Part 14 (1/2)
When it was too late, I found out what had beco would have sent a check, but he sent gold The hotel clerk put it in the safe and went on vacation, and there it had reposed all this tiht have thought to tell me that the e, but it never occurred to Orion to do that
Later, Mr Careed to buy our Tennessee land for two hundred thousand dollars, pay a part of the a notes for the rest His sche districts in Europe, settle the country He knehat Mr
Longworth thought of those Tennessee grapes, and was satisfied I sent the contracts and things to Orion for his signature, he being one of the three heirs But they arrived at a bad time--in a doubly bad time, in fact The te force, and he wrote and said that he would not be a party to debauching the country ine Also he said how could he knohether Mr Ca to deal fairly and honestly with those poor people fro to find out, he quashed the whole trade, and there it fell, never to be brought to life again The land, fro suddenly worth two hundred thousand dollars, beca, and taxes to pay I had paid the taxes and the other expenses for some years, but I dropped the Tennessee land there, and have never taken any interest in it since, pecuniarily or otherwise, until yesterday
I had supposed, until yesterday, that Orion had frittered away the last acre, and indeed that was his own ientle that by a correction of the ancient surveys we still own a thousand acres, in a coal district, out of the hundred thousand acres which ht a proposition; also he brought a reputable and well-to-do citizen of New York The proposition was that the Tennesseean gentleentleht all the lawsuits, in case any should turn up, and that of such profit as entleman should take a third, the New-Yorker a third, and Sa heirs--the reet rid of the Tennessee land for good and all and never hear of it again
[Sidenote: (1867)]
[Sidenote: (1871)]
I came East in January, 1867 Orion reer Then he sold his twelve-thousand-dollar house and its furniture for thirty-five hundred in greenbacks at about sixty per cent
discount He and his wife took passage in the steamer for home in Keokuk About 1871 or '72 they ca in the law ever since he had arrived from the Pacific Coast, but he had secured only two cases Those he was to try free of charge--but the possible result will never be known, because the parties settled the cases out of court without his help
Orion got a job as proof-reader on the New York ”Evening Post” at ten dollars a week By and by he caet him a place as reporter on a Hartford paper Here was a chance to try o to the Hartford ”Evening Post,” without any letter of introduction, and propose to scrub and sweep and do all sorts of things for nothing, on the plea that he didn't need money but only needed work, and that that hat he was pining for Within six weeks he was on the editorial staff of that paper at twenty dollars a week, and he orth the money He was presently called for by soo to the ”Post” people and tell them about it They stood the raise and kept him
It was the pleasantest berth he had ever had in his life It was an easy berth He was in every way comfortable But ill-luck came It was bound to come
A new Republican daily was to be started in a New England city by a stock company of well-to-do politicians, and they offered him the chief editorshi+p at three thousand a year He was eager to accept My beseechings and reasonings went for nothing I said,
”You are as weak as water Those people will find it out right away
They will easily see that you have no backbone; that they can deal with you as they would deal with a slave You er Then they will not dis you out as they would fling out an intruding trarated to Keokuk oncethe law; that he thought that what his health needed was the open air, in some sort of outdoor occupation; that his father-in-law had a strip of ground on the river border a mile above Keokuk with some sort of a house on it, and his idea was to buy that place and start a chicken-fars, and perhaps butter--but I don't knohether you can raise butter on a chicken-farm or not He said the place could be had for three thousand dollars cash, and I sent the an to raise chickens, and he made a detailed monthly report to me, whereby it appeared that he was able to work off his chickens on the Keokuk people at a dollar and a quarter a pair But it also appeared that it cost a dollar and sixty cents to raise the pair This did not seeo Meantiularly, id business ways--and he really prided hie business capacities--the inning of each month, he always sent me his note for the amount, and with it he sent, _out of that money, three months' interest_ on the hundred dollars at six per cent per annu always for three months
As I say, he always sent a detailed statement of the month's profit and loss on the chickens--at least the month's loss on the chickens--and this detailed statement included the various items of expense--corn for the chickens, boots for himself, and so on; even car fares, and the weekly contribution of ten cents to help out theto damn the Chinese after a plan not satisfactory to those people
I think the poultry experiment lasted about a year, possibly two years
It had then cost me six thousand dollars
Orion returned to the law business, and I suppose he re quarter of a century, but so far as oes he was only a lawyer in name, and had no clients
[Sidenote: (1890)]
My hth year, in the summer of 1890 She had saved some ave it to Orion and he said, with thanks, that I had supported hi to relieve me of that burden, and would also hope to pay back soly, he proceeded to use up thata considerable addition to the house, with the idea of taking boarders and getting rich We need not dwell upon this venture It was another of his failures His wife tried hard to make the scheme succeed, and if anybody could have ood woreatly liked She had a practical side, and she would have -house lucrative if circuainst her
Orion had other projects for recouping me, but as they always required capital I stayed out of them, and they did not hastly idea, and I squelched it with a pro ether hienious; it was capable; and it would have made a co tiain Orion applied for a patent and found that the saone into business and was thriving
Presently the State of New York offered a fifty-thousand-dollar prize for a practicalthe Erie Canal with stea for two or three years, invented and completed a method, and was once more ready to reach out and seize upon imminent wealth when somebody pointed out a defect: his steam canal-boat could not be used in the winter-time; and in the summer-time the commotion its wheels would make in the water would wash away the State of New York on both sides
Innu the means to pay off the debt tothirty years, but in every case they failed During all those thirty years his well-established honesty kept him in offices of trust where other people's money had to be taken care of, but where no salary was paid He was treasurer of all the benevolent institutions; he took care of the money and other property of s and orphans; he never lost a cent for anybody, and never ion the church of his new faith was glad to get hiraft and the leaks in that church He exhibited a facility in changing his political complexion that was acurious thing happened, and he wrotehe was a Republican, and upon invitation he agreed tothat night He prepared the speech After luncheon he beca mottoes to be painted upon the transparencies which the Deht He wrote these shouting De the afternoon, and they occupied so ht before he had a chance to change his politics again; so he actually n speech in the open air while his Democratic transparencies passed by in front of him, to the joy of every witness present
He was a e creature--but in spite of his eccentricities he was beloved, all his life, in whatsoever coh estee man