Points of Difference between AuveiHists and their Opponents, 1. WE hold that the prophetic days of Daniel and John are years ; as did Wesley, Scott, Clark, Fletcher, the learned Joseph Mede, Faber, Prideaux, Dr. Hales, BishorJ* Newton, and Sir Isaac Newton, with all the standard protestant commentators. Our opponents claim that they are simply days, or half-days ! 2. We claim that the prophecies of Daniel and John are his- torical prophecies, extending to the end o/ time, as all Chris- tians have held, according to the undoubted testimony of histo- rians, till our day. And if the end is not brought to view by these prophecies, they are to us inexplicable. 3. We claim that the ninth of Daniel is an appendix to the eighth, and that the seventy weeks and the 2300 days or years commence together. Our opponents deny this. Dr. Hales renders Dan. ix. 27 thus : " But one week shall establish a [new] covenant with many;. and half of the \veek shall abrogate the [daily] sacrifice and oblation. And upon the pinnacle [or battlement of the temple shall stand] the abomina- tion of desolation, even until the consummation [of the 2300 days.] But then the decreed [desolation] shall be poured [in turn] upon the desolator." He then adds, " This chronological prophecy (which I have attempted to render more closely and intelligibly, supplying the ellipsis necessary to complete the sense of the original,) was evidently designed to explain the foregoing vision, espe- cially in its chronological part of the 2300 days ; at the end of which the predicted desolation of the Jews should cease, and their sanctuary be cleansed." If the " EXCEEDING GREAT HORN " of Dan. viii. is ROME, as all standard protestant commentators admit, it fol- lows that the 2300 days must be years. And as the 2300 days extend to the cleansing of the sanctuary, and the sanctuary is to be desolated to the end of the world ; if they begin with the seventy weeks, it follows that we have approached the very con- summation, and may look daily for the coining of the Son of God. 4. We believe that the longer prophetic periods mark the limits of probation ; and that when they expire, the Lord him- I self will descend from heaven with a shout, raise all the right- ! eons dead in incorruption and glory, change all the righteous I living from mortality to immortality, restore the whole earth to its Eden state, and set up God's everlasting kingdom. Then the kingdom and the dominion, and the greatness of the king- dom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the-peopfe of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting king- dom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him. Our oppo- nents locate their abode above the whole heaven. THE POOR RICH MAN, THE RICH POOR MAN. BY THE AUTHOR OF "HOPE LESLIE," "THE LINWOODS," &c. * There i that maketb himself rich, jet hath nothing : there is that maketb himself poor yet hath great riches." NEW-YORK: HARPER &. BROTHERS, CLIP F-S TREE T. 1838. LIBRARY ^ixSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVIS {Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1836, by HARPER & BROTHERS, in the Clerk's Office of the Southern District of New-York.] TO THE REV. JOSEPH TUCKERMAN, THE POOR MAN'S FRIEND, THIS UTTLE VOLUME IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED BY THE AUTHOR CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. School-Days Page 9 CHAPTER II. Uncle Phil" .18 CHAPTER III. A Friend in Need 24 CHAPTER IV A Poor Man's Journey 33 CHAPTER V. Charlotte's Return .^r. 37 CHAPTER VI. Showers and Sunshine 53 CHAPTER VII. Love-Letters . . 62 CHAPTER VIII. A Peep into the Poor Rich Man's House 75 CHAPTER IX. A Peep into the Rich Poor Man's House . - . . . 81 CHAPTER X. The Rich Poor Man's Charities .... .88 8 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XI. An Orphan Girl Page 95 CHAPTER XII. " Society" at the Poor Man's Home . . . . . .104 CHAPTER XIII. " Society" at the Rich Man's House 118 CHAPTER XIV. An Old Acquaintance not " Forgot" 125 CHAPTER XV. The Rich Man's Charities 137 CHAPTER XVI. Another Rich Merchant's House 144 CHAPTER XVII. A Cure for the Heartache 148 CHAPTER XJJH. Light in a Dark Place . . . W; 159 CHAPTER XIX. A Death-Bed 165 CHAPTER XX. The Conclusion 172 Note 180 THE POOR RICH MAN, RICH POOR MAN. CHAPTER I. SCHOOL-DAYS. JUST out of the little village of Essex, in New England, and just at the entrance of a rustic bridge, there is a favourite resting-place for loiterers of all ages. One of a line of logs that have been laid down to enable passengers at high water to reach the bridge dry-shod, affords an inviting seat under the drooping limbs of some tali sycamores. There the old sit down to rest their weary limbs, and read with pensive eye the fond histories that mem- ory has written over the haunts of their secluded lives. There, too, the young pause in their sports, and hardly know why their eyes follow with such delight the silvery little stream that steals away from them, kissing the jutting points of the green meadows, and winding and doubling its course as if, like a pleased child, it would, by any pretext, lengthen its stay ; nor, certainly, why no island that water bounds will ever look so beautiful to them as that little speck of one above the bridge, 10 THE POOK. RICH MAN. with its burden of willows, elders, and clematis ; of a summer evening, their every leaf lit with the firefly's lamp ; nor why their eye glances from the white houses of the village street,- glimmering- through the trees, and far away over the orchards and waving grain of the uplands, and past the wavy line of hills that bound the horizon on one side, to fix on .the bald gray peaks of that mountain wall whose Indian story the poet has consecrated. Time will solve to them this why. Under those sycamores, on a certain afternoon many years past, sat Charlotte May, a pale, sickly- looking girl, talking with Harry Aikin ; and beside them Susan May, whose ruddy cheek, laughing eye, and stocky little person presented an almost pain- ful contrast to her stricken sister. Charlotte was examining with a very pleased countenance a new little Bible, bound in red morocco. " Did Mr. Reed give you your choice of the prizes, Harry ?" she asked. " Oh, no ; Mr. Reed is too much afraid of exci- ting our emulation, or rivalry, as he calls it, for that. He would not even call the books he gave us prizes ; but he just told us what virtue, or rath- er quality, we had been most distinguished for." " I