6. For a penny a day, continued until the child readies the age of twenty-one years, the sum of £45 may be secured, to enable him or her to begin business, or start housekeeping.
7. For a penny a day, a young man or woman of twenty-four may secure the sum of £100, payable on reaching the age of sixty, with the right of withdrawing four-fifths of the amount paid in, at any time; the whole of the payments being paid back in event of death occurring before the age of sixty.
Such is the power of a penny a day! Who would have thought it? Yet it is true, as any one can prove by looking at the tables of the best assurance offices. Put the penny a day in the bank, and it accumulates slowly. Even there, however, it is very useful. But with the assurance office it immediately assumes a vast power. A penny a day paid in by the man of thirty-one, is worth £60 to his wife and family, in the event of his dying next month or next year! It is the combining of small savings for purposes of mutual assurance, by a large number of persons, that gives to the penny its enormous power.
The effecting of a life assurance by a working man, for the benefit of his wife and children, is an eminently unselfish act. It is a moral as well as a religious transaction. It is "providing for those of his own household." It is taking the right step towards securing the independence of his family, after he, the bread-winner, has been called away. This right investment of the pennies is the best proof of practical virtue, and of the honest forethought and integrity of a true man.
The late Joseph Baxendale was the constant friend of the working people who co-operated with him in the labours of his life. He was a man of strong common sense, and might have been styled the Franklin of Business. He was full of proverbial wisdom, and also full of practical help. He was constantly urging his servants to lay by something for a rainy day, or for their support in old age. He also used to pension off his old servants after they had ceased to be able to work.
He posted up Texts along his warehouses, so that those who ran might read. "Never despair," "Nothing without labour," "He who spends all he gets, is on the way to beggary," "Time lost cannot be regained," "Let industry, temperance, and economy be the habits of your lives." These texts were printed in large type, so that every passer-by might read them; while many were able to lay them to heart, and to practise the advices which they enjoined.
On other occasions Mr. Baxendale would distribute amongst his workpeople, or desire to be set up in his warehouses and places of business, longer and more general maxims. He would desire these printed documents to be put up in the offices of the clerks, or in places where men are disposed to linger, or to take their meals, or to assemble preparatory to work. They were always full of valuable advice. We copy one of them, on the Importance of Punctuality:—
"Method is the hinge of business; and there is no method without Punctuality. Punctuality is important, because it subserves the Peace and Good Temper of a family. The want of it not only infringes on necessary Duty, but sometimes excludes this duty. The calmness of mind which it produces is another advantage of Punctuality. A disorderly man is always in a hurry. He has no time to speak to you, because he is going elsewhere; and when he gets there, he is too late for his business, or he must hurry away to another before he can finish it. Punctuality gives weight to character. 'Such a man has made an appointment; then I know he will keep it.' And this generates Punctuality in you; for, like other virtues, it propagates itself. Servants and children must be punctual, when their Leader is so. Appointments, indeed, become debts. I owe you Punctuality, if I have made an appointment with you, and have no right to throw away your time, if I do my own."
Some may inquire, "Who was Joseph Baxendale?" He was, in fact, Pickford and Co., the name of a firm known all over England, as well as throughout the Continent. Mr. Baxendale was the son of a physician at Lancaster. He received a good education, went into the cotton trade, and came up to London to represent the firm with which he was connected. A period of commercial pressure having occurred, he desired to leave the cotton trade and to enter upon some other business. Mr. Pickford had already begun the business of a Carrier, but he was hampered by want of money. Mr. Baxendale helped him with capital, and for a time remained a sleeping partner; but finding that the business made no progress, principally for want of management, he eventually determined to take the active part in working and managing the concern.
He threw his whole energies into the firm of Pickford and Co. He reorganized the agencies, and extended them throughout the kingdom. He put flying vans upon the road, equal to our express trains; and slow vans, equal to our goods trains. He utilized the canals to a large extent, putting on flying boats between all the larger towns. Indeed the roads of the country were then so bad, that in certain seasons it was almost impossible to convey merchandize from one part of the country to another.