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of battle, none of the thrill of danger, none of those stirring scenes which set the nerves tingling and the blood bounding through the veins, was by no means to his taste. He had been a

soldier. He did not care to become a drill-master. A field of conflict of different character lay before him, that of professional or business life, and the warlike spirit which still inspired his soul counselled him to enter upon a private career, where alone his impulse to fight seemed likely to find a vent.

WITHOUT A TRADE OR PROFESSION

His father and mother, brothers and sisters, still resided in the quiet little village of Poland, whence he had set out as a lad of eighteen to follow his country's flag and give his young life, if need were, to her cause. He had spent in the army the years when most boys are getting their training for business, with the roar of cannon and rattle of rifles in his ears instead of the bustle of trade or the activity of professional life. He had entered the years of manhood without trade or profession, and to begin his 'prentice life at his age was not an attractive prospect. But it must be done; he had chosen the alternative; he must set his shoulder to the wheel.

What career should he choose? No doubt he called the combined experience and judgment of the family to the decision of this important question, and there may have been long and anxious consultations within the precincts of that humble home. However this be, the choice finally fell upon a profession in which many a Western boy has found the route to fame and fortune, that of law. He decided to enter upon a legal career.

Little time was lost after the decision had been made. He obtained admission as a student to the office of Judge Charles E. Glidden, the leading lawyer of the county in which he resided, and then earnestly began his studies, assailing the outworks of the law as vigorously as he had attacked the intrenchments of the Confederate troops in the field.

The young man had days and years to make up.

Others of

his age were practicing in the courts before he had opened his first legal tome. There was no time to be lost. Only hard and incessant work could regain the vanished time. Night and day found him at his studies, devouring books with an ever unsatisfied appetite. He worked like a Trojan, for he had more than the difficulties of legal lore to overcome. His family were far from wealthy and his father could give him little aid. Wants and demands pressed upon him, and more than once, during his long months of study, he was sorely tempted to abandon his books and enter upon a business

career.

We are told that his elder sister was his chief mental support in his persistent study. She assured him that no sacrifice was too great to enable him to accomplish the end which he had deliberately set out to win, and her courageous spirit was, no doubt, of the utmost aid to the struggling and penniless young man. For nearly two years he continued in Judge Glidden's office, and then entered a law school at Albany, New York, where he finished his studies and graduated with success. It was in 1867 that this struggle for a profession ended, and the newly-fledged lawyer gained admission to the bar.

The next question to be decided was that all-important one for a new "limb of the law," of the best place to locate; where, in the growing State of which he was a citizen, a young lawyer might look for a reasonable share of business. Poland, with its 400 people, was no place in which to hope for success. The town finally chosen was Canton, the county-seat of Stark County, and not far away from his boyhood's home. In selecting Canton he was largely influenced by the fact that his elder sister Anna, she whose counsel had done so much towards inducing him to persist in his legal studies, was a teacher in that town, where she had won the good-will and respect of the people by her merit as an instructor and her estimable character as a woman. Her brother had the warmest affection for her, and her residence in Canton was

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naturally a strong inducement for him to settle in that town. Thither, then, he made his way, there he hung out his shingle, and there he waited for clients to drift his way. And Canton remained his legal place of residence until the day of his death, his periods of residence in Washington being but passing incidents in his

career.

ants.

CANTON BECOMES HIS HOME

Canton was not large. It had at that time about 5,000 inhabitBut to the young man, reared in a village, accustomed for four years to the wild life of a camp, and with little knowledge of large cities, no doubt it seemed a thriving and bustling place, one likely to yield abundant opportunities for legal business. Men will quarrel and do wrong in small places as in large, and in all localities where disputes are settled by the law, instead of by the stick or the sword, a lawyer's services are likely to be called into request.

Stark County, indeed, was well settled, it being a fertile and productive section of land. It lies in the Tuscarawas Valley, covering 500 square miles of productive soil. Originally it was largely settled by Dunkers, a German religious sect, immigrants from Pennsylvania. These sturdy farmers took possession of the fields, leaving to the later-coming Americans the making of the towns. The Germans were Democrats in political faith; the newcomers, English and Scotch-Irish, from the Eastern and Middle States, were stalwart Whigs. Between these two parties the county was divided, with a preponderance in favor of the Demo

crats.

Stark County, and its county seat, have grown since that day. Its population has more than doubled, while Canton is six times as large as it was when the young lawyer sought it as the seat of his fortunes. Its growth has been due to the founding of numerous manufacturing industries, giving rise to a business activity very likely to make work for the courts. These industries consisted of iron works of various kinds, woolen factories, paper mills, agricultural implement manufactories, etc.

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