Nor did he stop at the rent. The free use of stamps, envelopes, paper,
messenger service, and clerks were to him only evidences of a lordly
sort of hospitality which endeared the real proprietor of the office
all the more to him, because it recalled the lavish display of the
golden days of Carter Hall.

"Permit a guest to stamp his own letters, suh? Never! Our servants
attended to that."

Really he owed his host nothing. No office of its size in the Street
made so much money for its customers in a bull market. Nobody lost
heart in a tumble and was sold out--that is, nobody to whom the colonel
talked. Once convince the enthusiastic Virginian that the scheme was
feasible,--and how little eloquence was needed for that!--and the
dear old fellow took hold with as much gusto as if it had been his own.

The vein in the copper mine was always going to widen out into a
six-foot lead; never by any possibility could it grow any smaller. The
trust shares were going up--"not a point or two at a time, gentlemen,
but with the spring of a panther, suh." Of course the railroad earnings
were a little off this month, but wait until the spring opened; "then,
suh, you will see a revival that will sweep you off yo' feet."

Whether it was good luck, or the good heart that the colonel put into
his friend's customers, the results were always the same. Singular as
it may seem, his cheery word just at the right time tided over
the critical moment many an uncertain watcher at the "ticker," often
to an enlargement of his bank account. Nor would he allow any one to
pay him for any service of this kind, even though he had spent days
engrossed in their affairs.