some more of the dam, the opening sufficed for the boat to "coast" on
the stones and get over into deep water. "I think," says an old
boatman--J. R. ("Row") Herndon--"that the captain gave Lincoln forty
dollars to keep on to Beardstown. I am sure I got that!"


* * * * *


THE INITIATOR INSTALLED.

As a fruit of incessant study Abraham Lincoln fitted himself to accept
the post of clerk at Offutt's store, in New Salem, in 1831. It was a
responsible position, requiring strict honesty, intelligence, glib
talk, attention, and courtesy to the few dames in the population of
twenty households, "with the back settlement to hear from." In fact,
Lincoln's gifts and cultivated acquirements made him such a favorite
that the list of customers from out of town was extensive. This
promotion of a newcomer nettled the bad element of the region. They
were located from congeniality in a suburb termed Clary's Grove. Like
the tail which undertakes to wag the dog, this tag constituted
itself the criterion and proposed "initiating" any accession to the
inhabitants. To take the conceit out of the upstart who had leaped
from the flatboat deck to behind the counter at the store--the acme of
a bumpkin's ambition--they selected their bully. This Jack Armstrong
was held so high by Bill Clary, "father" of the Grove boys, that he
bet with Offutt, over-loud in praise of his help, that Jack could beat
Abe, "and your Abe has got to be initiated, anyway!"

Abraham refused under provocation to have anything to do with