THOMAS LINCOLN'S FAMILY STORIES.
The red sun was glimmering through the leafless boughs of the great oaks
when Jasper again came to the gate of Thomas Lincoln's log cabin. Mr.
Crawford had remained after school with the tall boy who had brought
"obliquity" upon the spelling-class. Tradition reports that there was a
great rattling of leather breeches, and expostulations, and lamentations
at such solemn, private interviews. Mr. Crawford, who was "great on
thrashing," no doubt did his duty as he understood it at that private
session at sundown. Sticks were plenty in those days, and the will to
use them strong among most pioneer schoolmasters.
Abraham Lincoln and his sister accompanied Jasper to the log-house. They
heard the lusty cry for consideration and mercy in the log school-house
as they were going, and stopped to listen. Jasper did not approve of
this rugged discipline.
"I should not treat the boy in that way," said he philosophically.
"You wouldn't?" said Abraham. "Why? Crawford is a great teacher; he
knows everything. He can cipher as far as the rule of three."
"Yes, lad, but the true purpose of education is to form character. Fear
does not make true worth, but counterfeit character. If education fails
to produce real character, it fails utterly. True education is a matter
of the soul as much as of the mind. It should make a boy want to do
right because it is the right thing to do right. Anything that fails to
produce character for its own sake, and not for a selfish reason, is a
mistake. But what am I doing--criticising? Now, that is wrong. I seemed
to be talking with Froebel. Yes, Crawford is a great teacher, all things
considered. He does well who does his best. You have a great school. It
is not like the old German schools, but you do well."
Jasper began a discourse about Pestalozzi and that great thinker's views
of universal education. But the words were lost on the air. The views of
Pestalozzi were not much discussed in southern Indiana at this time,
though the idea of common-school education prevailed everywhere.
Thomas Lincoln stood at the gate awaiting the return of Jasper.
"I'm proper glad that you've come back to see us all," said he. "Wife
has been lookin' for ye. What did you think of the school? Great, isn't
it? That Crawford is a big man in these parts. They say he can cipher to
the rule of three, whatever that may be. Indiana is going to be great on
education, in my opinion."
He was right. Indiana, with an investment of some ten million of dollars
for public education, and with an army of well-trained teachers, leads
the middle West in the excellence of her schools. Her model school
system, which to-day would delight a Pestalozzi or a Froebel, had its
rude beginning in schools like Crawford's.
"Come, come in," said Thomas Lincoln, and led the way into the
log-house.
"This is my wife," said he to Jasper.
The woman had a serene and benevolent face. Her features were open and
plain, but there was heart-life in them. It was a face that could have
been molded only by a truly good heart. It was strong, long-suffering,
sympathetic, and self-restrained. Her forehead was high and thoughtful,
her eyes large and expressive, and her voice loving and cheerful. Jasper
felt at once that he was in the presence of a woman of decision of
character.
"Then you are a Tunker," she said. "I am a Baptist, too, but not your
kind. But such things matter little if the heart is right."
"You have well said," answered Jasper. "The true life is in the soul. We
both belong to the same kingdom, and shall have the same life and drink
from the same fountain and eat the same bread. Have you been here long?"
"Yes," said Thomas Lincoln, "and we have seen some dark days. We lived
in the half-faced camp out yonder when I first came here. My first wife
died of milk-sickness here. She was Abraham's mother. Ever heard of the
milk-sickness, as the fever was called? It swept away a great many of
the early inhabitants. Those were dark, dark days. I shall never forget
them."
"So your real mother is dead," said Jasper to Abraham.
"I try to be a mother to him, poor boy," said Mrs. Lincoln. "Abraham is
good to me and to everybody; one of the best boys I ever knew, though I
ought not to praise him to his face. He does the best he can."
"Awful lazy. You didn't tell that," said Thomas Lincoln; "all head and
books. He is. I believe in tellin' the whole truth."
"Oh, well," said Mrs. Lincoln, "some persons work with their hands, and
some with their heads, and some with their hearts. Abraham's head is
always at work--he isn't like most other boys. And as far as his
heart--Well, I do love that boy, and I am his step-mother, too. He's
always been so good to me that I love to tell on't. His father, I'm
thinkin', is rather hard on him sometimes. Abe's heart knows mine and I
know his'n, and I couldn't think more on him if he was my own son. His
poor mother sleeps out there under the great trees; but I mean to be
such a mother to him that he will never know no difference."
