Lincoln rose for the final, without eliciting any emotion from him. He dilated on the evidence, which he asserted boldly was proof of a plot against an innocent youth. He called the principal witness back to the stand, and caused him definitely to repeat that he had _seen_ Armstrong strike the fatal stroke, with a slung-shot undoubtedly, and by "the light of the moon." The proof that his accusation was false was in the advocate's hand--the almanac, which the usher handed into the jury, while the judge consulted one on his desk. The whole story was a fabrication to avenge a personal enmity, and the rock of the prosecution was blasted by the defense's fiery eloquence. The arbiters went out for half an hour, but the audience, waiting in breathless impatience, discounted the result. The twelve filed in to utter the alleviating "Not guilty!" and the liberator was able to fulfil his pledge. It was not sunset, and the prisoner was free to comfort his mother. In vain did she talk of paying a fee, and the man supported the desire by alleging his intention to work the debt out. Lincoln said in the old familiar tongue: "Aunt Hannah, I sha'n't charge you a _red_--I said 'without money or price!' And anything I can do for you and yours shall not cost you a cent." Soon after, as she wrote to him of an attempt to deprive her of her land, he bade her force a case into the court; if adverse there, appeal to the Supreme Court, where his law firm would act, and he would fight it out. (Regarding the rescued man, he enlisted in the war at the first call. He was still in the ranks two years later, when his mother, in her loneliness, begged for him of the President-commander-in-chief, for his release to come home. His leave was immediately written out by Lincoln's own hand, and the soldier went home from Kentucky. He remained a valuable citizen. It was Lincoln's speech and the moonbeam of inspiration that saved him.) * * * * * "NICE CLOTHES MAY MAKE A HANDSOME MAN--EVEN OF YOU!" In 1832, Lincoln, elected to the Illinois legislative chamber, found himself in one of those anguishing embarrassments besetting him in all the early stages of his unflagging ascent from the social slough of despond. Unlike eels, he never got used to skinning. For the new station, however well provided mentally, he had no means to procure dress fit for the august halls of debate. He was yet standing behind the counter in Offutt's general shop at New Salem, when an utter stranger strolled in, asked his name, though his exceptional stature and unrivaled mien revealed his identity, and announced his own name. Each had heard of the other. The newcomer was not an Adonis, perhaps, but he was one compared with the awkward, leaning Tower of Pisa "cornstalk," who carried the jack-knife as "the homeliest man in the section." Lincoln was doubly the _plainest_ speaker there and thereabouts.