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er with his carpenter's tools. Without any mishap he floated down Rolling Fork to Salt River, and with the current of that stream to the Ohio, which had overflowed its banks. Suddenly his frail craft was capsized in the swirling water, and whiskey and tools went to the bottom of the river. He swam to the shore and stood penniless upon the bank; but when the water receded, a few days later, he regained his property, obtained another boat, and floated down the Ohio to Thompson's Landing. Leaving his property in a storehouse, he went northward twenty miles through the forest to Pigeon Creek. He was charmed with the country. The soil was fertile. Mr. Gentry had built a cabin; other settlers were selecting lands. He made choice of a quarter section, and travelled seventy miles to Vincennes to enter his claim, and returned to Kentucky.

The November winds were rattling the acorns and walnuts to the ground, and the ripened leaves were falling, when the family moved to

Indiana. The nights were cold. No shelter had been provided. 1817. The late autumn rains were setting in. It was only a "camp that the carpenter could build, one side of which was open to the weather. () The hard-working wife, as in the floorless cabin at Nolin's Creek, baked the corn-bread and went on with the making and mending. It seems probable that while occupying this camp she taught writing to Abraham. We know that George Hazel did not teach it, but further on we shall see Abraham writing a letter to a friend in Kentucky.

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SITE OF THOMAS LINCOLN'S HOME ON KNOB CREEK. [From a photograph taken by the author, October, 1891. The well dug by Thomas Lincoln is seen in the centre of the picture.]

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Through the winter carpenter Lincoln was hewing timber for his future home, which was to be something more than a cabin. Although there would be but one room on the ground, he would build the walls high enough for a loft, which would give sleeping accommodations to Sarah and Abraham. Built of hewn logs, it would be palatial in comparison with his former homes. Picture it as we may, we shall not be able to portray the desolateness of the winter passed in the Pigeon Creek camp, and the weariness of spirit on the part of one endowed as was the mother to adorn a palace. We are not to think that Thomas Lincoln was idle, nor that he was altogether shiftless. He was in poverty. The family must have food. A home must be built. The ground must be cleared for planting corn. There is no evidence that he was idle. Other settlers, more industrious than he, could not accumulate much property in a section of country covered by a dense forest. Many sturdy blows must be given with the axe before he could complete his house and clear the ground for raising corn.

1818.

The new home was not finished when the family moved into it-the floor not laid, no boards provided for a door. The moving was hastened by the arrival of Thomas Sparrow, whose wife was Mrs. Lincoln's sister. Dennis Hanks, a nephew, came with them. Without doubt it was a glad day when they arrived, but the joy was quickly changed to mourning. A few weeks later Mr. and Mrs. Sparrow were borne to their graves. Sickness, which became epidemic, appeared throughout southern Indiana, attacking cattle and human beings alike, caused, as is supposed, by herbs which poisoned the milk of the cows. The physician had no counteracting medicine. The illness was brief; the result, in most cases, fatal.

Nancy Hanks Lincoln was thirty-three years old. Life as found by

her had presented few attractions. It seems probable that not much sunshine fell across her path, even during her girlhood, in Virginia. She had been dependent upon friends for a home. By circumstances beyond her control she had been compelled to accept uncongenial life on the frontier. Her aspirations were far different from those of her kind-hearted husband. She heard voices which he could not hear. Her discerning eyes beheld what he never would be able to see. Shall we wonder that the sadness deepened upon her countenance? Seemingly it was not much she could do to lift her offspring to a better life than her own had been; but human vision does not reach down to the springs which underlie character. The world never will know the greatness of its debt to her for doing what she could in stamping her own lofty conception of duty and obligation upon the hearts and consciences of her children.

October had come. The forest was arrayed in glory. The harvest was at hand. There had ever been loving intimacy and sympathy be

JUNCTION OF SALT RIVER WITH THE OHIO, WHERE THOMAS LINCOLN'S BOAT WAS

CAPSIZED.

[From a photograph taken by the author, 1890.]

GRAVE OF NANCY HANKS LINCOLN, PIGEON CREEK, IND. [From a photograph taken by the author, October, 1890. The marble slab and surrounding fence were erected by P. E. Studebaker, of South Bend, Ind. The stone bears the following inscription: "Nancy Hanks Lincoln, mother of President Lincoln, died October 5, A. D. 1818, aged 35 years. Erected by a friend of her martyred son, 1879."]

tween Mrs. Lincoln and her children. She had discerned what the father had not seen in their boy -a nature rich and rare: kindness of heart, sympathy with suffering, regard for what was right, impatience with wrong. She had watched the unfolding of his intellect. He had asked questions which others of his age did not ask. She knows that her work for this life is ended. Her boy stands by her bedside.

"I am going away from you, Abraham, and shall not return. I know that you will be a good boy; that you will be kind to Sarah and to your father. I want you

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to live as I have taught you, and to love your Heavenly Father." Through life he will hear her last words. In the full vigor of manhood he will not think it unmanly to say, with tearful eyes, "All that I am, all that I hope to be, I owe to my angel mother." (") Death came. The husband made the coffin. No preacher was near, but sympathizing neighbors bore all that was mortal of her to the summit of a hill that overlooked the unfinished home-the site selected for her resting-place.

That his mother had been buried without a religious service cut Abraham Lincoln to the heart. In the lonesomeness and desolation of the winter's camp she had trained his hand in holding the pen. Is it probable that there was any other boy only ten years old in the State of Indiana-or in the country--who would have set himself to write a letter inviting a minister 100 miles distant to come and preach a funeral sermon? But Rev. David Elkin, at Little Mound, received such a letter. (") Abraham Lincoln! That must be Nancy Hanks Lincoln's boy. Yes, he would go, although it was so many miles to

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