From the age of five or six until seventeen, I attended the subscription schools of the village, except during the winters of 1836-7 and 1838-9.

The former period was spent in Maysville, Kentucky, attending the school of Richardson and Rand; the latter in Ripley, Ohio, at a private school.

I was not studious in habit, and probably did not make progress enough to compensate for the outlay for board and tuition.

At all events both winters were spent in going over the same old arithmetic which I knew every word of before, and repeating: "A noun is the name of a thing," which I had also heard my Georgetown teachers repeat, until I had come to believe it--but I cast no reflections upon my old teacher, Richardson.

He turned out bright scholars from his school, many of whom have filled conspicuous places in the service of their States.