"I hardly think your mode of procedure was fair," said the friend; "but waiving that, could you have made any thing by the job, at your bidding?"
"Oh, yes, I'd have made something—more, a good deal, than I can make by day's work. The fact is, I set my heart on that job as a stepping stone to contract work; and am bitterly disappointed at its loss. Much good may it do both Jackson and Clinton. I shouldn't be much sorry to see the new dam swept away by the next freshet."
"Why, Maxwell! This is not the spirit of a Christian man. Envy, malice—these are what the Bible condemns in the plainest terms; and for these sins, the poor have quite as much to answer for as the rich—and perhaps more. If you go from church on the Sabbath with no better thoughts than these, I fear you are quite as far from the Kingdom of Heaven as you have supposed Mr. Clinton to be."
"Good day," said Maxwell, turning off abruptly from his friend, and taking a path that led by a nearer course than the one in which they were walking, to his home.
A few weeks later, the person with whom Maxwell thus conversed, had occasion to transact some business with Mr. Clinton. He had rendered him a bill for work done, and called to receive payment.
"You've made a mistake in your bill, Mr. Lee," said Clinton.
"Ah? Are you certain?"
"You can examine for yourself. I find an error of twenty dollars in the additions."
"Then you only owe me sixty dollars?" said Lee, with a disappointment in his tones that he could not conceal.
"Rather say that I owe you a hundred, for the mistake is in your favour. The first column in the bill adds up fifty, instead of thirty dollars."