Billy agreed, and the two clerks chuckled as they fixed the barrel so that the bunghole would come in the right place to win the bet, though the thing seemed impossible to Greene himself. Estep appeared in due time, and after long parleying and bantering the wager was laid. Lincoln then squatted before the barrel, lifted one end up on one knee, then raised the other end on to the other knee, bent over, and by a Herculean effort, actually succeeded in taking a drink from the bunghole--though he spat it out immediately. "That was the only time," said Greene long afterward, "that I ever saw Abraham Lincoln take a drink of liquor of any kind." This was the more remarkable, as whisky was served on all occasions--even passed around with refreshments at religious meetings, according to Mrs. Josiah Crawford, the woman for whom Abe and Nancy had worked as hired help. Much as Abe disapproved of drinking, he considered that "the end justified the means" employed to break his fellow clerk of the gambling habit. HOW HE WON THE NAME OF "HONEST ABE" Abe Lincoln could not endure the thought of cheating any one, even though it had been done unintentionally. One day a woman bought a bill of goods in Offutt's store amounting to something over two dollars. She paid Abe the money and went away satisfied. That night, on going over the sales of the day, Abe found that he had charged the woman six and one-fourth cents too much. After closing the store, though it was late, he could not go home to supper or to bed till he had restored that sixpence to its proper owner. She lived more than two miles away, but that did not matter to Abe Lincoln. When he had returned the money to the astonished woman he walked back to the village with a long step and a light heart, content with doing his duty. Another evening, as he was closing the store, a woman came in for a half-pound of tea. He weighed it out for her and took the pay. But early next morning, when he came to "open up," he found the four-ounce weight instead of the eight-ounce on the scales, and inferred that he had given that woman only half as much tea as he had taken the money for. Of course, the woman would never know the difference, and it meant walking several miles and back, but the honest clerk weighed out another quarter pound of tea, locked the store and took that long walk before breakfast. As a "constitutional" it must have been a benefit to his health, for it satisfied his sensitive conscience and soothed his tender heart to "make good" in that way. Drink and misdirected enthusiasm interfered with Denton Offutt's success. After about a year in New Salem he "busted up," as the neighbors expressed it, and left his creditors in the lurch. Among them was the clerk he had boasted so much about. For a short time Abe Lincoln needed a home, and found a hearty welcome with Jack Armstrong, the best fighter of Clary's Grove!