Part 24

251. Lincoln hires out to tend store; the gang of ruffians in New Salem; Jack Armstrong and "Tall Abe."--The year after young Lincoln came of age he hired out to tend a grocery and variety store in New Salem, Illinois. There was a gang of young ruffians in that neighborhood who made it a point to pick a fight with every stranger. Sometimes they mauled him black and blue; sometimes they amused themselves with nailing him up in a hogshead and rolling him down a hill. The leader of this gang was a fellow named Jack Armstrong. He made up his mind that he would try his hand on "Tall Abe," as Lincoln was called. He attacked Lincoln, and he was so astonished at what happened to him that he never wanted to try it again. From that time Abraham Lincoln had no better friends than young Armstrong and the Armstrong family. Later on we shall see what he was able to do for them.

252. Lincoln's faithfulness in little things; the six cents; "Honest Abe."--In his work in the store Lincoln soon won everybody's respect and confidence. He was faithful in little things, and in that way he made himself able to deal with great ones.

Once a woman made a mistake in paying for something she had bought, and gave the young man six cents too much. He did not notice it at the time, but after his customer had gone he saw that she had overpaid him. That night, after the store was closed, Lincoln walked to the woman's house, some five or six miles out of the village, and paid her back the six cents. It was such things as this that first made the people give him the name of "Honest Abe."

253. The Black Hawk War; the Indian's handful of dry leaves; what Lincoln did in the war.--The next year Lincoln went to fight the Indians in what was called the Black Hawk War. The people in that part of the country had been expecting the war; for, some time before, an Indian had walked up to a settler's cabin and said, "Too much white man." He then threw a handful of dry leaves into the air, to show how he and his warriors were coming to scatter the white men. He never came, but a noted chief named Black Hawk, who had been a friend of Tecumseh's, made an attempt to drive out the settlers, and get back the lands which certain Indians had sold them.

Lincoln said that the only battles he fought in this war were with the mosquitoes. He never killed a single Indian, but he saved the life of one old savage. He seems to have felt just as well satisfied with himself for doing that as though he had shot him through the head.

254. Lincoln becomes postmaster and surveyor; how he studied law; what the people thought of him as a lawyer.--After Lincoln returned from the war he was made postmaster of New Salem. He also found time to do some surveying and to begin the study of law. On hot summer mornings he might be seen lying on his back, on the grass, under a big tree, reading a law-book; as the shade moved round, Lincoln would move with it, so that by sundown he had travelled nearly round the tree.

When he began to practise law, everybody who knew him had confidence in him. Other men might be admired because they were smart, but Lincoln was respected because he was honest. When he said a thing, people knew that it was because he believed it, and they knew, too, that he could not be hired to say what he did not believe. That gave him immense influence.

255. The Armstrong murder trial; how Lincoln saved young Armstrong from being hanged.--But Lincoln was as keen as he was truthful and honest. A man was killed in a fight near where Lincoln had lived, and one of Jack Armstrong's brothers was arrested for the murder. Everybody thought that he was guilty, and felt sure that he would be hanged. Lincoln made some inquiry about the case, and made up his mind that the prisoner did not kill the man.

Mrs. Armstrong was too poor to hire a lawyer to defend her son, but Lincoln wrote to her that he would gladly do it for nothing.

When the day of the trial came, the chief witness was sure that he saw young Armstrong strike the man dead. Lincoln questioned him closely. He asked him when it was that he saw the murder committed. The witness said that it was in the evening, at a certain hour, and that he saw it all clearly because there was a bright moon. Are you sure? asked Lincoln. Yes, replied the witness. Do you swear to it? I do, answered the witness. Then Lincoln took an almanac out of his pocket, turned to the day of the month on which the murder had been committed, and said to the court: The almanac shows that there was no moon shining at the time at which the witness says he saw the murder. The jury was convinced that the witness had not spoken the truth; they declared the prisoner "Not guilty," and he was at once set free.

Lincoln was a man who always paid his debts. Mrs. Armstrong had been very kind to him when he was poor and friendless. Now he had paid that debt.

256. Lincoln and the pig.--Some men have hearts big enough to be kind to their fellow-men when they are in trouble, but not to a dumb animal. Lincoln's heart was big enough for both.

