called "The Elms" on account of the
fine old trees which grew there. The older Webster boys did all kinds of
heavy work, but as Daniel was not very strong, he was petted, and as he
grew up, was asked to do only very light work. He rode the plow horse in
the fields, drove the cows to pasture, and tended logs in his father's
sawmill. When he was sent to do this last, he always took a book along,
because it took twenty minutes for the saw to work its teeth through one
of the tree-trunks, and he could not bear to waste all that time. He
learned to read from his mother and sister almost as soon as he could
talk, and he pored over the Bible for hours at a time.

Daniel's father kept a tavern, besides carrying on his farm. The
teamsters who got their dinners there used to ask Daniel to read to
them. His voice was deep and musical, and he gave such meaning to the
words of the Bible that they thought him a wonder. His eyes were like
black velvet, and his hair was as black and shiny as the feathers of a
crow. Every one called him "little black Dan."

Daniel read everything he could find, and could recite whole poems and
chapters of books when he was quite small. At a country store, just
across the road from his father's tavern, he bought a cotton
pocket-handkerchief on which the Constitution of the United States was
printed. After looking at the eagles and flags which were printed as a
border, he sat down under one of the giant elm trees and learned by
heart every word printed there.

Daniel liked to wander along the banks of the Merrimac River, and as he
played in the fields and woods, he learned a great deal about animals
and plants. Robert Wise taught him to fish for the salmon and shad that
were plenty about there. Robert Wise was an old English sailor, who
lived with his wife in a cottage on the Webster farm. He told Daniel
famous stories of the strange countries he had sailed to. This man could
not read, so he felt well repaid for carrying little black Dan on his
shoulder, or paddling him up and down streams half a day at a time, if
the boy would go after supper to his cottage and read aloud to him from
books or newspapers.

Daniel loved all outdoor beauty, the sun, moon, and stars, the ocean,
and the wind. In almost every one of the great speeches that he made, as
a middle-aged, or old man, he mentioned them.

In the state of New Hampshire, when Daniel was a boy, teachers and
schools were scarce. A man or a woman woul