264.Lady Architect.—There is no reason why women should not succeed in this occupation, since it is one in which taste is a chief requisite. Several young lady graduates of college have entered it recently, and with flattering success. Architects charge about three per cent. on contracts.
265.Lost and Found Agency.—In every large city numbers of articles are lost by the owners and found by others every day. A single New York paper containsdaily from ten to twenty advertisements of lost articles. Open a small office, advertise in the “Lost and Found” column of the paper that you will receive any articles that may be found, and charge the owner a small commission. The agency could be carried on in connection with some other light business.
Seven Ways to Get a Place—The Way a Boy Should Advertise—Openings Everywhere for the Right Kind of Boys—Beating the Booksellers—Stories About Smart Boys—Twenty-five Hints to Hang Your Fortune On—How a Towheaded Country Boy Became a Great Editor—A Barrel Full of Postage Stamps—How a Poor Boy Became the Richest Man in the Country—The Journey from Nothing to Forty Millions—The Best School in the World—The Beginnings of Great Fortunes.
Seven Ways to Get a Place—The Way a Boy Should Advertise—Openings Everywhere for the Right Kind of Boys—Beating the Booksellers—Stories About Smart Boys—Twenty-five Hints to Hang Your Fortune On—How a Towheaded Country Boy Became a Great Editor—A Barrel Full of Postage Stamps—How a Poor Boy Became the Richest Man in the Country—The Journey from Nothing to Forty Millions—The Best School in the World—The Beginnings of Great Fortunes.
Boys, you can do it! What! get rich? attain to fame? Yes, both. “But I have no chance.” Neither had Humphry Davy, nor Jay Gould, nor Henry Wilson. But the first became one of the greatest of scientists; the second, the richest man in the country; and the third, vice-president of the United States.
“The best school is the school of adversity,” said Rousseau, who, from a waiter in a restaurant, became the most noted man of his age. The boy, Horace Greeley, wandered up and down the streets of New York, asking of printers if they “wanted a hand,” and was everywhere laughed at and turned away; and the boy, George W. Childs, worked for $2 a week as a clerk in a book store, saved money, bought the PhiladelphiaLedger, and became a millionaire.
“I have no capital,” you say. But you have ten servants (fingers) to work for you. Daniel Manning, ex-President Cleveland’s Secretary of Treasury, started asa newsboy. John Wanamaker, the great merchant, commenced in a book store at $1.25 a week. Fred Douglass, the colored orator, began life as a slave without a cent. And P. T. Barnum, the world-famed showman, rode a horse for ten cents a day. No chances! You havefiveon each hand. No capital! It is thebloodthat fights and wins. If you have no opportunity, make it. Do not wait for something to turn up;turnsomething up. Be a match for events. The world’s great and rich men have forced their way to success at the bayonet points of their fingers, and with the iron pry of an unconquerable will. Boys, here are a few hints for you:
266.Free Service.—Make friends with a clerk. Offer to go with him on the delivery wagon. He will be only too glad of your assistance. The next step will be to help in odd jobs about the store. After a little familiarity with the business, you will find an opening. Your friendly clerk will have a sick day, or a leave of absence, or a vacation. The employer knows you have assisted the clerk, and will gladly give you his place for a day or a week, and from temporary employment it is but a step to a permanent place.
267.Special Department.—Make yourself familiar with a particular department of the work of shop or store. Suppose you take a pound of tea. It will surprise you to find out how many things you can learn about so insignificant a thing as a pound of tea. Ascertain the different brands; what markets they come from; where they are raised; how they are manufactured; in what quantities they are shipped; whatare the fluctuations in price; who are the largest dealers; in what section of the country the trade is chiefly carried on. A study of these things will suggest other branches. A year given to a study of this kind, and you will know more about tea than the most trusted employee, whose knowledge is commonly of a superficial kind. Then, if you have an opportunity, you can surprise the merchant with a knowledge of his business, and he will be sure to give you a place as soon as he has an opening. One merchant says: “I always have a place for a person who can tell me anything about my business I don’t know myself.”
268.Show Superiority of Goods.—A man occupied his spare moments in measuring the linear feet of advertisements contained in the different Sunday papers, and sent the result to the one which had printed the most. Go around among customers and find what brand of goods they like the best. Then report to the makers of these brands, and you may be sure they will take an interest in you if they see that you take an interest in them.
269.Advertising.—Here is an advertisement for the right kind of boy: “A brisk-footed, up-to-date boy, not afraid to work, will take a place at low wages for the sake of learning the business.” Here you have four qualities in two lines—quickness, intelligence, industry, and low wages—the four things men are looking for, and such an advertisement will not wait long for a reply.
