The life and times of Col. James Fisk, Jr. : being a full and impartial account of the remarkable career of a most remarkable man ... : embracing, also, the lives of Helen Josphine Mansfield, the enchantress, and Edward S. Stokes, the assassin

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Chapter I

James Fi'ss. (he Boy — At school — Tiis <"';>:npo-i1.u;o ;:!>u;u the Do,' - Jim's Yarn-spinning — His Itoinanciug, slid how it ended — He begins his career as n business man 15

CHAPTER U.

Peddling — The offer —A good Trade ~ Jim buys his Father out, and omploya him on salary —

A happy iifu- -How lie ad.'ejaised -- id: aoauuuns bis iViO.;oi] raids, Mud ])!:>;■ >aias a coasterjumper— "I never liked lo dicker" — "IT there's siiythhijr T b;:ti; worse, it's lying" — "Doii'l ho a salc-man" — " llni.U:- be a nunnery " — Asa Salesman be is mo! u saccess. S!2

Chapter III

Goes into speculation — His dealing will! Uni (Jovcrnmc-ut — lie spends .Jl.OOn a day wining sud dining his guest.-? at Willard's — vVbat in; thought of Shoddj —"The man that will lake (In: a.ppcrhaud of a soliier i- a i.Lici — There's no sand in his craw — The sooner lie taktt to grava] the hotter S3

Chapter IV

Flak "becomes a member or the P.i-.n of Jonktu, viareh & Co. — lie toadies ids partners sonicthing— What t'isk knew aiionl. war- His ration spo cula lions - He goos Sonth — Tho iii'Miiss iu lliedald — risk in the Ked iiive;- Campaign — Explosion of Ids steamer — 3500,; 000 a day in cotton — Inside i.be Tiobol lines — A surprise — How Fish ran for Jill;, and left a quarter of a. jailliott dollars in gieenfacks hehind — Fish's old tia-oveu — Tbe bloody lislrt of Aniidam -what Pis'n did for die soldiers -'-Preach God in a now way to-day" — I'ioas Kabba-a bre^kin;; ■ 31

Chapter V

Butter and cheeso — Dealings In hops — The strong man of the Arm — Ooulding'a Patent — Fleksellsout — Starts for himself- Dryeoods down — He fails and pays up — Tries Wall Street — Tossed by (lie Hulls and buried liy i.be Dears- linhied iu pocket, but rich in pluck — Tries Wall Street again — ''Fisk's Luck" 43

CHAPTER VL

Daniel Drew, Kin;; of the Bears — Trie Brisio! line of steamers — "You'll do, Jeems" — Purchase of the steamers — " Who i, Jim risk?" — l.'nclu Daniel set:' Fish up as a broker— The great "Bear MoTCment" — Wall Street slang— How to buy 100 fori 4G n. Google

4 CONTENTS.

CHAPTER VH.

Draw's collateral — The first light for Erie ■ - Vanderbilt. against Uncle Daniel — The coalition — An injunction, fruitful mother of a hum :-,■([ ■.nu:-.- ., Daniel Drew visits the Commodore on Sunday — They shiilaUiaiuIs.imdV'amleroiltprouiise" to sell his Miaul* — Tin? second Sunday call — The third— Uncle Daniel explains — A new hi

CHAPTER YIH.

What Backet's Old Ruckle says about Bears — What n tan.sled web we weave when we first l>i-iii-l.i>'[: ;n deceive — l',sk and Gim.il elected — lire, v resigns - The Rears bowl — The trick

— The Old Bear affects to "Bull" — " Don '( be skecred, boys"-- -The IleUindto's method

— How the Ring was sold by the church-builder — YanderbHt blttOD ■ 69

CHAPTER IS.

The first suit ajaiusl. Erie — Drew called I...: nr.cr.ii.uit — JiuLsje Hansard issues one id' those 'njt.r.r.- tinns — How Uncle Daniel ;;o(. his slock — tic is dialled viiii Aljlr !■:.'. and docs nor dcriv - More injunctions — Wore yet — Fisk testifies 63

CHAPTER X.

