dwellings of their neighbors, and had she lived amid more favorable surroundings, she would, no doubt, have become a refined and cultured woman.

In the midst of such surroundings as these, and in the most abject poverty, Abraham Lincoln was born on the 12th day of February, 1809. Never was hero brought into this world under more inauspicious circumstances. There was, in the lonely life of the Lincoln family, no hint of the glory, which was to crown their name and draw the attention of the world to their humble cabin. Nor did it seem possible that, amid such surroundings and privations, a child could be born and nurtured, whose hand in after-life should wield the fate of a nation.

There were in all three children: the eldest, Sarah, and the youngest, Thomas, who lived but a short time. The family remained on the little rocky farm until Abraham was four years old, when they removed to a much better farm on Knob Creek, which might have been developed into a valuable estate. But the shiftless father, content with a diet of milk and cornmeal, and satisfied, if his physical wants were moderately well supplied, only attempted to cultivate a small patch of about six acres. He met with his usual indifferent success, although his patient wife did her best to make up for his deficiencies. He paid but little attention to the education of his children, and their overburdened mother could do but little more than clothe and feed them. Twice they attended a school in the neighborhood for a few weeks, at one time being compelled to walk four miles each way, carrying a well-worn spelling-book, their only textbook, and a scanty lunch of corn bread. The course

of study included only reading, writing, spelling and a few simple arithmetical rules.

Young Abraham spent the most of his time out-ofdoors hunting and fishing, or helping his father in the farmwork. He was bright and active, and his free life in the open air no doubt laid the foundation of the sturdy good health which afterwards was of so much value in the terrible physical strain to which he was subjected.

Yet from childhood he was subject to the fits of melancholy which afterwards so frequently overshadowed his life. He had inherited the sensitive nature of his mother, and the gloom of his surroundings and prospects seemed to impress itself upon him, even at an age when most boys would have been oblivious to it. Whether working at his father's side, or wandering aimlessly about in the grand old forests, or fishing in the clear waters of the creek, he was still oppressed by the atmosphere of poverty and shiftlessness in which he was compelled to live.

In after-life he always looked back upon these early years with pain, and rarely alluded to them. They were characterized by no important occurrence, and their story was but "the short and simple annals of the poor." Yet the habits of simple living, of rising above hardships and of overcoming the obstacles of life, were of more value to him than schools, society and culture to many a more favored youth. The school of necessity is a hard one but it teaches its lessons well and thoroughly.

After a residence of four years in this place, Mr. Lincoln, becoming uneasy and discontented, determined. to move again. He had probably been able to pay

but little, if anything, on the land, and may have been compelled to seek another location. At any rate, he sold his interest in the land for ten barrels of whiskey and twenty dollars. Having built a rickety flat-boat and laden it with the whiskey, he set sail alone upon the Ohio for the purpose of seeking a new home for himself and family.

After a short voyage, his boat went to pieces, and the cargo sank to the bottom of the river. He fished it up with much labor, and leaving it at a house on the Indiana shore, he pushed into the wilderness to select a suitable spot to settle. He soon found one, and immediately moved his family and furniture from the old location to the new. The comforts of a home this poor, wandering family hardly knew. His household possessions were scanty and of little value, consisting of a little bedding, a few coarse dishes and two or three wooden stools, with his kit of carpenter's tools. His neighbors assisted him in the task of moving, ferrying the family with their goods across the river, and the remainder of the journey was made with the help of a yoke of oxen and a cart, both borrowed.

CHAPTER II.

MR. LINCOLN was no doubt influenced in his determination to leave his Kentucky home by the fact that his relations with his neighbors were becoming more and more unpleasant. His poverty and shiftlessness, together with his tendency to become implicated in disreputable affairs, all combined to make him a social outcast. Hence in leaving the State of his nativity he had but few ties to break and few friends to bewail his departure.

In Indiana, the Mecca of their pilgrimage, this forlorn family could look forward to no friendly welcome, nor even to a comfortable home. When they arrived, they were compelled to camp out until a miserable hut, commonly called a "lean-to," could be built for a temporary shelter. It was made of poles and was open on one side to the wind and weather. Here they lived for nearly a year, suffering great privations, and hardly protected at all from the storms and cold. In the mean time, Mr. Lincoln broke up a small piece of ground and planted it with corn, work ing in the intervals upon a rude log-hut, in which, when completed, they lived for three years, without either door or windows.

Furniture was almost wholly lacking. A few threelegged stools and a rough board for a table with a bed made of a large bag of leaves placed upon slats fas

tened to the walls and held up by poles resting on a crotched stick, completed the list. The children slept on the ground, for there was no floor, except on the coldest nights, when they crawled into the primitive bed with their father and mother.

The house was located upon an eminence about sixteen miles from the Ohio River, in what was then known as Perry County, near the present village of Gentryville. It was in the midst of a thickly wooded country, where were found great oaks, maples, walnuts and many other native trees, with little or no undergrowth. The location was charming and picturesque and lacked nothing but water, which had to be brought from a considerable distance. The country abounded in deer and other inoffensive wild animals, which furnished an abundance of meat together with the materials of which the pioneers were accustomed to make their clothes.

Abraham was about eight years old when the family removed to Indiana; yet he was possessed of considerable strength, and assisted materially in the arduous labors of the journey. He afterwards said in regard to this period of his life: "We reached our new home about the time that the State came into the Union. It was a wild region with many bears and other animals still in the woods. There I grew

up. There were some schools, so-called, but no qualification was ever required of a teacher beyond 'readin', ritin' and cipherin' to the rule of three.' If a straggler, supposed to understand Latin, happened. to sojourn in the neighborhood, he was looked upon as a wizard. There was absolutely nothing to excite ambition for an education. Of course, when I came