CHAPTER IV
ABE’S SCHOOLING

“Spell defied!”

This question was put a class in spelling by the master.

The first pupil in the straggling line of backwoods boys and girls who stood up in class, answered with some hesitation: “D-e-f-i-d-e, defied.”

The master frowned.

“Next!” he called sharply.

The next improved upon the effort of the first speller, and in a confident tone answered.

“D-e-f-y-d-e.”

“Wrong again! The next may try it,” said the teacher.

“D-e-f-y-d!” said the third scholar.

“Worse and worse! You are entitled to a medal!” said Crawford, sarcastically. “Next!”

“D-e-f-y-e-d!” was the next attempt.

“Really, you do me great credit,” said the teacher, a frown gathering on his brow. “You can’t spell an easy word of two syllables. It is shameful. I’ll keep the whole class in all the rest of the day, if necessary, till the word is spelled correctly.”

It now became the turn of a young girl named Roby, who was a favorite with Abe. She was a pretty girl, but, nevertheless, the terrible word puzzled her. In her perplexity she chanced to turn toward the seat at the window occupied by her long-legged friend, Abe.

Abe was perhaps the best speller in school. A word like defied was easy enough to him, and he wanted to help the girl through.

As Miss Roby looked at him she saw a smile upon his face, as he significantly touched his eye with his finger. The girl took the hint, and spelled the word correctly.

“Right at last!” said Master Crawford, whose back was turned, and who had not seen Abe’s dumb show. “It’s lucky for you all that one of the class knew how to spell, or I would have kept my word, and kept you all in.”

Though Master Crawford’s school had a department of manners, there was no department of English composition. Abe took this up on his own account, according to his schoolmate Nat Grigsby, and probably the teacher consented to examine his essays, though he did not require them of his other pupils. Considering the kindness of heart which he afterward exhibited on many occasions, my readers will not be surprised to hear that his first composition was against cruelty to animals. This is said to have been called forth by the conduct of some of his fellow-pupils in catching terrapins and putting coals of fire on their backs.

After a time Master Crawford’s school was discontinued, and some two or three years later Abe attended another, kept by a Mr. Swaney. It gives us an idea of the boy’s earnest desire to obtain an education, when we learn that he had to walk four and a half miles to it from his father’s house, and this walk had to be repeated, of course, in the afternoon. How many of my young readers would care sufficiently for an education to walk nine miles a day, to and from school?

We are told that the new school-house was no more impressive, architecturally, than the first, already described. In fact, it was very similar, though it had two chimneys instead of one. The course of instruction does not seem to have been any higher than at Mr. Crawford’s school. The department of “manners” was omitted, though it is doubtful whether many of the pupils could have appeared to advantage in a city ball-room.

Probably Abe did not attend Mr. Swaney’s school many weeks, and this, we are told, was the end of his school attendance anywhere. He had, however, in that short time imbibed a love of learning, which is to be credited rather to his own tastes than to the influence of his teachers, and carried on by himself the studies of which he had learned something in the humble backwoods school. We are told that he was already the equal of his teachers in learning, which probably was not saying much. Nevertheless he did not regard his education as finished. He had his books, and kept on studying at home, or wherever he was employed. In the hard work which fell to his lot he did not take much interest. He knew that it was necessary, but he did not enjoy it. He preferred to labor with his brain rather than with his hands, and often seemed so listless and preoccupied that he got the reputation of being “awful lazy.”

This is what his neighbor, Romine, says of him: “He worked for me; was always reading and thinking; used to get mad at him. I say, Abe was awful lazy; he would laugh, and talk, and crack jokes and tell stories all the time; didn’t love work, but did dearly love his pay. He worked for me frequently, a few days only at a time… Lincoln said to me one day, that his father taught him to work, but never learned him to love it.”

All the information we can obtain about this early time is interesting, for it was then that Abe was laying the foundation of his future eminence. His mind and character were slowly developing, and shaping themselves for the future.

From Mr. Lamon’s Life I quote a paragraph which will throw light upon his habits and tastes at the age of seventeen:

“Abe loved to lie under a shade-tree, or up in the loft of the cabin, and read, cipher, and scribble. At night he sat by the chimney ‘jamb,’ and ciphered by the light of the fire, on the wooden fire-shovel. When the shovel was fairly covered, he would shave it off with Tom Lincoln’s drawing-knife, and begin again. In the day-time he used boards for the same purpose, out of doors, and went through the shaving process everlastingly. His step-mother repeats often that ‘he read every book he could lay his hands on.’ She says, ‘Abe read diligently. He read every book he could lay his hands on, and when he came across a passage that struck him, he would write it down on boards if he had no paper, and keep it there until he did get paper. Then he would rewrite it, look at it, repeat it. He had a copy-book, a kind of scrap-book, in which he put down all things, and thus preserved them.’ ”

I am tempted also to quote a reminiscence of John Hanks, who lived with the Lincolns from the time Abe was fourteen to the time he became eighteen years of age: “When Lincoln – Abe – and I returned to the house from work, he would go to the cupboard, snatch a piece of corn-bread, take down a book, sit down on a chair, cock his legs up as high as his head, and read. He and I worked barefooted, grubbed it, ploughed, mowed, and cradled together; ploughed corn, gathered it, and shucked corn. Abraham read constantly when he had opportunity.”