Drew's new trick with new bonds — Erie Issue- |[i).(t:iS,i.i«l, lrelf for Pisk, half for Uncle Daniel -■■ Erie up I — Drew is ■' rally sorry lor V.i: irlt-j-lj:l r. " ' - Wad iiireet amazed - Erie down '. — The battle of the miauls - Vaaderbilt =e r = 1 1 bays -Draw diseiuyod - ■ Aniit!:c:' injunctions — ITic secret of Ysiiriiumillrscriy.rsetow'ard Erie JS

CHAPTER XI.

Judge Barnard enjoined The injunction — An iu-uarlKC and amtiiiiu." ciiaptcr 79

CHAPTER XII.

A great deal alien i. injunctions — Tlie history of injunc.-ons — Uric in the legislature — Re pre - sum ii i!ve (1 lei in charces fellow-member.? will] ascojiujig bribes ■ - And wi!h clvii;;.; bribes — Dark hh.is lomiain;; a Milk Rill —A ComiuU.I.eu n;i|iei:n :■■:■ — Mr. IHcini refuses 1.0 l.cs-

CHAPTER XHI.

Dnole Daniel disobeys a Jod-c of tiie 'Supreme Court--- jle trembles in Wall direct — lias Fisk deserted mar -bisk throw? his M,HH shurc?., and Ella coes down ■ Ruin in Willi Street — Vauuerbilt loses t.f!t,!)IJi:d::Ll -Some mere Erie war — Bar nurd belligerent — liver j hody lu contempt — A Receiver appointed 86

CHAPTER XIV.

Pisk, Gould, Drew and others abscond to Jersey — They carry away $3,000,000 — Erie made a Sew Jersey Corporation — Attempt to kidnap "Tnelc Daniel — The Judges' injunctions couu'.er-eajoiaeil- - Distress in the cat .■:■;■ market 100

CHAPTER XV.

The Receivership- - An attcuipl to p-eveur the mull iiilinily of suits, and whin it come to— Judge Barnard on his mettle — Fort Taylor in danger: — A fuls;! alarm — ViL-ibncc of die [■:_•;; Jos

CHAPTER XVI.

CONTENTS. S

CHAPTER XVII.

Undo "Daniel tires of Jersey — The midniahc irips to the land of Manhntt'iii ■ -Drew suspocicd of ireae'ieiy — Ho is i-hadowed — lh: diHiii noi go l.u church — Ho \ls;:s Yimderbilt — Loss 0/118 98,000,000— Drew again I— Plakgtraa check, iind wins in one more 121

CHAPTER XVIII.

Brow continues hi. climcesLinc visits to the Commodore — Jay Gould [liviiljrea some secrets- He goes as a misskmuiy to Albany, but m molested and made afraid— He meets a sheriff slid a summons, b;iL gives bail, and i:i:i-ar.u members of the Assembly. JSB

CHAPTER XIX.

Jay Gould is sold by those whom he bad bought — Erie defeated — The two reports in full. 1S3

CHAPTER XX.

Jay Gould's certiiiciite of disability - The Invalid's liberality —A singular malady — The new Brie Bill — A {Tij ml success- ■ Sir. Miini.u-.n's rsmarkable conversion ■, 189

CnAPTEB XXL

Tho Drew-Vauderbilt Compromise - Ttcsuli. of Drew's inirhraus — llcnirn of the Erie Exiles — Tins English holders of Erie stock alarmed - Uncle Danis] culls on L'isk and confesses — Hi! he;:-; am] l.brsslcns - Merc injunction risk in possession of tin; Kiln road 144

CHAPTER XXII.

Pisk sues the 7H'/une and other papers for libel — The Brie Directors on the offensive — The blads carpet-bng — Fi-k insets itus Commodore — A funny inter vie w — The arrest of Sam. Bowles — An eiliLor'a night in Ludlow Wiiect Jail 165

CHAPTER XXIII.

Wliy Fist fought Sam. Bowies — What Bowles said of his night In Jail 168

CHAPTER XXIV.

