Another name, well known in religious circles, was that of the late Mr. Thomas Wilson, who was the first to begin chapel-building on a large scale in London. Even in our more ostentatious day, Mr. Wilson’s charities would be considered princely.
And here, for the present, we take leave of the Christian merchant princes of London—the righteous men who possibly may have preserved it from the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah.
In the great mediæval cities of the continent, it was the men who had made money by trade who were the first to spend it liberally for the promotion of art, and the benefit of charity and religion. It has been so in London. Our Norman barons, our men with pedigrees running up to the time of the Conqueror, have done little for the welfare of the people, compared with the men of humble birth, who, as they have grown in wealth, have also grown in their estimate of its power to help those lower in the social scale than themselves.
CHAPTER II.
ACROSS THE ATLANTIC.
It is in America, as was to be expected, that rise more quickly than in any other country. Every one is ambitious, and there he realises the fact that no position is beyond his power if he will but work for it. Franklin was a printer’s boy, General Putnam was a farmer, Roger Sherman was a shoemaker, and Andrew Jackson was a poor boy, who worked his way up from the humblest position; Patrick Henry, the great American orator, was a country tavern-keeper; Abraham Lincoln was equally low placed in his start in life. But even in America it is hard work to make a fortune. Niorse, an American artist, but a better chemist and mechanician than a painter, thought out the magnetic telegraph on a Havre packet-ship, but met the common fate of inventors. He struggled for years with poverty and a thousand difficulties. He failed to interest capitalists. At last, when he was yielding to despair, and meditated suicide, on the last night of a session of Congress, at midnight, when the Appropriation Bill was being rushed through, he got an appropriation of £6,000 for an experimental line between Washington and Baltimore; then success, rewards, honours, titles of nobility, gold medals, and an immense fortune. The American inventor of the sewing machine had similar misfortune, and then as great a success.
“There are two kinds of men and two kinds of business in New York,” says an American author. The old-school merchants of New York are few; their ranks are thinning every day. They were distinguished for probity and honour; they took time to make a fortune. Their success proved that business success and mercantile honour were a good capital. Their colossal fortunes and enduring fame prove that, to be successful, men need not be mean, or false, or dishonest. When John Jacob Astor was a leading merchant in Now York, there were few who could buy goods by the cargo. A large dealer in tea, knowing that few merchants could outbid him, or purchase a cargo, concluded to buy a whole shipload that had just arrived, and was offered at auction. He had nobody to compete with, and he expected to have everything his own way. Just before the sale commenced, to his consternation he saw Mr. Astor walking slowly down the wharf. He went to meet him, and said—“Mr. Astor, I am sorry to meet you here this morning; if you will go to your counting-room, and stay till after the sale, I’ll give you a thousand dollars.” Without thinking much about it, Mr. Astor consented, turned on his heel, and said—“Send round the cheque.” He lost money, but he kept his word. When the lease for Astor House was nearly out, some parties from Boston tried to hire it over the heads of the then tenants. In a private interview with Mr. Astor, they wanted to know his terms. He replied, “I will consult Mr. Stetson (the tenant), and let you know.” To do that was, as they were well aware, to defeat the object they had in view. The old New York merchant never gave a guarantee as to the genuineness of the article he sold. It were needless to ask it.
In New York, in Boston, and elsewhere, the rule of prosperity is plain. One of the best-known presidents of a New York bank began his career by blacking boots: he came to New York a penniless lad, and sought employment at a store. “What can you do?” said the merchant. “I can do anything,” replied the boy. “Take these boots and black them.” He did so, and he blacked them well, and did everything else well.
