"We might take him along with us, Si," said Shorty, in a low tone, with a nod toward Abraham{267} Lincoln. "We could make a bully cook out of him. We could have no end of fun with him. We could learn him lots o' tricks. He's as strong as an ox, and after I'd give him a few lessons in puttin' up his hands, he'd knock out that sassy nigger o' the Colonel's." "I think so, too," acquiesced Si, with an estimating glance at the sleeper. Abraham Lincoln's education began bright and early the next morning, when Shorty kicked and shook him into wakefulness at the sound of the reveille. "Git up; git up," said Shorty. "Wash your hands and face, comb your hair, cut some wood and put it on the fire, and bring a kettle o' water from the spring." "Wash my hands and face," said the negro, in a dazed way. "Wha' fo'? Don't got nufin on dem. Comb my ha'r? Nebber did dat in my life." "Well, you've got to do it now every mornin', and be spry about it, too. Come, don't move around as if sawed out o' basswood. This ain't nigger-quarters. Git some springs in your feet." And he emphasized his injunctions with a vigorous push. The negro's face looked as if he began to have doubts as to whether freedom was all that had been represented to him. To have to get up early every morning, and wash his face and hands and comb his hair, seemed at the moment to be a high price to pay for liberty. "Does I hab tuh do dat ebbery mornin', Boss?" he said, turning with a look of plaintive inquiry to the Deacon.{268} "Why, certainly," said the Deacon, who had just finished his own ablutions,' and was combing his hair. "Every man must do that to be decent." Abraham Lincoln gave a deep sigh. "Washes himself as if he's afraid the water'd scald him," said the Deacon, watching the negro's awkward efforts. "He'll have to take more kindly to water, if he comes into a Baptist total immersion family. There's no salvation except by water, and plenty of it, too. Now," he continued, as the black man had finished, "pick up that ax and cut some wood to get breakfast with." Abraham Lincoln took the ax, and began belaboring the wood, while the Deacon studied him with a critical eye. There was little that the Deacon prided himself on more than his skill as a wood chopper. People who think the ax is a simple, skill-less tool, dependent for its efficiency solely upon the strength and industry with which it is wielded, make a great mistake. There is as much difference in the way men handle axes, and in the result they produce, as there is in their playing the violin. Anybody can chop, it is true, as anybody can daub with a paint brush, but a real axman of the breed of the Deacon, who had gone into the wilderness with scarcely any other tool than an ax, can produce results with it of which the clumsy hacker can scarcely imagine. The Deacon watched the negro's work with disgust and impatience.