A MAN OF SAMPLES.
[ILLUSTRATION]
Morgan had been on the road for one house about 20 years. This is a long period of travel. In less time than that most men work up or work down. No man can continue on a dead level as a salesman during that time, even if his habits are good. If he has ability he is sure, with rare exception, to work himself off the road. If he is mediocre no one house can afford to carry him for twenty years. Morgan was the rare exception just mentioned. He was an excellent salesman, and his ability and success but served to weld him the closer to his work. The house had made him a partner long since, but the business he controlled was so large and so profitable, that they all knew, and he best, that to withdraw him and experiment with a new man would be but playing with fire over a magazine of powder. So he went on his way year after year, making no plans for the future that would change his work or his life.
But his family, consisting of his wife and their one daughter, Mary, a romping girl of twelve, was not of his disposition, These two could not see husband and father start off without a protest. The wife had always on her heart a burden of anxiety about him; of dangers on railroads, of his possible robbery and murder; of the discomforts of hotels, and the fear of his falling sick among strangers. She was naturally a timid woman, and the responsibility of the house weighed upon her. The whole burden of Mary's growth in body and mind, her training, her companions, and her pleasures were matters the mother would gladly have shared with the father, but she was generally compelled to decide them alone.
The father's continued absence was a constant pain and grievance to Mary. There was never a week but that she felt deprived of some special outing because he was not at home to go with her. Saturday night and Sunday, if he was where he could run home, were so many solid hours of happiness to them all, but to Mary they were full of perfect bliss.
Morgan was known to all his friends as a man who never worried. If a train was late he sat down and waited; if a customer failed he always signed a compromise; if he didn't get the best room in the hotel, he took what he could get; and he lost no sleep in picturing how his competitors might get ahead of him. He always left home with the assurance that everything would go on all right until he returned, and when he went away he thought of the two he loved as being happy and well.
But as he started on this trip, he could not shake off a slight feeling of anxiety that had possessed him all the night, and had grown since he awoke. Their talk the previous day had been about the entrance Of diphtheria into the neighborhood, and of the fatal case but two blocks away from their door. Mary had complained of a slightly sore throat, but on Monday morning declared it was entirely well again, kissing him good-by with more spirit than usual, as if trying to convince him of the truth of her words, and send him away assured and happy.
When he was seated in the cars the shadows came over his spirits again and began to torture him with doubts and possibilities. It might be, he thought, that her sprightliness of the morning was due to fever, rather than to health. He wished he had looked into her throat, and he regretted that he had not cautioned his wife about her. He nursed these fears until he felt himself becoming wild with apprehension, and then he resolutely put the thoughts aside, declared he was foolish and would have no more of it, and devoted himself to a companion and to his papers.
Men cannot always govern their minds. These are kingdoms that frequently rebel against all government. Several times during the day Morgan caught himself going back to his morning thoughts and he resolutely changed the current. But at night, try as he would, he could not conquer them. Even his dreams took up the forebodings of the day, exaggerated and intensified them, and tortured him. Next morning found him out of sorts, nervous, and miserable. He had a long drive to take in the country, but he shrank from it as if he saw danger in his track. All his intuitions seemed to be crying to him to go home, but what he thought was his common sense kept insisting that he should go on with his business, and not cross the bridge of trouble until he came to it.
The day was one of the loveliest October days he had ever seen. His drive was through twenty miles of the best corn land of Illinois. The black road was as dry as a board, and as level as only a prairie can be. The first effect of the beautiful day and pure air was invigorating. He enjoyed the drive through the street into the country road. Then the broad fields, the pleasant farm houses, the herds of horses and cattle, the long Osage hedges, the perpetual but always surprised rabbit at the road side, all these attracted and entertained him, and his ride was successful in driving away his blues. His customer seemed especially glad to see him; took him to his house to dinner; talked with him of important personal matters, and gave him a large order for goods. He turned back to the railroad feeling as happy as he had ever done; took out his order-book and figured up the amount of the bill and the profit, as was his custom, and then began to sing.
