by his agreeable
and winning manners. Fred had the quiet man's distrust of ready talkers;
but he admired his brother. Charles was no end of a bright fellow and
would undoubtedly get on.

"I tell you what I'll do with you, old man," Charles continued. "I
suppose you already know some of these farmers around here. We're going
to give them every chance to go in with us--let 'em in on the ground
floor. We feel that this should be the people's line in the broadest
sense,--give 'em a share of the benefits,--not merely that they can flip
a can of milk on board one of our cars and hustle it direct to the
consumer and get back coal right at their door, but they shall
participate in the profits they help to create. Now listen to this;
there's not much you can do this winter out here and I stopped to make
you an offer to solicit stock subscriptions among the country people. A
lot of these farmers are rich fellows,--the farmers are getting
altogether too much money for their own good,--and here's an ideal
investment for them, a chance to add to the value of their farms and at
the same time earn a clean six per cent on our bonds and share in the
profits on a percentage of common that we're giving bondholders free
gratis for nothing. What do you say to taking a hand with us? We'll put
you on a salary right away if you say so. The very fact that you've
chosen to come here to live and take up farming will give you standing
with the country folks."

Fred smiled at this.

"On the other side of the sketch the fact that I'm as ignorant of
farming as the man in the moon is likely to rouse their suspicions. I'm
much obliged, Charlie, but my job's right here. I'm going to try to
raise something that I can haul to town in a wagon and get money for. I
haven't your business genius. It would seem queer to me to go about
asking people to take their money out of the bank to give me in exchange
for pieces of paper that might not be good in the end. And besides, a
good many of these country people swallowed the same hook when it was
baited with Sycamore. It's not a good time to try the same bait in this
neighborhood,--not for the Holton family, at any rate."

"Mossback! I tell you we're out of Sycamore with clean hands. Don't you
know that the big fellows in New York are the men who get in on such
promotions as this and clean up on it! I'm giving you a chance that lots
of men right here in this county would jump at. It's a little short of a
mira