Genius delights in hatching her offspring in out-of-the-way places.-Irving.
When some great work is waiting to be done,
And Destiny ransacks the city for a man
To do it; finding none therein, she turns
To the fecundity of Nature's woods,
And there, beside some Western hill or stream,
She enters a rude cabin unannounced,
And ere the rough frontiersman from his toil,
Where all day long he hews the thickets down,
Returns at evening, she salutes his wife,
His fair young wife, and says, Behold! thou art
The Mother of the Future!-Anonymous.
EN, like books, have their beginnings. James Abram Garfield was born on the 19th day of November, 1831. His first outlook upon things was from a cabin door in Cuyahoga County, Ohio. The building was of rough logs, with mud between the cracks, to keep out the winter cold. The single room had a puncheon floor, and on one side a large fire-place, with a blackened crane for cooking purposes. In winter evenings, a vast pile of blazing logs in this fire-place filled the cabin with a cheerful warmth and ruddy glow. Overhead, from the rude rafters, hung rows of well-cured hams, and around the mud chimney were long strings of red-pepper pods and dried pumpkins. The furniture was as primitive as the apartment. A puncheon table, a clumsy cupboard, a couple of large bedsteads, made by driving stakes in the floor, some blocks for seats, and a well-kept gun,