HIS LIFE AND WORK 



He dominated his own lawyers. And he fought 

 always in an old-fashioned, straight-from-the- 

 shoulder way that put him at a great disadvan- 

 tage in a legal conflict. Also, he was supposed 

 to be much richer than in reality he was. He 

 had made money by the rise in Chicago real 

 estate. By 1866 he had become a millionaire. 

 And his entire fortune was assumed by opposing 

 lawyers to be the product of the Reaper 

 business. 



It is to be said, to the lasting honor of South 

 Carolina, that she gave a grant of money to Whit- 

 ney, out of the public treasury, as a token of 

 gratitude for the invention of the cotton gin. 

 But no wheat State ever gave, or proposed to 

 give, any grant or vote of thanks to Cyrus Mc- 

 Cormick for the invention of the Reaper. The 

 business that he established was never at any 

 time favored by a tariff, or franchise, or patent 

 extension, or tax exemption, or land grant, or 

 monopoly. Single-handed he built it up, and 

 single-handed he held it against all comers. If, 

 as Emerson has said, an institution is no more 

 than "the lengthened shadow of one man," we 



[97] 



