The Lincoln farm on Nolin Creek, Ky., where Abraham Lincoln was born. The pear trees here seen were planted by Thomas Lincoln in front of his cabin. This farm is now a National Park. Here President Roosevelt will deliver an address on the hundredth anniversary of Lincoln's birth. Reproduced by permission from "How Abraham Lincoln Became President," by J. McCan Davis.

to do for the neighbors. Abraham and his sister, Sarah, two years older than he, went to school a little, but they had to walk four miles. The boy learned to read and spell. They carried their dinner to school. It was only a piece of corn bread. At home they had milk with the corn bread. He really lived out of doors, only slept in the cabin. Much of the time he was alone. We may think this was a hard life, yet it was good for Abe. He had time to think. It helped him to look closely at everything out of doors and to think about it. He grew up strong and hardy.

LIFE IN INDIANA.

Thomas Lincoln was always ready to remove to a better country. He heard of Indiana, the new state across the Ohio. From what he heard of it, it must be just like Kentucky in the time of his boyhood. He built a boat, loaded it with his tools and other things and floated down Knob creek into the Rolling fork, into Salt river, and into the Ohio. The family remained in Kentucky until he returned. Sixteen miles from the river he found a piece of land that suited him. It was indeed a good country; the finest timber of every kind. The ground was strewn with nuts upon which hogs could feed and get fat. The forest floor was covered with blue grass, the best feed for horses and cattle. The woods were full of game-deer, bear and wild turkey. He returned to Kentucky for his family without building a house although he had his carpenter tools with him.

They loaded the few things which they had on borrowed horses and started for their new home. It was great fun for the children camping out at night and sleeping under the stars. There was much to see and to learn that was new to them. But it must have been hard on the mother who was not well or very strong. Arriving at the place selected by the father they found themselves in the thick woods. No house to go into, and no neighbors nearer than several miles.

They soon erected what was known as a "half-faced camp." Two posts forked at the top about eight feet high were placed firmly in the ground and about ten feet apart. From one to the other of these a ridge pole was placed. Poles about eighteen feet long were placed on this side by side, one end resting upon the ground. These were covered with broad pieces of bark and answered for a roof. Poles were now placed side by side to close up the two ends, and the front, facing the south, was left open. This formed a mere shed, but when a great log fire was kept burning in front it was quite warm. In rainy weather bear skins were hung up in front to keep out the storm. The beds were heaps of leaves in the back part of the camp. The covering was the skins of animals and whatever could be used. Thomas Lincoln meant this for a shelter for a short time only, until he could build a cabin. The summer wore away and winter came and the cabin was not built.

LIFE IN INDIANA.

Ida M. Tarbell.

On arriving at the new farm an ax was put into the boy's hands, and he was set to work to aid in clearing a field for corn, and to help build the "half-faced camp" which for a year was the home of the Lincolns. There were few more primitive homes in the wilderness of Indiana in 1816 than this of young Lincoln, and there were few families, even in that day, who were forced to practice more make-shifts to get a living. The cabin which took the place of the "half-faced camp" had but one room with a loft above. For a long time there was no window, door, or floor; not even the traditional deer-skin hung before the exit; there was no oiled paper over the opening for light; there was no puncheon covering on the ground.

The furniture was of their own manufacture. The table and chairs were of the rudest sort-rough slabs of wood in which holes were bored and legs fitted in. Their bedstead, or rather bed frame, was made of poles held up by two outer posts, and the ends made firm by inserting the poles in auger holes that had been bored in a log which was a part of the wall of the cabin; skins were its chief covering. Little Abraham's bed was even more primitive. He slept on a heap of dry leaves in the corner of the loft, to which he mounted by means of pegs driven into the wall.

Their food, if coarse, was usually abundant; the chief difficulty in supplying the larder was to secure any variety. Of game there was plentydeer, bear, pheasants, wild turkeys, ducks, birds of all kinds. There were fish in the streams, and wild fruits of many kinds in the woods in the summer, and these were dried for winter use; but the difficulty of raising and milling corn and wheat was very great. Indeed, in many places in the west the first flour cake was an historical event. Corn-dodger was the every-day bread of the Lincoln household, the wheat cake being a dainty reserved for Sunday mornings.

Potatoes were the only vegetable raised in any quantity, and there were times in the Lincoln family when they were the only food on the table; a fact proved to posterity by the oft-quoted remark of Abraham to his father after the latter had asked a blessing over a dish of roasted potatoes-"that they were mighty poor blessings." Not only were they all the Lincolns had for dinner sometimes; one of their neighbors tells of calling there when raw potatoes, pared and washed, were passed around instead of apples or other fruit. They even served as a kind of pioneer chauffrette-being baked and given to the children to carry in their hands as they started to school or on distant errands in the winter time.

The food was prepared in the rudest way, for the supply of both groceries and cooking utensils was limited. The former were frequently wanting entirely, and as for the latter, the most important item was the Dutch oven. An indispensable article in the primitive kitchen outfit was the "gritter." It was made by flattening out an old piece of tin, punching it full of holes, and nailing it on a board. Old tin was used for many other contrivances besides the "gritter," and every scrap was carefully saved. Most of the dishes were of pewter; the spoons, iron; the knives and forks, horn-handled. -From Life of Abraham Lincoln, published by the McClure Co., New York.

DEATH OF ABRAHAM'S MOTHER.

We may think Abraham had a hard time thus far in his short life. But he did not think so. All healthy boys like to live out of doors. He enjoyed his meals of coarse food. His mother was kind to him and now that Dennis Hanks, his cousin, had come from Kentucky and lived in the half-faced camp, he had a lot of fun when he did not have to work. But hard times came knocking at the door. A great sorrow was just ahead. A terrible sickness broke out. They called it the "milk sick" for it seemed to come from the cows. The cattle died suddenly in great