Samuel Bowles on tho Press — Fisk berated in the newspapers ITS

CHAPTER XXV.

A stilt rorS5,0DD,000 — Eiskon the stana— Ha keeps the Court-room in e, root — How bo signed papers — GouldM man liiday -The cpiso.lc in Eisk's lite -His ayey-hairs. and the cow caso IBS

CHAPTER XXVI.

Opening of the Albany and ^i'.squeb.inna Kr.iii'oad — The Grand Opera House — Trouble with a iajuby- school — V\.i\Cs neurit., ni:ni:y -TtiYr.;::;:] rv.wi-i;- - They ihic: a journalist mad. 1M

CHAPTER XXVH.

Opening ofthe Albany and Susquehanna Ltaiboad war — Eisk and ftouM interested — The Hon. Jerry S. Black's answer to caar'los frimcis Adams — The theory of Injunctions — Ramsey's ralda — The purity and majesty of the law 203

CHAPTER XXVIII.

The Albany and Susquehanna, war — Contending formis in th-s held — Eight at tho Tunnel — Eiakat Albany- Horace (ircolcv on injunctions — What he knew about Judges, etc. . . 288

6 CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XXIX.

Tho Gold Panic — What the Freaiaent's brofliw-in-law had to do with it — Flak and Goald'a maiucilvrcs to entrap 5';r:-i;:i^niL Craiji, ■ Howl.Uey-afT.eoa'ed- li'iskdnes tiu( -.vi:li to spocti-

lh;n. Ilai.lerlkikl in tin; Kins — i'isk'- alian^o inlervLew ivilli the ti i ol 1 :■-:■ in law ni' the President — Ilia tali with Gen. Grant about the finances — Tlio kin-riod me"::a;o to the President - Money for Coi-bin. tho frv': I'-'^b n'.an Weo;n':i;r and w;iiliiirr ami sntiiihiii-.; of Iceth-Corbin in tears — risk's "Pkanloei (I'M" — It weiit where the woodbine i.wimil.h — Report of tho Committee of InvestAgalion $$3

CHAPTER XXX.

CHAPTER XXXI.

Bail at the Continent:!? — Cot. Fist's Address to l.he Eoiiimenl — Hall at the "New York Academy of Music- jj'isk's Spoor.k lo (!m Woi-kinon :st nir'q.t'.Jianna, l'a. — -'Don-i hanker anor

CHAPTER XXXII.

Col. Fish and tho Court Journals — A Trip to Boston — Fish snubbed — Spicy letter to the Major of Booton — Flak's nose up — llig :*n-. hi.r-band — Tim Sunday night -how — Fisk adarassaB the Hlnth 30»

CHAPTER XXXIII.

The Oianjro l?iof - Polioo Order — «ov. Tloffmim revokes it ~ - " Tho Orangemen shall parade"— Fijtkl in Ki.';hlh Avc-ne — Tllood.died- Fist's c-ca;)iwle — His own account Of it — The Irishmen offer Mm — His skin in fcncc-climbiug— Hia disguise — Flees to Long Branch , 31S

CHAPTER XXXIV.

Tho lost time at the head of his roirimojit Fish and the Ov.;nd fluke — The serenade -- Fiijhi. with the Union Pacific — Their safe opened wUh t]-d,'C-bn miner and chisol — what followed-. , 324

CHAPTER XXXV.

Arrcot of Edward S. Stokes — The. Brooklyn Oil Refinery — Fish betrayed by his mistress — "a friendship to enmity — A physical impossibility — Blackmail —

Josiosue- .risk — The trial.

CHAPTER XXXVI.

Stokes on the trail — He skulks in tho corridor of the Grand Central — Fisk shot — Stokes

seized — Be Ik identified by his victim — link's ( znte-inartim deposition — His death.. UBS

CHAPTER XXXVII.

The Inquest — How the minder was committal — Was Fisk armed ! 848

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

The Inqnest continued -Testimony of a stupid witness BT1

CONTENTS. 7

CHAPTER XXXIX.

