The Every-day Book and Table Book. v. 3 (of 3) / Everlasting Calerdar of Popular Amusements, Sports, Pastimes, Ceremonies, Manners, Customs and Events, Incident to Each of the Three Hundred and Sixty-five Days, in past and Present Times; Forming a Complete History of the Year, Month, and Seasons, and a Perpetual Key to the Almanac

by William Hone

“The Thing to a T.”

A young man, brought up in the city of London to the business of an undertaker, went to Jamaica to better his condition. Business flourished, and he wrote to his father in Bishopsgate-street to send him, with a quantity of black and grey cloth, twenty gross of black Tacks. Unfortunately he had omitted the top to his T, and the order stood twenty gross of black Jacks. His correspondent, on receiving the letter, recollected a man, near Fleet-market, who made quart and pint tin pots, ornamented with painting, and which were called black Jacks, and to him he gave the order for the twenty gross of black Jacks. The maker, surprised, said, he had not so many ready, but would endeavour to complete the order; this was done, and the articles were shipped. The undertaker received them with other consignments, and was astonished at the mistake. A friend, fond of speculation, offered consolation, by proposing to purchase the whole at the invoice price. The undertaker, glad to get rid of an article he considered useless in that part of the world, took the offer. His friend immediately advertised for sale a number of fashionable punch vases just arrived from England, and sold the jacks, gaining 200 per cent.!

The young undertaker afterwards discoursing upon his father’s blunder, was told by his friend, in a jocose strain, to order a gross of warming-pans, and see whether the well-informed correspondents in London would have the sagacity to consider such articles necessary in the latitude of nine degrees north. The young man laughed at the suggestion, but really put in practice the joke. He desired his father in his next letter to send a gross of warming-pans, which actually, and to the great surprise of the son, reached the island of Jamaica. What to do with this cargo he knew not. His friend again became a purchaser at prime cost, and having knocked off the covers, informed the planters, that he had just imported a number of newly-constructed sugar ladles. The article under that name sold rapidly, and returned a large profit. The parties returned to England with fortunes, and often told the story of the black jacks and warming-pans over the bottle, adding, that “Nothing is lost in a good market.”

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