When Augustus went to school, at the age of ten, he did more drawing on his slate than arithmetic. How the pupils craned their necks to see his pictures! He did not draw just one man, a bird, or a single house, but whole armies shooting guns and cannon. These soldiers looked alive. On his way home, Augustus was apt to draw charcoal sketches on every white house he passed. The sketches were fine, but the housekeepers scolded. Few people noticed the real talent of the boy, but one old doctor became much excited and urged Augustus's father to let him study art. His father had seen very lifelike pictures of his own workshop and cobblers which Augustus had drawn, and agreed that he would do what he could to help him. Only Augustus must for a few more years earn money for the family. So while he went to a night school for drawing lessons, he cut cameos through the day. My, but the man who taught him cameo cutting was cross! Augustus was scolded and driven to work faster all day long. In spite of the terrible rages into which this stonecutter would go, he was very artistic, and Augustus learned how to cut wonderful heads of dogs, horses, and lions, for scarf pins. He made hundreds of lions' heads, and twenty years later, when he was helping his brother model the lion figures for the Boston Public Library, his hands fairly flew, he knew all the lines so well. When Augustus went in the evenings to the drawing classes at Cooper Union, he began drawing human figures and was so eager about his art that he would have forgotten to eat or sleep if his mother had not watched him. As he grew older, he loved art more and more. The only thing else that attracted his eye was the city-full of soldiers, at the beginning of the Civil War. He read the bulletin boards, heard groups of men telling about battles, and his heart ached with love for America. He wanted to go to war to show that love. But his father was now sure that Augustus was a genius and insisted upon his going to Europe to study. The father could not give him much money, hardly more than enough to get him across the ocean, but he could cut cameos to pay for his lessons.