He had already become an easy, fluent, and forcible speaker--a very necessary qualification for the great work of his life.
"Oh, I suppose he had a talent for it," some of my young readers may say.
Probably he had; indeed, it is certain that he had, but it may encourage them to learn that he found difficulties at the start.

When a student at Geauga, he made his first public speech.

It was a six minutes' oration at the annual exhibition, delivered in connection with a literary society to which he belonged.

He records in a diary kept at the time that he "was very much scared," and "very glad of a short curtain across the platform that hid my shaking legs from the audience." Such experiences are not uncommon in the career of men afterward noted for their ease in public speaking.

I can recall such, and so doubtless can any man of academic or college training.