guess I know what yours was, Harry," said Susan May, looking up from weaving a wreath of nightshade that grew about them. " What do you guess, Susy ?" " Why, kindness to everybody !" " No, not that." " Well, then, loving everybody." Harry laughed and shook his head. " No, nor that, Susy ;" and, opening to the first unprinted page SCHOOL-DAYS. 11 of ihe Bible, he pointed to the following testimony, in his master's autograph. Charlotte read it aloud : " It gives me great pleasure to record here the diligence and success of my esteemed pupil, Harry Aikin, and still more to testify to his strict practice of the golden rule of this book, Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you." " There, there ! I knew I guessed right. You know you couldn't do so if you didn't love every- body ; could he, Lottie ?" *' You were not very far from right, Susan," re- plied her sister ; " for I am sure Harry could not do so much to make everybody happy if he did not love almost everybody." " No, indeed, I do not ; at least, I feel a great difference. Do you think, for instance, I love Morris Finley or Paulina Clark as well as I love you and Susan 1 No, not by a sea-full. But, then, it is very true, as mother used to tell me, if you want to love people, or almost love them, just do them a kindness, think how you can set about to make them happier, and the love, or something that will answer the purpose, will be pretty sure to come." " It will," said Charlotte, with a faint smile ; " otherwise how could we live up to the rule of this book ; and certainly God never gave us a law that we could not obey if we would. 0, Harry, I am so glad you got the Bible instead of any of the other books, for' I know you will love it, and study it, and live after it." " I will try, Lottie." " But, then, Harry, it seems to me those that are well, and strong, and at ease, can never value 12 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. that book as those do who are always sick, and suffering pain." It was the rarest thing in the world for Charlotte to allude to her peculiar trials. Harry looked sad, and little Susan, who had the most marvellous fac- ulty of seeing a bright side to every thing, said, ia a tender voice, and putting her arm round her sis- ter's neck, " Then, Lottie, there is some comfort in being sick, is not there ?" 4< There is, Susan ; there is comfort when you cannot eat, nor sleep, nor walk abroad in the pure air, nor look out upon this beautiful world ; when neither doctors' skill nor friends' love can lessen one pang, it is then comfort it is life to the dead y Susan, to read in this blessed book of God's good- ness and compassions ; to sit, as it were, at the feet of Jesus, and learn from him who brought life and immortality to light ; that there is a world where there is no more sickness nor pain where all tears are wiped away." There was a pause, first broken by Susan ask- ing if those that were well and happy did not love to read the Bible too. " Oh, yes, indeed," replied Harry ; " I remember mother used to say she read the Bible for every thing to make her wiser, and better, and happier. I believe seeing mother so happy over it has made me like it more." " I should think so," said Susan ; " I am sure I should not love to read any thing that did not make me happy but here comes Morris ; what book did you get, Morris ?" " Bewick's History of Birds." SCHOOL-DAYS. 13 " Oh, full of pictures how lovely !" exclaimed Susan, running over the leaves ; " did Paulina Clark get a book, Morris ?" " Yes, and she has changed it at Hutchinson's store for a pink silk handkerchief." " How could she 1 I am sorry !" said Charlotte. " It's just like her !" said Susan ; and then, re- turning Morris's book, she added, " after all, I had rather have Harry's Bible." " The more goose you, then my book cost twice as much as his Bible." " Did it ?" Susan was rather crestfallen. "To be sure it did, and, what is more, I can sell it for twice as much." " Ah, then I've caught you, sir ; Harry would not sell his Bible for any sum, so by your own rule Harry's is worth the most !" Morris was somewhat disconcerted. He re- sumed, in a lowered tone, " Maybe I should not sell it just for the dollar and a half ; but, then, when one knows the value of money, one does not like to have so much lying idle. Money shoul(J work, as father says. If you could reckon interest and compound interest as well as I can, Miss Susan, I guess you would not like to have your money lying idle on a book-shelf!" " I don't know what kind of interest compound interest is, Morris ; but I know the interest I take in a pleasant book is better than a handful of money, and if I only had the dollar and a half I would give it to you in a minute for that book." {' ' Only had /' Ah, there's the rub ! you people that despise money never get it, and that is what father always says" B 14 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. " ' Despise it /' " repeated Susan, sighing as she knelt on the log between Harry and her sister, and bound over Charlotte's pale forehead the wreath of ominous nightshade. " ' Despise money,' Morris, I would do any thing in the world to get enough to take Lottie down to that wonderful New- York doctor ; but there's one comfort, Lottie," she added, brightening, " he might not cure you, and then we should feel worse than ever." " What doctor is Sue speaking of ?" asked Harry, looking up eagerly from his Bible. Charlotte explained that a cousin living in New- York had written to her of a physician in the city, who had been particularly successful in treating diseases of the spine. Her cousin had urged Charlotte's coming to the city, and had kindly offered to receive the poor invalid at her house. " Father," she said, " talks of our going, but I do not think we can make it out, so I don't allow myself to think of it much ; and when mur- muring thoughts rise, I remember how many rich people there are who travel the world over, and consult all the doctors, and are nothing bettered ; and so I put a little patience-salve on the aching place, and that, as Susy would say, is a great com- fort when you can't get any thing else." " Yes when you can't," replied Harry, fixing his eyes compassionately on Charlotte's face, where, though the cheek was pale, and the eye sunken, the health of the soul was apparent. " But can't there be some way contrived ?" " We are trying our best at contrivance, Harry. Father, you know, never has any thing ahead ; but he