to pay when he could, and it took the labor of years to do it; but he
paid at last every farthing of the debt, which seemed to him and his
friends so large that it was called among them "the national debt."

[Illustration: JUDGE STEPHEN T. LOGAN.]

He had already begun to read elementary books of law, borrowed from
Major Stuart and other kindly acquaintances. Indeed, it is quite
possible that Berry and Lincoln might have succeeded better in
business if the junior member of the firm had not spent so much of his
time reading Blackstone and Chitty in the shade of a great oak just
outside the door, while the senior quietly fuddled himself within.
Eye-witnesses still speak of the grotesque youth, habited in homespun
tow, lying on his back with his feet on the trunk of the tree, and
poring over his book by the hour, "grinding around with the shade," as
it shifted from north to east. After his store, to use his own
expression, had "winked out," he applied himself with more continuous
energy to his reading, doing merely what odd jobs came to his hand to
pay his current expenses, which were of course very slight. He
sometimes helped his friend Ellis in his store; sometimes went into
the field and renewed his exploits as a farm-hand, which had gained
him a traditional fame in Indiana; sometimes employed his clerkly hand
in straightening up a neglected ledger. It is probable that he worked
for his board oftener than for any other compensation, and his hearty
friendliness and vivacity, as well as his industry in the field, made
him a welcome guest in any farmhouse in the county. His strong arm was
always at the disposal of the poor and needy; it is said of him, with
a graphic variation of a well-known text, "that he visited the
fatherless and the widow and chopped their wood."