"Yes," said Thomas Lincoln, "Abraham does middlin' well, considerin'.
But he does provoke me sometimes. He would provoke old Job himself. Why,
he will take a book with him into the corn-field, and he reads and
reads, and his head gets loose and goes off into the air, and he puts
the pumpkin-seeds in the wrong hills, like as not. He is great on the
English Reader. I'd just like for you to hear him recite poetry out of
that book. He's great on poetry; writes it himself. But that isn't
neither here nor there. Come, preacher, we'll have some supper."
The Tunker lifted his hand and said grace, after which the family sat
down to the table.
"We used to eat off a puncheon when we first came to these parts," said
Mr. Lincoln. "We had no beds, and we slept on a floor of pounded clay.
My new wife brought all of this grand furniture to me. That beereau
looks extravagant--now don't it?--for poor folks, too. I sometimes think
that she ought to sell it. I am told that in a city place it would be
worth as much as fifty dollars."
There were indeed a few good articles of furniture in the house.
The supper consisted of corn-bread of very rough meal, and of bacon,
eggs, and coffee.
"Do you smoke?" asked Mr. Lincoln, when the meal was over.
"No," said Jasper. "I have given up everything of that kind, luxuries,
and even my own name. Let us talk about our experiences. There is no
news in the world like the news from the soul. A man's inner life and
experience are about all that is worth talking about. It is the king
that makes the crown."
But Thomas Lincoln was not a man of deep inward experiences and
subjective ideas, though his first wife had been such a person, and
would have delighted Jasper. Mr. Lincoln liked best to talk about his
family and the country, and was more interested in the slow news that
came from the new settlements than in the revelations from a higher
world. His former wife, Abraham's mother, had been a mystic, but there
was little sentiment in him.
"You said that you were going to meet Black Hawk," said Mr. Lincoln.
"Where do you expect to find him? He's everywhere, ain't he?"
"I am going to the Sac village at Rock Island. It is a long journey, but
the Voice tells me to go."
"That is away across the Illinois, on the Mississippi River, isn't it?"
"Yes, the Sac village looks down on the Mississippi. It is a beautiful
place. The prairies spread around it like seas. I love to think of it.
It commands a noble view. I do not wonder that the Indians love it, and
made it the burial-place of their race. I would love it myself."
"You favor the Indians, do you?"
"Yes. All men are my brothers. The field is the world. I am going to try
to preach and teach among the Sacs and Foxes, as soon as I can find an
interpreter, and Black Hawk has promised me one. He has sent for him to
come down to Rock Island and meet me. He lives at Prairie du Chien, far
away in the north, I am told."
"Don't you have any antipathy against the Indians, preacher?"
"No, none at all. Do you?"
"My father was murdered by an Indian. Let me tell you about it. Not that
I want to discourage you--you mean well; but I don't feel altogether as
you do about the red-skins, preacher. You and Abe would agree better on
the subject than you and I. Abe is tender-hearted--takes after his
mother."
Thomas Lincoln filled his pipe. "Abe," as his oldest boy was called, sat
in the fireplace, "the flue," as it was termed. By his side sat John
Hanks, who had recently arrived from Kentucky--a rough, kindly-looking
man.
[Illustration: LINES WRITTEN BY LINCOLN ON THE LEAF OF HIS SCHOOL-BOOK
IN HIS FOURTEENTH YEAR.
Preserved by his Step-mother.
_Original in possession of J. W. Weik._]
"Wait a minute," said great-hearted Mrs. Lincoln--"wait a minute before
you begin."
"What are you going to do, mother (wife)?"
"I'm just going to set these potatoes to roast before the fire, so we
can have a little treat all by ourselves when you have got through your
story. There, that is all."
The poor woman sat down by the table--she had brought the table to her
husband on her marriage; he probably never owned a table--and began to
knit, saying:
"Abraham, you mind the potatoes. Don't let 'em burn."
"Yes, mother."
"Mother"--the word seemed to make her happy. Her face lighted. She sat
knitting for an hour, silent and serene, while Thomas Lincoln talked.
