46 MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



town miliio7iaircs, with whom we are apt to associate no ideas but of the most 

 luxurious indulgence and the most ostentatious displays of superfluous wealth. 



HavinjT occasion, some weeks since, to remit nearly $30,000 to Paris, ana 

 being without experience as to the minutia; of the mercantile process, I put my- 

 self under the direction of a friend to guide me through what I considered quite 

 an important operation. Accordingly, under his instruction, I got from the bank 

 clerk a pencil memorandum of the amount to be remitted, on a paper as large as 

 your thumb-nail. Thus provided, we proceeded a few doors below, in Wall-street, 

 to the office of the celebrated house of P. W. &: Co., where, instead of finding a 

 starched dignitary in his silk gown and Worked slippers, reposing in his velvet 

 arm-chair, difficult of access and supercilious in his demeanor, I came plump upon 

 the head of the house, standing at his desk like one of his clerks, and evidently 

 quite as hard at work as any among them. On my name being mentioned, in place 

 of stopping to sbake hands, and asking me to be seated, and inquiring when I 

 came to town, and hoAv were all at home, and remarking on the news and the 

 weather as I, good easy soul, had imagined he would, in the way of a long pre- 

 face to a great piece of business, this Wall-street millionaire regarded me with 

 an air of courteous affability, but at the same time with an unmistakable desire 

 to learn and to dispatch my aflTair, whatever it might be, without any useless 

 palaver ; so, holding up my bank memorandum, I told him 1 wanted him to put 

 rae in the way of remitting that amount to my friend in Paris. In an instant, 

 with one hand he took the paper, and saying only "three fifty. Sir," with the 

 forefinger of the other, he beckoned a clerk to him, and handing him the mem., 

 he told him to prepare the bills of exchange ; then, casting his eyes on a clock in 

 full view, he pointed to it, and said to me, " Call at 12, Sir, if you please," and 

 straightway he turned to his work ! What " ihree-and-a-halt " meant this de- 

 ponent did not know ; but doubted rot that all would be 0. K., and not choosing 

 to betray his ignorance of what any fool on 'Change was supposed to understand, 

 he went his way, and true to the appointment, called again at 12, with an "en- 

 dorsed check from the bank for, as before said, something short of $30,000. 

 Here again the ceremony was brief, and the dialogue as sententious as nautical 

 language in a storm at sea. On reentering I handed him the check, whereupon 

 he again called the same clerk, signed the three bills of exchange on Hottinguer 

 & Co., Paris, in the twinkling of an eye, handed them over with practiced suav- 

 ity of manner, and — again turned back to /its xcork. In this " business transac- 

 tion of tens of thousands, there were not a dozen words spoken, nor more than 

 one minute consumed ; aiul such are the habits of application and dispatch, day 

 in and day out, throughout the year, with these men of enormous fortunes in our 

 large towns. The punctuality and industry which take their root in the early 

 struggles for independence, continue through life ; Avhile in the country, if one 

 farmer call on another to buy or sell a cow, or a few barrels of corn, the chance 

 is that the bargain will not be struck until after he has been persuaded to " din- 

 ner," if not to supper, though everything on his farm is the worse for his ab- 

 sence — that is, if he be on it a man of intelligence and industry, such as every 

 farmer should aspire to be. Finally, sir, let me ask you whether the best guar- 

 anty for profitable employment of such leisure moments as can be gained in the 

 country, be not in a love of books, and of such reading as you give us in The 

 Farmers' Library ? * 



N. B. — These thoughts have been committed to paper while Ave are steaming 

 up the Rappahannock River, 120 miles in length, winding its way to the Chesa- 

 peake throttgh a district of Old Virginia famed in olden time for hospitality and 

 high living — for the excellent management of its housewives and the beauty of 

 their daughters — for cock-fighting, fox-hunting, horse-racing — in a word, for fun 

 and frolic, as for talents, gallantry and patriotism. Should you ever be going to 

 any of the Virginia Springs, I recommend you to take the delightful " Ma?-y 

 Washington^' steamer, Capt. Myers, at Baltimore, at 4 P. M., on any Saturday, 

 At daylight next morning you enter the Rappahannock, and, arriving at Frede- 

 ricksburgh befq^e night, you will have passed in view of what remains of the 



[* All that we can say to the remark of our correspondent is, that we endeavor assiduously to 

 make up each number of such matter as ought to be placed iu the hands of every young man in 

 the country. £d. Farm. Lib.] 



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