thrust back. I hardly
know what to say. The way for a young man to
rise is to improve himself every way he can,
never suspecting that anybody wishes to hinder
him. Allow me to assure you that suspicion and
jealousy never did keep any man in any
situation. There may be sometimes ungenerous
attempts to keep a young man down; and they
will succeed, too, if he allows his mind to be
diverted from its true channel to brood over
the attempted injury. Cast about, and see if
this feeling has not injured every person you
have ever known to fall into it.

"Now in what I have said, I am sure you will
suspect nothing but sincere friendship. I would
save you from a fatal error. You have been a
laborious, studious young man. You are far
better informed on almost all subjects than I
have ever been. You cannot fail in any laudable
object, unless you allow your mind to be
improperly directed. I have somewhat the
advantage of you in the world's experience,
merely by being older; and it is this that
induces me to advise.

"Your friend, as ever,
"A. LINCOLN."

LAST DAYS OF THOMAS LINCOLN

Mr. Lincoln did not allow his name to be used as a candidate for
re-election, as there were other men in the congressional district who
deserved the honor of going to Washington as much as he. On his way home
from Washington, after the last session of the Thirtieth Congress, he
visited New England, where he made a few speeches, and stopped at
Niagara Falls, which impressed him so strongly that he wrote a lecture
on the subject.

After returning home he made a flying visit to Washington to enter his
patent steamboat, equipped so that it would navigate shallow western
rivers. This boat, he told a friend, "would go where the ground is a
little damp." The model of Lincoln's steamboat is one of the sights of
the Patent Office to this day.

After Mr. Lincoln had settled down to his law business, permanently, as
he hoped, his former fellow-clerk, William G. Greene, having business in
Coles County, went to "Goosenest Prairie" to call on Abe's father and
stepmother, who still lived in a log cabin. Thomas Lincoln received his
son's friend very hospitably. During the young man's visit, the father
reverted to