Abraham's life was spent at hard labor. He was a boy of unusual stature and, from the time he was ten years old, did a man's work. He learned all the tricks in the trades that a pioneer's son must know; hired out upon the neighboring farms when there was nothing for him to do at home, and his wages (twenty-five cents a day) were paid to his father. He cared little for amusement, and hunting, which was the chief recreation of young men of his age, had no attractions for him. In his brief autobiography, which was prepared for the newspapers the day after his nomination for the Presidency, he says,-- "A flock of wild turkeys approached the new log cabin, and Abraham, with a rifle gun, standing inside, shot through the cracks and killed one of them. He has never since pulled a trigger on any larger game." He joined in the rude amusements and sports of the community like other boys and enjoyed them. His quick intelligence, ready sympathy, wit, humor, and generous disposition made him a great favorite. He was the best talker and story-teller in the neighborhood. His tall stature and unusual strength made him a leader in athletic sports, and his studious habits and retentive memory gave him an advantage among his comrades, a few of whom had a little, but the most of them no education. His less gifted comrades recognized his ability and superiority; they learned to accept his opinions and to respect his judgment. He became an instructor as well as a leader, and the local traditions represent him as a sort of intellectual phenomenon, whose wit, anecdotes, doggerel verses, practical jokes, muscular strength, and skill made him the wonder of the community and are a part of the early history of that section. When he was sixteen he operated a ferry-boat at the mouth of Anderson's Creek, transporting passengers across the Ohio River, and it was then that he earned the first money that he could claim as his own. One evening in the White House, while he was President, he told the story to several members of his Cabinet, and Mr. Secretary Seward gives the following account of it: "I was contemplating my new flat-boat, and wondering whether I could make it stronger or improve it in any particular, when two men came down to the shore in carriages with trunks, and looking at the different boats singled out mine, and asked: 'Who owns this?' I answered, somewhat modestly, 'I do.' 'Will you,' said one of them, 'take us and our trunks out to the steamer?' 'Certainly,' said I. I was glad to have the chance of earning something. I supposed that each of them would give me two or three bits. The trunks were put on my flat-boat, and the passengers seated themselves on the trunks, and I sculled them out to the steamer.