"Brown of Philadelphia" was one who is known among our "cousins" as a "live" man. Brown of Philadelphia was an enterprising man; he was more: he was a benevolent man. He had a splendid scheme, he told me, for turning over thousands of dollars at once. He had no wish to merely better himself, however. He was a man with a large heart, and would make my fortune too. It seemed as if Providence had specially interfered to prevent his meeting with a partner until I had answered his advertisement! _I_ should be his partner. I need not know anything of the business--_he_ would manage all that. What I should have to do, would be, to take care of all the money that came in--a post for which both he and I thought I was peculiarly fitted. And the scheme?-- Perhaps you will laugh when I tell you. It was selling blacking! There is nothing to be ashamed of in it, though. Have not Day and Martin made a fortune by it, and a name in all the world? Has not many a proud merchant prince risen to eminence on a more ignoble commodity? Blacking! There is something noble in causing the feet of posterity to shine; and to be the means of testing the standing of a would-be gentleman! Clean boots are an essentiality of society; why should I shrink from the responsibility of helping to produce them? Well, whether you consider it a lowering trade or not, Brown of Philadelphia suggested our "going into" blacking together. He knew of a place, he said, where he could get it for "next to nothing;" and, as he then pertinently observed, I must be aware that it might be disposed of in New York at more than cent, per cent, profit. So, why should we not embark in it? If we did, Brown of Philadelphia--only he was opposed to betting, on moral principle--was prepared to wager a trifle that we would soon have more "greenbacks" than we should know what to do with! He had an office already, had my benevolent friend,--"located" in a first-rate part of Broadway. All I should have to do, he explained, would be to put a small sum into the concern--so as to be independent, as it were, and not merely accepting "a big thing" at his hands--and, my fortune was made. If I would contribute, say, five hundred dollars--"a mere song"--we might go joint shares in what would turn out to be a most remarkably go-a-head enterprise; yes, sir! Strange! But, the amount he mentioned was the exact sum, in American exchange, of my capital--about which, you know, I had previously spoken to him in a friendly and communicative way. It _was_ odd, my just having sufficient, wasn't it?--Yet, how lucky, to be sure! And then, there was no necessity for my being acquainted with the business:--he would manage that. My duty would be to take in money--exactly what I liked! That's what took my fancy so amazingly--"tickled" me, as Artemus Ward would have expressed it--so I repeat it!