offered himself to let out old Jock by the day, and SCHOOL-DAYS. 15 save all he earns towards the journey ; that will be something. I have three dollars left of the last I ever earned, and dear little Susy has given me five dol- lars, which aunt Mary sent to buy her a cloak." " And how much will the journey cost, Char- lotte ?" " Father says his last journey down to Barnsta- ble cost him but ten dollars besides the provision and fodder he carried in the wagon. New- York is not as far as Barnstable ; but horse-keeping there is terrible, and I dare not think what the doctor's bill may be." " Oh," thought Harry, " if I were only rich ! if I were only worth fifty dollars !" Money he had none, but he ran over in his mind all his converti- ble property. " There's Bounce (his dog) ; Squire Allen offered me three dollars for Bounce I thought I would not sell him for a hundred, but he shall have him and I have been offered two dol- lars for Sprite and Jumper (two black squirrels he had tamed with infinite pains) ; and what else have I ?" He ran over his little possessions, his wear- ing apparel, article by article ; he had no superflui- ty sundry little keepsakes, but they were out of the class of money-value articles his Bible, it was new and pretty, and would certainly bring a dollar. He looked at it lovingly, and was obliged again to look at Charlotte before he mentally added it to the list. He resolved on his benevolent traffic, and was just saying, " To-morrow, Charlotte,! think I shall have something to add to your store," when Morris, who had taken a seat at some distance, and seemed much absorbed, started up, exclaiming, " Yes, in five years, at compound interest, I 16 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. shall have two dollars and a fraction won't that be a nest-egg, Harry Aikin ?" A tear in Charlotte's eye had already replied to Harry, but any reply to Morris was cut off by the appearance of Charlotte's father, Philip May, com ing down the road. Philip was a most inoffen- sive, kind-hearted creature ; and, though rather an unproductive labourer in worldly matters, he had, by dint of harming no one, and serving every one rather better than himself, kept bright the links of human brotherhood, and made them felt, too, for his general appellation was " Uncle Phil." As " Uncle Phil" approached, it was apparent that the calm current of his feelings had been ruffled. Little Susan, her father's pet, with the unerring eye of a loving child, was the first to perceive this. " What's the matter, father ?" she asked. "Oh, dreadful bad news ! I don't know how you'll stand it, Charlotte" the girls were breath- less- " poor Jock is gone !" " Gone, sir ! how gone ? what do you mean ?" " Clean gone ! drownded /" " Drowned ! oh, dear, how sorry I am !" and 14 poor Jock !" was exclaimed and reiterated, while Uncle Phil turned away to hide certain convulsive twitches of his muscles. " But it's some comfort, any how," said Susan, the first to recover herself, " that he was so old he must have died of his own accord before long." " And that comfort you would have had if it had been me instead of Jock, Susan." " Oh, father !" "I did not mean nothing, child ; I'm sure I think it is kind of providential to have a lively dis- SCHOOL-DAYS. 17 position, that's always rising over the top of every trouble. But then it's so inconvenient to lose Jock just now, when he's arning money for us ; and how in natur am I ever to get Charlotte to New- York without him ?" " Don't think of that now, father ; how did the accident happen ?" " Ah, that's the onluckiest of all ; it beats all that Sam should be so careless. You know I let Jock out to Sam Glover to plough his meadow you said, Charlotte, Jock looked too low in flesh for hard work ; I wish 1 had taken your warning ! Well, you see, when Sam went to dinner, he tied Jock close by the river, and somehow the poor critter backed down the bank into the river, and fell on his back, and he was tied in such a fashion he could not move one way or the other, and the water running into his nostrils, and ears, and mouth and when Sam came back from dinner it was all over with him." " Then," said Morris, " it was wholly owing to Sam Glover's carelessness ?" " To be sure, there was no need on't ; if it had been me, I should have calculated to tie the horse so that if he did back into the river he could have helped himself out." " Better have tied him where there was no dan- ger of such an accident, Uncle Phil." Uncle Phil was right in his calculations. What were acci- dents to other men, made up the current of events to him. " But," proceeded Morris, " you can cer- tainly make Sam pay for the horse ?" Uncle Phil made no reply. " You mean to get it out of him, don't you, Uncle Phil ?" 18 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. " I kind o' hate to Sam ain't rich." " No but he is not poor. I heard him say to father, when he was talking of buying the mountain farm, that he had two hundred dollars clear of the world." " He did not, did he ?" " He certainly did, and I don't see why you should make him a present of your horse." " Nor do I see, father, why you should not be just to yourself," said Charlotte. " Well, well, I calculate to do what's fair, all round but Sam felt bad, I tell you ! and I did not want to bear down on him ; but when I've got the mind of the street, I'll do something about speaking to him." Charlotte mentally determined to keep her father up to this resolution, the most energetic that could be expected from him ; and all lamenting the fate of poor Jock, the parties separated and pro- ceeded homeward. CHAPTER II. "UNCLE PHIL" WE have rathe*r unceremoniously presented some of the humble inhabitants of Essex to our readers. A few more preparatory words to en- sure a better acquaintance. Philip May was bred a hatter. His trade and patrimony (amounting to "UNCLE PHIL." 19 a few hundred dollars) would have ensured inde- pendence to most of his countrymen ; but Philip lacked their characteristics energy and sound judgment, and all the prospering go-ahead quali- ties that abound with them. But, lacking these, a most kind Providence had given him a disposi- tion that made him content without them, and quite independent of their results. His horizon was bounded by the present hour he literally took no thought for the morrow. He married early, and in this turning point of life Heaven seemed to have taken special care of him. Never was a wife better calculated by