Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance

by Albert Bigelow Paine

  3

  But sad days were coming to Pigeon Creek. There was a terrible sickness.Aunt Betsy and Uncle Thomas died, and Dennis came to live with theLincolns. Then Nancy was taken ill. After she died, her family felt thatnothing would ever be the same again.

  Sally tried to keep house, but she was only twelve. The one little roomand the loft above looked dirtier and more and more gloomy as the weekswent by. Sally found that cooking for four people was not easy. Thesmoke from the fireplace got into her eyes. Some days Tom brought home arabbit or a squirrel for her to fry. On other days, it was too cold togo hunting. Then there was only cornbread to eat and Sally's cornbreadwasn't very good.

  It was hard to know who missed Nancy more--Tom or the children. He sataround the cabin looking cross and glum. The ground was frozen, so verylittle work could be done on the farm. He decided, when Andrew Crawfordstarted his school, that Abe and Sally might as well go. There wasnothing else for them to do, and Nancy would have wanted it.

  For the first time since his mother's death Abe seemed to cheer up.Every morning, except when there were chores to do at home, he and Sallytook a path through the woods to the log schoolhouse. Master Crawfordkept a "blab" school. The "scholars," as he called his pupils, studiedtheir lessons out loud. The louder they shouted, the better he liked it.If a scholar didn't know his lesson, he had to stand in the corner witha long pointed cap on his head. This was called a dunce cap.

  One boy who never had to wear a dunce cap was Abe Lincoln. He was toosmart. His side won nearly every spelling match. He was good atfiguring, and he had the best handwriting of anyone at school. MasterCrawford taught reading from the Bible, but he had several other booksfrom which he read aloud. Among Abe's favorite stories were the onesabout some wise animals that talked. They were by a man named Aesop whohad lived hundreds of years before.

  Abe even made up compositions of his own. He called them "sentences."One day he found some of the boys being cruel to a terrapin, or turtle.He made them stop. Then he wrote a composition in which he said thatanimals had feelings the same as folks.

  Sometimes Abe's sentences rhymed. There was one rhyme that the childrenthought was a great joke:

  "Abe Lincoln, his hand and pen, He will be good, but God knows when."

  "That Abe Lincoln is funny enough to make a cat laugh," they said.

  They always had a good time watching Abe during the class in "Manners."Once a week Master Crawford had them practice being ladies andgentlemen. One scholar would pretend to be a stranger who had justarrived in Pigeon Creek. He would leave the schoolhouse, come back,and knock at the door. Another scholar would greet "the stranger," leadhim around the room, and introduce him.

  One day it was Abe's turn to do the introducing. He opened the door tofind his best friend, Nat Grigsby, waiting outside. Nat bowed low, fromthe waist. Abe bowed. His buckskin trousers, already too short, slippedup still farther, showing several inches of his bare leg. He looked sosolemn that some of the girls giggled. The schoolmaster frowned andpounded on his desk. The giggling stopped.

  "Master Crawford," said Abe, "this here is Mr. Grigsby. His pa justmoved to these parts. He figures on coming to your school."

  Andrew Crawford rose and bowed. "Welcome," he said. "Mr. Lincoln,introduce Mr. Grigsby to the other scholars."

  The children sat on two long benches made of split logs. Abe led Natdown the length of the front bench. Each girl rose and made a curtsy.Nat bowed. Each boy rose and bowed. Nat returned the bow. Abe keptsaying funny things under his breath that the schoolmaster could nothear. But the children heard, and they could hardly keep from laughingout loud.

  Sally sat on the second bench. "Mrs. Lincoln," said Abe in a highfalsetto voice, "this here be Mr. Grigsby."

  While she was making her curtsy, Sally's cheeks suddenly grew red."Don't let on I told you, Mr. Grigsby," Abe whispered, "but Mrs. Lincolnbakes the worst cornbread of anyone in Pigeon Creek."

  Sally forgot that they were having a lesson in manners. "Don't you daretalk about my cornbread," she said angrily.

  The little log room rocked with laughter. This time Master Crawford hadalso heard Abe's remark. He walked over to the corner where he kept abundle of switches. He picked one up and laid it across his desk.

  "We'll have no more monkeyshines," he said severely. "Go on with theintroducing."

  One day Abe almost got into real trouble. He had started for schoolearly, as he often did, so that he could read one of Master Crawford'sbooks. He was feeling sad as he walked through the woods; he seemed tomiss his mother more each day. When he went into the schoolhouse, helooked up and saw a pair of deer antlers. Master Crawford had gonehunting. He had shot a deer and nailed the antlers above the door.

  What a wonderful place to swing! thought Abe. He leaped up and caughthold of the prongs. He began swinging back and forth.

  CRASH! One prong came off in his hand, and he fell to the floor. Hehurried to his seat, hoping that the master would not notice.

  But Master Crawford was proud of those antlers. When he saw what hadhappened, he picked up the switch on his desk. It made a swishing soundas he swung it back and forth.

  "Who broke my deer antlers?" he shouted.

  No one answered. Abe hunched down as far as he could on the bench. Heseemed to be trying to hide inside his buckskin shirt.

  Master Crawford repeated his question. "Who broke my deer antlers? Iaim to find out, if I have to thrash every scholar in this school."

  All of the children looked scared, Abe most of all. But he stood up. Hemarched up to Master Crawford's desk and held out the broken prong thathe had been hiding in his hand.

  "I did it, sir," he said. "I didn't mean to do it, but I hung on theantlers and they broke. I wouldn't have done it, if I had thought they'da broke."

  The other scholars thought that Abe would get a licking. Instead, MasterCrawford told him to stay in after school. They had a long talk. Heliked Abe's honesty in owning up to what he had done. He knew how muchhe missed his mother. Perhaps he understood that sometimes a boy "cutsup" to try to forget how sad he feels.

  Abe felt sadder than ever after Master Crawford moved away from PigeonCreek. Then Tom Lincoln left. One morning he rode off on horsebackwithout telling anyone where he was going. Several days went by. Eveneasy-going Dennis was worried when Tom did not return.

  Abe did most of the chores. In the evening he practiced his sums. MasterCrawford had taught him to do easy problems in arithmetic, and he didnot want to forget what he had learned. He had no pen, no ink, not evena piece of paper. He took a burnt stick from the fireplace and workedhis sums on a flat board.

  He wished that he had a book to read. Instead, he tried to remember thestories that the schoolmaster had told. He repeated them to Sally andDennis, as they huddled close to the fire to keep warm. He said themagain to himself after he went to bed in the loft.

  There were words in some of the stories that Abe did not understand. Hetried to figure out what the words meant. He thought about the people inthe stories. He thought about the places mentioned and wondered whatthey were like.

  There were thoughts inside Abraham Lincoln's head that even Sally didnot know anything about.