INTRODUCED

“Boy, are there any schools in these parts?”

“Crawford’s.”

“And who, my boy, is Crawford?”

“The schoolmaster, don’t yer know? He’s great on thrashing on thrashing and and he knows everything. Everybody in these parts has heard of Crawford. He’s great.”

“That is all very extraordinary. ’Great on thrashing, and knows everything.’ Very extraordinary! Do you raise much wheat in these parts?”

“He don’t thrash wheat, mister. Old Dennis and young Dennis do that with their thrashing-flails.”

“But what does he thrash, my boy what does he thrash?”

“He just thrashes boys, don’t you know.”

“Extraordinary very extraordinary. He thrashes boys.”

“And teaches ’em their manners. He teaches manners, Crawford does. Didn’t you never hear of Crawford? You must be a stranger in these parts.”

“Yes, I am a stranger in Indiana. I have been following the timber along the creek, and looking out on the prairie islands. This is a beautiful country. Nature has covered it with grasses and flowers, and the bees will swarm here some day; I see them now; the air is all bright with them, my boy.”

“I don’t see any bees; it isn’t the time of year for ’em. Do you cobble?”

“You don’t quite understand me. I was speaking spiritually. Yes, I cobble to pay my way. Yes, my boy.”

“Do you preach?”

“Yes, and teach the higher branches like Crawford. He teaches the higher branches, does he not?”

“Don’t make any odds where he gets ’em. I didn’t know that he used the higher branches. He just cuts a stick anywhere, and goes at ’em, he does.”

“You do not comprehend me, my boy. I teach the higher branches in new schools Latin and singing. I do not use the higher branches of the trees.”

“Latin! Then you must be a wizard.”

“No, no, my boy. I am one of the Brethren called. My new name is Jasper. I chose that name because I needed polishing. Do you see? Well, the Lord is doing his work, polishing me, and I shall shine by and by. ’They that turn many to righteousness shall shine like the stars of heaven.’ They call me the Parable.”

“Then you be a Tunker?”

“I am one of the wandering Brethren that they call ‘Tunkers.’”

“You preach for nothin’? They do.”

“Yes, my boy; the Word is free.”

“Then who pays you?”

“My soul.”

“And you teach for nothin’, too, do ye?”

“Yes, my boy. Knowledge is free.”

“Then who pays you?”

“It all comes back to me. He that teaches is taught.”

“You don’t cobble for nothin’, do ye?”

“Yes I cobble to pay my way. I am a wayfaring man, wandering to and fro in the wilderness of the world.”

“You cobble to pay yourself for teachin’ and preachin’! Why don’t you make them pay you? I shouldn’t think that you would want to preach and teach and cobble all for nothin’, and travel, and travel, and sleep anywhere. Father will be proper glad to see you and mother; we are glad to see near upon anybody. I suppose that you will hold forth down to Crawford’s; in the log meetin’-’ouse, or in the school-’ouse, may be, or under the great trees over Nancy Lincoln’s grave. Elkins he preached there, and the circuit-rider.”

“If I follow the timber, I will come to Crawford’s, my boy?”

“Yes, mister. You’ll come to the school-’ouse, and the meetin’-’ouse. The school-’ouse has a low-down roof and a big chimney. Crawford will be right glad to see you, won’t he now? They are great on spellin’ down there have spellin’-matches, and all the people come from far and near to hear ’em spell hundreds of ’em. Link he’s the head speller he could spell down anybody. It is the greatest school in all these here new parts. You will have a right good time down there; they’ll treat ye right well.”

“Good, my boy; you speak kindly. I shall have a good time, if the people have ears.”

“Ears! They’ve all got ears just like other folks. You didn’t think that they didn’t have any ears, did ye?”

“I mean ears for the truth. I must travel on. I am glad that I met you, my lad. Tell your father and mother that old Jasper the Parable has gone by, and that he has a message for them in his heart. God bless you, my boy God bless you! You are a little rude in your speech, but you mean well.”

The man went on, following the trail along the great trees of Pigeon Creek, and the boy stood looking after him. The water rippled under the trees, and afar lay the open prairie, like a great sun sea. The air was cool, but the light of spring was in it, and the blue-birds fluted blithely among the budding trees.

