Yet there seemed to be no lack of money. It lay in banks, it went begging for good security. Where was there any good security? Every inch of ground, every building, stocks and furniture, were covered by mortgages. Stock companies trembled in the balance, and went down like card-houses. Everybody wanted to sell every thing, but there were no buyers. Everybody wanted to work, but there was nothing to do. Everybody was in a chronic state of grumbling; there was no profit to be made in farming, in manufacturing, in any thing. There had been too much over-production, for which every one blamed his neighbor. The great warehouses were full of grain, the mills loaded up with iron, the factories full of cloth and flannels and cottons; and yet people were going hungry and in rags. It was puzzling and painful. We had bought too much abroad, and sent the money out of the country, the balance of trade would make it all right again; there had been over-production, and now there must be a vigorous repression; there had been too much speculation in real estate; there had been too great an accumulation of capital in the business centres; we were fast verging to the state of older countries, where there were the few rich and the many poor: there was a surplus of labor, and was there not also a surplus of people? There was another sad side to it all, that made Jack's heart ache. These young men and boys tramping through the country, begging or worse, swearing, telling foul stories, herding together anywhere, corrupting one another's morals, smoking, drinking,--somehow they managed to obtain these indulgences,--looking furtively out of languid, sodden eyes, their faces hard and worn, their voices coarse and gruff; and they were to be the next generation of what?--loyal and honest citizens, or jail-birds? It was not all so sombre. At five and twenty a healthy, unwarped nature is many-sided. There were countless marvels to see and to study. He stumbled over people who had known Mr. Lawrence, and who had a kindly feeling for a Hope Mills man. And he had done something more in the last eight years than merely learn how to make cloth. He had dipped into chemistry, and knew a little about dyes; he had studied up in grades and kinds of wool, and was interested in labor processes. With fresh opportunities he looked into it more closely, observed new methods of decreasing waste, or saving labor. He was a well-informed, well-mannered, sensible fellow; and occasionally some one would say of him, "A smart, long-headed chap, that! The world will hear of him some day, or I am mistaken." He kept looking about for some place where, if the world did not hear of him, he might get a chance in some enterprise where he could take a few steps upward. There certainly were more men than places. The world was a bee-hive, surely; but alas for those who swarmed out in such times as these!