mmon allotment of men of his intelligence and
abilities, but he was never too indigent to answer the appeals of
poverty. If the asker's needs were greater than his own he divided with
him the little which he had. To his home all sorts of people were
attracted, Abolitionists, peace men, temperance reformers,
perfectionists, homoeopathists, hydropathists, mesmerists,
spiritualists, Grahamites, clairvoyants, whom he received with unfailing
hospitality, giving welcome and sympathy to the new ideas, food and
shelter for the material sustenance of the fleshly vehicles of the new
ideas. He evidently was strongly of the opinion that there are "more
things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of" in the philosophy of any
particular period in the intellectual development of man. No age knows
it all. It was almost a lo, here, and a lo, there, with him, so large
was his bump of wonder, so unlimited was his appetite for the incredible
and the improbable in the domain of human knowledge and speculation.
Great was the man's faith, great was his hope, great was his charity.

He was one of the most observant of men in all matters affecting the
rights of others; he was one of the least observant in all matters
appertaining to himself. With a decided taste for dress, yet his actual
knowledge of the kind of clothes worn by him from day to day was
amusingly inexact, as the following incident shows: Before wearing out
an only pair of trousers, the pioneer had indulged in the unusual luxury
of a new pair. But as there was still considerable service to be got out
of the old pair, he, like a prudent man, laid aside the new ones for
future use. His wife, however, who managed all this part of the domestic
business, determined, without consulting him, the morning when the new
trousers should be donned. She made the necessary changes when her lord
was in bed, putting the new in the place of the old. Garrison wore for
several days the new trousers, thinking all the time that they were his
old ones until his illusions in this regard were dispelled by an
incident which cost him the former. Some poor wretch of a tramp,
knocking in an evil hour at the pioneer's door and asking for clothes,
decided the magnificent possessor of two pairs of trousers, to don his
new ones and to pass the old ones on to the tramp. But when he
communicated the transaction to his wife, she hoped, with a good deal of
emphasis, that he had not given away the pair of breeches which