The Verdict — Stokes examined — Heoommttted to the Tomba — JTsk'B body lying in stole —

Aiibainj ssenes- ■ The (a i. era I — Uliii^lsin lri;i-s™'a sermon !il. Jiial.tleburo' B6T

CHAPTER XL.

The celebrated T^i :!;-:■] :i :i ri'i :■:■! loiters Fisk's confession ■ " I bave sought and oblsincd the forglveneesofniy wife, now let the world laugh" 395

CHAPTER XLI.

The English Stockholders of Erie — The fall of Tammany, and its effect — Gen. Sickles returns

ANECDOTES, Etc.

John M'urrb'sey and .Taiuo.-i Visk An inifoshiioil raaior Flr.kartl Ci-iiiii White's letter — Flsk'6 kindness of heart — He saves ayonng merchant — Fisk and [he Lecturer — •• Let her fall!" — Tin; bogn- dispatch — Orders to shoot bisk on Election cay — Bribery in tho Lee'sUiuire — -iisa.n !!. A[il!n)i:y am? Priur.o E-lrie Prssiilci:! Grant at the Opera House — ■' Jiitiik.'u Jim" - Horace Grceit.y in tin? Iniciit-fhamber — fink's owln ■ --Tbc < I rami Opcia House -Tits new I'e.ry Seven-up for a railroad ■■ i'isk's first mistake in tiie — Dis second— Fish and tie ijins-Shy ciiiLvici. -■ For charity — The colored minis;ci' — The linniplsh:k new'. >oy ■ - The Morse family — Mrs. James i'isk. Jr., ami her IIij-Iijel mansion — The Fisk jewels — The i.hoological student — What is the use of a grave-yard fence ; — "S.r.iharisk" — b'isk's will — "Mis birds — Tin: sale — Fisk saves the National Savings' Bank — G rai.il ude ■:>:' Tharlow V.'ecil - '■ Send them to me lor coal anil ileal-" — A chapter in ileleu Josephine Man^icid' • Ml':.: — i'-.iilk i.aivlor's story 4S6

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

L'OMiionoiiK VATiDKltBILT. Begins life as a walorinan — His courage — P team-boat in" — " The Steamboat King" -"Who is this i'isk i - Advice to a relative - "Keep out of Wall

Street" — The Golden Wcdiliu;; _ The Vaiuliasdll broiews — The latest clijnnls in tho

Jh-ew anil Aster — Slcambo:i:s — Opposilion 1.0 Vaniliirliilt. - ■ liniiioads — " King of Ike Fears"- Goes into Jlrio — And into religion — lircw and Vandcrbilt joiu feres- and buy tie llaiiiTii road - Drew's wealth. 491

Jat Oodlb. His influence in Wall Street - His friendship for Fiak - How he forced Flak to mtiffa — Retribution 4D5

tViiiiiii M. Tweed. Birth — Chair-making; — " Bis Si.? " — flow Tweed came into power — His eareer '. 493

EBV/\KO S. Stoki:;-, Birth in Philadelphia-— At the High -school - Removes to Xeiv York — tr:i,i:v Jose.rniNn .li.'^sptF.Ln. Born in Boston — Homovca to Calil'oiaia ■ Jlarvjss fianl; Lawlor — Her own story — Scandal — licseli, of a bad life :. C04

HELEN JOSKPHINE MANSFIELD.