Alexander Stewart (when alive, reputed to be the richest man in the world) was born in Ireland, came young to New York, and, with a little money that was left him by a relative in Ireland, took a small shop. He kept in it from fourteen to eighteen hours a day. He was his own errand-boy, porter, book-keeper, and salesman. He lived over his store, and, for a time, one room served as kitchen, bedroom, and parlour. Mr. Stewart began business when merchants relied on themselves, when banks gave little aid, when traders made money out of their customers, not out of their creditors. One day, while doing business in this little store, a note became due which he was unable to pay. The banks were unfriendly, and his friends, as is always the case when you want to borrow, were peculiarly hard up. Resolving not to be dishonoured, he met the crisis boldly. He made up his mind never to be in such a fix again. He marked every article in his shop below cost price; he flooded the city with hand-hills; they were everywhere—in basements, shops, steamboats, hotels, and cars, promised everybody a bargain, and took New York by storm. The little shop was crowded. Mr. Stewart presided in person. He said but little, offered his goods, and took the cash, all attempts to beat him down he quietly pointed to the price plainly written on each package. He had hardly time to eat or sleep; everyone came and bought, and when they got home customers were delighted to find that they were not cheated, but that they had secured a real bargain. Long before the time named for closing the sale in the hand-bill, the whole store was cleaned out, and every article sold for cash. The troublesome note was paid, and a handsome balance left over. For the future, he resolved to trade no more on credit. The market was dull, times were bad, cash was scarce; he would buy on his own terms the best of goods, and thus he laid down the foundation of a fortune which, long before he died, was reckoned at 30,000,000 dols. 1836, an American writer thus described his mode of doing business:—“Though Mr. Stewart sells goods on credit, as do other merchants, he buys solely for cash. If he takes a note, instead of getting it discounted at a bank, he throws it into a safe and lets it mature. It does not enter into his business, and the non-payment of it does not disturb him. He selects the style of carpet he wants, buys every yard made by the manufacturer, and pays cash. He monopolises high-priced laces, sells costly goods, furs, and gloves, and compels the fashionable world to pay him tribute. Whether he sells a first-rate or a fourth-rate article, the customer gets what he bargained for. A lady on a journey, who passes a couple of days in the city, can find every article that she wants for her wardrobe at a reasonable price. She can have the goods made up in any style, and sent to her house at a given hour, for the opera or ball, or for travel. Mr. Stewart will take a contract for the complete outfit of a steamship; furnish the carpets, mirrors, chandeliers, china, silver-ware, cutlery, mattresses, linen, blankets, napkins, with every article needed, in every style demanded. He can defy competition. He buys from the manufacturer at the lowest cash price; he presents the original bills, charging only a small commission. The parties have no trouble; the articles are of the first class. They save from ten to twenty per cent., and the small commission pays Stewart handsomely. He furnishes hotels and churches in the same manner; as easily he could supply the army and navy. He attends personally to his business. He is down early, and remains late; those who pass through the Broadway at the small hours may see the light burning brightly from the working-room of the marble palace. He remains till the day’s work is done and everything squared up. He knows what is in the store, and not a package escapes his eye. He sells readily, without consulting books, invoice, or salesmen. He has partners, but they are partners only in the profits. He can buy and sell as he will, and holds the absolute management of the concern in his own hands.”
Who has not heard of the Harpers of New York, whose publishing house in Franklin Square was, and it may be is, the largest of the kind in the world; as they do all the business connected with the publication of a book under one roof. In 1810, James Harper left his rural home on Long Island, to become a printer. His parents were devout Methodists. His mother was a woman of rare gifts. She embraced him on his departure, and bade him never forget the altar of his God, his home, or that he had good blood in his veins. In his new office all the mean and servile work was put upon the printer’s devil, as he was called. At that time Franklin Square was inhabited by genteel people—wealthy merchants; and poor James Harper’s appearance attracted a good deal of unpleasant comment. His clothes, made in the old homestead, were coarse in material, and unfashionable in cut. The young swells made fun of the poor lad. They shouted to him across the streets—“Did your coat come from Paris?” “Give us a card to your tailor.” “Jim, what did your mother give a yard for your broadcloth?” Sometimes, in their insolence, the fellows came near, and, under pretence of feeling the fineness of the cloth, would give an unpleasant nip. The lad had a hard life of it; but he resolved not to be imposed upon. One day, as he was doing some menial work, he was attacked by one of his tormentors, who asked him for his card. He turned on his assailant, having deliberately set down a pail that he was carrying, kicked him severely, and said, “That’s my card; take good care of it. When I am out of my time, and set up for myself, and you need employment—as you will—come to me and I will give you work.” Forty-one years after, when