DEATH OF HIS GRANDMOTHER AND FATHER--LEFT PENNILESS AND
BAREFOOTED--WORK IN A STORE--HIS FIRST LOVE--TRYING TO BUY
RUSSIA--UNCLE BIBBIN'S DUEL.

In August, 1825, the aged grandmother met with an accident in
stepping on the point of a rusty nail, which shortly afterwards
resulted in her death. She was a woman of great piety, and before
she died sent for each of her grandchildren--to whom she was
devoted--and besought them to lead a Christian life. Barnum was
so deeply impressed by that death-bed scene that through his
whole life neither the recollection of it, nor of the dying
woman's words, ever left him.

The elder Barnum was a man of many enterprises and few successes.
Besides being the proprietor of a hotel he owned a livery-stable,
ran a sort of an express, and kept a country store. Phineas was
his confidential clerk, and, if he did not reap much financial
benefit from his position, he at least obtained a good business
education.

On the 7th of September, 1825, the father, after a six months'
illness, died at the age of forty-eight, leaving a wife and five
children and an insolvent estate. There was literally nothing
left for the family; the creditors seized everything; even the
small sum which Phineas had loaned his father was held to be the
property of a minor, and therefore belonging to the estate. The
boy was obliged to borrow money to buy the shoes he wore to the
funeral. At fifteen he began the world not only penniless but
barefooted.