"First, may I pin a sprig of wild plum on your coat for luck? It's almost too early for them yet and I searched the thicket before I found this, which looks as if it had only half opened its white eyes, but it gives out its springtime fragrance to stir up happy memories and hopes."
Abe Lincoln held out the lapel of his coat. "Look at me, Ann," he said when she had fastened the flower there.
She raised her eyes. They were rimmed with tears.
Abe Lincoln stared a minute as if wholly unable to comprehend the girl; then he said: "Good-bye, Ann, take care of yourself," and he turned hurriedly away.
"BOOKS BEAT GUNS, SONNY"
It was the tenth day of July when Abe Lincoln, who had for weeks been struggling through the swamps and forests of Michigan territory in pursuit of the fleeing Black Hawk, turned his face homeward.