hope was the one striking point in his character.


HIS CHEERY VOICE

could always be heard. People liked to have him around, but they never
seemed to pay him anything in return. Early in June he got a job
sandpapering window-frames in a city cellar. This tried his mettle for
it broke his hands to pieces, but he worked through the job at eight
dollars a week. It ruined about twenty-five dollars' worth of clothes
unavoidably. Coming out of the cellar the last day of the job, he looked
into a store which was just opening. Did they want clerks? Oh, yes.
"Lots" of them. How much did they pay? Five per cent. What were they to
sell? "Milton gold jewelry." All right.


"MILTON GOLD JEWELRY"

was made a sensation. It was all in the name. Had they called it brass
the people would have stood off. Make a chain that looks like gold,
call it Milton or Shakspeare or Byron gold, and the people want it--or,
at least they did, the year of the fire. The sales of our friend footed
up more than those of any of thirty clerks, and netted him about a
dollar and a quarter a day. But this charming industry could not last.
The people had bought a chain which they supposed to be worth sixty
dollars for a dollar and a half. In two weeks the chain would fade. It
was a necessity of the business to keep moving. Our friend could have
gone to some other city with the lover of Milton, if he had paid his own
fare, but he was heartily disgusted with the business, the scheme being
essentially American. He next was taken to Morris, Ill., by some kind of