Talbot was an old gentleman who kept a country store in which was sold every thing useful and ornamental, embracing dry goods and groceries, confectionery and hardware, from rat-traps to plows, and from woolen socks to ready-made overcoats, and Sheridan found himself in a position to learn a little of every thing--every thing, at least, in the country grocery line. Mr. Talbot was a man who delighted in being thought, if not by others, at least by himself, a patron of youth, and he patronized young Sheridan, and was, as he afterward declared, "a friend to him when a friend was every thing." When Sheridan grew older and famous, Talbot still continued to patronize him, and once said, alluding to his former protégé, that, on taking him into his service, he "perceived that he was smart and active, and took some pains to instruct him not only in selling goods, etc., for that," he adds, with great candor, "was our duty and interest," but when a leisure moment offered he taught him to improve his "slight knowledge of writing, arithmetic, pronunciation," etc. Young Sheridan did not remain long with Mr. Talbot, but gave up his service for that of a gentleman named Henry Dittoe, in the same trade and in the same town as that of Mr. Talbot. While still here he attracted the attention of the Hon. Thomas Ritchey, then member of Congress from the Congressional district in which Perry County was located, and, owing to the influence of an elder brother and the favorable impression he made upon Mr. Ritchey, Sheridan obtained, very unexpectedly to him, the appointment of cadet to the West Point Military Academy. This was immediately after the close of the Mexican War, when it was a very difficult matter to obtain appointments for others than the sons and orphans of officers who had fallen in the war.