Rensselaer Republican, Volume 25, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 January 1893 — A STORY OF CHAUNCEY DEPEW. [ARTICLE]

A STORY OF CHAUNCEY DEPEW.

When He Was a Boy He Wanted to be a Farmer, New York T.edger. “When Chauncey Depew was a little boy,” is a beginning almost as interesting as a title to a story book. Every boy has heard of Mr. Depew and is proud of him as a statesman and as the president of one of the biggest railroad companies in the world. And every girl has heard of his amiability on social occasions and of the great readiness he has in making after dinner speeches. Bi t very few have any ideaof Mr. Depew as a little boy. He is such a great and good man that he seems always to have been grown up and never to have known the temptations and willful inclinations of other children. Yet if you will talk to Mr. Depew he will tell you how near he came to missing his great vocation of one of his country’s statesmen and to settling down to'a kind of work for which he had not been fitted. The Depew family have for many years owned a large farm up on the Hudson river, and there it was that little Chauncey was born and grew into big boyhood. When he got to be 15 or 16 years of ago Chauncey made up his mind to settle down and be a “ISflfor fOFTIfo; tils father did not want him to do farming. A farmer’s life, his father said, was a very honorable one, and that many boys who are in the city at work would do well to go back to the farm for a good living and pleasant occupation. “But,” said Chauncey’s father, “I have a tine law library which 1 wish you to use, and besides that your family for generations have been lawyers, and, in my judgment you are best fitted to follow the law.” “But I don’t want to be a lawyer, father;” said Chauncey; “I hate the books and I want to be a farmer.” “Very well,” said his father, “you may try real farm work for three days aud see how you like it.” The first day young Chauncey hoed potatoes side by side with the hired man and thought it great fun, and when he came in at night he told his father that he was more than ever inclined to stick to the farm for life. The second day his father set him to work hauling* stumps out of a lot that had to be cleared before things could be planted on it, and by night Chauncey was so tired that he could not eat his supper. The third day he was set to work picking stones out of a lot that was altogether too stony for any use, and by the time he had picked stoues for ten hours Chauncey had given up all ideas of being a farmer. “I guess I’m not strong enough to be a farmer, father," he said; “it's too hard work. I am so tired that I don’t believe I will get rested for a week. The son of our hired man, who worked along with me, Is not tired at all, so I guyss I’m not made out of the right kind of stuff to be a farmer. Get out the law books, father, and I’ll be the very best lawyer I can.” That is the way “Our Own Chauncey” qame to be a lawyer instead of farmer.