as were older and wiser than himself.  His mother, about this time, married a lawyer of wealth and position, residing in the interior of New York, who, appreciating the talent of the boy, aided him in his laudable endeavors to obtain an education, and sent him to the academy at Canandaigua in that State.  There Douglas was soon among the first.  He was the most popular speaker of them all, pleasing old and young, and causing the hall of the academy to be filled with an interested audience whenever it was known that he was to be the orator of the night.  His love of humor and his keen sense of the ludicrous aided him not a little in the quick repartee, for which he was then, as since, noted.  He was far from idle during the three years of his life at Canandaigua; for, besides applying himself with untiring energy and zeal to the pursuit of a classical course at the academy, he devoted much of his time to reading in the law office of the Messrs. Hubbell.  His examiners for the bar stated that they had never before met a student who in so short a time made such proficiency; and while they took pleasure in complimenting him, they also extended to him the privileges which are accorded by rule only to those who have pursued a complete collegiate course.  This was especially gratifying and stimulating to Douglas, who remarked to a fellow-student that for the wealth of a continent he would not have had his “mother die without hearing that intelligence of her son’s progress.”

At the age of twenty, Douglas commenced, with the fairest prospects, the practice of law in the beautiful village of Cleveland, Ohio.  Hardly had the paint on his “shingle” become dry, when a sudden attack of bilious fever prostrated him, and confined him to his room for months.  He was thoroughly restless; he pined for action; and when his physician said to him, “Sir, if you allow yourself to fret in this manner, you will certainly frustrate my efforts, and die,” he replied, “Not now, Doctor; there’s work ahead for me.”  Upon his recovery, he found himself in a situation such as would crush the spirit of ninety-nine men in a hundred.  He was weak, with but a few dollars, with no friends, in a region of country that did not promise him health, and with no knowledge of other localities.  He paid his debts and left the place.  He wandered, literally, from town to town, until his means were gone and his strength well-nigh exhausted, when, on a bright Wednesday morning in the month of November, 1833, he reached the village of Winchester, Illinois.

In his head were his brains, in his pocket his cash resources, namely, thirty-seven and a half cents, and in a checkered blue handkerchief his school-books and his wardrobe.  He knew no one there, he had no plan of action, and, foot-sore, with heavy heart, he leaned against a post in the public square, and for the first time in his life gave way to gloomy forebodings.  He had, however, entered the town where his fortunes were to mend, his life to receive new vigor, and his successful career to begin.