flatboats to give him confidence in this task of shipbuilding.
Neither Johnston nor Hanks was gifted with skill or industry, and
it is clear that Lincoln was, from the start, leader of the
party, master of construction, and captain of the craft.

The floods went down rapidly while the boat was building, and
when they tried to sail their new craft it stuck midway across
the dam of Rutledge's mill at New Salem, a village of fifteen or
twenty houses not many miles from their starting-point. With its
bow high in air, and its stern under water, it looked like some
ungainly fish trying to fly, or some bird making an unsuccessful
attempt to swim. The voyagers appeared to have suffered
irreparable shipwreck at the very outset of their venture, and
men and women came down from their houses to offer advice or to
make fun of the young boatmen as they waded about in the water,
with trousers rolled very high, seeking a way out of their
difficulty. Lincoln's self-control and good humor proved equal to
their banter, while his engineering skill speedily won their
admiration. The amusement of the onlookers changed to gaping
wonder when they saw him deliberately bore a hole in the bottom
of the boat near the bow, after which, fixing up some kind of
derrick, he tipped the boat so that the water she had taken in at
the stern ran out in front, and she floated safely over the dam.
This novel method of bailing a boat by boring a hole in her
bottom fully established his fame at New Salem, and so delighted
the enthusiastic Offut that, on the spot, he engaged its inventor
to come back after the voyage to New Orleans and act as clerk for
him in a store.

The hole plugged up again, and the boat's cargo reloaded, they