It may well be supposed, however, that the books upon which Abe could lay hands were few in number. There were no libraries, either public or private, in the neighborhood, and he was obliged to read what he could get rather than those which he would have chosen, had he been able to select from a large collection. Still, it is a matter of interest to know what books he actually did read at this formative period. Some of them certainly were worth reading, such as “Æsop’s Fables,” “Robinson Crusoe,” “Pilgrim’s Progress,” a History of the United States, and Weem’s “Life of Washington.” The last book Abe borrowed from a neighbor, old Josiah Crawford, (I follow the statement of Mr. Lamon, rather than of Dr. Holland, who says it was Master Crawford, his teacher). When not reading it, he laid it away in a part of the cabin where he thought it would be free from harm, but it so happened that just behind the shelf on which he placed it was a great crack between the logs of the wall. One night a storm came up suddenly, the rain beat in through the crevice, and soaked the borrowed book through and through. The book was almost utterly spoiled. Abe felt very uneasy, for a book was valuable in his eyes, as well as in the eyes of its owner.

He took the damaged volume and trudged over to Mr. Crawford’s in some perplexity and mortification.

“Well, Abe, what brings you over so early?” said Mr. Crawford.

“I’ve got some bad news for you,” answered Abe, with lengthened face.

“Bad news! What is it?”

“You know the book you lent me – the ‘Life of Washington’?”

“Yes, yes.”

“Well, the rain last night spoiled it,” and Abe showed the book, wet to a pulp inside, at the same time explaining how it had been injured.

“It’s too bad, I vum! You’d ought to pay for it, Abe. You must have been dreadful careless.”

“I’d pay for it if I had any money, Mr. Crawford.”

“If you’ve got no money, you can work it out,” said Crawford.

“I’ll do whatever you think right.”

So it was arranged that Abe should work three days for Crawford, “pulling fodder,” the value of his labor being rated at twenty-five cents a day. As the book had cost seventy-five cents this would be regarded as satisfactory. So Abe worked his three days, and discharged the debt. Mr. Lamon is disposed to find fault with Crawford for exacting this penalty, but it appears to me only equitable, and I am glad to think that Abe was willing to act honorably in the matter.

CHAPTER V
ABE AND HIS NEIGHBORS

If Abe’s knowledge had increased in proportion to the increase in his stature, he would have been unusually learned at the age of seventeen, for he stood at that time nearly six feet four inches in his stockings, and, boy as he was, was taller than any man in the vicinity.

I must not omit to state that he had a remarkable memory, and this was of great service to him in his early efforts at oratory. Mr. Lamon tells us that:

“He frequently amused his young companions by repeating to them long passages from the books he had been reading. On Monday mornings he would mount a stump and deliver, with a wonderful approach to exactness, the sermon he had heard the day before. His taste for public speaking appeared to be natural and irresistible.”

Let me describe one of the scenes in which Abe often took part.

Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln have gone to church, for it is Sunday morning. The children are excused on account of the distance, and are left at home to fill up the time as they may.

“Come in,” said Abe, appearing at the door of the cabin, “I’m going to preach.”

With more willingness, perhaps, than if the services were to be conducted by a grown-up minister, the other young people in the family enter and sit down in decorous style, while Abe pulls down the Bible, reads a passage, and gives out a hymn. This is sung with more earnestness than musical taste, and then the young preacher begins his sermon.

I am sure we should all like to have been present, and should have listened with interest while the gaunt, awkward boy, gesticulating with his long arms, delivered a homily not original with himself, but no doubt marked by some of his peculiarities.

We are told that this young audience, the girls probably, were sometimes affected to tears. One might have been tempted to predict that the boy would develop into a preacher when he grew to man’s estate. But Abe did not confine himself to “preaching.” He was just as fond of other kinds of public speaking. Sometimes in the harvest field he mounted a stump and began to talk on political subjects.

More than once Thomas Lincoln, going out to the field, found work at a standstill, and a little group collected at one point, Abe being the central figure.

“What’s all this?” he would ask angrily.

“It’s Abe,” one of the hands would answer. “He’s givin’ us a rousin’ speech on politics.”

“I’ll rouse him!” said the incensed father. “Only let me get at him!”