As he passed along amid these new scenes, a singular figure appeared in the way. It was a woman in a linsey-woolsey dress, corn sun-bonnet, and a huge cane. She looked at the Tunker suspiciously, yet seemed to retard her steps that he might overtake her.

“My good woman,” said the latter, coming up to her, “I am not sure of my way.”

“Well, I am.”

“I wish to go to the Pigeon Creek settlement ”

“Then you ought to have kept the way when you had it.”

“But, my good woman, I am a stranger in these parts. A boy has directed me, but I feel uncertain. What do you do when you lose your way?”

“I don’t lose it.”

“But if you were ”

“I’d just turn to the right, and keep right straight ahead till I found it.”

“True, true; but this is a new country to me. I am one of the Brethren.”

“Ye be, be ye? I thought you were one of them land agents. One of the Brethren. I’m proper glad. Who were you lookin’ for?”

“Crawford’s school.”

“The college? Am you’re goin’ there? I go over there sometimes to see him wallop the boys. We must all have discipline in life, you know, and it is best to begin with the young. Crawford does. They say that Crawford teaches clear to the rule of three, whatever that may be. One added to one is more than one, according to the Scriptur’; now isn’t it? One added to one is almost three. Is that what they call high mathematics? I never got further than the multiplication-table, though I am a friend to education. My name is Olive Eastman. What’s yourn?”

“Jasper.”

“You don’t? One of the old patriarchs, like. Well, I live this way you go that. ’Tain’t more’n half a mile to Crawford’s close to the meetin’-’ouse. Mebby you’ll preach there, and I’ll hear ye. Glad I met ye now, and to see who you be. They call me Aunt Olive sometimes, and sometimes Aunt Indiana. I settled Pigeon Creek, or husband and I did. He was kind o’ weakly; he’s gone now, and I live all alone. I’d be glad to have you come over and preach at the ’ouse, though I might not believe a word on’t. I’m a Methody; most people are Baptist down here, like the Linkuns, but we is all ready to listen to a Tunker. People are only responsible for what they know; and there are some good people among the Tunkers, I’ve hern tell. Now don’t go off into some by-path into the woods. Tom Lincoln he see a bear there the other day, but he wouldn’t ‘a’ shot it if it had been an elephant with tusks of ivory and gold. Some folks haven’t no calculation. The Lincolns hain’t. Good-by.”

The Tunker was a middle-aged man of probably forty-five or more years. He had a benevolent face, large, sympathetic eyes, and a patriarchal beard. His garments had hooks instead of buttons. He carried a leather bag in which were a Bible and a hymn-book, some German works of Zinzendorf, and his cobbling-tools. We can not wonder that the boy stared after him. He would have looked oddly anywhere.

My reader may not know who a Tunker was, as our wandering schoolmaster was called. A Tunker, or Dunker, was one of a sect of German Baptists or Quakers, who were formerly very numerous in Pennsylvania and Ohio. The order numbered at one time some thirty thousand souls. They called themselves Brethren, but were commonly known as “Tunkards,” or “Dunkards,” from a German word meaning to dip. At their baptisms they dip the body of a convert three times; and so in their own land they received the name of Tunkers, or dippers, and this name followed them into Holland and to America. A large number of the Brethren settled in Germantown, Pa. Thence they wandered into Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, preaching and teaching and doing useful work. Like the Quakers, they have now nearly disappeared.

Their doctrines were peculiar, but their lives were unselfish and pure, and their influence blameless. They believed in being led by the inner light; that the soul was a seat of divine and spiritual authority, and that the Spirit came to them as a direct revelation. They did not eat meat or drink wine. They washed each other’s feet after their religious services, wore their beards long, and gave themselves new names that they might not be tempted by any worldly ambitions or rivalries. They thought it wrong to take oaths, to hold slaves, or to treat the Indians differently from other men. They would receive no payment for preaching, but held that it was the duty of all men to live by what they earned by their own labor. They traveled wherever they felt moved to go by the inward monitor. They were a peculiar people, but the prairie States owe much that was good to their influence. The new settlers were usually glad to see the old Tunker when he appeared among them, and to receive his message, and women and children felt the loss of this benevolent sympathy when he went away. He established no church, yet all people believed in his sincerity, and most people listened to him with respect and reverence. The sect closely resembled the old Jewish order of the Essenes, except that they did not wear the garment of white, but loose garments without buttons.

