at the family remained housed in this poor
camp for nearly a whole year; but, after all, he must not be too hastily
blamed. He was far from idle. A cabin was doubtless begun, and there
was the very heavy work of clearing away the timber--cutting down large
trees, chopping them into suitable lengths, and rolling them together
into great heaps to be burned, or of splitting them into rails to fence
the small field upon which he managed to raise a patch of corn and other
things during the following summer.

Though only seven years old, Abraham was unusually large and strong for
his age, and he helped his father in all this heavy labor of clearing
the farm. In after years, Mr. Lincoln said that an ax "was put into his
hands at once, and from that till within his twenty-third year he was
almost constantly handling that most useful instrument--less, of course,
in ploughing and harvesting seasons." At first the Lincolns and their
seven or eight neighbors lived in the unbroken forest. They had only the
tools and household goods they brought with them, or such things as they
could fashion with their own hands. There was no sawmill to saw lumber.
The village of Gentryville was not even begun. Breadstuff could be had
only by sending young Abraham seven miles on horseback with a bag of
corn to be ground in a hand grist-mill.

About the time the new cabin was ready relatives and friends followed
from Kentucky, and some of these in turn occupied the half-faced camp.
During the autumn a severe and mysterious sickness broke out in their
little settlement, and a number of people died, among them the mother of
young Abraham. There was no help to be had beyond what the neighbors
could give each other. The nearest doctor lived fully thirty miles away.
There was not even a minister to conduct the funerals. Thomas Lincoln
made the coffins for the dead out of green lumber cut from the forest
trees with a whip-saw, and they were laid to rest in a clearing in the
woods. Months afterward, largely through the efforts of the sorrowing
boy, a preacher who chanced to come that way was induced to hold a
service and preach a sermon over the grave of Mrs. Lincoln.

Her death was indeed a serious blow to her husband and children.
Abraham's sister, Sarah, was only eleven years old, and the tasks and
cares of the little household were altogether too heavy for her years
and experience. Nevertheless they struggled bravely through the winter
and following s