services of Lincoln to assist him in marketing the goods when they should arrive. The young adventurer put in the intervening time making himself popular as a story teller, lending ready assistance to any one having a difficult task on hand, and devouring whatever printed matter fell under his observing eye. An election proceeding and Mentor Graham, a school teacher of considerable learning, having the matter in charge, noted Lincoln lingering near and asked him if he could write. "I can make a few rabbit tracks," was the good-natured reply.

He was put to work and proved such a careful and accurate clerk that Graham became interested at once. During the afternoon when things were dragging a little Lincoln entertained the voters with stories which proved so palatable to his audience that he was the center of an animated crowd for the entire evening following the counting of the votes.

A few days later Lincoln was employed by Dr. Nelson, who after the style of the dignitaries of later days, started with his family for Texas in his "private conveyance"-which in this instance was a flatboat, "The Texas." Lincoln was hired to pilot the vessel through the Illinois River. Arriving at Beardstown the pilot was discharged and returned on foot across the sand hills to New Salem.

Offut's merchandise having arrived, Lincoln was placed in charge. A country store in those days was the meeting place of all the male gossips of the village. Lincoln generally had an audience for his quaint fables and striking parables. If they were not basically his own, his original phrasing, art of mimicry and telling gestures made them so. Offut, a man of loud activities, deep potations, but withal warm-hearted and generous, was proud of the abilities of his talented clerk and boasted without stint of his mental and physical prowess.

He challenged the world to combat in the name of Lincoln, either in debate or in feats of strength and skill. It is a wellestablished fact that Lincoln during this period, by the aid of a harness he himself constructed of straps and ropes, lifted a dead weight of 1,999 pounds.

At Clary's Grove lived a set of boys who were the terror of the entire region. Such groups have ever been the natural product of American frontier settlements. The Clary Grove boys headed by Jack Armstrong took up the boastful challenge of Offut, and proposed a wrestling bout between Armstrong and Lincoln. Not without protest Lincoln finally agreed to the match. He was now fully matured, stood six feet four in his stockings, and weighed 234 pounds. Armstrong was bulky and strong as an ox. During the struggle and when Lincoln was getting the best of the tussle, the Clary Grove crowd broke into the ring and attempted foul tactics to save their champion from defeat. This so enraged Lincoln that he caught his antagonist by the throat, lifted him bodily from the ground, shook him like a rag, and flung him prostrate out of the ring. So impressed were the Clary Grove boys with this exhibition of strength and the righteous anger of the young wrestler, that they became at once his advocates. From this time forward Armstrong was his warm. friend, and his wife Hannah, and all others of the Clary Grove contingent welcomed the new champion to their circle. They gave him loyal support in all his appeals to the public and when he ran for office discarded their party affiliations to give him their votes. Lincoln appreciated their friendship and support and in after years proved his gratitude by saving one member of the Armstrong family from the gallows.

But neither the interests of the store nor the seductions of athletic exhibitions could keep the young student from his

books. His determination to have knowledge was the mainspring of his being. He studied in season and out of season. The store counter supplied him with a place to stretch his long figure, and with a bolt of calico under his head and a book before his face he made the lax hours of trade yield him deep draughts of the best thought of the world. But true to his boyhood habit, he was ever anxious to divide his mental treasures with anyone who happened along. He read books while he walked through the streets. He read them seated on store boxes in the shadow of a building. His library was his armpit and it was seldom without one or more volumes to answer his needs. Following a suggestion of Mentor Graham he hunted up one Vaner who was reputed to own a copy Kirkham's Grammar, and having secured the coveted volume began diligently to master the science of the English language. He delved into Arithmetic also. And when Offut, in the words of Lincoln, "petered out" and the store passed into other hands, Lincoln continued in New Salem making friends and gaining knowledge and wisdom after his own original fashion.

of

In the spring of 1832, New Salem was thrilled with the news that a steamboat was on its way down the Sangamon. The navigability of this river was one of the live questions of the day in that part of the country, and the people of Springfield and New Salem made great preparations to welcome the coming of Captain Vincent Bogue's "Talisman," as the boat was named, and which the enterprising captain was bringing from Cincinnati. On the day of her arrival all the people round and about New Salem were gathered to make fitting demonstration of joy. The boat tied up at Bogue's mill and there was much cheering, songs, speeches and general rejoicing. Lincoln, who with a company of axmen had cleared the

branches from over the stream, took advantage of the occasion to increase his acquaintance and popularity. And while the steamboat was destined to destruction at the end of the voyage and the navigation of the Sangamon finally abandoned, the theme served Lincoln for campaign material a year later, when he made his race for a seat in the State Legislature.

Chapter VI
PURIFYING FIRES

T

HE EXCITEMENT occasioned by the arrival and departure of the Talisman had hardly subsided when

the Black Hawk War broke out and Lincoln was chosen Captain of a company of volunteers to combat the wily old Indian Chieftain. It was his first official trust and he prized the distinction to its full worth. His company was composed of the Clary Grove boys and others of their ilk, wild young fellows unused to discipline of any kind, and the young and inexperienced captain found them difficult to manage. Through their disregard of law he met the first public humiliation of his career. A number of the recruits one night broke into the quarters of the regular army officers and carried off by stealth a goodly supply of wines and liquors which they drank during the night. Morning found them unable to resume their march. An investigation followed, and their innocent captain was condemned to wear a wooden sword for two days, because of their escapade. What chagrin this undeserved disgrace must have cost the temperamental Lincoln can be imagined, but he bore it with dignified calm however deep his resentment.

During this campaign Lincoln suffered a second humiliation at the hands of Soldier Thompson, who managed to throw him twice in succession. A footrace between the two