In the meantime I took off my coat and hung it on the back of a chair. In the inside pocket of my coat I had my billfold containing about one hundred dollars, all the money I had, and also my valuable papers. When I went to reach for my money my billfold was gone. The saloon keeper seemed to know what had taken place and handed me five dollars. I had no work as there was none to be found. It was the custom in those days for the saloons to give a free lunch with a glass of beer. I went at noon every day and bought a glass of beer so I could have the free lunch that went with it. I lived that way for about two months. During the late winter I got a job at night work, which consisted of pushing loads of stone in a wheelbarrow for the building of the Stone Arch Bridge over the St. Anthony Falls on the Mississippi River for the Great Northern Railway Company. The planks upon which we had to walk became very slippery and on one trip the man ahead of me slipped back in the wheel of my wheelbarrow upon which I had a large stone. The force of his fall threw both stone and wheelbarrow into the river. The man behind me, seeing what was happening, flung himself face down over his wheelbarrow, and in the dark, grabbed me as I was going over the plank into the river. He caught me by one of my arms and held me until help came and I was pulled out. I was hanging from his hands about fifty to seventy-five feet above the river. After that experience I could not make myself walk those planks anymore, so I was again out of work and so terribly discouraged. A few nights later I walked onto the Tenth Avenue bridge intending to jump off into the river to end it all. As I took hold of the railing someone from behind me called out and said, "When you jump, your troubles will begin." I looked, to see the man who had spoken but there was no one on the bridge. The way he spoke had sent a chill through me. It was after eleven o'clock at night and I seemed to realize that it was the Lord who had spoken to me. After sometime in America I found that I was still the the same young man as before in Norway. It seemed that I was unable to do better. Thinking to improve matters, I decided to go to school and study for the ministry. After two semesters in the college certain things happened which turned me into an infidel. I quit school, went into business and got married. Soon after I contracted tuberculosis of the lungs, and the doctor said there was no help for me, as both my lungs were like soup. During the depression of 1892 I lost all I had. In my sinful condition I called on God and He healed me.