vigour, firmness, and in- dustry, to counteract the destructive tendencies of a shiftless husband. Nor was she, like some dri- ving wives, a thorn in her quiet, loving husband's side. While she cured all the evils that could be cured in her condition, she endured the incura- ble with cheerfulness a marvellous lightener of the burdens of life ! Before his marriage Philip built a house, the cost of which far exceeding his means, he finished but one end of it, and the rest was left for the rains to enter, and the winds to whistle through, till he took his wife's counsel, sold his house, paid his debts, and bought a snug little dwelling far more comfortable than their " shingle palace" in its best state. But, before they arrived at this stage in the journey of life, both good and evil had chanced to them. Their firstborn, Ellen, ran into an open cistern, the surface of which was just on a level with the platform before the house : so it had re- mained a year after the active child began to run 20 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. about ; and, to its mother's reiterated requests and warnings, Philip always answered " Now that's just what I am going about next week." When his only child was drowned in this seeming water- trap was certainly no time to reproach Philip, and he who never reproached any one could not be ex- pected to make himself an exception. He merely said, " It was a wonderful providence Ellen was drowned that day, for the very next he calculated to put a kerb to the cistern but it was meant so to be he always felt Ellen was not long for this world !" Their next child was our friend Charlotte ; and she, like her drowned sister, was born with one of the best mortal gifts a sound constitution, which, watched over by her wise and vigilant mother, promised a long life of physical comfort. But these prospects were sadly reversed when her father, having one day taken her out in his wagon, left her holding the reins " while he just stepped to speak to a neighbour." While he was speaking, the horse took fright, Charlotte was thrown out, and received an injury that imbittered her whole life. Philip was really grieved by this accident. He said " It seemed somehow as if it was so to be, for he had no thought of taking Char- lotte out that day till he met her in his way." His next mishap was the burning of his work- shop, in which, on one gusty day, he left a blazing fire. A consequence so natural seemed very strange to Uncle Phil, who said "It was most ^accounta- ble, for he had often left it just so, and it had nev- er burnt up before !" This incident gave a new turn to Philip's life. He abandoned his trade, and really loving, or, as he said; " aiming" to suit every 21 body, he was glad to be rid of incessant complaints of want of punctuality, bad materials, and bad work, and became what most imbeciles become sooner or later, a Jack at all trades. In a community like that at Essex, where labourers in every depart- ment are few, and work plenty, even the universal Jack need not starve ; and Uncle Phil, if unskilful and slack, was always good-natured, and seldom so much engrossed by one employment that he could not leave it for another. But, though rather an unprofitable labourer, Uncle Phil had no vices. He was temperate and frugal in his habits, and a striking illustration of how far these virtues alone will sustain a man even in worldly matters. His small supplies were so well managed by his wife, that no want was felt by his family during her life. That valuable life was prematurely ended. Soon after the birth of her last baby, Uncle Phil was called up in the night by some cattle having entered his garden through his rickety fence. His bed- room door opened upon the yard ; he left it open ; it was a damp, chilling night. Mrs. May, being her own nurse, had fallen asleep exhausted. She awoke in an ague that proved the prelude to a fatal illness ; and Uncle Phil, being no curious tra- cer of effects to causes, took no note of the open door, and the damp night, and replied to the con- dolence of his friends that " Miss May was too good a wife for him the only wonder was Provi- dence had spared her so long." More gifted peo- ple than honest Uncle Phil deposite quietly at the door of Providence the natural consequences of their own carelessness. The baby soon followed its mother, and Philip 22 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. May was left with but two children Charlotte, at the time of her mother's death, thirteen, and Susan, nine. They had been so far admirably trained by their mother, and were imbued with her character, seeming only to resemble their father in hearts running over with the milk of human kindness, un- less Susan's all-conquering cheerfulness was de- rived from her father's ever-acquiescing patience. His was a passive virtue hers an active princi- ple. If any one unacquainted with the condition of life in New-England should imagine that the Mays had suffered the evils of real poverty, they must allow us to set them right. In all our wide- spread country there is very little necessary pov- erty. In New-England none that is not the result of vice or disease. If the moral and physical laws of the Creator were obeyed, the first of these causes would be at an end, and the second would scarcely exist.* Industry and frugality are won- derful multipliers of small means. Philip May brought in but little, but that little was well admin- istered. His house was clean his garden pro- ductive (the girls kept it wed) his furniture care- fully preserved his family comfortably clad, and his girls schooled. No wonder Uncle Phil never dreamed he was a poor man ! Henry Aikin was the youngest of twelve chil- dren. His father was a farmer all his property, real and personal, might have amounted to some * We have heard a gentleman who, in virtue of the office he holds as minister at large, is devoted to succouring the poor, state, that even in this city (New -York), he had known very few cases of suffering from poverty that might not be traced directly or indirectly to vice. "UNCLE PHIL." 23 five or six thousand dollars, and on this he had his dozen children to feed and clothe, and fit to fill honourable places in society to be farmers, me- chanics, doctors, ministers, and so on. In such a family, well regulated, there are excellent lessons in the economy of human life, and well learned were they by the Aikins, and afterward well ap- plied. Morris Finley was the son of the only man