In his own country he
would have had no opportunity for the display of his great abilities,
and it was only by placing himself in the midst of institutions
favorable to progress that he was enabled to make use of his talents. It
is for this reason, therefore, that we may justly claim him as one of
the most celebrated of American merchants.

John Jacob Astor was born in the village of Waldorf, near Heidelberg, in
the Grand Duchy of Baden, on the 17th of July, 1763. This year was
famous for the conclusion of the Treaties of Paris and Hubertsburg,
which placed all the fur-yielding regions of America, from the Gulf of
Mexico to the Frozen Sea, in the hands of England. He was the youngest
of four sons, and was born of Protestant parents. He was early taught to
read Luther's Bible and the Prayer-book, and throughout his whole life
remained a zealous Protestant. He was trained to the habit of rising
early, and giving the first of his waking hours to reading the Bible and
Prayer-book. This habit he continued all through life, and he often
declared that it was to him the source of unfailing pleasure and
comfort. His religious impressions were mainly due to his mother, who
was a pious, thrifty, and hard-working woman, given to saving, and
devoted to her family.

His father, on the contrary, was a jolly "ne'er do well," a butcher by
trade, and not overburdened with industry. The business of a butcher in
so small a village as Waldorf, where meat was a luxury to the
inhabitants, was merely a nominal calling. It knew but one season of
real profit. It was at that time the custom in Germany for every farmer
to set apart a calf, pig, or bullock, and fatten it against harvest
time. As that season approached, the village butcher passed from house
to house to slaughter the animal, cure its flesh, or make sausage meat
of it, spending, sometimes, several days at each house. This season
brought Jacob Astor an abundance of work, and enabled him to provide
liberally for the simple wants of his family; but during the rest of the
year it was with difficulty that he could make bread for them. Yet Jacob
took his hard lot cheerfully. He was merry over his misfortunes, and
sought to forget them in the society of companions who gathered at the
village beer-house. His wife's remonstrances against such a course of
life were sometimes so energetic that the house became any thing but a
pleasant place for the children.

Here John Jacob grew up to boyhoo