The scene of the Tunker’s journey was in Spencer County, Indiana, near the present town of Gentryville. This county was rapidly being occupied by immigrants, and it was to this new people that Jasper the Parable believed himself to be guided by the monitor within.

Early in the afternoon he passed several clearings and cabins, where he stopped to receive directions to the school-house and meeting-house.

The country was one vast wilderness. For the most part it was covered with gigantic trees, though here and there a rich prairie opened out of the timber. There were oaks gray with centuries, and elms jacketed with moss, in whose high boughs the orioles in summer builded and sang, and under which the bluebells grew. There were black-walnut forests in places, with timber almost as hard as horn. The woods in many places were open, like colonnades, and carpeted with green moss. There were no restrictions of law here, or very few. One might pitch his tent anywhere, and live where he pleased. The land, as a rule, was common.

Jasper came at last to a clearing with a rude cabin, near which was a three-faced camp, as a house of poles with one open side was called. Spencer County was near the Kentucky border, and the climate was so warm that a family could live there in a house of poles in comfort for most of the year.

As Jasper the Parable came up to the log-house, which had neither hinged doors nor glass windows, a large, rough, good-humored-looking man came out to the gate to meet him, and stood there leaning upon a low gate-post.

“Howdy, stranger?” said the hardy pioneer. “What brings you to these parts lookin’ fer a place to settle down at?”

“No, my good friend I’m obliged to you for speaking so kindly to a wayfarer peace be with you I am looking for the school-house. Can you direct me there?”

“I reckon. Then you be going to see the school? Good for ye. A great school that Crawford keeps. I’ve got a boy and a girl in that there school myself. The boy, if I do say it now, is the smartest fellow in all the country round and the laziest. Smart at the top, but it don’t go down. Runs all to larnin’. Just reads and studies about all the time, speaks pieces, and preaches on stumps, and makes poetry, and things. I don’t know what will ever become of him. He’s a queer one. My name is Linkem” (Lincoln) “Thomas Linkem. What’s yourn?”

“They call me Jasper the Parable that is my new name. I’m one of the Brethren. No offense, I hope just one of the Brethren.”

“Oh, you be a Tunker. Well, we’ll all be proper glad to see you down here. I come from Kentuck. Where did you come from?”

“From Pennsylvania, here. I was born in Germany.”

“Sho, you did? From Pennsylvany! And how far are you going?”

“I’m going to meet Black Hawk. My good friend, I stop and preach and teach and cobble along the way.”

“What! Black Hawk, the chief? Is it him you’re goin’ to see? You’re an Indian agent, perhaps, travelin’ for the State or the fur-traders?”

“No, I am not a trader of any kind. I am going to meet Black Hawk at Rock River. He has promised me a young Indian guide, who will show me all these paths and act as an interpreter, and gain for me a passage among all the Indian tribes. I have met Black Hawk before.”

“You’ve been to Illinois, have ye? Glad to hear ye say so. What kind of a kentry is that, now? I’ve sometimes thought of going there myself. It ain’t over-healthy here. Say, stranger, come back and stop with us after you’ve been to the school. I haven’t any great accommodations, as you see, but I will do the best I can for you, and it will make my wife and Abe and the gal proper glad to have a talk with a preacher. Ye will, won’t ye, now? Say yes.”

“Yes, yes, if it is so ordered, friend. Thank you, yes. I feel moved to say that I will come back. You are very good, my friend.”

“Yes, yes, come back and see us all. I won’t detain ye any longer now. You see that there openin’? Well, you just follow that path as the crow flies, and you’ll come to the school-’ouse. Good-day, stranger good-day.”

It was early spring, a season always beautiful in southern Indiana. The buds were swelling; the woodpeckers were tapping the old trees, and the migrating birds were returning to their old homes in the tree-tops. Jasper went along singing, for his heart was happy, and he felt the cheerful influence of the vernal air. The birds to him were prophets and choirs, and the murmur of the south winds in the trees was a sermon. A right and receptive spirit sees good in everything, and so Jasper sang as he walked along the footpath.