One morning just after he had bought a new suit of clothes he started to drive to the court-house, a number of miles distant. On the way he saw a pig that was making desperate efforts to climb out of a deep mud-hole. The creature would get part way up the slippery bank, and then slide back again over his head in mire and water. Lincoln said to himself: I suppose that I ought to get out and help that pig; for if he's left there, he'll smother in the mud. Then he gave a look at his glossy new clothes. He felt that he really couldn't afford to spoil them for the sake of any pig, so he whipped up his horse and drove on. But the pig was in his mind, and he could think of nothing else. After he had gone about two miles, he said to himself, I've no right to leave that poor creature there to die in the mud, and what is more, I won't leave him. Turning his horse, he drove back to the spot. He got out and carried half a dozen fence-rails to the edge of the hole, and placed them so that he could get to it without falling in himself. Then, kneeling down, he bent over, seized the pig firmly by the fore legs and drew him up on to the solid ground, where he was safe. The pig grunted out his best thanks, and Lincoln, plastered with mud, but with a light heart, drove on to the court-house.

257. Lincoln is elected to the state legislature; he goes to Springfield to live; he is elected to Congress.--Many people in Illinois thought that they would like to see such a man in the state legislature helping to make their laws. They elected him; and as he was too poor at that time to pay so much horse-hire, he walked from New Salem, a distance of over a hundred miles, to Vandalia, which was then the capital of the state.

Lincoln was elected to the legislature many times; later, he moved to Springfield, Illinois, and made that place his home for the rest of his life.

The next time the people elected him to office, they sent him to Congress to help make laws, not for his state only, but for the whole country. He had got a long way up since the time when he worked with John Hanks fencing the cornfield round his father's cabin; but he was going higher still,--he was going to the top.

258. The meeting for choosing a candidate for President of the United States; the two fence-rails; the Chicago meeting; Abraham Lincoln elected President of the United States.--In the spring of 1860 a great convention, or meeting, was held in one of the towns of Illinois. Lincoln was present at that convention. The object of the people who had gathered there was to choose a candidate that they would like to see elected President of the United States. A number of speeches had been made, when a member of the convention rose and said that a person asked the privilege of making the meeting a present. It was voted to receive it. Then John Hanks and one of his neighbors brought in two old fence-rails and a banner with these words painted on it:--

ABRAHAM LINCOLN, THE RAIL CANDIDATE FOR THE PRESIDENCY IN 1860. TWO RAILS FROM A LOT OF 3000 MADE IN 1830 BY JOHN HANKS AND ABE LINCOLN.

The rails were received with cheer after cheer, and Lincoln was chosen candidate. About a week after that a much greater meeting was held in Chicago, and he was chosen there in the same way. The next November Abraham Lincoln, "the Illinois rail-splitter," was elected President of the United States. He had reached the top. There he was to die.

259. The great war between the North and the South; why a large part of the people of the South wished to leave the Union.--In less than six weeks after Lincoln actually became President, in the spring of 1861, a terrible war broke out between the North and the South. The people of South Carolina fired the first gun in that war. They, together with a great part of the people of ten other southern states, resolved to leave the Union. They set up an independent government called the Confederate States of America, and made Jefferson Davis its president.

The main reason why so many of the people of the South wished to withdraw from the United States was that little by little the North and the South had become like two different countries.

At the time of the Revolution, when we broke away from the rule of England, every one of the states held negro slaves; but in the course of eighty years a great change had taken place. The negroes at the North had become free, but those of the South still remained slaves. Now this difference in the way of doing work made it impossible for the North and the South to agree about many things.

They had come to be like two boys in a boat who want to go in opposite directions. One pulls one way with his oars, the other pulls another way, and so the boat does not get ahead.

At the South most of the people thought that slavery was right, and that it helped the whole country; at the North the greater part of the people were convinced that it was wrong, and that it did harm to the whole country.

But this was not all. The people who held slaves at the South wanted to add to the number. They hoped to get more of the new country west of the Mississippi River for slave states, so that there might always be at least as many slave states in the Union as there were free states. But Abraham Lincoln like most of the people at the North believed that slavery did no good to any one. He and his party were fully determined that no slaves whatever should be taken into the territories west of the Mississippi River, and that every new state which should be added should be entirely free.

For this reason it happened that when Lincoln became President most of the slave states resolved to leave the Union, and, if necessary, to make war rather than be compelled to stay in it.

In 1861 eleven of the southern states endeavored to withdraw from the Union; this attempt brought on the war.]

260. The North and the South in the war; President Lincoln frees the slaves; General Grant and General Lee; peace is made.--The North had the most men and the most money to fight with, but the people of the South had the advantage of being able to stay at home and fight on their own ground.