a bread-winner, and made so little provision for the future that when
Mr. Van Bergen, who had purchased the Radford note, sued and got
judgment on it, his horse and his surveying instruments were taken to
pay the debt, and only by the generous intervention of a friend was he
able to redeem these invaluable means of living. He was, nevertheless,
an excellent surveyor. His portion of the public work executed under
the directions of Mr. Calhoun and his successor, T. M. Neale, was well
performed, and he soon found his time pretty well employed with
private business which came to him from Sangamon and the adjoining
counties. Early in the year 1834 we find him appointed one of three
"viewers" to locate a road from Salt Creek to the county line in the
direction of Jacksonville. The board seems to have consisted mainly of
its chairman, as Lincoln made the deposit of money required by law,
surveyed the route, plotted the road, and wrote the report.
[Transcriber's Note: (3) Lengthy footnote relocated to chapter end.]

Though it is evident that the post-office and the surveyor's compass
were not making a rich man of him, they were sufficient to enable him
to live decently, and during the year he greatly increased his
acquaintance and his influence in the county. The one followed the
other naturally; every acquaintance he made became his friend, and
even before the end of his unsuccessful canvass in 1832 it had become
evident to the observant politicians of the district that he was a man
whom it would not do to leave out of their calculations. There seemed
to be no limit to his popularity nor to his aptitudes, in the opinion
of his admirers. He was continually called on to serve in the most
incongruous capacities. Old residents say he was the best judge at a
horse-race the county afforded; he was occasionally second in a duel
of fisticuffs, though he usually contrived to reconcile the
adversaries on the turf before any damage was done; he was the arbiter