"Who is that gentleman?" I inquired.
"Mr. Lyons, the banker on Main Street," was the reply.
"All right," I said, "I shall remember him." I stepped into Edwin
Comstock's and mentioned this proposition.
"Very well; I will give five dollars for the sake of twenty-five dollars from Mr. Lyons," and I placed that in my book. I next met Stephen Allen on the street and I told him Mr. Lyons's pledge.
"All right," he said; "I will give four dollars, and that takes all I have in my purse to-day; but I am glad to give it for the twenty dollars we are to get from Mr. Lyons."
I called upon Anson Backus with my report and he said: "Here is five dollars for the twenty-five from Mr. Lyons." I then stepped into the Lyons's bank. "This, I believe, is Mr. Lyons, the proprietor, who pledged a few minutes ago five dollars for every one dollar I would get from an abolitionist in this place." His face flushed in reading the names with the fives and four dollar bills in the book I handed him.
"There is no abolitionist's name here."
"Isn't Edwin Comstock an abolitionist?"
"No, he isn't."
"Isn't Stephen Allen an abolitionist?"