OF THE SADDLE AND SIRLOIN CLUB 191 



SAVIOUR OF THE UNION 



75. Abraham Lincoln was the most typical American. His 

 individualism was personally characteristic; "he was copied from 

 no model and founded on no example." "He blended and accen- 

 tuated the American traits and stands out before the world pre- 

 eminently the American of Americans. He was equally skilled 

 in leading the leaders and getting into the hearts of the plain 

 people. No other American ever so thoroughly understood or 

 came so close to the great throbbing masses. He sprang from 

 their ranks and he continued to be their soul. Concentrate the 

 genius of the common people in one grand incarnation, refining 

 and sublimating their essence to be then idealized in their adora- 

 tion, and you call it Abraham Lincoln." 



He was born in Hardin Co., Ky., February 12, 1809, of Vir- 

 ginian ancestry. He grew to manhood in a wild region "with 

 many bears and other wild animals still in the woods." No 

 qualification was required of his school teachers except "readin', 

 writin' and the rule of three." There was absolutely nothing to 

 excite ambition for education. But in spite of this he made the 

 best of what the half educated teachers could impart, and by the 

 time he was nineteen he had acquired sufficient business pro- 

 ficiency to take a carload of farm products to New Orleans for 

 sale. In 1830 his father emigrated to Macon Co., 111., and young 

 Lincoln, then an angular giant of six feet four, went with him 

 to build the cabin, clear the fields and split the fence rails from 

 the walnut forests. 



Once the farm was cleared he left his father, and engaging 

 himself to a merchant, employed his leisure hours in reading and 

 study. Both surveying and the principles of law interested him, 

 but the outbreak of the Black Hawk war retarded his legal am- 

 bitions, as he volunteered to become a soldier. In 1833 he was 

 appointed postmaster of New Salem, 111., at the same time acting 

 as deputy surveyor. In 1834 he headed his ticket for the legisla- 



