re playing poker in the smoking-room and all the young ones
were lallygagging under the boats--until I found that we were carrying a
couple of hundred steers between decks. They looked mighty homesick, you
bet, and I reckon they sort of sized me up as being a long ways from
Chicago, for we cottoned to each other right from the start. Take 'em as
they ran, they were a mighty likely bunch of steers, and I got a heap of
solid comfort out of them. There must have been good money in them, too,
for they reached England in prime condition.

I wish you would tell our people at the Beef House to look into this
export cattle business, and have all the facts and figures ready for me
when I get back. There seems to be a good margin in it, and with our
English house we are fixed up to handle it all right at this end. It
makes me mighty sick to think that we've been sitting back on our
hindlegs and letting the other fellow run away with this trade. We are
packers, I know, but that's no reason why we can't be shippers, too. I
want to milk the critter coming and going, twice a day, and milk her
dry. Unless you do the whole thing you can't do anything in business as
it runs to-day. There's still plenty of room at the top, but there isn't
much anywheres else.

There may be reasons why we haven't been able to tackle this exporting
of live cattle, but you can tell our people there that they have got to
be mighty good reasons to wipe out the profit I see in it. Of course, I
may have missed them, for I've only looked into the business a little by
way of recreation, but it won't do to say that it's not in our line,
because anything which carries a profit on four legs is in our line.

I dwell a little on the matter because, while this special case is out
of your department, the general principle is in it. The way to think of
a thing in business is to think of it first, and the way to get a share
of the trade is to go for all of it. Half the battle's in being on the
hilltop first; and the other half's in staying there. In speaking of
these matters, and in writing you about your new job, I've run a little
ahead of your present position, because I'm counting on you to catch up
with me. But you want to get it clearly in mind that I'm writing to you
not as the head of the house, but as the head of the family, and that I
don't propose to mix the two things.

Even as assistant manager of the lard department, you don't occupy a
very important posit