So he would push his way into the crowd unseen by Abe, and would suddenly seize his son by the collar and drag him from his extemporized rostrum.

“Now go to work!” he would exclaim in irritation. “You can’t make your living by talking.”

Abe, with a comical smile, would close his speech, to resume it on some more auspicious occasion.

I have already said that Thomas Lincoln was a carpenter, though a poor one. Abe sometimes worked with him in the shop, but had no idea of learning the trade. He preferred to work in the field, and, as he could not fill up his time on the four acres his father cultivated, he hired out to any one of the neighbors who required his services.

No prediction could have surprised his employers more than that the tall, awkward youth, who had grown out of his clothes, would hereafter hold in his hands the destinies of the country, and guide it triumphantly to the end of a protracted and bloody struggle.

The career of Lincoln is a striking illustration of the often-repeated saying that “Truth is stranger than fiction.”

While there is room for suspicion that Abe was not fond of physical labor, he is said to have worked very satisfactorily for those who employed him. He had no troublesome pride, but was willing to do anything that was asked, and pleased the women especially by never objecting when called upon “to make a fire, carry water, or nurse a baby.”

I am tempted to quote from Mr. Lamon’s interesting volume an account furnished him by Mrs. Elizabeth Crawford of the people among whom Abe lived and some of their peculiarities. It throws light upon the homely side of the future President’s character and speech:

“You wish me to tell you how the people used to go to meeting – how far they went. At that time we thought it nothing to go eight or ten miles. The old ladies did not stop for the want of a shawl, or cloak, or riding-dress, or two horses in the winter-time; but they would put on their husbands’ old overcoats, and wrap up their little ones, and take one or two of them on their beasts, and their husbands would walk, and they would go to church, and stay in the neighborhood until the next day, and then go home. The old men would start out of their fields from their work, or out of the woods from hunting, with their guns on their shoulders, and go to church. Some of them dressed in deer-skin pants and moccasins, hunting-shirts, with a rope or leather strap around them. They would come in laughing, shake hands all around, sit down and talk about the game they had killed, or some other work they had done, and smoke their pipes together with the old ladies. If in warm weather, they would kindle up a little fire out in the meeting-house yard to light their pipes.

“If in winter-time, they would hold church in some of the neighbors’ houses. At such times they were always treated with the utmost of kindness; a bottle of whisky, a pitcher of water, sugar, and glass were set out, or a basket of apples or turnips, or some pies and cakes. Apples were scarce them times. Sometimes potatoes were used for a treat. (I must tell you that the first treat I ever received in old Mr. Linkhern’s house – that was our President’s father’s house – was a plate of potatoes, washed and pared very nicely, and handed ’round. It was something new to me, for I had never seen a raw potato eaten before. I looked to see how they made use of them. They took off a potato, and ate them like apples).

“Thus they spent the time till time for preaching to commence, then they would all take their seats; the preacher would take his stand, draw his coat, open his shirt-collar, and commence service by singing and prayer; take his text and preach till the sweat would roll off in great drops. Shaking hands and singing then ended the service. The people seemed to enjoy religion more in them days than they do now. They were glad to see each other, and enjoyed themselves better than they do now.”

Such is the testimony of an old lady, who, like old people generally, is prone to praise the past at the expense of the present.

The ladies in Abe’s early days wore “corn-field bonnets, scoop-shaped, flaring in front, and long, though narrow behind.” They were as fond of dancing as our city ladies, but did not find an elaborate toilet so essential. It was not uncommon for both sexes to discard shoes and dance barefooted. I have no doubt they enjoyed themselves as well, if not better, in this absence of restraint, than their more polished sisters who are to be found in city drawing-rooms to-day.

Brought up in such an unconventional atmosphere, it is not surprising that Abraham Lincoln never set much value upon form and ceremony, and sometimes shocked his more conventional political associates.

Mr. John B. Alley, a member of the Massachusetts Congressional delegation during the war of the Rebellion, described to me on one occasion how much shocked Senator Sumner was when, on calling upon the President, in company with Lord Lyons, the English Minister, they found him sitting at ease in true Western style, with his heels resting on the table.

“How are you, Sumner?” was the President’s greeting. “Take a seat, Lord Lyons.”

And all the while the good President did not seem to be aware that he was acting in a manner unbecoming the dignity of a great ruler. Yet he might have been aware of it, and secretly enjoyed the annoyance of his distinguished guests. I am not prepared to recommend my young readers to imitate Lincoln in this respect, but I wish them to understand how he was affected by his early acquaintances and surroundings. We shall all agree that there are many things more important than polished manners and personal dignity, and we shall find hereafter that Abraham Lincoln, in spite of his homely manners, was a Providential man, who served his country in her hour of need, as probably no other could have done.