Suddenly there came across him a wave of anxious worry, and all his thoughts flew back to the daughter's sore throat, and the funeral he saw last Sunday. He could not drive these away. They clung to him; they whispered to him; they unfolded themselves like a panorama, and on the canvas he saw Mary sick, then worse, and then dead! It was the longest twenty-mile ride that he had ever taken, and his old friend, the landlord, concluded from his face that Morgan had met with bad luck in sales that day.
He had a night run to Decatur and determined that he would telegraph to the house, and quiet these nervous apprehensions that were so cruel, though probably so absurd. It would cost but little, he reasoned, and though foolish, it was wiser than to continue to be torn by doubts. So before going to bed he gave the operator a half rate message, for morning delivery, as follows:
To Manning, Morgan & Co., Chicago, Ill.: Is my wife or daughter sick? Answer, care Gilsey.
C. MORGAN.
He felt easier having done this, and passed a better night than the previous one, although there was in all his sleeping and waking thoughts an under current of solicitude over impending danger to Mary.
With an attempt not to be anxious, yet terribly apprehensive at heart, he tore open the telegram that reached him about 9 o'clock:
To C. Morgan, care Gilsey & Co., Decatur: Come home first train.
MANNING.
Good God, what was this! Were his forebodings indeed true? If so he was all the more totally unprepared for the truth. His constant comfort had been that his fears had not the slightest foundation to rest upon, and the more they crowded upon him the surer he had been that they were flimsier than dreams. But here staring him in the face were those four ominous words:
“Come home first train.”
Why had they not given him the whole story? He started for the telegraph office to send for further particulars, but stopped. Suppose Mary was dead! Did he want to learn it here, so far from his wife? No; he would wait. Such a story would unfold soon enough. There were several hours before a train went his way; the discipline of twenty years asserted itself, and he attended to his business.
The ride home was one that can be understood in its depths only by those who have been similarly circumstanced. The train seemed to creep. The minutes were like hours. The stops seemed to be interminable, and every mile nearer home seemed to be proportionately longer than the previous one. He reached the city at dark. The store was closed. He had expected to find Manning there, but he suddenly remembered that he had not telegraphed to him the time of his arrival. As he neared his home the first glance showed him there was a change. The lower part of the house was in darkness, and only a dim light shone in the front chamber, which was but rarely occupied.
“They have laid her there,” he said to himself, and all his soul cried within him in anguish. His poor wife! How she must have suffered, to have gone through all this alone! What a brute he was to go away Monday, when he ought to have known, and did know, that something dreadful was upon them! He reached the door; it was fastened; he would go to the other side and enter quietly. But some one heard his step, and, opening the door, called him back.
“Is it Mr. Morgan?” The voice was that of a neighbor.
“Yes.” He passed in, expecting to see or hear his wife. The friend closed the door and turned to him.
“Have you heard—,” she began.
“I have heard nothing; is Mary—,” he broke down. The door beside him opened.
“Oh, papa!”
Give him air! What mystery was this?
“Mary, is it you? Are you alive? Why, I thought—I feared—Oh, darling, is it you?”
Yes, it was Mary. Oh, thank God! Thank God!
“Tell me again, dear, are you well?”
“Oh, yes, papa, but poor mamma!”
“Mamma! What of her? Is she sick? What is it? Tell me quick!” And again he was pushed from the heaven of happiness to the bottomless pit of doubt. “Is mamma sick? where is she?”
“Oh, papa, the doctor says she is going to—”
“Hush,” said the neighbor. “Step inside, sir; the doctor is with her now; he will soon be down. Prepare yourself, Mr. Morgan; your wife is very low. The servant's carelessness caused an explosion in the kitchen, setting herself on fire; your wife ran to her assistance and saved her life, but, I fear, at the expense of her own.”
“I must see her.”
“No, sir, not now; be guided by me for a moment. The doctor will soon be down.”
He took Mary in his arms and they wept together. Oh, if his wife, his darling wife! were to be taken from him! It was the cruelest blow God ever struck! And she saving another's life, too! He cursed and raved, but it was in his own heart; and Mary, crying on his breast, only knew what comfort it was to have her papa once more with her.
