a boy, it is a task that seems almost above their utmost powers.
Nevertheless, Mrs. Garfield and her son did not fail under it. With her
own hands, the mother split up the young trees into rude triangular
rails to make the rough snake fences of the country--mere zigzags of
wood laid one bit above the other; while the lad worked away bravely at
sowing fall and spring wheat, hoeing Indian corn, and building a little
barn for the harvest before the arrival of the long cold Ohio winter. To
such a family did the future President originally belong; and with them
he must have shared those strong qualities of perseverance and industry
which more than anything else at length secured his ultimate success in
life.

For James Garfield's history differs greatly in one point from that of
most other famous working men, whose stories have been told in this
volume. There is no reason to believe that he was a man of exceptional
or commanding intellect. On the contrary, his mental powers appear to
have been of a very respectable but quite ordinary and commonplace
order. It was not by brilliant genius that James Garfield made his way
up in life; it was rather by hard work, unceasing energy, high
principle, and generous enthusiasm for the cause of others. Some of the
greatest geniuses among working men, such as Burns, Tannahill, and
Chatterton, though they achieved fame, and though they have enriched the
world with many touching and beautiful works, must be considered to have
missed success in life, so far as their own happiness was concerned, by
their unsteadiness, want of self-control, or lack of fixed principle.
Garfield, on the other hand, was not a genius; but by his sterling good
qualities he nevertheless achieved what cannot but be regarded as a true
success, and left an honourable name behind him in the history of his
country.