"Caleb, I want to start a new enterprise that will revolutionize this part of the country and part of Europe, too, if it succeeds, but it won't work unless you join me in it." "You know I'm yours to command," Caleb replied, at the same time forcing a tiny gleam of interest. "That's kind of you, but this project of mine is so unusual that I almost fear to suggest it. You know that the farmers of this section plant far more corn than anything else." "Yes, 'n always will, I reckon, no matter how small the price of what they can't put into pork. The idee o' corn-plantin' 's been with 'em so long that I reckon it's 'petrified in their brain structure,' as a scientific sharp I once read about, said about somethin' else." "Quite so, and we can't hope to change it unless labor and horses should suddenly become cheaper and more plentiful. Now I propose that we take advantage of this state of affairs by making some money and getting some glory, besides indirectly helping the farmers, by increasing the future demand for corn. You yourself once told me that if the people of Europe could learn to eat corn-bread, 'twould be money in their own pockets, relieve corn-bins here of surplus stock, and perhaps lessen the quantity of the corn spoiled by being made into whiskey." "That's a fact," said Caleb. "Very well. Corn never was cheaper here than it is now,--so I'm told,--nor were the mills ever so idle. I can buy the best of corn-meal, barrelled, and deliver it in London or Liverpool, freight paid, at less than two dollars per barrel, and I can buy all I want of it on my note at six months. If you'll go into the enterprise with me, every barrel shall be labelled 'Claybanks Western Corn-Flour: trademark registered by Philip Somerton.'" "Hooray for Claybanks! Hooray for the West!" shouted Caleb, becoming more like his old self. "Thank you. But as I've quoted to you about your bath-house project, 'You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.' Meal has often been sent to the English market, and some dealers have even sent careful cooking and bread-making directions. The different methods of making good food from corn-meal must, I am satisfied, be shown, practically, before the eyes of possible consumers. So my plan is this: to send over, say, two hundred barrels to London; hire for a month a small shop in a district thickly inhabited by people who know the value of a penny saved, cook in various forms--hasty pudding, hoe-cake, dodgers, muffins, corn-bread, etc., at the rate of a barrel of meal a day, or as much as can be sold, or even given away as an advertisement of the 'Claybanks Western Corn-Flour'--meanwhile persuading grocers in the vicinity to keep the meal for sale to persons who are sensible enough to appreciate it. And finally, as you know how to make all sorts of good things of corn-meal, I'd like you to go over to England and manage the entire business." "Wh-e-e-e-e-e-ew!" "That's somewhat non-committal, isn't it?"