Introduction

No apology for offering this boob to the public is needed. The tragic occurrence on the 6th of January, 1872, which resulted in the death of Col. James Fisk, Jr., terminated the career of a most remarkable man, whose name had become familiar to nearly every reader in the world. For five years or more he and his deeds were always subjects of general interest ; the boldness of his schemes, his seeming recklessness in every operation in which he engaged, the character of the associates with whom he was most intimately connected, made him at all times remarkable, and the reading public were never tired of discussing him. The manner of his taking off, and the singular circumstances leading to it, have only increased the desire to learn all that may be known of the man, and it is with the view of fully satisfying that desire that this book has been prepared. He was a man of unbounded ambition ; full of generons impulses, though erratic and somewhat reckless. No enterprise was too vast for his ambition, or too difficult for his genius ; and no giant of the money world could intimidate him when he had made up his mind to accomplish a given object. Everything he touched was a success. The drama, the opera, the railroad, the stock-market, and even our local marine found in him a ready capitalist and a shrewd leader. He did not hesitate to grapple with Vanderbilt, one of the financial monarchs ot the age, and the astute and wily Daniel Drew was not loath to secure the aid of the young adventurer. His purse was ever open to the needy, yet his charities were rarely marked by ostentatious display. As the commander of a regiment, he lavished money in supporting his own organization, while he created a spirit of rivalry which infused new life into the whole of the National Guard of New York, and forced from many prominent military men what they had previously denied him, a hearty recognition of his enterprise and public spirit.

10 INTRODUCTION.

One of the most eccentric men that ever basked in the sunshine of prosperity, he was at the same time one of the most kindly. He was wayward, yet clear-headed ; hot-tempered, yet easily won by a pleasant word ; notoriously indifferent to the opinion of the world, but ever ready to alleviate humanity's sorrows. His faults were many, but now that he is dead, thousands of people who felt his 'quiet sympathy, and enjoyed his princely bounty, will forget the follies of the erring man, and remember only the tender solicitude of the benefactor and his prompt and hearty answer to appeals for aid. The world has not had time to forget his labors on behalf of the Chicago sufferers ; and there are many who can recall that bright sunny Sabbath-day when the news of the battle of Antietam reached Boston, and when Fisk, then an obscure dry-goods salesman, by appeals to the clergy and the congregations of the city, induced them to devote the holy day to the preparation of needful supplies for the sick and wounded braves on that bloody field, and toiled throughout the day and night in superintending the transportation of the precious freight.

But James Fisk, Jr., must not be judged altogether on his merit as a good-hearted man. He was a power in the land. His audacity in speculation was fully matched by the success that attended his efforts to control the Legislature, and even the Judiciary, on nearly all occasions when their action was needed to advance his interests. For many years the bar of Europe and America strove in vain to loosen his grasp upon the Erie Road, and all to no apparent effect. The strongest attacks upon him resulted in nothing. The man seemed predestined to a life of unvarying success. His influence upon the financial history of the country for three or four years was greater than that of any hundred other men combined, for he dealt with Fortune with a perfect trust in her good-will to him, and his dealings were almost unparalleled in their magnitude. " The pistol-shot of a cyprian's champion," said the Tribune, on the morning after Fisk's .death, "will have its echo in every exchange 'of the world."

The savm journal, always the bitterest in its denunciations

INTRODUCTION. I r

of the singular man, thus sums up the salient points in his character, and comments upon his strange career:

"It is doubtful whether even in this age, so fruitful in phenomena] men and in sudden transitions, any more picturesque life than Fisk's can be recorded. His purposes were as insane as those of Train or Clootz, yet he accomplished them all. His morals were as loose as those of Casanova or Lauzun, yet in this reticent age he had no reserve or concealments. He was an adventurer as fantastic as Cagliostro, but never pretended to be anything more than what he was. 'If I were not Alexander,' said the Macedonian, ' I would be Diogenes.' This Yankee peddler was both — cynic and conqueror. Even fiction furnishes few personages more absurd in qualities and in fortune. Falstaff was not droller, more sensual, and more prudent. The list which Leporello made of his master's victims was scarcely more varied in race and name than that of this travesty of Don Juan. Even the story oi Aladdin ceases to seem so impossible when we think of this illiterate Vermonter stepping almost without an interval from his cart of notions to take the reins of a great corporation, to purchase to-day a fleet and to-morrow a theater, to make to-day a panic and to-morrow a "statute, to buy legislatures and prima donnas, to dazzle Wall street with the brilliancy of his thefts and Central Park with the splendor of his equipages ; to complement Sardanapalus with Robert Macaire.

