Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance

by Albert Bigelow Paine

  13

  The Lincolns were leaving Pigeon Creek. One day a letter had arrivedfrom John Hanks, a cousin, who had gone to Illinois to live. The soilwas richer there, the letter said. Why didn't Tom come, too, and bringhis family? He would find it easier to make a living. Even the name ofthe river near John's home had a pleasant sound. It was called theSangamon--an Indian word meaning "plenty to eat."

  "We're going," Tom decided. "I'm going to sell this farm and buyanother. Do you want to come with us, Abe?"

  Two years had passed since Abe's return from New Orleans. Two years ofhard work. Two years of looking forward to his next birthday. He wasnearly twenty-one and could leave home if he wanted to.

  "Well, Pa--" he hesitated.

  Sarah was watching him, waiting for his answer.

  "I'll come with you," said Abe. "I'll stay long enough to help you getthe new farm started."

  There were thirteen people in the Lincoln party: Tom and Sarah, Abe andJohnny, Betsy and Dennis Hanks who had been married for several years,Mathilda and her husband, and two sets of children. They made thejourney in three big wagons, traveling over frozen roads and crossingicy streams. After two weeks they came to John Hanks' home on theprairies of Illinois. He made them welcome, then took them to see theplace that he had selected for their farm. In the cold winter light itlooked almost as desolate as Pigeon Creek had looked fourteen yearsbefore. Tom Lincoln was beginning all over again.

  This time he had more help. John Hanks had a great pile of logs splitand ready to be used for their new cabin. Abe was now able to do a man'swork. After the cabin was finished, he split enough rails to build afence around the farm. Some of the new neighbors hired him to split logsfor them.

  The following spring, he was offered other work that he liked muchbetter. A man named Denton Offut was building a flatboat, which heplanned to float down the Illinois River to the Mississippi and on toNew Orleans. He hired Abe to help with the cargo. The two young menbecame friends. When Abe returned home after the long voyage, he hadnews for Sarah.

  "Ma," he said, "Denton is fixing to start a store up in New Salem.That's a village on the Sangamon River. He wants me to be his clerk."

  Sarah said nothing for a moment. If Abe went away to stay, the cabinwould seem mighty lonesome. She would miss him terribly. But she wantedhim to do whatever was best for him.

  "Mr. Offut said he'd pay me fifteen dollars a month," Abe added.

  That was more money than he had ever earned, thought Sarah. And now thathe was over twenty-one, he could keep his wages for himself. "I reckonyou'll be leaving soon," she said aloud.

  "Yes, Ma, I will." Telling her was harder than Abe had expected. "It ishigh time that I start out on my own."

  Sarah set to work to get his clothes ready. He was wearing his only pairof jeans, and there wasn't much else for him to take. She washed hisshirts and the extra pair of socks that she had knit for him. He wrappedthese up in a big cloth and tied the bundle to the end of a long stick.The next morning he was up early. After he told the rest of the familygood-by, Sarah walked with him to the gate.

  Abe thrust the stick with his bundle over his shoulder. He had lookedforward to starting out on his own--and now he was scared. Almost asscared as he had felt on that cold winter afternoon when his new motherhad first arrived in Pigeon Creek. Because she had believed in him, hehad started believing in himself. Her faith in him was still shining inher eyes as she looked up at him and tried to smile.

  He gave her a quick hug and hurried down the path.

  It was a long, long walk to New Salem, where Abe arrived on a hot summerday in 1831. This village, on a high bluff overlooking the SangamonRiver, was bigger than Gentryville, bigger even than Rockport. As hewandered up and down the one street, bordered on both sides by a row ofneat log houses, he counted more than twenty-five buildings. There wereseveral stores, and he could see the mill down by the river.

  He pushed his way through a crowd that had gathered before one of thehouses. A worried-looking man, about ten years older than Abe, satbehind a table on the little porch. He was writing in a big book.

  "Howdy, Mister," said Abe. "What is all the excitement about?"

