was a warning of atmospheric disturbance. A vague and ignorant
astronomy governed their plantings and sowings, the breeding of their
cattle, and all farm-work. They must fell trees for fence-rails before
noon, and in the waxing of the moon. Fences built when there was no
moon would give way; but that was the proper season for planting
potatoes and other vegetables whose fruit grows underground; those
which bore their product in the air must be planted when the moon
shone. The magical power of the moon was wide in its influence; it
extended to the most minute details of life.

[Sidenote: Lamon, p. 52.]

Among these people, and in all essential respects one of them, Abraham
Lincoln passed his childhood and youth. He was not remarkably
precocious. His mind was slow in acquisition, and his powers of
reasoning and rhetoric improved constantly to the end of his life, at
a rate of progress marvelously regular and sustained. But there was
that about him, even at the age of nineteen years, which might well
justify his admiring friends in presaging for him an unusual career.
He had read every book he could find, and could "spell down" the whole
county at their orthographical contests. By dint of constant practice
he had acquired an admirably clear and serviceable handwriting. He
occasionally astounded his companions by such glimpses of occult
science as that the world is round and that the sun is relatively
stationary. He wrote, for his own amusement and edification, essays on
politics, of which gentlemen of standing who had been favored with a
perusal said with authority, at the cross-roads grocery, "The world
can't beat it." One or two of these compositions got into print and
vastly increased the author's local fame. He was also a magnanimous
boy, with a larger and kindlier spirit than common. His generosity,