He took a flat-boat to New Orleans, and defended her against the negroes, who, poor fellows, were not prophetic enough to see that they were plotting against their Deliverer.
He "always had much dry wit about him that kept oozing out"!
We have given a bird's-eye view of the main incidents of his boyhood, for we cannot quite agree with our author in thinking that his "old grammar laid the foundation, in part, of Abraham's future character," seeing we have previously been told that he had "become the most important man in the place," and we have the same writer's authority for believing that "the habits of life are usually fixed by the time a lad is fifteen years of age." Nor can we admit that his grammar even "taught him the rudiments of his native language," when we have been having proof upon proof, for two hundred and eighty-six pages, that he was already familiar with its rudiments. We are equally skeptical as to whether it really "opened the golden gate of knowledge" for him: we should certainty say that this gate had stood ajar, at least, for years. Indeed, that portion of his history which relates to grammar seems to us by far the most unsatisfactory of all. In his honesty, in his penmanship, in his kindness of heart, in his wit, dry or damp, we feel a confidence which not even the shock of political campaigns has been able to move. But in respect of grammar we find ourselves in a state of the most painful uncertainty. We have never regarded it as our beloved President's strong point, but we have considered any linguistic defect more than atoned for by the hearty, timely, sturdy, plain sense which appeals so directly and forcibly to the good sense of others. This book calls up a distressing doubt, and a doubt that strikes at vital interests. "Grammar," our President is reported to have said before he had cast the integuments of a grocer's clerk, "Grammar is the art of speaking and writing the English language with propriety"! Is this a definition, we sorrowfully ask, becoming an American citizen? It has, indeed, in many respects the qualities of a perfect definition. It is deep; it is accurate; it is exhaustive; but it is not loyal. Coming from the lips of a subject of Great Britain, it would not surprise us. An Englishman undoubtedly believes that grammar is the art of speaking and writing the English language with propriety. All the grammatical research that preceded the establishment of his mother-tongue was but the collection of fuel to feed the flame of its glory; all that follows will be to diffuse the light of that flame to the ends of the earth. Greek, Latin, Sanscrit, were but stepping-stones to the English language. Philology per se is a myth. The English language in its completeness is the completion of grammatical science. To that all knowledge tends; from that all honor radiates. So claims proud Britain's prouder son. But can an American tamely submit to such a monopoly? Is not grammar rather, or at least quite as much, the art of speaking and writing the American language correctly, and shall he sit calmly by and witness this gross outrage upon his dearest rights? But, as our author would say, we "must not dwell," and most gladly do we leave this unpleasant branch of a very pleasant subject, inwardly supplicating, that, whatever disaster is yet to befall us, we may be spared the pang of suspecting that our revered President, so stanch against the Rebels, so unflinching for the Slave, is in danger of lowering his lofty crest before the rampant British lion! In view of such a calamity, one can only say in the words of that distinguished British citizen who, living in England in the full light of the nineteenth century, must be supposed to have reached the summit of grammatical excellence,—
"Gin I mun doy I mun doy, an' loife they says is sweet,
But gin I mun doy I mun doy, for I couldn' abear to see it."
The life of the Ferry Boy was scarcely less adventurous than that of the Pioneer Boy, and was, indeed, in some respects its counterpart. As the latter learned to write on the tops of stools, so the former learned to read on bits of birch-bark. At an early period of his existence he broke a capful of eggs. He owned a calf. He caught an eel. He put salt on a bird's tail and learned his first lesson of the deceitfulness of the human heart. He walked to Niagara Falls from Buffalo. He got lost in the woods. He went to live with his uncle in Ohio, where he displayed spirit and killed a pig. Here also occurred a "prophecy" almost as striking as the Pioneer Boy's writing his name with a stick. "Salmon" wished to go swimming. "The Bishop said, 'No!' adding, 'Why, Salmon, the country might lose its future President, if you should get drowned!' This was the first time his name had ever been mentioned in connection with that high office; and the remark, coming from the grave Bishop's lips, must have made a strong impression on him. Was it prophetic?" Let us assume that it was, although it must for the present be ranked with what is theologically called "unfulfilled prophecy." We cannot, at any rate, be too thankful that the only occasion on which it was ever hinted to an American boy that he might one day become President has not been suffered to pass into oblivion, but has found in this little volume a monument more durable than brass. To go on with our inventory. A whole flock of thirteen pigeons shot by the Ferry Boy answered through their misty shroud to the Pioneer Boy's turkey which called to them aloud. He taught school two weeks, and then had leave to resign. He went to Washington and said his prayers like a good boy: we trust he has kept up the practice ever since.
From such a record there is but one inference: if the man is not President, he ought to be!
One great element in the success which these little books have met, the one fact which, we are persuaded, accounts for the quiet, but significant "twenty-sixth thousand" that we find on the title-page of one of them, is the pains which their authors take to make their meaning clear. They do not, like too many of our modern authors, leave a book half written, forcing the reader to finish their work as he goes along. They are instant, in season and out of season, with explanation, illustration, reflection, until the idea is, so to speak, reduced to pulp, and the reader has nothing to perform save the act of deglutition.
"When he ['Nat'] was only four years old, and was learning to read little words of two letters, he came across one about which he had quite a dispute with his teacher. It was inn.
"'What is that?' asked his teacher.
"'I-double n,' he answered.