Rensselaer Republican, Volume 13, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 February 1881 — The Boy Lincoln. [ARTICLE]

The Boy Lincoln.

Fr.au the Louisville Courier-Journal. Lincoln’s early youth was spent in Spencer countyilnd., aliove Rockport, a beautiful little city crowning the abrupt elifts which frown over the Ohio river. He was faithful and industrious, but there was in him a latent indok-nee which made him fond of taking his rod to fish, or, with his gun u|K>n his shoulder, he would roam in search of game over the long, low hills bursting with the red clay. There are living at present several old citizens who know Lincoln well at that time. He was thoughtful, and his solitary expeditions probably gave him plenty of opportunity to indulge his meditative faculties. The description of his appearance then; his long, lank legs under an awkward body ; his.homely face upon w’hich the prominent nose* stood like a handle; his long hair dangling upon his shoulders, bring up instantly the picture of Jchaliod Crane in the twilieht, stealing over the hills of Sleepy Hollow to pay his court to Frances Katrina Von Tassel.

The embryo statesman was full of spirit and fond of mad pranks. One old gentleman in Rockport lives to tell of the, last time he saw Lincoln. He was visiting the Lincoln home-? stead. and as he was coming away they found a tresspassing cow hang, ing about the gate. The cow had given the Lincolns much annoyanceby entering their garden and committing depredations. Young Abe was dressed in a suit of jeans, without any coat, as it was summer tijne, and on his head he wore a broad-brimmed white straw hat, part of which was cracked and broken. Finding the cow standing hypocriticaly meek at the gate, young Abt- leaped astride of her back, and, digging his Imre heels into her side, the astonished animal broke away down the road in a lumbering gallop. “The last 1 saw of Abe Lincoln,” the old gentleman relates fondly, “he was” swinging his hat, shouting at the top of.his voice and gallopping down' the road on that thunderstruck cow.” In the old country church near the Lincoln place is a pulpit which was made by Abe Lincoln and his father. There is a bookcase in the Evansville Custom House made by the same carpenters and taken there for preservation. ’ Near where the old house stood is a dilapidated corn-crib with rail floor, the rails for which were split by young Lincoln. Last fall a monument was raised over Nancy Lincoln’s grave through the efforts of General Veach, of Rockport. It is a plain slab with a plain inscription.