  "This is election day," the man replied, "and I am the clerk in charge.That is, I'm one of the clerks."

  He stopped to write down the name of one of the men who stood in line.He wrote the names of several other voters in his big book before he hada chance to talk to Abe again. Then he explained that the other clerkwho was supposed to help him was sick.

  "I'm mighty busy," he went on. "Say listen, stranger, do you know how towrite?"

  "I can make a few rabbit tracks," Abe said, grinning.

  "Maybe I can hire you to help me keep a record of the votes." The manrose and shook hands. "My name is Mentor Graham."

  By evening the younger man and the older one had become good friends.Mr. Graham was a schoolmaster, and he promised to help Abe with hisstudies. Soon Abe began to make other friends. Jack Kelso took himfishing. Abe did not care much about fishing, but he liked to hear Jackrecite poetry by Robert Burns and William Shakespeare. They were Jack'sfavorite poets, and they became Abe's favorites, too.

  At the Rutledge Tavern, where Abe lived for a while, he met the owner'sdaughter, Ann Rutledge. Ann was sweet and pretty, with a glint ofsunshine in her hair. They took long walks beside the river. It was easyto talk to Ann, and Abe told her some of his secret hopes. She thoughtthat he was going to be a great man some day.

  Her father, James Rutledge, also took an interest in him. Abe wasinvited to join the New Salem Debating Society. The first time that hegot up to talk, the other members expected him to spend the time tellingfunny stories. Instead he made a serious speech--and a very good one.

  "That young man has more than wit and fun in his head," Mr. Rutledgetold his wife that night.

  Abe liked to make speeches, but he knew that he did not always speakcorrectly. One morning he was having breakfast at Mentor Graham's house."I have a notion to study English grammar," he said.

  "If you expect to go before the public," Mentor answered, "I think itthe best thing you can do."

  "If I had a grammar, I would commence now."

  Mentor thought for a moment. "There is no one in town who owns agrammar," he said finally. "But Mr. Vaner out in the country has one. Hemight lend you his copy."

  Abe got up from the table and walked six miles to the Vaner farm. Whenhe returned, he carried an open book in his hands. He was studyinggrammar as he walked.

  Meanwhile he worked as a clerk in Denton Offut's store. Customers couldbuy all sorts of things there--tools and nails, needles and thread,mittens and calico, and tallow for making candles. One day a womanbought several yards of calico. After she left, Abe discovered that hehad charged her six cents too much. That evening he walked six miles togive her the money. He was always doing things like that, and peoplebegan to call him "Honest Abe."

  Denton was so proud of his clerk that he could not help boasting. "Abeis the smartest man in the United States," he said. "Yes, and he canbeat any man in the country running, jumping, or wrastling."

  A bunch of young roughnecks lived a few miles away in another settlementcalled Clary Grove. "That Denton Offut talks too much with his mouth,"they said angrily. They did not mind Abe being called smart. But theydeclared that no one could "out-wrastle" their leader, Jack Armstrong.One day they rushed into the store and dared Abe to fight with Jack.

  Abe laid down the book that he had been reading. "I don't hold withwooling and pulling," he said. "But if you want to fight, come onoutside."

  The Clary Grove boys soon realized that Denton's clerk was a goodwrestler. Jack, afraid that he was going to lose the fight, stepped onAbe's foot with the sharp heel of his boot. The sudden pain made Abeangry. The next thing that Jack knew he was being shaken back and forthuntil his teeth rattled. Then he was lying flat on his back in the dust.

  Jack's friends let out a howl of rage. Several of them rushed at Abe,all trying to f
ight him at the same time. He stood with his back againstthe store, his fists doubled up. He dared them to come closer. Jackpicked himself up.

  "Stop it, fellows," he said. "I was beaten in a fair fight. If you askme, this Abe Lincoln is the cleverest fellow that ever broke into thesettlement."

  From then on Jack was one of Abe's best friends.