_THOMAS LINCOLN'S STORY._
"My father," began the old story-teller, "came to Kentucky from
Virginia. His name was Abraham Lincoln. I have always thought that was a
good, solid name--a worthy name--and so I gave it to my boy here, and
hope that he will never bring any disgrace upon it. I never can be much
in this world; Abe may.
"This was in Daniel Boone's day. On our way to Kentucky we began to hear
terrible stories of the Indian attacks on the new settlers. In 1780, the
year that we emigrated from Virginia, there were many murders of the
settlers by the Indians, which were followed by the battle of Lower Blue
Licks, in which Boone's son was wounded.
"I have heard my mother and the old settlers talk over that battle.
When Daniel Boone found that his son was wounded, he tried to carry him
away. There was a river near, and he lifted the boy upon his back and
hurried toward it. As he came to the river, the boy grew heavy.
"'Father, I believe that I am dying,' said the boy.
"'We will be across the river soon,' said Boone. 'Hold on.'
"The boy clung to his father's neck with stiffening arms. While they
were crossing the river the son died. Oh, it was a sight for pity--now,
wasn't it, preacher? Boone in the river, with the dead body of his boy
on his back. Our country has known few scenes like that. How that father
must 'a' felt! You furriners little know these things.
"The Indians swam after him. He laid down the body of his son on the
ground and struck into the forest.
"It was in this war that Boone's little daughter was carried away by the
Indians. I must tell ye. I love to talk of old times.
"She was at play with two other little girls outside of the stockade at
Boonesborough, on the Kentucky River. There was a canoe on the bank.
"'Let us take the canoe and go across the river,' said one of the girls,
innocent-like.
"Well, they got into the boat and paddled across the running river to
the opposite side. They reached shallow water, when a party of Indians,
who had been watching them, cunning-like, stole out of the thick trees
'n' rushed down to the canoe 'n' drew it to the shore. The girls
screamed, and their cries were heard at the fort.
"Night was falling. Three of the Indians took a little girl apiece,
and, looking back to the fort in the sunset, uttered a shriek of
defiance, such as would ha' made yer flesh creep, and disappeared in the
timber.
"That night a party was got together at the fort to pursue the Indians
and rescue the children.
"Well, near the close of the next day the party came upon these Indians,
some forty miles from the fort. They approached the camp cautiously,
coyote-like, 'n' saw that the girls were there.
"'Shoot carefully, now,' said the leader. 'Each man bring down an
Indian, or the children will be killed before we can reach them.'
"They fired upon the Indians, picking out the three who were nearest the
children. Not one of the Indians was hit, but the whole party was
terribly frightened, leaped up, 'n' run like deer. The children were
rescued unharmed 'n' taken back to the fort. You would think them was
pretty hard times, wouldn't ye?
"There was one event that happened at the time about which I have heard
the old folks tell, with staring eyes, and I will never forget it. The
Indians came one night to attack a log-house in which were a man, his
wife, and daughter, named Merrill. They did not wish to burn the cabin,
but to enter it and make captives of the family; so they cut a hole in
the door, with their hatchets, large enough to crawl through one at a
time. They wounded Mr. Merrill outright.
"But Mrs. Merrill was a host in herself. Her only weapon was an axe, and
there never was fought in Kentucky, or anywhere else in the world, I'm
thinkin', such another battle as that.
"The leader of the Indians put his head through the hole in the door and
began to crawl into the room, slowly--slowly--so--"
Mr. Lincoln put out his great arms, and moved his hands mysteriously.
"Well," he continued, "what do you suppose happened? Mrs. Merrill she
dealt that Indian a death-blow on the head with the axe, just like
_that_, and then drew him in slowly, slowly. The Indians without thought
that he had crawled in himself, and another Indian followed him slowly,
slowly. That Indian received his death-blow on the head, and was pulled
in like the first, slowly. Another and another Indian were treated in
the same way, until the dark cabin floor presented an awful scene for
the morning.
"Only one or two were left without. The women felt that they were now
the masters in the contest, and stood looking on what they had done.
There fell a silence over the place. Still, awful still everywhere. What
a silence it was! The two Indians outside listened. Why were their
comrades so still? What had happened? Why was everything so still? One
of them tried to look through the hole in the door into the dark and
bloody room. Then the two attempted to climb down the chimney from the
low roof of the cabin, but Mrs. Merrill put her bed into the fireplace
and set it on fire.
