He significantly tapped a pocket-book, almost as large as himself, in an outside pocket, and which no doubt contained the obligations to pay certain sums of money at an agreed date. He always carried this book in a conspicuous way, and handled it as though it contained great sums of money, but as he looked through it for something I saw there was nothing in it except the obligations, a great many newspaper scraps, a few old letters, one or two postage stamps, and a piece of court plaster.
“I don’t mind confessing to you,” Mr. Biggs continued, with delightful candor, “that I flattered them into it. In case you do not become disgusted with the ignorance which renders such a thing possible, you can flatter men into anything. When I go into a new neighborhood to organize an Alliance, I get the prompt assistance of every man I meet by telling him that I can’t hope to do any thing without HIS aid, as HE has the popular confidence, and the people will follow wherever HE leads. ‘You are a man of intelligence,’ I say. ‘You can readily understand what I have to offer, and will see its benefit at once. But your neighbors are slower, and I will not attempt an organization here without your assistance.’ That kind of argument never fails, and as I talk to all of them in the same way, there is a great deal of enthusiasm, each one imagining that the others went into it on his recommendation. I worked up the mill subscription in that way.”
I doubt if this statement was true, for the people originated the idea themselves, but to illustrate a great truth Mr. Biggs did not hesitate to tell a great lie.
“I make a great deal of money in organizing Alliances, but sometimes I think of going out of the business because I meet so many silly men that it disgusts me, and I become ashamed of my sex. But I suppose every business has that draw back, for every man I have ever talked with was of the opinion that his business developed more silly men, more contemptible men, and more mean men than any other calling, and I am forced to conclude that these qualities are so common that they are met with everywhere.”
When he spoke of retiring from the business of organizing Alliances, I was about to say that publishing a newspaper collected about all the objectionable men within reach, but from what he said afterwards I judged the observation would not be well received. As if he understood that I was about to say something, which he did not allow, he continued:—
“I was about to say, however, when you interrupted me (I had not spoken at all), that the way to get rich is to go in debt, and work out, therefore I shall recommend that Jo Erring complete his mill at once. No matter if he goes in debt; he has health and can pay it. The people of the country through which we are passing believe it the best to pay as you go. That party over in the field, for instance, is ploughing his corn with a single shovel plough, whereas there are dealers in town who would readily take his note for a cultivator with four shovels and a riding seat. His library no doubt consists of a book warning him against counting his chickens before they are hatched—as pointless a suggestion as I ever heard in my life, by the way (for why do we set eggs if not to bring forth chickens)—but it is regarded as fine logic here. The man will die some of these days with his single shovel plough, his slab house, his cow, his two horses, and his handful of land paid for, worth altogether from three to seven hundred dollars, but if he has a neighbor who sets a good many hens with care, AND counts the number of chickens they can reasonably be expected to hatch, he will attend the funeral in a carriage, and look at his remains through gold-rimmed spectacles.”
I had regarded this pay-as-you-go principle as a very good one, but he convinced me that I was mistaken, as usual, for I could never dispute his philosophy until I had thought over it a day or two, when its sophistry seemed quite clear. I had remarked of Mr. Biggs before that he seemed to understand what was in my mind, and attack it. I was thinking that the man he was talking about—his name was McJohn, and a local curiosity because his voice was uncertain, and jumped from a high falsetto to a guttural bass—had the reputation of being the hardest working man in Fairview, when my companion said:—
“I never knew a man, I believe, who didn’t boast occasionally that he worked harder than his neighbor; I wonder it never occurs to them that it is to their discredit, unless they are more prosperous than any of those around them, for if their neighbors work less, and succeed as well or better, it is an indication that they have more sense. I have no doubt that McJohn, as he spends his time in ploughing a field which could be done in one-fourth the time with common sense and a cultivator, thinks that no other man’s lot is as hard as his, and that he is a martyr to hard work. Before I became a philosopher—when I was a fool, in short—I boasted that no man worked as hard as I did, but now I boast that no man works so little. But simply because a man says he is the hardest-working man in the country, it does not follow that it is true. Every traveller who crosses the ocean says that the captain (who had been at sea continuously for thirty years) came into the cabin during the storm, and said it was the worst he had ever experienced. I have no doubt the captains say so (there is no reason why sea captains should not lie as well as other men), but only to impress the passengers with their remarkable skill in managing the vessel under such critical circumstances. You may have noticed that every winter is the coldest ever known, and every summer the hottest; the people seem to expect picnics in December and skating in July, but the facts are that it is always cold in December and always warm in July.”
I would have made oath, if necessary, that I had heard Mr. Biggs many a time complaining of the excessively hot and cold days, and declaring that there was never before anything like it.
“The people here learn nothing by experience,” he proceeded. “Since I have lived in the West, every spring has been made gloomy by the lamentations of the farmers that crops were ruined, but just before the crops were burned up—as the tooth came just before the doctor killed the boy—the rains come, and the crops do very well. You will find that the men who carry the fate of the country around on their shoulders do not get on so well as the country. I have always found it safe to trust the country to take care of itself, for the country usually does very well.”