270.Influence.—Great names are mighty. Introduce yourself to the greatest man in your town, and tell him your qualifications and ambitions. Do not beafraid of him. A truly great man is more willing to do a real kindness to a meritorious boy than you think. Robert Lennox, an old-time New York merchant, one Sunday at church saw a timid young person looking anxiously around as if for a seat. “Come with me,” said Mr. L., “and I will give you a seat.” The next day the young man took a letter of recommendation to the store of a merchant. “Can I get a small bill of goods to begin business with?” he inquired. “I will trust anybody that Robert Lennox invites into his pew,” was the reply. “I owe all my success in life,” said Jonathan Sturges, “to the invitation of Robert Lennox to sit in his pew.” With the great-and-good-man’s indorsement you will find places waiting for you.
271.A Trial Week.—All many boys want is a chance. When you apply in vain for a place, tell the proprietor you are sure that he needs you, and that you will come a week for nothing (better a month if you can afford it). If you really have the merit you think you have, it will be strange if you cannot displace some indolent or indifferent employee.
272.Commission.—Offer to sell the dealer’s goods on commission. You must leave a deposit to cover the worth of the goods. Take the articles to your friends and tell them you are trying to get a place. In most cases, if the goods are cheap, they will try to help you, and you will be able to make an excellent report to your employer. When he sees that your service means money in his pocket, he will be eager to employ you at a salary.
273.The Boy Magician.—For fifty cents you canbuy a book entitled “The Parlor Magician,” containing one hundred tricks for the drawing room. A few weeks’ practice should make you master of these arts, and then with your outfit you are ready for a money-making tour. It is best to take along a friend, as in some of the most clever tricks you will need an assistant.
274.The Glass-blower.—For twenty-five cents you can get a book with full instructions in the curious art of glass-blowing. The wondrous forms you will be able to produce, the pleasure of the work, and above all the money derived from the sale of your products, will delight the heart of any boy. There is money in glass-blowing after you have mastered the art, but if you would make a business of it you must apprentice yourself for a time to a master of the trade.
275.The Dime Lunch.—There are thousands of business men and clerks in our large stores and offices who would prefer to pay ten or fifteen cents rather than go out to a restaurant. Especially is this the case in rainy weather. Pretty boxes with tasteful lunches could be prepared at a small cost, and taken through the places of business. The important item is attractiveness.
276.Cancelled Stamps.—In every large city there are dealers who will pay you for canceled stamps. Ordinary stamps bring about ten cents per thousand, but rare ones bring very high prices. Ask all your friends for their canceled stamps. In a store in New York there are several barrels full of postage stamps collected by boys. Each barrel contains a million.
277.The Boys’ Press.—Do you know you can get a printing press with complete outfit, a full font of type, and one hundred cards for $3? You can make money easily by printing cards and doing other small press jobs. Charge fifty cents, seventy-five cents or $1 for cards, according to the quality of paper and amount of printing.
278.Saw and Scroll.—Most interesting articles, both of use and ornament, can be made by the scroll-saw. Some have earned boys’ fortunes in making these curious articles, and there is as much pleasure in making them as in getting the money for them.
279.The Magic Lantern.—The very best lantern and slides can be obtained for $6. From that figure the price runs downward to fifty cents. Purchase a good one and give parlor exhibitions at a charge of five cents admission. As you become more expert, you can increase your price. If you are a success at the business, your services will be in demand for more pretentious entertainments, where you can make $5 or more in a single evening.
280.Candy Making.—What can please a boy better than candy making. Offer your services free for a short time to a confectioner. When you have learned the trade, which you can do in a little while, commence the business on your own account in a small way. Beginning with those sweets which are easily made, you can extend your art as your business increases until you have a good trade.
281.Odd Jobs.—“I push baby carriages through the park at five cents apiece,” says a Chicago boy. “Iclean and oil bicycles,” says a New York lad. “I stand on the Boulevard and pump up tires,” declares a third. “I buy a dozen lemons and a pound of sugar and sell lemonade on all holidays and at times of parade,” says an enterprising schoolboy. “I carry bundles and valises from the train, and make often fifty cents a day,” says a Boston youth. “I hang up a slate on the front gate and take store orders for neighbors,” says a bright village lad.
282.General Employment Agency.—Inform a hundred or more families in a particular district that at a certain hour of the day you will be there to carry messages, roll out barrels of ashes, go on errands, mail letters, black boots, and do whatever work they may require. If the work is sufficient to warrant it, a business partnership of boys may be formed, so that while one is engaged another can go on his usual rounds, and thus insure punctuality.
283.Collect Magazines.—Almost every one takes a literary magazine, and some take two or three. After a time they become refuse on their hands. Many persons would gladly give you a truck-load. But these are worth money, and second-hand dealers who sell them at five cents apiece will give you three cents for them.
