ii8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



might ensue if we did but realize that the ships that pass between 

 this land and that are like the shuttle of a loom, weaving the web 

 of concord among the nations, and that commerce is the most po- 

 tent agent of civilization." 



Mr. Atkinson is what is called a self-educated man, but he 

 accepts the comment made by Dr. Francis Lieber on this phrase, 

 that one might as rightly speak of a self -laid egg. What both 

 gentlemen mean by this dictum doubtless is that men are inevita- 

 bly the creatures of the conditions among which they are placed, 

 over which they have no control. But, as it is usually applied, 

 the expression " a self-made man " means no more than that his 

 character and faculties have been developed independently of the 

 artificial aid of schools and book-lore, by hard contact with the 

 world and the experiences of active life ; and Mr. Atkinson would 

 hardly deny that he is a man of that kind. What he is, in char- 

 acter and modes of thought, is in the main the product of a life 

 spent in the factory and counting-house, combined with habits 

 of close, independent observation. A clew as to the turn which 

 his seeking takes when knowledge is to be acquired, may be 

 gained from the opening sentences of his paper on "Kentucky 

 Farms," in "Harper's Magazine" for June, 1881: "Whenever a 

 business man gets away from his affairs, and journeys into a far 

 country for even a short time, he may see many things that he 

 would entirely overlook if, with his mind filled with the every- 

 day cares of life, he passed through the very same sections in the 

 usual unobservant way. A pity it is that our commercial trav- 

 elers could not become trained observers, ready and acute as they 

 are in all that pertains to their work, often witty and full of good 

 stories. If they could learn to spend the many hours which they 

 are obliged to pass wearily in country taverns that are none of the 

 best, and are often of the worst, in reporting what they might 

 observe, what a resource against weariness it would be for them, 

 and what a benefit to all who wish to know what the resources of 

 this country really are, and how they could be developed ! The 

 business man who can write at all writes best for other business 

 men." To this habit of sharply observing for himself, Mr. Atkin- 

 son adds, as he goes on to relate, what he calls a patent method of 

 his own. He goes to persons — as for instance, in this case the State 

 geologist, in studying the resources of Kentucky — who have special 

 knowledge of the subject in hand, and becomes, for the time being, 

 their student. By such means he has accumulated a vast fund of 

 information about the resources of the United States, and the con- 

 dition of the different parts of the country, which, having made 

 himself familiar with the subject in hand, he can use with telling 

 effect whenever he has a condition to account for, or a lesson to 

 draw indicating a line of policy. His journey to Kentucky was 