" It is not creditable to our society and our civilization that such careers are possible. But the public conscience, if not vigorous enough to prevent them, has still enough vitality to mark and to resist them. In -the hight of his power Tweed knew no men but politicians. When Fisk was the most dreaded man in the business world, he had no social relations. His four-in-hand usually conveyed more spotted reputations than his own. His box in his own Opera House was shunned as if infected, by all who had any character to lose. The enormous diamonds he so delighted to wear only shed a stronger light upon the isolation in which he lived.

" His eccentricities marked him out for punishment. He lived so much in the public eye, his vanity and desire for ad-

12 INTRODUCTION.

miration made him so grotesquely picturesque, that he became a sort of type of that spirit of^awless fraud. and plunder which created him and by which he flourished. It was strong and vigorous in Wall street long before him. He was plucked and stripped by it when he first arrived here. He grappled with it, and at last forced it to serve him. There were 'worse men in the street than he could learn to be. When he is laid away in a grave where only a few will regret him, meaner and cooler rogues, who now join in condemning him, will go on cheating their friends and neighbors the same as before. But the public notice and reprobation was attracted by the magnitude, the audacity, and the marvelous luck of this man's ventures. His carriages, his gems, and his uniforms continually advertised him to the general indignation, as the plumage of a tropical bird betrays him to the hunter. His flashes of cynical and defiant humor furnished unfailing quotations to the haunters of the Clubs who imitated in silence the vices they affected to denounce. He was a predestined scape-goat, and so Wall street willingly loaded all its sins .on his broad shoulders and sent him out into the wilderness of ill-repute.

" We know the worst of him. What there was good in him the world has had little chance to learn. He was no hypocrite— if that is any praise. When he devoured the widow's substance, he differed from many of his associates in retraining from the pretence of long prayers. In the household circle where he was known before he became the James Fisk, Jr., of history, he will be sincerely mourned and wept. Perhaps it is as well that we should leave his story as it is known to the world— a warning and a lesson. There would be little to regret in the close of his career, if the public reprobation which was so freely lavished upon him could be turned upon the system that produced him and the slyer transgressors he has left behind."

In this book the whole story of Fisk's remarkable career is told plainly and truthfully. No pains have been spared to make it what we hope the public will declare it to be, an impartial Life of James Fisk, Jr.

THE

LIFE AND TIMES

OF

JAMES FISK, Je.

Chapter I

James Fisk, Jr., one of the very many singular characters whom the New England States have produced, was born near the battle-field of Bennington, Vermont, on the 1st of April, 1835. His father was an old-fashioned country peddler, of a class now seldom met with except in regions far removed from railroad lines, although sometimes encountered even in districts which the iron horse traverses in all directions. He was a very plain, commonplace man, with no education, and imbued with very little more taste than that acquired in a life devoted to petty trade and in a country inhabited mainly by people more given to manual labor than to intellectual culture. His mother, the eldest daughter of a well-to-do farmer, was noted for her neatness and thrift, and her great devotion to her husband and family. She died when Jim was two years old, and shortly afterward the elder Fisk married again.

At the age of five, little Jim, a fat and mischievous urchin, whose great delight was in " making a trade", with some playfellow, or in wandering away for miles in the country with a certainty of being soundly flogged on his return, was taken by his parents to Brattleboro, where his father established his head-quarters. Here Jim was sent to school, and was not long in making himself famous, not for proficiency in his studies, but, on the contrary, for his utter inability to appreciate the beauties of literal combination as set forth in Webster's old spelling-book, and his quaintly-expressed contempt for the syntax of his native tongue. Long after he had reached "three syllables" and had learned to write with some degree of skill, he continued to spell " busy" with two ss and an i, altogether ignoring the u, which he evidently believed to be out of place. One of his copy-books, used when he was about twelve years old, is still preserved by his stepmother at her home in Brattleboro, and to say that it is a literary curiosity is to do meagre justice to one of the most original of all the written results of school-boy labor ever examined by the critic. Hardly a page but shows the antipathy of the boy to everything like set. forms, and hardly a line but bears evidence of his natural contempt for uniformity. The little book contains three or four compositions, one of which, entitled "A Piece about The Dog," is as unique as ■anything ever penned by Artemus Ward. The young writer says in his " Piece" (which had evidently been originally written " Peace") :