"Such were some of the scenes of my father's few years of life in
Kentucky; and now comes the most dreadful memory of all. Oh, it makes me
wild to think o' it! Preacher, as I said, my father was killed by the
Indians. You did not know that before, did you? No; well, it was so.
Abraham Lincoln was shot by the red-skins. I was with him at the time, a
little boy then, and I shall never forget that awful morning--never,
never!--Abraham, mind the potatoes; you've heard the story a hundred
times."
Young Abraham Lincoln turned the potatoes and brightened the fire.
Thomas Lincoln bent over and rested his body on his knees, and held his
pipe out in one hand.
"Preacher, listen. One morning father looked out of the cabin door, and
said to mother:
"'I must go to the field and build a fence to-day. I will let Tommy go
with me.'
"I was Tommy. I was six years old then. He loved me, and liked to have
me with him. It was in the year 1784--I never shall forget the dark days
of that year!--never, never.
"I had two brothers older than myself, Mordecai and Josiah. We give boys
Scriptur' names in those days. They had gone to work in another field
near by.
"We went to the field where the rails were to be cut and laid, and
father began to work. He was a great, noble-looking man, and a true
pioneer. I can see him now. I was playing near him, when suddenly there
came a shot as it were out of the air. My poor father reeled over and
fell down dead. What must have been his last thoughts of my mother and
her five children? I have often thought of that--what must have been his
last thoughts? Well, Preacher, you listen.
"A band of Indians came leaping out of the bush howling like demons. I
fell upon the ground. I can sense the fright now. A tall, black Indian,
with a face like a wolf, came and stood over me, and was about to seize
hold of me. I could hear him breathe. There came a shot from the house,
and the Indian dropped down beside me, dead. My brother Mordecai had
seen father fall, 'n' ran to the house 'n' fired that shot that saved my
life. Josiah had gone to the stockade for help, and he returned soon
with armed men, and the Indians disappeared.
"O Preacher, those were dark days, wasn't they? Dark, dark days! You
never saw such. They took up my father's body--what a sight!--and bore
it into the cabin. You should have seen my poor mother then. What was to
help us? Only the blue heavens were left us then. What could we do? My
mother and five children alone in the wilderness full of savages!
"Preacher, I have seen dark days! I have known what it was to be poor
and supperless and friendless; but I never sought revenge on the
Indians, though Mordecai did. I'm glad that you're going to preach among
them. I couldn't do it, with such memories as mine, perhaps; but I'm
glad you can, 'n' I hope that you will go and do them good. Heaven bless
those who seek to do good in this sinful world--"
"Abraham, are the potatoes done?" said a gentle voice.
"Yes, mother."
"Then pass them 'round. Give the preacher one first; then your father. I
do not care for any."
The tall boy passed the roasted potatoes around as directed. Jasper ate
his potato in silence. The stories of the hardships of this forest
family had filled his heart with sympathy, and Thomas Lincoln had
_acted_ the stories that he told in such a way as to leave a most vivid
impression on his mind.
"These stories make you sad," said Mrs. Lincoln to Jasper. "They are
heart-rendin', and I sometimes think it is almost wrong to tell them. Do
you think it is right to tell a story that awakens hard and rebellious
feelin's? 'Evil communications corrupt good manners,' the Good Book
says. I sometimes wish that folks would tell only stories that are good,
and make one the better for hearin'--parables like."
"My heart feels for you all," said Jasper. "I feel for everybody. This
life is all new to me."
"Let us have something more cheerful now," said Mrs. Lincoln.--"Abraham,
recite to the preacher a piece from the English Reader."
"Which one, mother?"
"The Hermit--how would that do? I don't know much about poetry, but
Abraham does. He makes it up. It is a queer turn of mind he has. He
learns all the poetry that he can find, and makes it up himself out of
his own head. He's got poetry in him, though he don't look so. How he
ever does it, puzzles me. His mother was poetic like. It is a gift, like
grace. Where do you suppose it comes from, and what will he ever do with
it? He ain't like other boys. He's kind o' peculiar some.--Come,
Abraham, recite to us The Hermit. It is a proper good piece."
