gatherings and much done for their entertainment. On one of these
occasions a young lady sang a ballad. Whirling Thunder listened
intently, and when she ended he plucked an eagle's feather from his
head-dress, and giving it to a white friend, said: "Take that to your
mocking-bird squaw." Black Hawk's sons remained with him until his
death in 1838, and then removed with the Sacs and Foxes to Kansas.]


Lincoln's comments in his circular on two other subjects on which
all candidates of the day expressed themselves are amusing in their
simplicity. The practice of loaning money at exorbitant rates was then
a great evil in the West. Lincoln proposed a law fixing the limits of
usury, and he closed his paragraph on the subject with these words,
which sound strange enough from a man who in later life showed so
profound a reverence for law:

"In cases of extreme necessity, there could always be means
found to cheat the law; while in all other cases it would have
its intended effect. I would favor the passage of a law on
this subject which might not be very easily evaded. Let it be
such that the labor and difficulty of evading it could only be
justified in cases of greatest necessity."

A change in the laws of the State was also a topic which he felt
required a word. "Considering the great probability," he said, "that
the framers of those laws were wiser than myself, I should prefer not
meddling with them, unless they were attacked by others; in which case
I should feel it both a privilege and a duty to take that stand which,
in my view, might tend most to the advancement of justice."