284.Vacant Lot.—If you live in the city, get the owner of a vacant lot to give you the privilege of raising vegetables. With a little experience you can easily raise from $50 to $100 worth of vegetables on a lot 20 × 100 feet. This will go far to eke out the support of a large family.
285.Bicycle Teaching.—Here is a field for a stout lad of fifteen years. There are thousands of modest young ladies and men, especially elderly gentlemen, who would like to learn to ride a wheel, but do not like the publicity of a riding academy. Issue some neat cards and circulate them from house to house with the information that for the sum of $1 you will teach any one to ride. Most people have a back yard where such instruction could be given. Having no rent to pay, you could easily afford to take them for that price, as you have the advantage over the professional instructor, both of cheapness and privacy. There is a lot of money in this for the right kind of a boy.
286.First-Cost Sales.—When public attention is aroused upon any subject, consider how you can turn it to account. Here is what a boy thirteen years old says: “When ‘Coin’s Financial School’ came out and the people were talking about it, I wrote to Mr. Harvey, the author, and got a lot of the books and sold them all before they got into the book stores here. I have made in this and like enterprises $500.” Like opportunities were presented in our late war, with the Dewey buttons, battleship pictures, etc. Keep your eyes open. Opportunities to make money are all about you. The alert boy makes the successful man.
Boys, there is gold in all the mountains, pearls in all the seas, and money in every street. Elijah Morse at fifteen years of age bought a recipe for stove polish, paying $5 for the materials. He peddled it in a carpetbag, and from this small beginning grew the celebrated “Rising Sun Stove Polish,” whose huge factory covers four acres at West Canton, Mass., and whose proprietor is immensely rich. Cornelius Vanderbilt was a poorboy without a cent. When he died his estate was valued at $40,000,000.
Boys, there is a fortune for you. It is not to be found, but made by hard work. Write on your banner, “Luck is a fool. Pluck is a hero.”
The Omnipresent Agent—What He Says and What He Sells—Power of the Successful Drummer—The Five Secrets of the Book Agent—Five Thousand Dollars Commission on a Patent—How Seven Men Carry $7,000,000 Insurance—A Man Who Receives $5,000 a Year and Does Nothing—How Teachers Pay for Their Positions—Searching for a $10,000 Preacher—The Matrimonial is Often a Matter-of-money-all—A New Way to Get Good Servants—The Farm Supply Company.
The Omnipresent Agent—What He Says and What He Sells—Power of the Successful Drummer—The Five Secrets of the Book Agent—Five Thousand Dollars Commission on a Patent—How Seven Men Carry $7,000,000 Insurance—A Man Who Receives $5,000 a Year and Does Nothing—How Teachers Pay for Their Positions—Searching for a $10,000 Preacher—The Matrimonial is Often a Matter-of-money-all—A New Way to Get Good Servants—The Farm Supply Company.
Fewoccupations offer such inducements for persons with little or no capital as that of the agent. There are two classes of agencies. In one, as a book or patent agency, the agent works for one or two persons at a fixed commission and needs no capital. In the other, as that of servants and of supply companies, the agent is also in a certain sense a principal; he obeys no one’s orders, fixes his own commissions, and makes his profits directly from the public. Here are a few points for agents:
287.Book Agency.—The book agency depends partly upon the kind of book, but chiefly upon the kind of man. The right man selling the right book can make enormous wages. An agent selling a commentary on the Bible made sometimes $25 in half a day. An agent for the “People’s Encyclopædia” earned $3,000 in one year, and spent only about half the time in the work. Many agents for “Memoirs of General Grant” earned from $10 to $20 a day. Ordinarily, anagent should be satisfied if he can make from $3 to $5 a day. From this sum must come his expenses. Book agents receive from 25 to 45 per cent., according to the nature of the work. Forty per cent. is considered excellent compensation.
288.The Patent Agency.—Considerable business is now done in the selling of patent rights. The agent studies the lists that come out weekly in the “United States Patent Gazette,” and sends his circulars to those who have secured patents. The agent will charge from five to ten per cent., if he can arrange with a patentee for the sale of the patents. In other cases, he charges a fixed sum, which is paid in advance, and is considered an equivalent for his services whether or not he is successful in effecting a sale, on the same principle that doctors and lawyers are paid whether they gain or lose a case. In extent and profit, the business varies from the itinerant vender with half a dozen patents in his valise to the established business house with sub-agencies in all parts of the world. What the profits are in the latter situation may be judged from a single case in the former, where a traveling man received as commission on a single patent sold the sum of $5,000.