The physician came down with manner so grave that it told its own story. “There is scarcely a chance,” he said; “you can go to her; she will not know you.”
“When did this happen?”
“Monday evening.”
“Have you consulted others? Can nothing more be done?”
“Nothing except to help her to die easy.”
* * * * * * *
But she did not die. She knew her husband. He begged of her to live, as only a man can plead whose soul is bound up in a woman's life, and whether love, or whether medicine, or whether care saved her, I do not know. But she lived. But Morgan informed Manning that his traveling days were over; that a new man must be engaged for that route. They found him, after diligent search, and much to the surprise of everyone connected with the house, he sold more goods for the firm than Morgan had ever done. The one who rejoices most at this is Morgan, who says he has made his last trip.
[The following sketch by M. Quad in the Detroit Free Press, will be new to some of our readers, and will, we think, be appreciated by them all.]
I really and truly believe that the day will come when the kicker will be classed where he belongs and be entitled to the reverence due him. I look upon him as a philosopher and a philanthropist. He stands forth one man out of ten thousand. He is actuated by the most unselfish motives. He is the real reformer.
I am not a kicker. I am simply taking the preparatory lessons to enable me to blossom out. The other day when I bought a ticket to go east they told me at the ticket office:
“While the train does not leave until about eleven, the sleeper is open at nine, and you can go right to bed and wake up at Niagara Falls next morning.”
I entered the sleeper at half-past nine and went to bed. That is, it is called going to bed. You are boxed up, boxed in, surrounded and smothered and charged two dollars for the misery. A sleeping-car is a mockery, a fraud and a deception. The avarice of the companies results in misery for the passengers. Four other persons had gone to bed, and at ten o'clock we were all asleep. At that hour two men entered with a great clatter. They were talking loudly, and they sat down and continued. I waited fifteen minutes for one of the other sleepers to kick. No one uttered a protest Then I rose up and asked:
“Do you men know that this is a sleeping-car?”
“We do,” they answered.
“And do you propose to continue this disturbance?”
“We propose to talk as long and as loud as we please!”
I called the conductor and inquired:
“I have paid for a berth in which to sleep. I can't sleep for this disturbance. Will you stop it?”
“Really, I can't,” he answered.
“Are there no rules?”
“Yes, but people in a sleeping-car must expect to be disturbed.”
“Oh, they must. Very well—see me later.”
Four others came in with just as much racket, and they kept their chattering going until eleven o'clock. At half-past eleven the lights were turned down and everybody was ready for sleep. I had been patiently waiting for this. Lying on my back, arms locked over my head and my palate down, I brought a snore which went thundering over that car in a way to open every eye. After two more a man called out.
“Thunder and blazes, but we've got a whale aboard!”
After three more they began to yell at me from every berth. I put in two extra ones, and the porter came down and shook my arm and said:
“Heah—you—stop dat!”
“Colored man!” I said, as I looked up at him, “if you come here and do that again I may fire upon you!”
As soon as he had gone I went back to business. When a man sets out to snore for revenge you'd be surprised to know what a success he can make of it. In five minutes they were calling for the conductor. He came down and parted the curtains and said:
“Hey—you—wake up! You are disturbing the car.
“Conductor, haven't I paid for this berth?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Is there any rule which prohibits snoring?”
“No, but—”
“Then you keep away from me! I have a revolver, and I might take you for a robber!”
Then I returned to the main question. I snored in every key of the scale. I snored for blood. I had every person in the car swearing mad and ready to fight, and they sent for the passenger conductor. He refused to interfere. Several chaps volunteered to “pull me out o' that,” but when they came close enough to see the muzzle of a revolver they fell back. At two o'clock in the morning they held a convention, and as the result one of them asked:
“Stranger, can we buy you off?”
“No, sir.”
“Is there any way on earth to stop that bazoo of yours?”
“The four of you who came in last were grossly selfish. You had no care for the rights of others. The four who were here before I came were disturbed but hadn't the grit to kick. Now, then, promise me on your solemn words that if you ever enter a sleeping-car again you will respect; the situation, and I will let you off.”
Every soul in that car made the promise, and half an hour later we were all asleep.