The influence of life in New Salem upon the mind of Abraham Lincoln was very marked. We must not make the mistake of considering it solely in the character of a poor little frontier town destined to short life and in its day of no consequence to the world. To Lincoln it was a city, and it had its own ambitions to become a greater city. Although it had scarcely twenty houses, not one of them costing much over a hundred dollars, and not more than a hundred inhabitants, it was to him no mean city. Here Lincoln developed rapidly. He read, discussed, thought, wrote, and spoke on a wide variety of subjects. His style was that of florid declamation, a stump oratory with some affectation of erudition. He made the most of his few books, and every one of them left its deep impression upon him. He continued to read the Bible, and grew somewhat familiar with Shakespeare, Burns, and even Byron. While there was no church building in New Salem, and church services were irregular, such services as were held were generally in the tavern where he boarded, a tavern kept at first by James Rutledge and afterward by Henry Onstott. It is interesting to cull out of T. G. Onstott's reminiscences a number that are based on his own recollections, supplemented perhaps by traditions received from his father: "After James Rutledge moved out of the log tavern, my father, Henry Onstott, moved in and occupied it from 1833 till 1835, and still had for a boarder Abraham Lincoln. It was at this time that my early impressions of him were formed. We did not know at that time that we were entertaining an angel unawares. My first knowledge of him was as a great marble player. He kept us small boys running in all directions gathering up the marbles he would scatter. During this time he followed surveying, having learned in six weeks from books furnished him by John Calhoun, of Springfield. About this time he commenced to read some law-books which he borrowed of Bowling Green, who lived one-half mile north of Salem. I think my father and Esquire Green did more than any other two men in determining Lincoln's future destiny."--T. G. ONSTOTT: _Lincoln and Salem--Pioneers of Menard and Mason Counties_, p. 25. Of Lincoln's habits he says: "Lincoln never drank liquor of any kind and never chewed or smoked. We never heard him swear, though Judge Weldon said at the Salem Chautauqua that once in his life when he was excited he said, 'By Jing!'"--ONSTOTT: _Lincoln and Salem_, p. 73. Of Peter Cartwright, Onstott says: "He was a great man for camp-meetings and prayer meetings. He was converted at a camp-meeting, and in his early ministry lived in a tented grove from two to three months in a year. He said: 'May the day be eternally distant when camp-meetings, class meetings, prayer meetings, and love feasts shall be laid aside in Methodist churches.'...