in Essex who had not any regular business. He was what our rustics call a schemer and a jockey ; in a larger sphere he would have been a specula- tor. Money, not as a means, but as an end, seem- ed to him the chief good ; and he had always a plan for getting a little more of it than his neigh- bours. He was keen-sighted and quick-witted ; of course he often succeeded, but sometimes failed ; and, distrusted and disliked through life, at the end of it he was not richer in worldly goods than his neighbours, and poor indeed was he in all other respects. He had, however, infused his ruling passion into his son Morris, and he, being better educated than his father, and regularly trained to business, had a far better chance of ultimate suc- cess. 24 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. CHAPTER III. A FRIEND IN NEED. A WINTER had passed away, and one of our un- genial springs, always unkind to invalids, was wearing to the last days of May. Charlotte's dis- ease was aggravated by long confinement, and as she sat toiling over an old coat of her father's, her eye turned sadly towards the cold sky and the thinly-clad boughs of the trees that were rustling against the window, and that, like her, seemed pining for warmth and sunshine. " Will summer ever come ?" she thought ; and then, suppressing a sigh of impatience, she added, " but I don't mean to murmur." At this moment Susan bounded into the room, her cheek flushed with pleasure. " Good news, good news !" she cried, clapping her hands ; " H'arry has got home !" " Has he ?" " Why, Lottie, you don't seem a bit joyful !" The tears came to Charlotte's eyes. " I have got to be a poor creature indeed," she said, " when the news of Harry's getting home does not make me joyful." " Oh, but Lottie, it's only because you did not sleep last night : take a little of your mixture and lie down, and by the time Harry gets up here he told me he should come right up you will look glad ; I am sure you feel so now." A FRIEND IN NEED. 25 ' i do, Susy : Essex never seems Essex when Barry is out of it." ' No, I am sure it does not ; but, then, if he did not go away, we should not have the joy of his coming home." Susan was the first to see the compensation. " I hope," said Charlotte, after a short pause, " that Harry will not go away again on this busi- ness ; he may be getting money, but then he should have been at school the past winter. You know what Doctor Allen used to say to mother 1 Education is the best capital for a young man to begin with.' I am afraid Harry has caught some of Morris Finley's notions." " Oh, no, no, Charlotte ! they are as different as day and night. I am sure, if Harry is eager to get money, it's because he has some good use for it, and not, like Morris, just for the money's sake." " I hope it is so, but even then I do not like this travelling about ; I am afraid he will get an unset- tled disposition." " Why, Charlotte, it is not so very pleasant trav elling about in freezing winter weather, and deep muddy spring roads, peddling books." The subject of their discussion broke it off by his entrance ; and, after mutual kind greetings were over, he sat down by Charlotte with a face that plainly indicated he had something to say, and knew not how to begin. " Have you had good luck, Harry ?" asked Char- lotte. " Very !" The very was most emphatic. " Well, I hope it won't turn your head." C 26 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. " I don't know," he replied, with a smile ; " it feels very light just now, and my heart too." Charlotte looked grave. " No one would think," said Susan, " that Char- lotte was glad to see you, Harry ; but sh^ is, for we both love you just as well as 'if you w*re a brother having none that's natural, you know. But poor Lottie is worse than ever this spring, and nothing seems to do her any good ; and I have been trying to persuade her to send round a sub- scription-paper to get money to go to New-York ; maybe she'll consent now you have come to ask her." " That's the very thing," said Harry, " I want to speak to her about." " Oh, don't, Harry ; if our friends and neigh- bours were to think of it themselves, I would ac- cept the money thankfully, but I cannot ask for it." " You need not, Charlotte you need not but you will take it from a brother, as Susy almost calls me, won't you ?" He hastily took from his pocketbook five ten- dollar notes, and put them on Charlotte's lap. "Harry!" Charlotte feebly articulated. " Oh, Harry, Harry !" shouted Susan, throwing her arms round his neck in a transport of joy, and then starting back and slightly blushing ; " did I not tell you so, Lottie ?" she said. Charlotte smiled through her tears. " Not pre- cisely so, Susy, for who could have expected this ? But I might have known it was not for the money, as you did say, but for what the money would bring, that Harry was working." " And what could money bring so good as bet- A FRIEND IN NEED. 27 ter health for you, Charlotte ? Your suffering is the only thing that ever makes me unhappy ; and so, after all, it is selfishness in me." Happy would it be for our race if there were more such selfishness as Harry Aikin's. The benevolent principle is, after all, the true alchymy that converts the lead to gold. The preceding fall, and shortly before the scene described at the bridge, an acquaintance and very good friend of Harry's, a bookseller in the shire town of their county, had applied to Harry to be his agent in peddling books, and had offered him a tempting per centage on his sales. Harry, then but fourteen, was rather young for such a business ; but the good bookseller had good reason to rely on his fidelity and (Discretion, and hoped much from his modest and very pleasing address. Harry communicated the offer to his parents. They told him to decide for himself ; that whatever money he earned should be his ; but that, as he was to go to a trade the following spring, and the intervening winter being the only time he had for further school- education, they advised him to forego the booksel- ler's offer. Harry could think of plenty of eligible appropriations for any sum he might earn ; but, af- ter a little reflection, nothing that even fifty dollars could buy weighed in the scales against six months' good instruction ; and, thanking his pa- rents for their liberality to him, he decided on the school. This decision occurred on the very day of poor Jock's untimely death, and was reversed by that event, and the consequent