"At this period in the life and career of Joseph Smith, Jr., or
'Joe Smith,' as he was universally named, and the Smith family,
they were popularly regarded as an illiterate, whiskey-drinking,
shiftless, irreligious race of people--the first named, the chief
subject of this biography, being unanimously voted the laziest
and most worthless of the generation. From the age of twelve to
twenty years he is distinctly remembered as a dull-eyed,
flaxenhaired, prevaricating boy noted only for his indolent and
vagabondish character, and his habits of exaggeration and
untruthfulness. Taciturnity was among his characteristic
idiosyncrasies, and he seldom spoke to any one outside of his
intimate associates, except when first addressed by another; and
then, by reason of his extravagancies of statement, his word was
received with the least confidence by those who knew him best. He
could utter the most palpable exaggeration or marvellous
absurdity with the utmost apparent gravity. He nevertheless
evidenced the rapid development of a thinking, plodding,
evilbrewing mental composition--largely given to inventions of
low cunning, schemes of mischief and deception, and false and
mysterious pretensions. In his moral phrenology the professor
might have marked the organ of secretiveness as very large, and
that of conscientiousness omitted. He was, however, proverbially
good natured, very rarely, if ever, indulging in any combative
spirit toward any one, whatever might be the provocation, and yet
was never known to laugh. Albeit, he seemed to be the pride of
his indulgent father, who has been heard to boast of him as the
'genus of the family,' quoting his own expression."*

* "Remarkable Visions."