289.Commission Merchants.—A vast business is done in the sale of general merchandise on commission. Foreign houses have their agencies in this city. Also much of the produce of the farm and of the products of manufactures are disposed of in the same way. Take a case of the former kind. A man hires an office in New York and storage in a warehouse. Then he sends circulars to Westerndealers, stating that he is prepared to take their stock or grain on commission. When he can make quick sales he saves the expense of storage,but rental in a warehouse is necessary in holding for futures. He receives in one day 100,000 bushels of wheat at seventy-five cents per bushel, which, after paying freightage, he sells at one half of one per cent. profit. Gain of one day, $500. He will not receive so much every day, and some days he will have to sell at a loss; but, taken altogether, there are good chances of wealth in the commission business.
290.Insurance Agency.—Insurance, both fire and life, is a mine of wealth, and has opened wondrously during the last few years. The present magnitude of the business is shown by the statement that there are $2,500,000,000 invested in life insurance in the United States, while the fire insurance agents last year wrote more than $16,000,000,000. There are seven men who have an aggregate of $7,000,000 on their lives. But the business is yet in its infancy. The field of life insurance is not nearly covered, and if it were, ten million persons will come to maturity during the next ten years, all of whom may be considered as candidates for insurance, and all the policies will have to be renewed in a short time. Insurance agents receive as commission from ten to twenty-five per cent. Some companies secure to their agents a regular percentage on the premium so long as the policies continue in force. If, therefore, an agent gets fifteen per cent. commission, and the company receives $10,000 per year as premiums from the policies he has written, his share will be $1,500; and thus he enjoys an annuity without any further work for a long period of time. The larger old-time companies, also, have general agents whose positions are still more lucrative. Many of them are in circumstances of affluence, and have very little to do. In fact, it is in the insurance business as in many otheroccupations, that as one rises the salaries are larger, and the actual work, aside from the responsibility, is smaller.
291.Traveling Salesman.—In some houses a traveling salesman is allowed a standing commission on all goods bought by firms whose custom was secured through his influence. As the commission continues as long as the customer continues the trade at that house, some agents, after a few years of active work are enabled to retire on incomes of $2,000, $3,000, and in some cases of $5,000 a year. The business done by drummers is immense. Three hundred million tons of goods are shipped by them yearly, and the business amounts to nearly $2,000,000 a day.
292.Supply Companies.—A supply company differs from an ordinary merchants’ firm in that it does not keep goods in stock. It is a mammoth general agency for procuring whatsoever you desire. Specimens only are kept in the store, and from these the customers make selections. The advantage of supply companies is the saving of large rentals, of expensive clerk-hire, and of loss or damage in the long keeping of goods, and, most of all, of risk in unsalable articles, and in the fall of prices. Thus, a supply company can undersell an ordinary dealer, and if alert and prompt can make vast profits. Another great advantage is the smallness of the capital required. Here are great opportunities for bright young business men of limited means.
293.Agencies for Teachers.—The number of teachers in the public schools in the United States is 400,325. The matter of engaging school teachers varies in different States, and often in different parts of thesame State. Sometimes it is done by county superintendents, often by the Board of Education, but most frequently by the school trustees, commissioners, or committees. One going into the business of a Teachers’ Agency must ascertain the particular method in every part of the country, and learn the name of the persons authorized to act in that capacity. Then he should issue circulars by the hundred thousand. For the eyes of applicants, he should use the advertising pages of the newspapers. Teachers should be charged a commission upon their salaries in something like the following order: Five per cent. on first year’s salary, three per cent. the second year, and one per cent. the third year. After that it may be allowed to lapse. The contract should be rigorously drawn, and, where possible, payments should be collected in advance. There are great profits in the business when systematically and vigorously conducted. One agency in the eastern part of the United States is receiving commissions from ten thousand school teachers. Owing to frequent changes, the majority of these are paying five per cent.; but if we suppose the average to be only the amount payable the second year—$3 commission—the income would be $30,000.
294.Clerical Agency.—Here is an opportunity for an unoccupied clergyman of wide clerical acquaintance. There are thousands of vacant pulpits and other thousands of ministers anxious for calls. Establish an agency through whose medium the supply shall meet the demand. Your list should comprise the names of all churchless pastors, together with those desirous of change; and their experience, qualifications, education, family, age, personal appearance, together with other interesting information, should be properly tabulatedfor the inspection of church committees. Candidates should be graded according to the catalogue, and sent out in order as pulpit candidates. As clerical engagements are commonly much longer than those of teachers, it is right that you should receive a larger per cent. for your services. If a church pays its pastor a salary of $10,000, and you are successful in the search for an available man for its pulpit, it would hardly be a presumption for you to charge $500 for your services.
295.Matrimonial Agencies.—These should be conducted with the greatest care, and only by the most conscientious persons, on account of the great responsibilities involved. They are, however, capable of vast development, and of immense good. In Massachusetts alone there are seventy thousand females in excess of the males, while in Illinois the men preponderate to the number of fifty thousand. Your task of bringing together the unmated is a most delicate one, and you should accordingly be well compensated. Where there is much wealth on either side, your commission may be expressed in three figures, and even in four. One thousand dollars is a small sum for a man to pay who secures an accomplished wife and a happy home. We have known several marriages made in this way to turn out exceedingly well.