Mr. Harper’s establishment was known throughout all the land—after he had borne the highest municipal honours of the city, and had become one of the wealthiest men in New York—the person who had received the card came to Mr. James Harper’s establishment, and asked for employment, claiming it on the ground that he had kept the card given him forty-one years before. With great fidelity James served out his time. His master was pleased with him. In a patronising way he told him, when he was free, he should never want for employment. James rather surprised his old master by informing him that he intended to set up for himself; that he had already engaged to do a job, and that all he wanted was a certificate from his master that he was worthy to be trusted with a book. In a small room in Dover Street, James, and his brother John, began their work as printers. Their first job was 2,000 volumes of “Seneca’s Morals.” Their second book laid the foundation of their fortune. The Harpers had agreed to stereotype an edition of the Prayer-book for the Episcopal Society of New York. Stereotyping was in a crude state, and the work was roughly done. When the Harpers took the contract, they intended to have it done at some one of the establishments in the city. They found that it would cost them more than they were to receive. They resolved to learn the art, and do the work themselves. It was a slow and difficult labour, but it was accomplished. It was pronounced the best piece of stereotyping ever seen in New York. It put the firm at the head of the business. It was found to be industrious, honourable, and reliable. In six years it became the great printing-house of New York. Other brothers joined the firm of Harper Brothers. Besides personal attention to business, the brothers exercised great economy in their personal and domestic expenses; one thousand dollars was what it cost the brothers each to live for the first ten years of their business life. As regarded their employés, the utmost care was taken. The liberal, genial, honourable spirit of the proprietors prompted them to pay the best wages, and secure the best talent. Those who entered the house, seldom or never left it. Boys became men, and remained there as employés all the same.
In New York the love of Mammon finds no small place even in sanctified breasts. The author of “Sunshine and Shade,” in New York, says—“Among the most excited in the stock-market are men who profess to be clergymen. One of this class realised a snug little fortune of 80,000 dollars in his speculations. He did not want to be known in the matter. Daily he laid his funds on the broker’s desk. If anything was realised it was taken quietly away. The broker, tired of doing business on the sly, advised the customer, if the thing was distasteful to him, or he was ashamed openly to be in business, he had better retire from Wall Street.” Men of this class often have a nominal charge. They affect to have some mission, for which they collect money; they roam about among our benevolent institutions, visit prisons or penitentiaries—wherever they can get a chance to talk, to the great disgust of regular missionaries, and the horror of superintendents. They can be easily known by white cravats, sanctified looks, and the peculiar unction of their whine. “One man,” continues the writer in question, “especially illustrates the gentlemen of the cloth who are familiar with stocks. His name appears in the Sunday notices as the minister of an up-town church; down town he is known as a speculator. His place of worship is a little house built in his yard. It is not as long or as wide as the room in which he writes his sermons. The pastor is a speculator; his church is his capital, and on ’Change Rev. pays well. He has controlled and abandoned half-a-dozen churches. He went over to London, made a written contract with Mr. Spurgeon, the celebrated preacher, by which the latter was to visit America. It bound Spurgeon to give a certain number of lectures in the principal cities of the land. Tickets were to be issued to admit to the services. One-half of the proceeds Spurgeon was to take with him to London to build his tabernacle, the other half was to be left in the hands of the gentleman who brought him over and engineered him through. The contract, coming to light, produced a great commotion, and Mr. Spurgeon declined to fulfil it. The war breaking out, this clerical gentleman tried his hand at a horse contract. He approached a general of high position, and said he was a poor minister, times were hard, and he wanted to make a little money; would the general give him a contract? One was placed in his hands for the purchase of a number of horses. The minister sold the contract, and made a handsome thing of it; the government was cheated. A committee of Congress, in looking up frauds in the city, turned up this contract. In a report to Congress, the general and the minister were mentioned in no complimentary terms. While these transactions were going on in New York, the general was in the field where the battle was the thickest, maintaining the honour of the flag. The report in which his name was dishonourably mentioned reached him. His indignation was aroused. He sent a letter to the speculating preacher, sharp as the point of his sword. He told him if he did not clear him in every way from all dishonourable connection in the transaction complained of, he would shoot him in the street as soon as he returned to New York. The frightened minister made haste to make the demanded reparation.” Happily for the credit of America, the author already referred to says, “Such men are held in as light esteem by the respectable clergy of the city, and by the honourable men of their own denomination, as they are by the speculators whom they attempt to imitate.”