IT is in America, as was to be expected, that rise more quickly than in any other country. Every one is ambitious, and there he realises the fact that no position is beyond his power if he will but work for it. Franklin was a printer’s boy, General Putnam was a farmer, Roger Sherman was a shoemaker, and Andrew Jackson was a poor boy, who worked his way up from the humblest position; Patrick Henry, the great American orator, was a country tavern-keeper; Abraham Lincoln was equally low placed in his start in life. But even in America it is hard work to make a fortune. Niorse, an American artist, but a better chemist and mechanician than a painter, thought out the magnetic telegraph on a Havre packet-ship, but met the common fate of inventors. He struggled for years with poverty and a thousand difficulties. He failed to interest capitalists. At last, when he was yielding to despair, and meditated suicide, on the last night of a session of Congress, at midnight, when the Appropriation Bill was being rushed through, he got an appropriation of £6,000 for an experimental line between Washington and Baltimore; then success, rewards, honours, titles of nobility, gold medals, and an immense fortune. The American inventor of the sewing machine had similar misfortune, and then as great a success. “There are two kinds of men and two kinds of business in New York,” says an American author. The old-school merchants of New York are few; their ranks are thinning every day. They were distinguished for probity and honour; they took time to make a fortune. Their success proved that business success and mercantile honour were a good capital. Their colossal fortunes and enduring fame prove that, to be successful, men need not be mean, or false, or dishonest. When John Jacob Astor was a leading merchant in Now York, there were few who could buy goods by the cargo. A large dealer in tea, knowing that few merchants could outbid him, or purchase a cargo, concluded to buy a whole shipload that had just arrived, and was offered at auction. He had nobody to compete with, and he expected to have everything his own way. Just before the sale commenced, to his consternation he saw Mr. Astor walking slowly down the wharf. He went to meet him, and said—“Mr. Astor, I am sorry to meet you here this morning; if you will go to your counting-room, and stay till after the sale, I’ll give you a thousand dollars.” Without thinking much about it, Mr. Astor consented, turned on his heel, and said—“Send round the cheque.” He lost money, but he kept his word. When the lease for Astor House was nearly out, some parties from Boston tried to hire it over the heads of the then tenants. In a private interview with Mr. Astor, they wanted to know his terms. He replied, “I will consult Mr. Stetson (the tenant), and let you know.” To do that was, as they were well aware, to defeat the object they had in view. The old New York