swered by relating this anecdote about his father:

"The last time I saw my father he was sixty-four years of age. He was about to mount a tall and restless horse, so that it was difficult for him to put his foot in the stirrup. Suddenly he vaulted from the ground into the saddle without any assistance. He was usually of a grave and stoical character, and of such sound judgment that his opinions were a law to his children, and quoted by them long after he had gone to his final rest, and when they were growing old."

Mr. Davis then continued his dictation:

My parents lived near Augusta, Ga., where they had a farm, on which they resided until after the birth of several children, when they moved to what was then known as the Green River country, in the southwestern part of Kentucky. There father engaged in tobacco planting and raising blooded horses, of which he had some of the finest in the country.

my

"I was born on the 3d of June, 1808, in what was then Christian County. The spot is now in Todd County, and upon the exact site of my birthplace has since been built the Baptist church of Fairview.*

*In 1886 Mr. Davis attended and made a speech at the presentation of his birthplace to the trustees of the Baptist congregation.

"During my infancy my father removed to Bayou Têche, in Louisiana; but, as his children suffered from acclimatization, he sought a higher and healthier district. He found a place that suited him about a mile east of Woodville, in Wilkinson County, Miss. He removed his family there, and there my memories begin.

My father's family consisted of ten children, of whom I was the youngest. There were five sons and five daughters, and all of them arrived at maturity excepting one daugh ter. My elder brother, Joseph, remained in Kentucky when the rest of the family removed, and studied law at Hopkinsville in the office of Judge Wallace. He subsequently came to Mississippi, where he practised his profession for many years, and then became a cotton-planter, in Warren County, Miss. He was successful both as a planter and a lawyer, and, at the beginning of the war between the States, possessed a very large fortune.

"Three of my brothers bore arms in the War of 1812, and the fourth was prevented

All the surviving friends and neighbors of his father and of his own boyhood were present, and received Mr. Davis with the tenderest affection. It was my husband's last visit to his birthplace, and gave him much pleasure. The house was taken down, moved, and reerected as a parsonage on a lot adjacent to the new church.

from being in the army by an event so characteristic of the times, yet so unusual elsewhere, that it may be deemed worthy of note. When it was reported that the British were advancing to the attack of New Orleans, the men of Wilkinson County, who were then at home, commenced volunteering so rapidly that it was deemed necessary to put a check upon it, so as to retain a sufficent number at home for police purposes. For this purpose a county court, consisting of a justice and quorum, ordered a draft for a certain number of men to stay at home. This draft stopped my brother, who was about to start for New Orleans-making him the exception of my father's adult sons who were not engaged in the defence of the country during the War of 1812.

"The part of the county in which my father resided was at that time sparsely settled. Wilkinson County is the southwestern county of the State. Its western boundary is the Mississippi River. The land near the river, although very hilly, was quite rich. Toward the east it fell off into easy ridges, the soil became thin, and the eastern boundary was a 'pine country.' My father's residence was at the boundary line between the two kinds of soil. The population of the county, in the western portion of it, was generally composed

of Kentuckians, Virginians, Tennesseeans, and the like; while the eastern part of it was chiefly settled by South Carolinians and Georgians, who were generally said to be unable to live without 'lightwood' *—which is fat pine. The schools were kept in log-cabins, and it was many years before we had a 'County Academy.'

Mississippi was a part of the territory ceded by Georgia to the United States. Its early history was marked by conflicts with the Spanish authorities, who had held possession, and who had a fort and garrison in Natchez.

"During the administration of President. Adams a military force was sent down to take possession of the country. It was commanded by General Wilkinson, for whom the county in which we lived was named. He built a fort overlooking the Mississippi, and named it, in honor of the President, Fort Adams. There is still a village and riverlanding by that name.

"My first tuition was in the usual logcabin school-house; † though in the summer,

The necessity for "fat pine" is not understood now that lucifer matches are in such general use. It is hard to recall when they were invented, but I remember when a flint and a piece of punk were the precarious means of “striking a light,” and when the kitchen fire was of nearly as great importance as the sacred flame of India, and kept up religiously by the cook.

At this time Jefferson and his little sister Pollie used to take a

when I was seven years old, I was sent on horseback through what was then called 'The Wilderness '-by the country of the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations-to Kentucky, and was placed in a Catholic institution then known as St. Thomas, in Washington County, near the town of Springfield.

"In that day (1815) there were no steamboats, nor were there stage-coaches traversing the country. The river trade was conducted on flat- and keel-boats. The lastnamed only could be taken up the river. Commerce between the Western States and the Lower Mississippi was confined to waterroutes. The usual mode of travel was on horseback or afoot. Many persons who had gone down the river in flat-boats walked back through the wilderness to Kentucky, Ohio,

basket of luncheon and walk to school. She was two years older than he, but he thought he must take care of her. There used to be a peripatetic chair-mender who carried home his work in stacks on his head. He often got so drunk as to stagger aimlessly about, and at these times was quarrelsome, not to say dangerous ; but, at all events, he was an object of terror to the children. One day they were in the thickest and loneliest of the woods on their way to school, and they saw him, as they supposed, with his load poised high above him, reeling along in the road, coming directly toward them. The five-year-old hero took his sister's hand and said, "We will not run;" so they stood terrified, but waiting the old drunkard. Instead of the legs of chairs it was the antlers of a splendid buck, which walked up quite near to these babes in the wood, looked at them for some minutes, and turned off. They stood their ground; but it was a wild beast to them.