[Illustration: ANDREW JACKSON AND THE OFFICER'S BOOTS.] 212. The prisoners in the yard of Camden jail; seeing a battle through a knot-hole.--Andrew was sent with other prisoners to Camden, South Carolina,[9] and shut up in the jail-yard. There many fell sick and died of small-pox. One day some of the prisoners heard that General Greene--the greatest American general in the Revolution, next to Washington--was coming to fight the British at Camden. Andrew's heart leaped for joy, for he knew that if General Greene should win he would set all the prisoners at liberty. General Greene, with his little army, was on a hill in sight Of the jail, but there was a high, tight board fence round the jail-yard, and the prisoners could not see them. With the help of an old razor Andrew managed to dig out a knot from one of the boards. Through that knot-hole he watched the battle. Our men were beaten in the fight, and Andrew saw their horses, with empty saddles, running wildly about. Then the boy turned away, sick at heart. Soon after that he was seized with the small-pox, and would have died of it if his mother had not succeeded in getting him set free. [Footnote 9: Camden: see map in paragraph 140.] 213. Mrs. Jackson goes to visit the American prisoners at Charleston; Andrew loses his best friend; what he said of her.--In the summer Mrs. Jackson made a journey on horseback to Charleston, a hundred and sixty miles away. She went to carry some little comforts to the poor American prisoners, who were starving and dying of disease in the crowded and filthy British prison-ships in the harbor. While visiting these unfortunate men she caught the fever which raged among them. Two weeks later she was in her grave, and Andrew, then a lad of fourteen, stood alone in the world. Years afterward, when he had risen to be a noted man, people would sometimes praise him because he was never afraid to say and do what he believed to be right; then Jackson would answer, "_That_ I learned from my good old mother." 214. Andrew begins to learn a trade; he studies law and goes west; Judge Jackson; General Jackson.--Andrew set to work to learn the saddler's trade, but gave it up and began to study law. After he became a lawyer he went across the mountains to Nashville, Tennessee. There he was made a judge. There were plenty of rough men in that part of the country who meant to have their own way in all things; but they soon found that they must respect and obey Judge Jackson. They could frighten other judges, but it was no use to try to frighten him. Seeing what sort of stuff Jackson was made of, they thought that they should like to have such a man to lead them in battle. And so Judge Andrew Jackson became General Andrew Jackson. When trouble came with the Indians, Jackson proved to be the very man they needed.