Franklin's Autobiography: (Eclectic English Classics)Franklin, Benjamin
History
Franklin's Autobiography: (Eclectic English Classics)
Franklin, Benjamin
Franklin, Benjamin, 1706-1790
Thus the matter rested for some time, when I said to my partner,
"Perhaps your father is dissatisfied at the part you have undertaken
in this affair of ours, and is unwilling to advance for you and me
what he would for you alone. If that is the case, tell me, and I will
resign the whole to you, and go about my business." "No," said he, "my
father has really been disappointed, and is really unable; and I am
unwilling to distress him further. I see this is a business I am not
fit for. I was bred a farmer, and it was a folly in me to come to
town, and put myself, at thirty years of age, an apprentice to learn a
new trade. Many of our Welsh people are going to settle in North
Carolina, where land is cheap. I am inclined to go with them, and
follow my old employment. You may find friends to assist you. If you
will take the debts of the company upon you, return to my father the
hundred pounds he has advanced, pay my little personal debts, and
give me thirty pounds and a new saddle, I will relinquish the
partnership, and leave the whole in your hands." I agreed to this
proposal; it was drawn up in writing, signed, and sealed immediately.
I gave him what he demanded, and he went soon after to Carolina, from
whence he sent me next year two long letters, containing the best
account that had been given of that country, the climate, the soil,
husbandry, etc., for in those matters he was very judicious. I printed
them in the papers, and they gave great satisfaction to the public.
As soon as he was gone, I recurred to my two friends; and because I
would not give an unkind preference to either, I took half of what
each had offered and I wanted of one, and half of the other, paid off
the company's debts, and went on with the business in my own name,
advertising that the partnership was dissolved. I think this was in or
about the year 1729.
About this time there was a cry among the people for more paper money,
only fifteen thousand pounds being extant in the province, and that
soon to be sunk. The wealthy inhabitants opposed any addition, being
against all paper currency, from an apprehension that it would
depreciate, as it had done in New England, to the prejudice of all
creditors. We had discussed this point in our Junto, where I was on
the side of an addition, being persuaded that the first small sum
struck in 1723 had done much good by increasing the trade, employment,
and number of inhabitants in the province, since I now saw all the old
houses inhabited and many new ones building; whereas, I remembered
well that when I first walked about the streets of Philadelphia,
eating my roll, I saw most of the houses in Walnut Street, between
Second and Front Streets, with bills on their doors, "To be Let;" and
many likewise in Chestnut Street and other streets, which made me then
think the inhabitants of the city were deserting it one after another.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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