n these ashes
and set the paper on fire. They think the smoke of the burning paper
will carry the prayer up to heaven.

I asked a Chinese man who could speak a little English why they put
teacups of wine and tea and rice before their god; if they believed that
the god would eat and drink.

"Oh, no," he said, "that not what for. What you like self, you give god.
He see. He like see."

=Lincoln's Birthday=

_February 12_

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

Born February 12, 1809 Died April 15, 1865

Lincoln was the sixteenth President of the United States. He was
descended from a Quaker family of English origin. He followed various
occupations, including those of a farm laborer, a salesman, a merchant,
and a surveyor; was admitted to the bar in 1836 and began the practice
of law in this year. He was twice elected President, the second time
receiving 212 out of 233 electoral votes. He was shot by John Wilkes
Booth at Ford's Theater, Washington, April 14, 1865, and died the
following day.

=ABRAHAM LINCOLN=

BY HELEN NICOLAY

Abraham Lincoln was not an ordinary man. He was, in truth, in the
language of the poet Lowell, a "new birth of our new soil." His
greatness did not consist in growing up on the frontier. An ordinary man
would have found on the frontier exactly what he would have found
elsewhere--a commonplace life, varying only with the changing ideas and
customs of time and place. But for the man with extraordinary powers of
mind and body, for one gifted by Nature as Abraham Lincoln was gifted,
the pioneer life, with its severe training in self-denial, patience, and
industry, developed his character, and fitted him for the great duties
of his after life as no other training could have done.

[Illustration: LINCOLN'S HOME AFTER HIS MARRIAGE]

His advancement in the astonishing career that carried him from
obscurity to world-wide fame--from postmaster of New Salem village to
President of the United States, from captain of a backwoods volunteer
company to Commander-in-chief of the army and navy--was neither sudden
nor accidental nor easy. He was both ambitious and successful, but his
ambition was moderate, and his success was slow. And, because his
success was slow, it never outgrew either his judgment or his powers.
Between the day when he left his father's cabin and launched his canoe