overthrow of Charlotte May's project. He immediately con- ceived the design of effecting her journey to New- 28 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. York by the result of his labour ; and, communica ting his purpose to his two confidential friends, his parents (most happy are those children who make their parents the depositaries of their secrets), he received their consent and approbation. They were consistent Christians, and thought that active goodness enriched their child far more than money, or even than education, which they held to be next best to virtue. The contract was made with the bookseller, and the fifty dollars, an immense sum to him that .earned it, and to her who received it, esti- mated by the painstaking of the one, and the reliet and gratitude of the other, were appropriated to the expenses of the New- York journey. Those who travel the world over seeking pleas- ures that have ceased to please ; going, as some one has said, from places where no one regrets them, to places where no one expects them, can hardly conceive of the riches of a poor person, who, having fifty dollars to spend on the luxury of a journey, feels the worth of every sixpence ex- pended in a return of either advantage or enjoy- ment. If any of my readers have chanced to hear a gentleman curse his tailor, who has sent home, at the last moment, some new exquisite articles of apparel for a journey, when they were found to be a hair's breadth too tight or too loose ; or if they have assisted at the perplexed deliberations of a fine lady as to the colour and material of her new dresses and new hat, and have witnessed her vexations with dressmakers and milliners, we invite them to peep into the dwelling of our young friends, and witness the actual happiness resulting A FRIEND IN NEED 29 from the successful expedients and infinite inge- nuity of the poor. The practicability of the long-wished-for journey had been announced to Uncle Phil, and they were entering upon deliberations about the outfit, when their father, beginning, as need was, at the crown of his head, exclaimed, " I declare, gals, I never told you my bad luck about my tother hat. I laid it down by the door just for a minute last Sab- bath, and our plaguy pup run off with it into a mud-puddleit was the worse for wear before, and it looks like all natur now." 44 Let us look at it, father," said Susan ; " there are not many people that know you in New- York, and maybe we can smooth it up and make it do." The hat was brought, and examined, and heads mournfully shaken over it ; no domestic smoothing- up process would make it decent, and decency was to be attained. Suddenly, Charlotte remembered that during her only well week that spring, she had bound some hats for Mr. Ellis, the hatter, and Susan was despatched to ascertain if her earnings amounted to enough to pay for the re-dressing of her father's hat. Iris could scarcely have returned quicker than did Susan ; indeed, her little divinity- ship seldom went on such pleasant errands. " Ev- erybody in the world is kind to us," said Susan, as she re-entered, breathless. " Mr. Ellis has sent full pay for your work, Lottie, and says he'll dress father's hat over for nothing. I'm so glad, for now you can get a new riband for your bonnet." 44 After all the necessafies are provided." 44 Anybody but you, Lottie, would call that a necessary. Do look at this old dud all frayed C2 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. out. It has been turned, and died, and sponged, and now it is not fit to wear in Essex what will they say to it in New-York?" " We'll see, Susy, how we come out. Father's Sunday coat must be turned." The coat was turned, and the girls were delighted to see it look almost as well as new ; and even Susan was satis- fied to pay the hat-money to Sally Fen, the tai- loress. A long deliberation followed upon father's nether garments, and they came to the conclusion they were quite too bad to be worn where father was not known and respected. And, to get new ones, Charlotte must give up buying a new cloak, and make her old one do. There is a lively pleasure in this making do that the rich know not of; the cloak was turned, rebound, and new-collared, and Susan said, " Considering what a pretty colour it was, and how natural Charlotte looked in it, she did not know but what she liked it better than a new one." And now, after Charlotte had bleached and remodelled her five-year old Dunstable, her dress was in order for the expedition all but the riband, on which Susan's mind was still intent. " Not but just ninepence left," said she to Char- lotte, after the last little debt for the outfit was paid. " Ninepence won't buy the riband, that's certain, though Mr. Turner is selling off so cheap. Why can't you break into the fifty dollars ; I do hate to have you seen in New- York with that old riband, Lottie." " But I must, Susan for I told Harry I would not touch the fifty dollars till we started." tune to be able to eat those nuts you are eating, Miner, and go to bed and sleep as you will after them. Look at Morris Finley his face looks to me like an account-book, written over with dollars and cents, as if he had coined his soul into them. And there is Robson, of the house of Robson & Co. I remembe-r his hair as black, glossy, and thick as your John's, and his colour as pure red and white ; now, he has a scratch on the top of his head his eyes buried in unwholesome fat his skin mottled, and he lives between his counting- house and Broadway, in continual dread of an ap- oplexy. How juany Pearl-street merchants over five-and-thirty are dyspeptics ?" " But, mercy on us, Aikin! you don't suppose money is infected with dyspepsy ?" " No ; but I do suppose that those who make it an end, and not a means, pay the penalty of their folly. I do suppose that the labour and anxiety of mind attending the accumulation and care of it, and the animal indulgences it procures, are a very common means of destroying the health. Now, Miner, have we not a greater chance for health, which we all allow to be the first of earthly bles- sings, than the rich? Then, we have some ad- vantages for the education of our children which they cannot get. You may say, necessity is a rough schoolmaster, but his lessons are best taught. The rich cannot buy books, or hire masters, that will teach their children as thoroughly as ours are taught by circumstances, industry, ingenuity, fru- gality, and self-denial. Besides, are not our little "SOCIETY'* AT THE POOR MAN'S HOUSE. 