296.Agency for Servants.—This is not new, but you might revolutionize it by a new plan. Written recommendations are worthless, because almost every one will compensate the disappointment of the discharged servant by a certificate of good behavior, in the writing of which the elasticity of the conscience is more or less drawn upon. Instead of accepting a valueless paper, let an employee of the office personallyvisit two or three of the places where the servant has been employed. The lady of the house will tell you many things she would not write in the letter. This will consume time, but the compensation is in the better class of service you will be enabled to offer. When it is known that you make personal investigation, sifting out the useless and offering only first-class help, your patronage will be vastly increased, and you can charge much higher commissions. Tell your patron that at the end of a month she may pay you $10 if satisfied; and most people would prefer to do that than to pay a half or quarter of that sum in advance with small guarantee of fitness.
297.Agency for Farm Hands.—There are thousands of idle people in the great cities who would gladly go on farms for a portion of the year. If they make personal application, they are commonly regarded by the farmer as tramps. Besides these, there are thousands of emigrants arriving in search of work. Many of them are valuable as farm help, having tilled the soil at home. An agent who has a keen knowledge of human nature, and knows how to ask questions, sifting out the useless and the vicious from the valuable and the virtuous, can through proper advertising in agricultural papers, send at least a thousand of these men into the country every summer. Through an arrangement with the farmer by which $5 of the first month’s wages shall be withheld and forwarded to the agent, the sum of $5,000 as commission for these one thousand laborers is secured. But the energetic agent ought to do far better than this.
Proprietary Kings and How They Acquired Power—Patent Medicine Secrets Given Away—Where Perry Davis Found His Recipe—The Parent of the “Killers”—Men Who Made Their “Pile” in Pills—Fortunes in “Bitters”—Electricity, or “Mustard Plasters”—The Story of a “Discovery”—How a Man Made a Fortune With an Indian Cure—“What’s in a Name?” The Mighty Lubec—Tons of Drugs Taken Every Day—Triumph of “Soothing Syrup”—A New Patent Medicine for Every Day of the Year—The Man Who Took Everything.
Proprietary Kings and How They Acquired Power—Patent Medicine Secrets Given Away—Where Perry Davis Found His Recipe—The Parent of the “Killers”—Men Who Made Their “Pile” in Pills—Fortunes in “Bitters”—Electricity, or “Mustard Plasters”—The Story of a “Discovery”—How a Man Made a Fortune With an Indian Cure—“What’s in a Name?” The Mighty Lubec—Tons of Drugs Taken Every Day—Triumph of “Soothing Syrup”—A New Patent Medicine for Every Day of the Year—The Man Who Took Everything.
Ownersof proprietary compounds have built up great fortunes in the sale of their concoctions. Our drug stores are filled with patent medicines, and millions of “cures” are sold annually. The names of some of these, such as Hostetter, Brandreth, and Mother Winslow, have become household words, proving how largely and universally their medicines have sold. The story is told of one credulous hypochondriac, who, on the theory that of many shot some one is likely to hit, actually took every kind of patent medicine in the world, or at least of every sort he had heard about. As there are more than three hundred and sixty diverse concoctions, this genius must have taken a different kind for every day of the year, or else have extended his experiments through a long period, which seems impossible under the circumstances. It is said that Perry Davis obtained his famous “Discovery” in the form of a recipe in an old newspaper which he found in an outhouse. This was the foundation of one of thelargest fortunes in patent medicines, and it was the parent of all the “Killers.” The men who have made their piles in “pills” may be counted by the hundred. Perhaps the “Soothing Syrup” success is the most signal example of “multum in parvo.” It is sold by the million bottles, and yet it is nothing but a little paregoric dropped in some sweet mixture. “Lubec” is a mighty name, but anybody can be a Lubec so far as the question of perfumery goes. Among the anecdotes of medicine venders we have only space for one or two. A man was crying up the virtues of an electric belt, and it was found that he had adroitly attached a strip of mustard plaster to the magic band, and this when heated by contact with the warm skin produced redness and an itching, which were supposed by the too trusting patient to be the effects of the healing electricity. Another man has made a fortune with an “Indian Plant.” He travels about the country with what he advertises to be a “troop of Indians,” giving performances and hawking his “cures.” The “Indians” are New York toughs, and the “medicine plant” is a common pasture weed. We give no sort of countenance to these frauds, but, dismissing them all, there are still both profit to the patient and profit to the maker in the taking of proprietary medicines. To succeed in this line one should first have an article of genuine merit, and then advertise lavishly. Below are given some recipes quite as good as those that have made fortunes for their possessors, and in some cases the exact formulas of these widely renowned medicines are given.
