alphabet; and she showed him how to write his name.
For Thomas Lincoln had never gone to school, and he had never learned
how to read.

As soon as little Abraham Lincoln was old enough to understand, his
mother read stories to him from the Bible. Then, while he was still very
young, she taught him to read the stories for himself.

The neighbors thought it a wonderful thing that so small a boy could
read. There were very few of them who could do as much. Few of them
thought it of any great use to learn how to read.

There were no school-houses in that part of Kentucky in those days, and
of course there were no public schools.

One winter a traveling schoolmaster came that way. He got leave to use a
cabin not far from Mr. Lincoln's, and gave notice that he would teach
school for two or three weeks. The people were too poor to pay him for
teaching longer.

The name of this schoolmaster was Zachariah Riney.

The young people for miles around flocked to the school. Most of them
were big boys and girls, and a few were grown up young men. The only
little child was Abraham Lincoln, and he was not yet five years old.

There was only one book studied at that school, and it was a
spelling-book. It had some easy reading lessons at the end, but these
were not to be read until after every word in the book had been spelled.

You can imagine how the big boys and girls felt when Abraham Lincoln
proved that he could spell and read better than any of them.

* * * * *

II.--WORK AND SORROW.

In the autumn, just after Abraham Lincoln was eight years old, his
parents left their Kentucky home and moved to Spencer county, in
Indiana.

It was not yet a year since Indiana had become a state. Land could be
bought very cheap, and Mr. Lincoln thought that he could make a good
living there for his family. He had heard also that game was plentiful
in the Indiana woods.

It was not more than seventy or eighty miles from the old home to the
new. But it seemed very far, indeed, and it was a good many days before
the travelers reached their journey's end. Over a part of the way there
was no road, and the movers had to cut a path for themselves through the
thick woods.

The boy, Abraham, was tall and very strong for his age. He already knew
how to handle an ax, and few men could shoot with a rifle better than
he. He was his father's helper in all kinds of work.

It was in November when the family came to