he was born and reared, it should be remembered that thence he received and acquired the qualities which did very much to enable him to win the first position in the most influential calling, and to earn even in his lifetime the candid respect of all men whose respect is worth having.

Horace Greeley was born in humble circumstances. His father, sometime after his marriage, had bought a farm of forty acres (afterwards increased to fifty), most of which was situated in the town of Amherst, but some of it in the adjoining town of Bedford. It was on the old road from Amoskeag Falls (now the thriving city of Manchester) to the village of Amherst, and about five miles from the latter. To this farm the family had removed about three years before the birth of Horace. The house in which he was born was a modest, framed, unpainted structure of one story, and at the time quite new. "It was only modified in our time," he long afterwards says, "by filling up and making narrower the oldfashioned kitchen fireplace, which, having already devoured all the wood on the farm, yawned ravenously for more." The dwelling, which still remains, faces the road from the north on a narrow plateau, about two-thirds down a hill, which was mostly covered by an orchard of natural fruit. In front was a patch of garden and a small frog-pond. Mr. Greeley always thought that sweeter and more spicy apples grew in the neglected orchard of his birthplace than can be bought in market; and insisted that it was not a mere notion that most fruits attain their highest and best flavour at or near the coldest latitude in which they can be grown at all.

Horace was for some years a feeble, sickly child, even unable to watch through a closed window the falling of rain without incurring instant and violent illness. He became the companion and confident of his mother about as soon as he could talk, and the willing, interested listener to her store of ballad, story, anecdote, and tradition. He says: "I learned to read at her knee, of course longer ago than I can remember; but I can faintly recollect her sitting spinning at her 'little wheel,' with the book in her lap, whence I was taking my daily lesson; and thus I soon acquired the facility of

reading from a book sidewise or upside down as readily as in the usual fashion,--a knack which I did not at first suppose peculiar; but which, being at length observed, became a subject of neighbourhood wonder and fabulous exaggeration." Having so early learned to read in so singular a manner, Horace was sent to public school two months before he was three years of age. In order that so little a boy might attend school, he made his home for stated times with his grandfather Woodburn, the school-house of his district being but fifty rods from his house. Hence the precocious boy lived at his grandfather's, and went thence to school, most of each winter and some months in summer from the time he was three till he was six years of age.

His first schoolmaster was David Woodburn Dickey, distantly related to himself: a classical scholar, and an able, worthy man, but a severe governor of youth, and having practical faith in the efficacy of birch and ferule. It appears clear that thus early in his life Horace Greeley manifested a strong antipathy to harsh punishments. His next teacher was Cyrus Winn, who rarely or never struck a blow, but governed by moral force and by appeals to the nobler impulses of his pupils. He was highly successful, and left at the close of his second term to the great regret of pupils and parents. His departure caused the first keen sorrow of Horace Greeley's life. He never saw his beloved teacher again, who was drowned during the following winter.

The admirable start given Horace by his mother enabled him to make rapid progress in school. He was diligent, and quick to learn. He was especially clever in spelling, and very soon rose to the head of the first class, and retained that position almost constantly during the whole of his school-days. "It was a custom of the school," says Mr. Greeley, "to choose sides for a spelling-match' one afternoon of each week,-the head of the first class in spelling and the pupil standing next being the choosers. In my case, however, it was found necessary to change the rule, and confide the choice to those who stood second and third respectively; as I-a mere infant of four years could spell, but not choose, often preferring my

IS FIRST SCHOOLHOUSE.

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playmates who could not spell at all. These spelling-matches usually took place in the evening, when I could not keep my eyes open and should have been in bed. It was often necessary to rap me sharply when the word' came around to me; but I never failed to respond; and it came to be said that I spelled as well asleep as awake. I apprehend that this was more likely to be true of some others of the class, who, if ever so sound asleep, could scarcely have spelled worse than they did."2

The present generation of school-boys, especially in our cities and towns, have little idea of school-day hardships fifty years ago. In nearly every Northern State, and now in many of the Southern States, one may find in every considerable town and city a public schoolhouse, often many, little less than palatial in size, built oftentimes at great expense, and with every consideration for the health and comfort of the pupils, and with all the "modern improvements" as to ventillation, water, heating apparatus, etc., which are found in the most celebrated hotels, with the exception, perhaps, of elevators. Upon these vast structures many millions of money have been expended, very much of which, undoubtedly, might have been more wisely laid out in more modest buildings of greater number and more attractive architecture. Horace Greeley was often carried through the snow to school by an affectionate aunt or the larger boys. When reached, the building was small, square, cheerless in situation, and comfortless within. The seats were rude benches, without backs, with the rudest possible apologies for desks along the sides of the room for those who might be engaged in writing or "cyphering." Such

I think there must be those who have a genius for spelling, just as there are those who have a genius for poetry, eloquence, mechanics, etc. I knew a lad at school-about as little and as young as Horace Greeley when he was the champion of the spelling-matches-who, though he could not at first spell at all, and used to weep most mournfully over always being at the foot of the class-suddenly went to the head, one day, and never afterwards missed a word. He "put down" the whole town at spelling-matches before he was five years old. He voted for Mr. Greeley for President, in 1872, and has been heard to say that he would not exchange that fact for all the offices in the United States.