The tall boy came out of "the flue" and stood before the dying fire. The
old leather-covered English Reader, which he said in later life was the
best book ever written, lay on the table before him. He did not open it,
however. He put his hands behind him and raised his dark face as in a
kind of abstraction. He began to recite slowly in a clear voice, full
of a peculiar sympathy that gave color to every word. He seemed as
though he felt that the experience of the poet was somehow a prophecy of
his own life; and it was. He himself became a skeptical man in religious
thought, but returned to the simple faith of his ancestors amid the dark
scenes of war.
The poem was a beautiful one in form and soul, an old English pastoral,
by Beattie. How grand it seemed, even to unpoetic Thomas Lincoln, as it
flowed from the lips of his studious son!
_THE HERMIT._
At the close of the day, when the hamlet is still,
And mortals the sweets of forgetfulness prove;
When naught but the torrent is heard on the hill,
And naught but the nightingale's song in the grove:
'Twas thus, by the cave of the mountain afar,
While his harp rung symphonious, a hermit began;
No more with himself or with Nature at war,
He thought as a sage, though he felt as a man:
"Ah, why, all abandoned to darkness and woe,
Why, lone Philomela, that languishing fall?
For spring shall return, and a lover bestow,
And sorrow no longer thy bosom inthrall.
But, if pity inspire thee, renew the sad lay,
Mourn, sweetest complainer, man calls thee to mourn;
O soothe him whose pleasures like thine pass away:
Full quickly they pass--but they never return.
"Now gliding remote, on the verge of the sky,
The moon, half extinguished, her crescent displays:
But lately I marked when majestic on high
She shone, and the planets were lost in her blaze.
Roll on, thou fair orb, and with gladness pursue
The path that conducts thee to splendor again:
But man's faded glory what change shall renew?
Ah, fool! to exult in a glory so vain!
"'Tis night, and the landscape is lovely no more:
I mourn; but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for you;
For morn is approaching, your charms to restore,
Perfumed with fresh fragrance, and glitt'ring with dew.
Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn;
Kind Nature the embryo blossom will save:
But when shall spring visit the moldering urn?
Oh, when shall day dawn on the night of the grave?
"'Twas thus by the glare of false science betrayed,
That leads to bewilder, and dazzles to blind;
My thoughts wont to roam, from shade onward to shade,
Destruction before me, and sorrow behind.
'Oh pity, great Father of light,' then I cried,
'Thy creature who fain would not wander from thee!
Lo, humbled in dust, I relinquish my pride:
From doubt and from darkness thou only canst free.'
"And darkness and doubt are now flying away;
No longer I roam in conjecture forlorn:
So breaks on the traveler, faint and astray,
The bright and the balmy effulgence of morn.
See truth, love, and mercy, in triumph descending,
And Nature all glowing in Eden's first bloom!
On the cold cheek of death smiles and roses are blending,
And beauty immortal awakes from the tomb."
Mrs. Lincoln used to listen to such recitations as this from the English
Readers and Kentucky Orators with delight and wonder. She loved the boy
with all her heart. In all the biographies of Lincoln there is hardly a
more pathetic incident than one told by Mr. Herndon of his visit to Mrs.
Lincoln after the assassination and the national funeral. Mr. Herndon
was the law partner of Lincoln for many years, and we give the incident
here, out of place as it is. Mrs. Lincoln said to her step-son's friend:
"Abe was a poor boy, and I can say what scarcely one woman--a
mother--can say, in a thousand: Abe never gave me a cross word or look,
and never refused, in fact or appearance, to do anything I requested
him. I never gave him a cross word in all my life.... His mind and my
mind--what little I had--seemed to run together.... He was here after he
was elected President." Here she stopped, unable to proceed any further,
and after her grateful emotions had spent themselves in tears, she
proceeded: "He was dutiful to me always. I think he loved me truly. I
had a son, John, who was raised with Abe. Both were good boys; but I
must say, both being now dead, that Abe was the best boy I ever saw or
ever expect to see. I wish I had died when my husband died. I did not
want Abe to run for President, did not want him elected; was afraid,
somehow--felt it in my heart; and when he came down to see me, after he
was elected President, I felt that something would befall him, and that
I should see him no more."
Equally beautiful was the scene when Lincoln visited this good woman for
the last time, just before going to Washington to be inaugurated
President.
"Abraham," she said, as she stood in her humble backwoods cabin,
"something tells me that I shall never see you again."
He put his hand around her neck, lifted her face to heaven and said,
"Mother!"