He made so many new
friends that he decided to be a candidate for the Illinois legislature.
One day during the campaign he had a long talk with Major John T.
Stuart. Major Stuart had been Abe's commander in the Black Hawk War. He
was now a lawyer in Springfield, a larger town twenty miles away.
"Why don't you study law?" he asked.
Abe pursed his lips. "I'd sure like to," he drawled; then added with a
grin: "But I don't know if I have enough sense."
Major Stuart paid no attention to this last remark. "You have been
reading law for pleasure," he went on. "Now go at it in earnest. I'll
lend you the books you need."
This was a chance that Abe could not afford to miss. Every few days he
walked or rode on horseback to Springfield to borrow another volume.
Sometimes he read forty pages on the way home. He was twenty-five years
old, and there was no time to waste.
Meanwhile he was making many speeches. He asked the voters in his part
of Illinois to elect him to the legislature which made the laws for the
state. They felt that "Honest Abe" was a man to be trusted and he was
elected.
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