Lincoln in his log-cabin home, splitting rails, working on the farm, hunting coons, driving the horses and cattle, must have found a glorious opportunity to become acquainted with this great mother of ours. The son of a pioneer who, with his great covered wagon, cattle, family, and household belongings, wanders over the country, whose only neighbors for hundreds of miles are the birds in the woods, the rabbits in the field, and the fish in the stream, the son of such a man certainly sees nature as few of our city-bred, World's Fair, Paris Exposition young people, can imagine it. Lincoln was content with these, his neighbors. Never do we hear sighs from him and wishes that his lot might be exchanged for that of another, even if his lot was toilsome and lonely. Who can tell but he thus imbibed his love for pure freedom undefiled and his lofty conceptions of this life in its relation to this world and something beyond? We cannot doubt that the great, tall, clumsy lad had a real love in his heart for the little feathered and furry friends about him, and not simply a love for the beautiful ones, but what is far higher a feeling of sympathy even for the ugly and a genuine tender solicitude for all. Even when the youth became a man perplexed by business and political problems his nature remained unaltered. Once when a party of his friends on a judicial circuit stopped to water their horses, Lincoln was not there. His companion on the way was asked of his whereabouts. He replied that the last he had seen of Lincoln he was hunting around for a bird's nest, two of the former occupants of which he held in his hand. The wind had blown the tiny nestlings from their snug little home and the greathearted man was trying to find the nest for the wee, helpless chirpers. The same great heart which felt the human cry of pain as keenly as the bewildered cry of the little birds gave its last throb to restore little black nestlings to the warm comfort of free homes protected by law. There is an amusing incident, told probably as a "good one" upon the politician, but which has more than an amusing side to us. Lincoln was one of a party of ladies and gentlemen, dressed in their best, journeying along a country road. Their attention was arrested by the distressed squealings of a pig. There it was by the roadside, caught in a fence. Of course a general laugh followed. To the astonishment of all Lincoln, clad as he was, dismounted from his horse and released the poor animal. He could not see even an occupant of the pigsty suffer without feelings of sympathy. We expect different stories of Washington, a different attitude toward nature and animals, just as the nature of the man was different. Visit Mt. Vernon and at once you feel his relation to the natural world, a love and keen appreciation of the beautiful in nature, with a thorough conviction that where man tampers with the rough beauties of nature a severe orderliness, precision, and care must be manifested.