in gratifying this ambition is yet to be developed. I am young,
and unknown to many of you. I was born, and have ever remained,
in the most humble walks of life. I have no wealthy or popular
relations or friends to recommend me. My case is thrown
exclusively upon the independent voters of the county; and if
elected, they will have conferred a favor upon me for which I
shall be unremitting in my labors to compensate. But if the good
people in their wisdom shall see fit to keep me in the
background, I have been too familiar with disappointments to be
very much chagrined."

He soon had an opportunity of being useful to his fellow-men,
though in a way very different from the one he was seeking. About
four weeks after he had published his letter "To the People of
Sangamon County," news came that Black Hawk, the veteran
war-chief of the Sac Indians, was heading an expedition to cross
the Mississippi River and occupy once more the lands that had
been the home of his people. There was great excitement among the
settlers in Northern Illinois, and the governor called for six
hundred volunteers to take part in a campaign against the
Indians. He met a quick response; and Lincoln, unmindful of what
might become of his campaign for the legislature if he went away,
was among the first to enlist. When his company met on the
village green to choose their officers, three-quarters of the
men, to Lincoln's intense surprise and pleasure, marched over to
the spot where he was standing and grouped themselves around him,
signifying in this way their wish to make him captain. We have
his own word for it that no success of his after life gave him
nearly as much satisfaction. On April 21, two days after the call
for volunteers had been printed, the company was organized. A