to be a
good soap-maker. We kept to the old ways, simply because what they call
improvement in soap-making, like many another improvement, has been the
cheapening the product by the addition of various articles that lower
the quality. Experience has to teach. Theoretical knowledge isn't much
use save as foundation. A man must use eyes and tongue, and watch for
the critical moment in the finishing like a lynx.

"Well, I beat my head against that wall of obstinacy till head and heart
were sore. It was enough to the old Quaker that he paid promptly and did
honest work; and when I told him at last that his gains were as
fraudulent as if he cheated deliberately, he said, 'Then thee need share
them no longer. Go thy way for a hot-headed fool.'

"I went. There was an opening in New York, and I had every detail at my
fingers' ends. I went in with a man a little older, who seemed to think
as I did, and who did, till I made practical application of my theories.
I had studied everything to be had on the subject. I had mastered a
language or two in my evenings, for I lived like a hermit; but now I
began to talk with every business man, and try to understand why
competition was inevitable. I was in no haste. I admitted that men must
be trained to co-operate, but I said, 'We shall never learn by waiting.
We must learn by trying.' I tried to bring in other soap-makers, and one
or two listened; but most of them were using the cheap methods,--increasing
the quantity and lowering the quality. Some of the men had come on to me
from Philadelphia, and were bound to stay, but it was hard on them. They
had to go into tenement-houses, for there were no homes for them such as
building associations in Philadelphia make possible for every workman.
But I took a house and divided it up and made it comfortable, and I
lived on the lower floor myself, so that kept them contented. I fitted
up a room for a reading-room, and twice a week had talks; not lectures,
but talks where every man had a chance to speak five minutes if he
would, and to ask questions. I coaxed the women to come. I wanted them
to understand, and two or three took hold. I made a decent place for
them to eat their dinners, and put these women in charge. I put in an
oil-stove and a table and seats, and gave them coffee and tea at two
cents a cup, and tried to have them care for the place. That has been
done over and over by many an employer who pities his workers; and nine
times out of