new farm.

After Abraham went out to seek his own fortune, his father moved several times, never long satisfied to remain in one place. He finally settled in "Goose Nest Prairie," a small farming community in Coles County, Illinois, where he remained until his death, in 1851, at the age of seventy-three. Whatever he had thought of the abilities of his son, who had bothered him with his youthful habit of speech-making and his proclivity to “talking politics," Thomas Lincoln lived to see him one of the best-known men and leading lawyers of the State. As soon as he could spare any thing from his own earnings, after his load of debt was lifted, Lincoln helped his parents continually. He bought lands for them, sent them good gifts, and in many ways showed his filial affection to the end of their stay on earth.

It may be said here that there were other members of the Lincoln family not holding so strong a claim on Abraham's generosity, that were helped by the warm-hearted man. John Johnston, Abraham's step-brother, appears to have been an unthrifty and easy-going person who needed a lift, and got it, now and again, from the frugal and not over-rich Springfield lawyer. In a letter to John, written about the time when he returned from Congress, Lincoln said:

"At the various times when I have helped you a little, you have said to me, 'We can get along very well now,' but in a short time I find you in the same difficulty again." And in the most friendly and affectionate way he went on to show how the difficulty was in his unwillingness to

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A SHIFTLESS RELATIVE.

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work for small pay, work for small things, work for what could be got then, rather than wait for something better to turn up. Later, in November, 1851, Lincoln wrote to John, giving him much wholesome advice, as follows:

Is

"DEAR BROTHER: When I came into Charleston, day befor yesterday, I learned that you are anxious to sell the land where you live and move to Missouri. I have been thinking of this ever since, and cannot but think such a notion is utterly foolish. What can you do in Missouri better than here? the land any richer? Can you there, any more than here, raise corn and wheat and oats without work? Will anybody there, any more than here, do your work for you? If you intend to go to work, there is no better place than right where you are; if you do not intend to go to work, you cannot get along anywhere. Squirming and crawling about from place to place can do no good. You have raised no crop this year, and what you really want is to sell the land, get the money, and spend it. Part with the land you have, and, my life upon it, you will never after own a spot big enough to bury you in. Half you will get for the land you will spend in moving to Missouri, and the other half you will eat and drink and wear out, and no foot of land will be bought. Now, I feel it is my duty to have no hand in such a piece of foolery. I feel that it is so even on your own account, and particularly on mother's account. The eastern forty acres I intend to keep for mother while she lives. If you will not cultivate it, it will rent for enough to support her; at least it will rent for something. Her dower in the other two forties she can let you have, and no thanks to me. Now, do not misunderstand this letter. I do not write it in any unkindness. I write it in order, if possible, to get you to face the truth, which truth is, you are destitute because you have idled away all your time. Your thousand pretences deceive nobody but yourself. Go to work, is the only cure for your case."

We shall understand Lincoln better from this letter to his step-brother. It shows him to be independent, selfreliant, and disposed to make his own way in the world without calling on others to carry him along, as so many young men are in the habit of doing. There are other letters extant that show that Lincoln had repeatedly assisted this same step-brother; and this letter gives touching evidence of his care and anxiety for his step-mother. None of these were kin to Lincoln, but they were, all the same, a charge upon his generosity and affection, just as though they were of the same blood. Brought up in a hard school, Lincoln was early taught many practical lessons in frugality and economy; but his natural kindliness and open-handedness were never spoiled by penury and need. He never, so say his contemporaries, was able to make any money outside of his profession. The only possession he ever had that was not gained by sheer hard work was a tract of wild land in Iowa, given to him by the United States Government (as it was to each volunteer), for his services in the Black Hawk war. When he went to Washington to take the presidency, the sum total of all his wealth in goods, chattels, lands, and cash was valued at a sum not so great as a single fee sometimes paid in these later days to a lawyer of the standing and ability he had at that time. Lincoln was thrifty only in the sense of working hard for what he got and never spending for that which was not absolutely needful for the comfort and happiness of those dependent upon him. Parsimonious he never was.

An Honest Advocate and Counsellor-The Snow Boys and Old Man Case —Famous Law-Suits about Negroes—Jack Armstrong's Son on Trial for Murder-Lincoln's Vindication of His Old Friend-How the Attorney Looked and Spoke.

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ENTION has already been made of Lincoln's im

movable honesty. This was not only conspicuous in his dealings with men, but in his course as a politician and a lawyer. No man more than he ever made so many concessions to his opponents in a discussion, and yet succeeded in convincing those who were to be carried by his argument, whether it was a jury in a law-case, or an audience of the people in a political canvass. Sometimes, those who were with him but did not, perhaps, understand his methods, were dismayed as they heard him give away point after point in the case that he presented. Their surprise, therefore, was very great when he began to sum up and, by the force of his reasoning, won his suit. This was because he knew his case thoroughly; he did not wait until its weak points were disclosed by the speaker on the other side. He relied on what lawyers call the equity of the case that he presented

to the minds of men; and he was sure to go to the very bottom of things before he got through. It was the natural habit of his mind to look at the objections that might be found against any given course rather than to the advantages and attractions of the same. People who knew him only on the surface, as it were, said that he looked on the dark side of things. This was not exactly true. He considered difficulties, in order that he might be prepared for failure and disappointment. He never forgot the advice of Captain Davy Crockett: "Be sure you are right, then go ahead.”

He seemed to seize

Honest himself, he was intolerant of dishonesty in others; and not a few cases are mentioned of his fairly blazing with wrath when he presented to a jury the facts which showed the craft and wickedness of those who would escape their just deserts. upon all the salient points of his opponent's case, before even they had attracted the attention of the counsel for the other side. And, what was remarkable, he seldom appealed to the native sense of justice which is hidden in a jury, without success. A good instance of this was shown in the suit of an old man named Case, brought against "the Snow boys," to recover the amount of a note given by them for three yoke of oxen and a “breaking plough." This team was used for breaking up the soil of the virgin prairie and was absolutely needful as part of the outfit of a prairie farmer, in those days. The Snow boys were not of age.

They had bought the team

and had given their note for the amount of the purchase