115 flocks mutual assistance and mutual kindness so- cieties r " They are, that's true they are ; and though. I must own mine ain't brought up like yours, and they do have their little sprees and flashes, yet they are open-handed to one another, and take part with one another in their pleasures, and troub- les, and battles, and so on. But go on, Aikin ; I feel as if I were growing richer every sentence you utter." Before Aikin could proceed, a hand-bell rung loudly and impatiently, the well-known signal for poor little Juliet. The children gathered around her to express their unwillingness to part with her, and William Aikin, in his eagerness, stumbled over Miner's foot, which was in rather an obtru- sive position. " Oh, Mr. Miner, I beg your par- don," said the little fellow. " There, now," said Miner, " that puts me in mind of what I am often grumbling at ; your children are an exception ; but how, in the name of nature, are our children to learn manners in our rough and tumble way of living ? Can you figure that out ?" " Why, Miner, manners, for the most part, are only the signs of qualities. If a child has a kind and gentle disposition, he will have the out- ward sign ; if he have the principle that teach- es him to maintain his own rights, and not en- croach on those of others, he will have dignity and deference, which I take to be qualities of the best manners. As to forms of expression, such as my boy used when he stumbled over your foot, they are easily taught : this I call women's work. They are naturally more mannerly than we. 116 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. There are, to be sure, certain forms that are in use by what are called the ' polite world' that we can know nothing of; but they are not essential to the spirit of good manners. Ours, I believe, is the only country where those who compose the lower classes have the power and the means of good manners ; for here there is no sense of degrada- tion from the necessity of labour. Here, if we will, the poorest of us can get education enough for our children to make them feel the dignity of their nature arid destiny, and to make them realize the real equality of rights on which the institutions of the country are based. Self-respect is the real basis of good manners. It makes my blood boil to see the manners of the low-born who come here from the old countries their servility, their mean- ness, their crouching to their superiors when they expect a favour, and their impertinence, and dis- obligingness, and downright insolence, when the power is in their own hands. They are like horses used to being guided and driven, and know no more than they would how, without harness, reins, and blinders, to do their duty."* * While writing this page, a circumstance has come to my knowledge that, illustrates my theory of the effect of condition upon manners. Our streets, since the last snow-storm, even the side-walks, are almost impassable with masses of snow and ice. M., a distinguished exile, and his wife, who earn an hon- ourable living by imparting the accomplishments of their more fortunate days, were returning from their lessons. The hack- ney-coach had disappointed them. M., deprived of one leg, found it impossible to use his crutches on the ice. They stopped at the corner of a street. The packed omnibuses passed them. Private sleighs, from which, as they drew up to turn the corner, they heard expressions of compassion, also, like the Levite, passed on. Two labouring men offered their aid : one carried M 's crutches, the other all but carried him to his own door "SOCIETY" AT THE POOR MAN'S HOUSE. 117 " You say, Harry," interposed Mrs. Aikin, " that it is women's work to teach manners to the chil- dren; but, don't you think they learn them mostly from example ?" " Certainly I do ; manners, as well as every thing else. Man is called an imitative animal You can tell by the actions of a child a year old what sort of people it has lived with. If parents are civil and kind to one another, if children never hear from them profane or coarse language, they will as naturally grow up well-behaved as that candle took the form of the mould it was run in." " But," said Miner, who was willing to shift off the consequences of some of his short-comings up- on inevitable chances, " suppose you do set a bright example at home, you can't shut your children up there they've got to go out, and go to school, and hear and see every thing under the sun." " Yes, Mr. Miner," replied Susan Aikin, " but it's surprising, if they are taken care of at home, how little any thing out of doors seems to harm them." " I tell you what, Miner," said Uncle Phil, glad of an opportunity to cut in, " what our folks call taking care is a pretty considerable chore, it's doing a little here, and doing a little there, and al- ways doing." " Wife !" called out Miner to his helpmate, who had just given her child a cuff for treading on her toe, " wife, I depend on your remembering all when they both respectfully took their leave, declining the compensation (a most liberal one) which M. offered, accustomed to countries where the services of the poor have always their money value. 118 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. this : you know TV e a dreadful poor memory; and I want you to tell it over to the children." Poor Miner, in spite of all Henry Aikin's hints, continued in the common error of expecting to effect that by precept which is the work of exam- ple, patiently repeated, day after day, and year after year. The conversation then took a more miscellane- ous turn. The women talked over their domestic affairs, and the men ran upon politics, showing themselves sufficiently enlightened, and as disin- terested as we wish all politicians were. At half past nine they separated, cheerful, and, we trust, profited ; and, as they heard the carriages rum- bling along the streets that were then conveying the earliest of our fashionables to their crowded parties, we think our humble friends had no reason to contrast their social pleasures unfavourably with those of the rich, but that they might feel that their meeting together, as Uncle Phil said. " in this neighbourly way, was a privilege.'