The school-house came into view. It was built of round logs, and was scarcely higher than a tall man’s head. The chimney was large, and was constructed of poles and clay, and the floor and furniture were made of puncheons, as split logs were called. The windows consisted of rough slats and oiled paper. The door was open, and Jasper came up and stood before it. How strange the new country all seemed to him!

The schoolmaster came to the door. He affected gentlemanly and almost courtly manners, and bowed low.

“Is this Mr. Crawford, may I ask?” said Jasper.

“Andrew Crawford. And whom have I the honor of meeting?”

“My new name is Jasper. I am one of the Brethren. They call me the Parable. I am on my way to Rock Island, Illinois, to meet Black Hawk, the chief, who has promised to assist me with a guide and interpreter for my missionary journeys among the new settlements and the tribes. I have come, may it please you, to visit the school. I am a teacher myself.”

“You do us great honor, and I assure you that you are very welcome very welcome. Come in.”

The scholars stared, and presented a very strange appearance. The boys were dressed in buckskin breeches and linsey-woolsey shirts, and the girls in homespun gowns of most economical patterns. The furniture seemed all pegs and puncheons. The one cheerful object in the room was the enormous fireplace. The pupils delighted to keep this fed with fuel in the chilly winter days, and the very ashes had cheerful suggestions. It was all ashes now, for the sun was high, and the spring falls warm and early in the forests of southern Indiana.

It was past mid afternoon, and the slanting sun was glimmering in the tops of the gigantic forest-trees seen from the open door.

“We have nearly completed the exercises of the day,” said Mr. Crawford. “I have yet to hear the spelling-class, and to conduct the exercises in manners. I teach manners. Shall I go on in the usual way?”

“Yes, yes, may it please you yes, in the usual way in the usual way. You are very kind.”

“You do me great honor. The class in spelling,” said Mr. Crawford, turning to the school. Five boys and girls stood up, and came to an open space in front of the desk. The recitation of this class was something most odd and amusing to Jasper, and so it would seem to a teacher of to-day.

“Incompatibility” said Mr. Crawford. “You may make your manners and spell incompatibility, Sarah.”

A tall girl with a high forehead and very short dress gave a modest and abashed glance at the wandering visitor, blushed, courtesied very low, and thus began the rhythmic exercise of spelling the word in the old-time way:

“I-n, in; there’s your in. C-o-m, com, incom; there’s your incom; incom. P-a-t, pat, compat, incompat; there’s your incompat; incompat. I-, pâti, compati, incompati; there’s your incompati; incompati. B-i-l, bil; ibil, patibil, compatibil, incompatibil; there’s your incompatibil; incompatibil. I-, bili, patibili, compatibili, incompatibili; there’s your incompatibili; incompatibili. T-y, ty, ity, bility, ibility, patibility, compatibility, incompatibility; there’s your incompatibility; incompatibility.”

The girl seemed dazed after this mazy effort. Mr. Crawford bowed, and Jasper the Parable looked serene, and remarked, encouragingly:

“Extraordinary! I never heard a word spelled in that way. This is an age of wonders. One meets with strange things everywhere. I should think that that girl would make a teacher one day; and the new country will soon need teachers. The girl did well.”

“You do me great honor,” said Mr. Crawford, bowing like a courtier. “I appreciate it, I assure you; I appreciate it, and thank you. I have aimed to make my school the best in the country. Your commendation encourages me to hope that I have not failed.”

But these polite and generous compliments were exchanged a little too soon. The next word that Mr. Crawford gave out from the “Speller” was obliquity.

“Jason, make your manners and spell obliquity. Take your hands out of your pockets; that isn’t manners. Take your hands out of your pockets and spell obliquity.”

Jason was a tall lad, in a jean blouse and leather breeches. His hair was tangled and his ankles were bare. He seemed to have a loss of confidence, but he bobbed his head for manners, and began to spell in a very loud voice, that had in it almost the sharpness of defiance.

