books, we went at it. But I must not tell the details of
that subscription. There were two or three men who
subscribed $5,000 each, because they were perfectly
certain the amount would never be raised. They wanted,
for once, to get the credit of liberality for nothing.
There were many men and many women who subscribed from
one dollar up to one thousand, not because they cared a
straw for the longitude, nor because they believed in the
least in the project; but because they believed in
Brannan, in Orcutt, in Q., or in me. Love goes far in
this world of ours. Some few men subscribed because
others had done it: it was the thing to do, and they must
not be out of fashion. And three or four, at least,
subscribed because each hour of their lives there came up
the memory of the day when the news came that the---- was
lost, George, or Harry, or John, in the----, and they
knew that George, or Harry, or John might have been at
home, had it been easier than it is to read the courses
of the stars!

Fair, subscriptions, and Orcutt's reserve,--we
counted up $162,000, or nearly so. There would be a
little more when all was paid in.

But we could not use a cent, except Orcutt's and our
own little subscriptions, till we had got the whole. And
at this point it seemed as if the whole world was sick of
us, and that we had gathered every penny that was in
store for us. The orange was squeezed dry!