298.Healing Ointment.—One of the most celebrated of ointments is composed of these simple ingredients: Butter, lard, Venice turpentine, white wax and yellowwax. Here is a rule for another ointment: Fresh butter, three-quarters pound; beeswax, four ounces; yellow resin, three ounces; melt together; add vinegar of cantharides, one fluid ounce; and simmer the whole with constant agitation for ten or twelve minutes, or until the moisture is nearly evaporated; then add of Canada balsam one ounce; express oil of mace, one drachm; balsam of Peru, ten or twelve drops; again stir well, allow mixture to settle; and when about half cold pour into pots previously slightly warmed, and allow it to cool very slightly. There is nothing else but to put on your label and expose for sale.
299.Spasm Killer.—Acetate of morphia, one grain; spirit of sal volatile and sulphuric ether, one fluid ounce each; camphor julep, four ounces. Keep closely corked in a cool place and shake well before use. Dose, one teaspoonful in a glass of cold water as required.
Here is another: Spirits of camphor, two ounces; tincture of capsicum, one ounce; tincture of guaiac, one-half ounce; tincture of myrrh, one-half ounce; alcohol, four ounces. This is Perry Davis’ famous medicine.
300.Anti-Malaria.—One ounce each of Peruvian bark and cream of tartar, cloves one-half drachm reduced to fine powder. Dose, one and one-half drachm every three hours.
301.Hostetter’s Bitters.—Here is the recipe for the famous bitters: Calamus root, two pounds; orange peel, two pounds; Peruvian bark, two pounds; gentian root, two pounds; colombo root, two pounds; rhubarb, eight ounces; cloves, two ounces; cinnamon, four ounces; diluted alcohol, four gallons; water, two gallons; sugar, two pounds.
302.Toothache Ease.—Liquor of ammonia, two parts; laudanum, one part; apply on lint.
303.Candy Digest.—Lump sugar, one pound; water, three ounces; dissolve by heat; add cardamom seeds, ginger, and rhubarb, of each one ounce; when the mixture is complete pour it out on an oiled slab or into moulds.
304.Cough Lozenges.—Lactucarium, two drachms; ipecacuanha, one drachm; squills, three-fourth drachm; extract of licorice, two ounces; sugar, six ounces; make into a mash with mucilage of tragacinth, and divide into twenty grain lozenges.
305.Lovers’ Hair Oil(Makes the hair glossy).—Castor oil, one pound; white wax, four ounces; melt together; add when nearly cold, of essence of bergamot, three drachms; oil of lavender, one-half drachm; essence of ambergris, ten drops.
306.Purgative Powder.—Equal parts of julep and cream of tartar, colored with a little red bole; dose, a teaspoonful in broth or warm water two or three times daily.
307.Consumption Wafers.—Two parts each lump sugar and starch in powdered form; powdered gum, one part; made into a lozenge mass with vinegar of squills, oxymel of squills, and ipecacuanha wine, equal parts, gently evaporated to one-sixth their weight with the addition of lactucarium in proportion of twenty to thirty grains to every ounce of the powders, the mass being divided into half-inch squares weighing about seven and one-half grains.
308.Beef, Iron and Wine.—Here is a recipe for Liebig’s famous extract: Beef juice, one-half ounce; ammonia citrate of iron, 256 grains; spirit of orange, one-half fluid ounce; distilled water, one-half ounce; sherry wine sufficient to make sixteen fluid ounces. Dissolve the ammonia citrate of iron in the water; dissolve the extract of beef in the sherry wine; add the spirit of orange and mix the solution.
309.Spring Tonic.—Calamus root, two pounds; orange peel, two pounds; Peruvian bark, two pounds; gentian root, two pounds; colombo root, two pounds; rhubarb, eight ounces; cinnamon, four ounces; cloves, two ounces; diluted alcohol, four gallons; water, two gallons; sugar, two pounds.
310.Dr. Pierce’s Golden Medical Discovery.—Here is all there is of Dr. Pierce’s Golden Medical Discovery. It is no doubt a good thing, but you can make it yourself. A one-dollar bottle holds 220 grains of a brownish-colored, clear liquid, consisting of fifteen grains of pure honey, one grain of extract of acrid lettuce, two grains of laudanum, 100 grains of diluted alcohol, with 105 grains of water.
311.Bed-Bug Exterminator.—Corrosive sublimate, one ounce; muriatic acid, two ounces; water, four ounces; dissolve, then add turpentine, one pint; decoction of tobacco, one pint. Mix. For the decoction of tobacco, boil two ounces of tobacco in one pint of water. The mixture must be applied with a paint-brush. If well applied, this is a sure destroyer of bed-bugs. It is a deadly poison.