“O-b, ob; there’s your ob; ob.” He made a leer. “L-i-k, lik, oblik; there’s your oblik ”

“No,” said Mr. Crawford, with a look of vexation and disappointment. “Try again.”

Jason took a higher key of voice.

“Wall, O-b, ob; there’s your ob; ain’t it? L-i-c-k, and there’s your lick ”

“Take your seat!” thundered Mr. Crawford. “I’ll give you a lick after school. Think of bringing obliquity upon the school in the presence of a teacher from the Old World! Next!”

But the next pupil became lost in the mazes of the improved method of spelling, and the class brought dishonor upon the really conscientious and ambitious teacher.

The exercise in manners partly redeemed the disaster.

“Abraham Lincoln, stand up.”

A tall boy arose, and his head almost touched the ceiling. He was dressed in a linsey-woolsey frock, with buckskin breeches which were much too short for him. His ankles were exposed, and his feet were poorly covered. His face was dark and serious. He did not look like one whom an unseen Power had chosen to control one day the destiny of nations, to call a million men to arms, and to emancipate a race.

“Abraham Lincoln, you may go out, and come in and be introduced.”

It required but a few steps to take the young giant out of the door. He presently returned, knocking.

“James Sparrow, you may go to the door,” said Mr. Crawford.

The boy arose, went to the door, and bowed very properly.

“Good-afternoon, Mr. Lincoln. I am glad to see you. Come in. If it please you, I will present you to my friends.”

Abraham entered, as in response to this courtly parrot-talk.

“Mr. Crawford, may I have the honor of presenting to you my friend Abraham Lincoln? Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Crawford.”

Mr. Crawford bowed slowly and condescendingly. Abraham was then introduced to each of the members of the school, and the exercise was a very creditable one, under the untoward circumstances. And this shall be our own introduction to one of the heroes of our story, and, following this odd introduction, we will here make our readers somewhat better acquainted with Jasper the Parable.

He was born in Thuringia, not far from the Baths of Liebenstein. His father was a German, but his mother was of English descent, and he had visited England with her in his youth, and so spoke the English language naturally and perfectly. He had become an advocate of the plans of Pestalozzi, the father of common-school education, in his early life. One of the most intimate friends of his youth was Froebel, afterward the founder of the kindergarten system of education. With Froebel he had entered the famous regiment of Luetzow; he had met Koerner, and sang the “Wild Hunt of Luetzow,” by Von Weber, as it came from the composer’s pen, the song which is said to have driven Napoleon over the Rhine. He had married, lost wife and children, become melancholy and despondent, and finally fallen under the influence of the preaching of a Tunker, and had taken the resolution to give up himself entirely, his will and desires, and to live only for others, and to follow the spiritual impression, which he believed to be the Divine will. He was simple and sincere. His friends had treated him ill on his becoming a Tunker, but he forgave them all, and said: “You reject me from your hearts and homes. I will go to the new country, and perhaps I may find there a better place for us all. If I do, I will return to you and treat you as Joseph treated his brethren. You are oppressed; you have to bear arms for years. I am left alone in the world. Something calls me over the sea.”

He lived near Marienthal, the Vale of Mary. It was a lovely place, and his heart loved it and all the old German villages, with their songs and children’s festivals, churches, and graves. He bade farewell to Froebel. “I am going to study life,” he said, “in the wilderness of the New World.” He came to Pennsylvania, and met the Brethren there who had come from Germany, and then traveled with an Indian agent to Rock Island, Illinois, where he had met Black Hawk. Here he resolved to become a traveling teacher, preacher, and missionary, after the usages of his order, and he asked Black Hawk for an interpreter and guide.

“Return to me in May,” said the chief, “and I will provide you with as noble a son of the forest as ever breathed the air.”

He returned to Ohio, and was now on his way to visit the old chief again.

The country was a wonder to him. Coming from middle Germany and the Rhine lands, everything seemed vast and limitless. The prairies with their bluebells, the prairie islands with their giant trees, the forests that shaded the streams, were all like a legend, a fairy story, a dream. He admired the heroic spirit of the pioneers, and he took the Indians to his heart. In this spirit he began to travel over the unbroken prairies of Indiana and Illinois.