"How is Abraham?" asked Jasper.
"Oh, he is well, and as good to me as ever, and he studies hard, just as he used to do."
"And is as lazy as ever," said Thomas Lincoln. "At the lazy folks' fair he'd take the premium."
"You shouldn't say that," said Mrs. Lincoln. "Just think how good he was to everybody during the sickness! He never thought of himself, but just worked night and day. His own mother died of the same sickness years ago, and he's had a feelin' heart for the sufferers in this calamity. I tell you, elder, that he's good to everybody, and if he does not take hold to work in the way that father does, his head and heart are never idle. I am sorry that he and father do not see more alike. The boy is goin' to do well in the world. He begins right."
When Abraham returned, there was one heart that was indeed glad to see him. It was the little dog. The animal bounded heels over head as soon as he heard the boy's step, and almost leaped upon his tall shoulder as he met him.
"Humph!" said Mr. Lincoln.
"Animals know who are good to them," said Mrs. Lincoln. "Abraham, here is the preacher."
How tall, and dark, and droll, and yet how sad, the boy looked! He was full grown now, uncouth and ungainly. Who but Jasper would have seen behind the features of that young, sinewy backwoodsman the soul of the leader and liberator?
It was a busy time with the Lincolns. Their goods were loaded upon a rude and very heavy ox-wagon, and the oxen were given into the charge of young Abraham to drive.
The young man's voice might have been heard a mile as he swung his whip and called out to the oxen on starting. They passed by the grave under the great trees where his poor mother's body lay and left it there, never to be visited again. There were some thirteen persons in the emigrant party.