Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son | Page 5

of Old Nick, he couldn't write up a satisfactory account of the Ice-Men's Ball. Could prove that two and two made four by trigonometry and geometry, but couldn't learn to keep books; was thick as thieves with all the high-toned poets, but couldn't write a good, snappy, merchantable street-car ad.; knew a thousand diseases that would take a man off before he could blink, but couldn't sell a thousand-dollar tontine policy; knew the lives of our Presidents as well as if he'd been raised with them, but couldn't place a set of the Library of the Fathers of the Republic, though they were offered on little easy payments that made them come as easy as borrowing them from a friend. Finally I hit on what seemed to be just the right thing. I figured out that any fellow who had such a heavy stock of information on hand, ought to be able to job it out to good advantage, and so I got him a place teaching. But it seemed that he'd learned so much about the best way of teaching boys, that he told his principal right on the jump that he was doing it all wrong, and that made him sore; and he knew so much about the dead languages, which was what he was hired to teach, that he forgot he was handling live boys, and as he couldn't tell it all to them in the regular time, he kept them after hours, and that made them sore and put Stan out of a job again. The last I heard of him he was writing articles on Why Young Men Fail, and making a success of it, because failing was the one subject on which he was practical.
I simply mention Stan in passing as an example of the fact that it isn't so much knowing a whole lot, as knowing a little and how to use it that counts.
Your affectionate father, JOHN GRAHAM.

+----------------------------+ | No. 2 | +----------------------------+ | From John Graham, at | | the Union Stock Yards | | in Chicago, to his son, | | Pierrepont, at Harvard | | University. | | | | Mr. Pierrepont's expense | | account has just passed | | under his father's eye, | | and has furnished him | | with a text for some | | plain particularities. | +----------------------------+

II
CHICAGO, May 4, 189-
Dear Pierrepont: The cashier has just handed me your expense account for the month, and it fairly makes a fellow hump-shouldered to look it over. When I told you that I wished you to get a liberal education, I didn't mean that I wanted to buy Cambridge. Of course the bills won't break me, but they will break you unless you are very, very careful.
I have noticed for the last two years that your accounts have been growing heavier every month, but I haven't seen any signs of your taking honors to justify the increased operating expenses; and that is bad business--a good deal like feeding his weight in corn to a scalawag steer that won't fat up.
I haven't said anything about this before, as I trusted a good deal to your native common-sense to keep you from making a fool of yourself in the way that some of these young fellows who haven't had to work for it do. But because I have sat tight, I don't want you to get it into your head that the old man's rich, and that he can stand it, because he won't stand it after you leave college. The sooner you adjust your spending to what your earning capacity will be, the easier they will find it to live together.
The only sure way that a man can get rich quick is to have it given to him or to inherit it. You are not going to get rich that way--at least, not until after you have proved your ability to hold a pretty important position with the firm; and, of course, there is just one place from which a man can start for that position with Graham & Co. It doesn't make any difference whether he is the son of the old man or of the cellar boss--that place is the bottom. And the bottom in the office end of this business is a seat at the mailing-desk, with eight dollars every Saturday night.
I can't hand out any ready-made success to you. It would do you no good, and it would do the house harm. There is plenty of room at the top here, but there is no elevator in the building. Starting, as you do, with a good education, you should be able to climb quicker than the fellow who hasn't got it; but there's going to be a time when you begin at