312.Catarrh Cure.—One-half gram of carbolic acid; one-half gram of camphor; and ten grams ofcommon salt; which are to be dissolved in four-sevenths of a liter of water and injected into the nostrils. You can call it the “Excelsior,” for it is excelled by none.
313.Lip Pomatum.—For chapped lips, lard, sixteen parts; cacao oil, twenty-four parts; spermaceti, eight parts; yellow wax, three parts; alcana root, one part. The substances are fused for a quarter of an hour at a gentle heat, then strain through a cloth, and mix with oil of lemon and oil of bergamot, each one-sixth part, oil of bitter almonds, one-fifteenth part; then the mass is poured into suitable vessels to cool.
314.Ointment for Chapped Hands.—Camphor, sixty grs.; boric acid, thirty grs.; lanolin and white vaseline of each one-half ounce.
315.Cod-Liver Oil Emulsion.—Yolks of two eggs; powdered sugar, four ounces; essence of oil of almonds, two drops; orange flower water, two ounces. Mix carefully with an equal bulk of cod-liver oil. This is a delicious emulsion. Of course, the dose is double that of the clear cod-liver oil.
316.Beauty Water.—(To remove freckles). Sulpho-carbonate of zinc, two parts; glycerine, twenty-five parts; rose water, twenty-five parts; spirits, five parts. Dissolve and mix. Anoint twice daily, keeping the ointment on the skin from one-half to one hour, then wash off with cold water. Wear a dark veil when exposed to the sun.
317.Cough Mixture.—Syrup of poppies, syrup of squills, and paregoric, each one-half ounce. Mix.Dose, a teaspoonful in a little warm water night and morning, or when the cough is troublesome.
318.Dr. Sage’s Catarrh Remedy.—Here is the famous secret: One-half grm. of carbolic acid; one-half grm. of camphor and ten grms. of common salt; which are to be dissolved in four-sevenths of a liter of water and injected into the nostrils. Its reputation is believed to be well deserved.
319.Diarrhea Mixture.—Wine of opium, one fluid ounce; tincture of valerian, one and one-half fluid ounces; ether, one-half fluid ounce; oil of peppermint, sixty minims; fluid extract of ipecac, fifteen minims; alcohol enough to make four fluid ounces. This is the formula for a most celebrated patent medicine. The dose is a teaspoonful in a little water every two or three hours until relieved.
320.Blood Purifier.—Equal to the best selling compounds. For a bottle holding 220 grms., take fifteen grms. of pure honey; one grm. extract of poisonous or acrid lettuce; two grms. laudanum; 100 grms. of diluted alcohol; with 105 grms. of water. Make large quantities in like proportion.
The Costliest Spot on the Western Hemisphere—A Mile and a Half of Millionaires—The Kings of the Earth—Why Some Rich Men Do Not Live in New York—The Country Fool and the Knowing Ones—How Coney Island Was Born—The Story of a Great Land Sale—Rents in Apartment Houses—The Fifty-story Office Building—The Man Who Gave aCarte BlancheDecoration Order, But Won’t Do it Again—The Western Land Bubble—Good Farms Going to Waste—The Jersey Flats.
The Costliest Spot on the Western Hemisphere—A Mile and a Half of Millionaires—The Kings of the Earth—Why Some Rich Men Do Not Live in New York—The Country Fool and the Knowing Ones—How Coney Island Was Born—The Story of a Great Land Sale—Rents in Apartment Houses—The Fifty-story Office Building—The Man Who Gave aCarte BlancheDecoration Order, But Won’t Do it Again—The Western Land Bubble—Good Farms Going to Waste—The Jersey Flats.
Noclass of men have made greater or securer fortunes than dealers in real estate. W. C. Ralston, James Lick, and J. J. Astor, are examples of persons who have accumulated vast sums through investments in land. Thepointsof real estate are: First, a sound title; second, a keen foresight of the wants and the roads of civilization; third, a careful inspection of the neighborhood where a contemplated purchase is located; fourth, a thorough knowledge of market values of this kind of property; fifth, non-professional advice, in the disinterested judgment of men thoroughly familiar with property and prices. Other considerations are the rate of taxes of various kinds, imposed or likely to be imposed upon the property. Tax methods in large cities are often ways that are dark. For this reason, George Gould, the multi-millionaire, and Mr. Rockefeller, the Standard Oil magnate, have disposed of their urban properties.
321.City Property.—A mile and a half of millionaires!Midway between the East River and the Hudson there lay a few years ago a neglected tract of land which could have been bought for a few hundred thousand dollars. To-day it is the wealthiest mile and a half on the Western continent. One hundred million dollars would not purchase the ground alone. Forty years ago a piece of land which is now almost “down-town” was called “Eno’s Folly,” because he paid for it what was supposed to be an extravagant sum. It is now the site of the Fifth Avenue Hotel. The tide is still running up, but you must now go to the Bronx, or even further for cheap city property. It is, however, the most secure of all investments. Nothing is more certain than that the property in the annexed district of New York is bound to advance. So also with real estate in all city suburbs.
