woman of the loveliest character. Richard Bailey, her husband, one of
the kindliest of men, soon found employment for me, and so, for a time,
I was happy and secure.

However, this was but a pause by the roadside. I was not satisfied. It
was a show of weakness to settle down on one's relations. I wanted to
make my way among strangers. I scorned to lean upon my aunt and uncle,
though they were abundantly able to keep me. It was mid-winter, nothing
offered and so I turned (as so many young men similarly placed have
done), toward a very common yet difficult job. I attempted to take
subscriptions for a book.

After a few days' experience in a neighboring town I decided that
whatever else I might be fitted for in this world, I was not intended
for a book agent. Surrendering my prospectus to the firm, I took my way
down to Madison, the capital of the state, a city which seemed at this
time very remote, and very important in my world. Only when travelling
did I have the feeling of living up to the expectations of Alice and
Burton who put into their letters to me, an envy which was very sweet.
To them I was a bold adventurer!

Alas for me! In the shining capital of my state I felt again the world's
rough hand. First of all I tried The State House. This was before the
general use of typewriters and I had been told that copyists were in
demand. I soon discovered that four men and two girls were clamoring for
every job. Nobody needed me. I met with blunt refusals and at last
turned to other fields.

Every morning I went among the merchants seeking an opportunity to clerk
or keep books, and at last obtained a place at six dollars per week in
the office of an agricultural implement firm. I was put to work in the
accounting department, as general slavey, under the immediate
supervision of a youth who had just graduated from my position and who
considered me his legitimate victim. He was only seventeen and not
handsome, and I despised him with instant bitterness. Under his
direction I swept out the office, made copies of letters, got the mail,
stamped envelopes and performed other duties of a manual routine kind,
to which I would have made no objection, had it not been for the
gloating joy with which that chinless cockerel ordered me about. I had
never been under that kind of discipline, and to have a pin-headed gamin
order me to clean spittoons was more than I could stomach.

At the end of the week I went to the proprietor, and