" A Dog is an animal with fore legs because he is a quadrooped. I like large dogs best because they can run further and fight better than little dogs and they can also cetch rabits. A big dog aint worth much without hes got good breed into him. Then I had drather hev a littler one. They can also drag sleds some has been learned to cary sticks and baskets and seterer. The bulldog is the best fighting dog because most likely he -was made for that purpus. A terrier goes mostly for rats but they can also fight. I think the newfoundland is the noblest dog, he saves children from drownding and they are sagasious. This is all for the present."

He was remarkably fond of dogs, horses and other animals, and had a special liking for little children, a trait that characterized him through life. One of his schoolmates says that Jim Fisk was ready to fight the largest boy at school whom he might detect in an act of cruelty or oppression toward anything weaker, whether child or beast.

Mr. Fisk, Sr., was very successful as a peddler, but like nearly all Vermonters he was ever ready to speculate outside of his legitimate business. He traded in live-stock "to some extent, bought and sold real estate, and shortly after taking up his residence in Brattleboro built the Revere House, now the property of Mrs. Fisk. The hotel was much needed, but was not always well managed; so, when the elder Fisk became dissatisfied with a tenant, he would take charge of the house himself and leave his peddling business in the hands of trusted agents. For a long time young Jim served as a waiter in his father's hotel, and was always popular with the guests. His ready wit, his unfailing good nature, his promptness, and his strict honesty in rendering accounts and giving change, gave him a good name, which not even the reports of his later career can injure in the estimation of his numerous old customers, the honest farmers of Eastern Vermont. Jim was fond of reading the few papers that reached the village, and as his memory was good he always mastered their contents and could entertain a select company of travelers with an unfailing stream of news-items from all parts of the world, seasoned and spiced with his quaint comments. As his hearers were seldom great readers, Jim had a great advantage over them, and he was more than once credited with the authorship of witty things that he had gathered from the "serious column" of the papers and treasured in his mind for future use.

11 1 used to set with a lot of old fellows around the stove on cold winter nights," said Fisk to a friend, a few months before his death, "and spin yarns. I tell you, it was fun to watch the faces of them men. Most of them liked jokes best, but some had a pious preference for stories with a one-horse moral. Well, I knew lots of such stories ; but, to save ray life, I couldn't help running in a joke once in a while, and then you'd ought to seen the skeered looks of the sober-sided ones. Once I told a long story. It was about some Adolphus or other that killed his rival on account of jealousy. They were both courting the same lovely maiden, whose father was a deacon in a slab church with a skew gable and a square steeple, with one of these corn-twisted lightning-rods pinting up from the top of it like the stick of an umbrella. I described the lovely maid, with her amber hair and her striped calico gown and her soft blue eyes, and pictured her on the way to meetin', with Adolphus a little ahead of her, and the other fellow on the opposite side of the road. Then I got her into church, where she devoted in a most proper manner, with all the young men gazing upon her like head-lights on that curve up yonder at Carr's Rock. Then I escorted her home again, where the two rivals met at the garden gate, and indulged in profanity. This part of the tale I cut short, like a terrier's tail, of course. Then I told how the two infatuated young men fit at that garden gate, and how the lovely maid with the amber hair rushed out, and was just in time to see her favorite killed. Well, you see, I made a long story of it, but I finally got her and Adolphus in love, on account of the explanation he made when they had him in jail, where she had been to carry him tracts and home-made bread, and to gabble with him through the bars. Then

Adolphus was pardoned, you know, and the happy pair got married. Then I wound up by remarking that Virtue was its own reward some time or other, any how. When father heard that, and seen old Mr. Payson Godfrey open his eyes and start as if to go out, he said, ' Look here, Jim, you know well enough that that wasn't in the story. Go out to the barn, now, and bed them horses.' Well, I didn't recover from that expose for a good while. My reputation was jammed, like a passenger car with nary a bumper; for, you see, most of these old cusses thought that my stories and things was all original."