322.Pleasure Resorts.—Less than forty years ago a man, simulating country simplicity, sauntered along Coney Island and astonished the owners by inquiring the price of what was supposed to be worthless land. They, thinking him crazy or a fool, named a thousand dollars, or five times what it was supposed to be worth. He accepted the offer on the spot. A million dollars would not buy the land to-day. The supposed countryman’s “folly” has been repeated many times since. The owner of Bergen Beach has made a fortune in this way during the last two or three years. As cities grow, pleasure resorts must be found. Buy a bit of seashore and make it into a Bergen Beach or a Bowery Bay. Or, purchase a grove within easy distance of the city, and make it into a pleasure park. In either case, railroads or trolley connection is indispensable, but with these and plenty of enterprise and money you cannot fail to reap a large harvest.
323.New Town Sites.—Large fortunes have been made by men who had the sagacity to see a potential factor in the meeting of two rivers, or the projection of a railroad. The question for investors in real estate is, “Where is the population going?” Keen observers note the drift, get ahead of the tide, and are ready to sell lots when the people arrive. Whitestone and Morris Park on Long Island were built in this way. It is a good investment, not quite so safe as city property, but paying more handsomely where the projector is fortunate in his location.
324.Western Lands.—Fortunes have been made and lost in Western lands. The facts are that some sharpers have been booming lands that are hardly worth the taxes. Persons who have bought “corner lots” in “promising” Western towns have been surprised to learn that the towns were not built, or even surveyed, and that often the site was located in the midst of an impenetrable swamp where a town was impossible. However, lands along the line of railroads, or places which have harbor facilities on the banks of rivers are good investments.
325.The Apartment House.—The apartment house, which is a kind of evolution of the flat, is becoming a feature of life in large cities. The question whether it is a paying property will receive light by the consideration of the rents received by the owners of a building of this kind in New York, the Knickerbocker at Fifth Avenue and Twenty-eighth Street. This is a typical apartment house, and the tenants may almost be said to buy their rooms, for there are several who give $100,000 for a ten-years’ lease, and even small bachelor apartments on the tenth floor command $1,000 a year.
326.The Sky Scraper.—There is no limit to the extent of a building in height. Some are twenty stories, one is thirty, and it is reported that a sky-scraper fifty stories in height is projected. Do they pay? Here is the account of a modest one of only nine stories, the Mills Building on William Street, New York. The cost, with land, was $2,500,000. It is 175 × 150 feet. It contains 400 offices, has 1,200 tenants, and pays an annual net rental of $200,000, or eight per cent. It is related of Mr. D. O. Mills, the owner, that in completing his magnificent residence on upper Fifth Avenue, he gave acarte blancheorder to a decorator, and departed with his family to California. On returning he was delighted to find the place transformed into an Aladdin’s Palace, but his joy was somewhat modified at the presentation of the bill which amounted to $450,000.
327.The Jersey Flats.—Right over against property whose taxable value is $3,000,000,000 lies another property worth literally nothing. Step over from Manhattan Island, where every foot of land needs to be overlaid with silver round-moons for its purchase, to New Jersey, and you will find 27,000 acres of marsh lying under the very nose of the metropolis—land hardly worth a song. Why is this? Simply because capitalists have not been wise enough to improve this great waste. In Holland, by a system of diking, land in a similar condition is now covered by great warehouses and factories, and cannot be bought for hundreds of millions of dollars. Here is the opportunity for capitalists. Why invest money in far-off gold fields when you have a Klondike here at the very threshold of the metropolis? “The first step,” says the State geologist, “is to build an embankment and a pumping station.The cost will be about $1,000,000. The main ditches should be made, and the whole area laid out in twenty-acre farms, and sold on the express condition that each plot shall be immediately ditched and brought under cultivation.” If we put the cost of ditching, and of other incidental expenses at $500,000, we have a total cost of $1,500,000. Then, if we estimate the worth of the land at only one-fourth the average price of land on Manhattan Island—which is the average worth of land in Jersey City—we have a value for the total 27,000 acres of $50,000,000. Profits, $48,500,000.
328.Abandoned Farms.—There are 4,300 abandoned farms in New England alone. These with a little expense could all be made profitable. Some are selling, buildings complete, as low as $700, and even $500. Many of these abandoned farms, costing $1,000, could, at the expense of another $1,000, be put in a highly thrifty condition and sold for $4,000. An Abandoned Farm Company will some time be organized with chances of good profit.