  A short time later Abe enlisted as a soldier in the Black Hawk War tohelp drive the Indians out of Illinois. The Clary Grove boys were in hiscompany, and Abe was elected captain. Before his company had a chance todo any fighting, Blackhawk was captured in another part of Illinois andthe war was over.

  When Abe came back to New Salem, he found himself out of a job. DentonOffut had left. The store had "winked out." Later, Abe and another youngman, William Berry, decided to become partners. They borrowed money andstarted a store of their own.

  One day a wagon piled high with furniture stopped out in front. A manjumped down and explained that he and his family were moving West. Thewagon was too crowded, and he had a barrel of odds and ends that hewanted to sell. Abe, always glad to oblige, agreed to pay fifty centsfor it. Later, when he opened it, he had a wonderful surprise.

  The barrel contained a set of famous law books. He had seen those samebooks in Mr. Pitcher's law office in Rockport. Now that he owned a setof his own, he could read it any time he wished. Customers coming intothe store usually found Abe lying on the counter, his nose buried in oneof the new books. The more he read, the more interested he became.

  Perhaps he spent too much time reading, instead of attending tobusiness. William Berry was lazy, and not a very satisfactory partner.The store of Lincoln and Berry did so little business that it had toclose. The partners were left with many debts to pay. Then Berry died,and "Honest Abe" announced that he would pay all of the debts himself,no matter how long it took.

  For a while he was postmaster. A man on horseback brought the mail twicea week, and there were so few letters that Abe often carried them aroundin his hat until he could deliver them. He liked the job because it gavehim a chance to read the newspapers to which the people in New Salemsubscribed. But the pay was small, and he had to do all sorts of oddJobs to earn enough to eat. On many days he would have gone hungry ifJack Armstrong and his wife, Hannah, had not invited him to dinner. Whenwork was scarce he stayed with them two or three weeks at a time.

  He knew that he had to find a way to earn more money, and he decided tostudy surveying. It was a hard subject, but he borrowed some books andread them carefully. He studied so hard that in six weeks' time he tookhis first job as a surveyor.

  Sometimes when he was measuring a farm or laying out a new road, hewould be gone for several weeks. People miles from New Salem knew whoAbe Lincoln was. They laughed at him because he was so tall and awkward.They thought it funny that his trousers were always too short. But theyalso laughed at his jokes, and they liked him. He made so many newfriends that he decided to be a candidate for the Illinois legislature.

  One day during the campaign he had a long talk with Major John T.Stuart. Major Stuart had been Abe's commander in the Black Hawk War. Hewas now a lawyer in Springfield, a larger town twenty miles away.

  "Why don't you study law?" he asked.

  Abe pursed his lips. "I'd sure like to," he drawled; then added with agrin: "But I don't know if I have enough sense."

  Major Stuart paid no attention to this last remark. "You have beenreading law for pleasure," he went on. "Now go at it in earnest. I'lllend you the books you need."

  This was a chance that Abe could not afford to miss. Every few days hewalked or rode on horseback to Springfield to borrow another volume.Sometimes he read forty pages on the way home. He was twenty-five yearsold, and there was no time to waste.

  Meanwhile he was making many speeches. He asked the voters in his partof Illinois to elect him to the legislature which made the laws for thestate. They felt that "Honest Abe" was a man to be trusted and he waselected.

  Late in November Abe boarded the stagecoach for the ride to Vandalia,then the capital of the state. He looked very dignified in a new suitand high plug hat. In the crowd that gathered to tell him good-by, hecould see many of his friends. There stood Coleman Smoot who had lenthim money to buy his new clothes. Farther back he could see Mr. Rutledgeand Ann, Hannah and Jack Armstrong, Mentor Graham, and others who hadencouraged and helped him. And now he was on his way to represent themin the legislature. There was a chorus of "Good-by, Abe."

  Then, like an echo, the words came again in Ann's high, sweet voice:"Good-by, Abe!" He leaned far out the window and waved.

  He was thinking of Ann as the coach rolled over the rough road. He wasthinking also of Sarah. If only she could see him now, he thought, as heglanced at the new hat resting on his knee.