in search of a thoroughly good book for boys need look no further, for 
 this ranks among the very best." Milwaukee Sentinel. 
 
 New York : D. APPLETON & CO., I, 3, & 5 Bond Street.
 
 s 
 
 D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 TRAIGHT ON. A story of a boy's school-life in 
 
 France. By the author of "The Story of Colette." With 
 
 86 Illustrations by Edouard Zier. 320 pages. 8vo. Cloth, 
 $1.50. 
 
 " It is long since we have encountered a story for children which we can recom- 
 mend more cordially. It is good all through and in every respect." Charleston 
 News and Courier. 
 
 " A healthful tale of a French school-boy who suffers the usual school-boy persecu- 
 tion, and emerges from his troubles a hero. The illustrations are bright and well 
 drawn, and the translation is excellently done." Boston Commercial Bulletin. 
 
 " A real story-book of the sort which is difficult to lay down, having once begun it. 
 It is fully illustrated and handsomely bound." Buffalo Courier. 
 
 " The story is one of exceptional merit, and its delightful interest never flags." 
 Chicago Herald. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED EDITION OF "COLETTE." 
 
 STORY OF COLETTE, a new, large-paper 
 * edition. With 36 Illustrations. 8vo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 The great popularity which this book has attained in its smaller form has 
 led the publishers to issue an illustrated edition, with thirty-six original 
 drawings by Jean Claude, both vignette and full-page. 
 
 " This is a capital translation of a charming novel. It is bright, witty, fresh, and 
 humorous. ' The Story of Colette * is a fine example of what a French novel can be, 
 and all should be." Charleston News and Courier. 
 
 " Colette is French and the story is French, and both are exceedingly pretty. The 
 story is as pure and refreshingas the innocent yet sighing gayety of Colette's life." 
 Providence Journal. 
 
 "A charming little story, molded on the simplest lines, thoroughly pure, and ad- 
 mirably constructed. It is told with a wonderful lightness and raciness. It is full of 
 little skillful touches, such as French literary art at its best knows so well how to pro- 
 duce. It is characterized by a knowledge of human nature and a mastery of style and 
 method which indicate that it is the work rather of a master than of a novice. . . . Who- 
 ever the author of 'Colette ' may be, there can be no question that it is one of the pret- 
 tiest, most artistic, and in every way charming stories that French fiction has been 
 honored with for a long time." New York Tribune. 
 
 H 
 
 ERMINE'S TRIUMPHS. A Story for Girls and 
 Boys. By MADAME COLOMB. With 100 Illustrations. 8vo. 
 Cloth. 
 
 The popularity of this charming story of French home life, which has 
 passed through many editions in Paris, has been earned by the sustained in- 
 terest of the narrative, the sympathetic presentation of character, and the 
 wholesomeness of the lessons which are suggested. One of the most de- 
 lightful books for girls published in recent years. It is bound uniformly 
 with " Straight On." 
 
 New York : D. APFLETON & CO., i, 3, & 5 Bond Street.
 
 B 
 
 D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 r)OYS IN THE MOUNTAINS AND ON THE 
 ^-^ PLAINS ; or, The Western Adventures of Tom Smart, Bob 
 Edge, and Peter Small. By W. H. RIDEING, Member of the 
 Geographical Surveys under Lieutenant Wheeler. With 101 
 Illustrations. Square 8vo. Cloth, gilt side and back, $2.50. 
 " A handsome gift-book relating to travel, adventure, and field sports in the West." 
 New York Times. 
 
 "Mr. Rideing's book is intended for the edification of advanced young readers. It 
 narrates the adventures of Tom Smart, Bob Edge, and Peter Small, in their travels 
 through the mountainous region of the West, principally in Colorado. The author was 
 a member of the Wheeler expedition, engaged in surveying the Territories, and his 
 descriptions of scenery, mining life, the Indians, games, etc., are in a great measure 
 derived from personal observation and experience. The volume is handsomely illus- 
 trated, and can not but prove attractive to young readers." Chicago Journal. 
 
 OYS COASTWISE; or, All Along the Shore. By 
 W. H. RIDEING. Uniform with " Boys in the Mountains." 
 With numerous Illustrations. Illuminated boards, $1.75. 
 
 " Fully equal to the best of the year's holiday books for boys. ... In his present trip 
 the author takes them among scenes of the greatest interest to all boys, whether resi- 
 dents on the coast or inland along the wharves of the metropolis, aboard the pilot- 
 boats for a cruise, with a look at the great ocean steamers, among the life-saving men, 
 coast wreckers and divers, and finally on a tour of inspection of lighthouses and light- 
 ships, and other interesting phases of nautical and coast life." Christian Union. 
 
 HE CRYSTAL HUNTERS. A Boy's Advent- 
 ures in the Higher Alps. By GEORGE MANVILLE FENN, author 
 of "In the King's Name," "Dick o' the Fens," etc. I2mo. 
 Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 "This is the boys' favorite author, and of the many books Mr. Fenn has written 
 for them this will please them the best. While it will not come under the head of 
 sensational, it is yet full of life and of those stirring adventures which boys always de- 
 light in." Christian at Work. 
 
 " English pluck and Swiss coolness are tested to the utmost in these perilous ex- 
 plorations among the higher Alps, and quite as thrilling as any of the narrow escapes 
 is the account of the first breathless ascent of a real mountain-peak. It matters little to 
 the reader whether the search for crystals is rewarded or not, so concerned does he be- 
 come for the fate of the hunters." Literary World. 
 
 OKZ? ELTON: The JSoy who would not go to Sea. 
 *-) By GEORGE MANVILLE FENN. With 6 full-page Illustrations. 
 I2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 "Who among the young story-reading public will not rejoice at the sight of the old 
 combination, so often proved admirable a story by Manville Fenn, illustrated by 
 Gordon Browne ? The story, too, is one of the good old sort, full of life and vigor, 
 breeziness and fun. It begins well and goes on better, and from the time Syd joins 
 his ship, exciting incidents follow each other in such rapid and brilliant succession that 
 nothing short of absolute compulsion would induce the reader to lay it down." London 
 "Journal of Education. 
 
 New York: D. APPLETON & CO., i, 3, & 5 Bond Street. 
 
 T
 
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