From Canal Boy to President

of Cleveland, who was part proprietor of the line of canal-boats on which the boy was employed. Edmund Kirke, however, conveys the impression that James was a stranger to the doctor at

on or two before, but now were far outgrown, reaching only half-way down from the tops of his cowhide boots. His waistcoat also was much too short, and his coat was threadbare, the sleeves being so short as to display a considerable portion of his arms. Add to these a

ou?" asked

ames Garfield

hen you were a babe, but you have outgr

to see you alon

orhood of the house, and then, sitting down on a log, t

er I had better take a course of liberal study. I am contemplating doing so, as my desire is in that direction. But if I a

eat care. I examined his head and saw that there was a magnificent brain there. I sounded his lungs, and found that they were strong, and capable of making good blood. I felt his pulse, and felt that there was an engine capable of sending the blood up to the head to feed the brain. I had seen many strong physi

a Webster, and you have the physical proportions that will back you in the most herculean efforts. Al

he resolution of James. If he were really so well fitted for the work and the career which his mother desi

to sea. He deliberately decided to become a scho

oney he had at command was the seventeen dollars which his mother had offered him. He

determination, two boys, one a cousin

door, and the boys with their trunks or valises were taken on board, but if so, imagination wo

at awaited James in his new home. I am afraid that the hearts of many of my young readers would sink within them if they thought that they must buy an education at such a cost as that. But let them not forget that this homespun boy, with his poor

enturers traveling into the domains of science with hopeful hearts and fresh courage, not altogethe

alled upon the principal and annou

I hope you mean

ly. "I am poor, and I want to get

nts, and I will help

eeded in borrowing a few dilapidated chairs from a neighbor who did not require them, and some straw ticks, which they spread upon the floo

it was a considerable advance upon any school that James had hitherto attended. English grammar, natural philosophy, arithmetic, and algebra-these were the principal studies to which James

boys a night or two after th

s time it is the turn of the one in

oys?" he asks, for the procurin

eggs," said Henry

ead, which I got at the b

ead and fried eggs. There i

a cent a dozen," re

hem. Probably even then the price was not greater than six to ei

n," said James, philosophically,

way down the street," said Henry. "I

und there a

as supplied with four fried eggs and as much bread as he cared for. Probably

hen, returning to their humble room, spent the e

cation and intuition great, as Dr. Robinson had implied. From the time he entered Geaug