. CHAPTER XIII " SOCIETY" AT THE RICH MAN'S HOME. " The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them." WE change the scene to a fine new house, in a fashionable quarter of the city: Mrs Finley alights from her own carriage, and meets her daughter at the door, her face full of something she had to 119 communicate. " Oh, mamma," she exclaimed, " who was that that came into Morrison's thread and needle store just as you passed ? a lady with an ermine boa, you bowed to her." " Mrs. Kingson. Why, Sabina Jane ?" " The lady that was with her asked her, when they got into the shop, who she bowed to ? She said, ' That Mrs. Finley that left her card at my house !' ' Does she keep a carriage V asked the other lady ; and then she took up her eye-glass- and looked after you, and said, so everybody might have heard her in the shop, i Liveries ! and a coat of arms ! no wonder we are a laughing-stock to foreigners.' " " Well," answered the perturbed and perplexed mother, " I do wonder what is the harm of liveries ? It is next to impossible to find a servant that is willing to wear them ; that's a proof they are gen- teel ; and then, as to the coat of arms, I am sure the man that made the harness said it was the latest pattern he had in his shop. That coach," she continued, " has been nothing but a plague to me. Your father is always fretting about the ex- pense, and complaining that the coachman cheats him ; and John will do * nothing but drive the horses ; and everybody that has a coachman in livery has a footman, and your father thinks the waiter can turn into a footman when I want one, but he don't know how inconvenient that is. No- body knows, but them that has them, the trials of keeping a carriage."* * One of these incidental trials was met by a ready ingenui ty that deserves a more enduring preservation than we can give it. A gentleman told his coachman to bring him a pitcher of fresh water from the pump. " I can't, sir."** Why not 2" 120 THE POOR RICH MAN, ETC. " Then, mamma, why do you keep one ?" " Don't ask such silly questions, Sabina Jane." A servant entered. " Mrs. Finley, here are the notes that have come in since you went out." Mrs. Finley took them eagerly. She had sent out in- vitations for a party, and she was anxious to know who had accepted and who refused. The first she opened was from the teacher of her only son Ar- thur William, informing her that Master Arthur was behind-hand in all his studies, and that, unless his lessons were superintended at home, he feared he must dismiss the boy, as the reputation of his school depended on the progress of his scholars. " This is too bad," said Mrs. Finley ; " I won- der what we pay him for but to teach ? Mr. Bel- tarn always said Arthur was a prodigy when he went to his school." " But, mamma, you said Arthur could not read when he had been to Mr. Beltam's two years." " What's that to the purpose, miss ? Mr. Bel- tarn never sent in any complaints. I will not make myself a slave to looking after your lessons at home ; I have not health for it : besides, your father and I never studied Latin, and French, and philosophy, and them things." " I wonder what you did study, mother ?" " For shame, Sabina Jane ! I am sure your father understands every kind of arithmetic." " Does he, mother ? I did not know he under- stood any thing." " 'Tis not my business." " What the deuse is your business ?" " Taking care of the carriage, sir." " Bring up the carriage, then." The carriage came : " John" (to the waiter), " get into the carriage, and bring me a pitcher of fresh water from the pump." " SOCIETY" AT THE RICH MAN'S HOUSE. 121 It was difficult to decide whether this was said with simplicity or impertinence. Unfortunate, in- deed, are those children who, with their acquisi- tions, acquire a contempt for their parents' igno- rance. The next note opened was a polite notice to Mrs. Finley, from Mademoiselle A , that a box of newly-arrived Parisian millinery would be opened for her patrons' inspection the next morn- ing. " Very attentive in Mademoiselle !" said Mrs. Finley, when unfortunately the pleasure of being a patron was checked by one of the usual penalties for such distinctions. A bill had dropped from within the note, which the little girl handed to her mother, reading the amount, $57 45. "How very provoking !" exclaimed Mrs. Finley ; " she might better have sent it at any other time : your father frets so about the expenses for the party. I am sure they are necessary; but 1 can't ask him for the money to pay Mademoiselle now, that's certain ; so, throw the bill in the fire, Sabina Jane ; and, when Mademoiselle sends for the money, I tan say I haven't got the bill." " Yes, mamma, and you can say it must have dropped out ; it did drop, you know." " That's well thought of, Sabina Jane, and no lie either." Thus did this poor child receive from her weak mother a lesson in fraud, lying, and hy- pocrisy. Mrs. Finley proceeded in the examina- tion of her notes. " ' Mrs. Dilhurst accepts,' &c. Oh, I knew she would accept ; I wonder when she ever refused 1 ' Mrs. Kingson regrets an en- gagement,' W 7 illiam L. Stone. 18mo. Constantinople and its Environs. In a Series o* Letters, exhibiting the actual State of the Manners, Customs, and Habits of the Turks, Armenians, Jews, and Greeks, as modified by the Policy of Sultan Mahmoud. By an Ameri- can, long Resident at Constantinople (Commodore Porter). 2 vols. 12mo. The Tourist, or Pocket Manual for Travellers on the Hudson River, the Western Canal and Stage Road to Niagara Falls, down Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence to Montreal and Quebec. Comprising also the Routes to Leba non, Ballston, and Saratoga Springs. 18mo. With a Map. An Improved Map of the Hudson River, with the Post Roads between New-York and Albany. The Life of Andrew Jackson, President of the United States of America. By William Cobbett, M.P. 18mo. With a Portrait. Things as they are ; or, Notes of a Traveller through some of the Middle and Northern States. 12mo. With Engravings. Letters to Young Ladies. By Mrs. L. H. Sigour ney. Third Edition enlarged. 12mo. RETURN TO the circulation desk of any University of California Library or to the NORTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY Bldg. 400, Richmond Field Station University of California Richmond, CA 94804-4698 ALL BOOKS MAY BE RECALLED AFTER 7 DAY 2-month loans may be renewed by calling (415) 642-6753 1-year loans may be recharged by bringing booh to NRLF Renewals and recharges may be made 4 day prior to due date DUE AS STAMPED BELOW JUN 3 1981 JAN 1 9 1993 MAY 801995 T" . .-"- 262235 PS Sedgwick, C.M. 2798 Poor rich man, and P6 the rich poor man. LI BRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVIS