THE EAST BRIDGEPORT ENTERPRISE--W. H. NOBLE--PLANS FOR A NEW CITY--DR. TIMOTHY DWIGHT’S TESTIMONY--INVESTING A FORTUNE--SELLING CITY LOTS--MONEY MAKING A SECONDARY CONSIDERATION--CLOCK COMPANY IN LITCHFIELD--THE “TERRY AND BARNUM MANUFACTURING COMPANY”--THE JEROME CLOCK COMPANY--BAITING FOR BITES--FALSE REPRESENTATIONS--HOW I WAS DELUDED--WHAT I AGREED TO DO--THE COUNTER AGREEMENT--NOTES WITH BLANK DATES--THE LIMIT OF MY RESPONSIBILITY--HOW IT WAS EXCEEDED--STARTLING DISCOVERIES--A RUINED MAN--PAYING MY OWN HONEST DEBTS--BARNUM DUPED--MY FAILURE--THE BARNUM AND JEROME CLOCK BUBBLE--MORALISTS MAKING USE OF MY MISFORTUNES--WHAT PREACHERS, PAPERS, AND PEOPLE SAID ABOUT ME--DOWN IN THE DEPTHS. I now come to a series of events which, all things considered, constitute one of the most remarkable experiences of my life--an experience which brought me much pain and many trials; which humbled my pride and threatened me with hopeless financial ruin; and yet, nevertheless, put new blood in my veins, fresh vigor in my action, warding off all temptation to rust in the repose which affluence induces, and developed, I trust, new and better elements of manliness in my character. This trial carried me through a severe and costly discipline, and now that I have passed through it and have triumphed over it, I can thank God for sending it upon me, though I feel no special obligations to the human instruments employed in the severe chastening. When the blow fell upon me, I thought that I could never recover; the event has shown, however, that I have gained both in character and fortune, and what threatened, for years, to be my ruin, has proved one of the most fortunate happenings of my career. The “Bull Run” of my life’s battle was a crushing defeat, which, unknown to me at the time, only presaged the victories which were to follow. In my general plan of presenting the facts and incidents of my life in chronological order, I shall necessarily introduce in the history of the next seven years, an account of my entanglement in the “Jerome Clock Company,”--how I was drawn into it, how I got out of it, and what it did to me and for me. The great notoriety given to my connection with this concern--the fact that the journals throughout the country made it the subject of news, gossip, sympathy, abuse, and advice to and about me, my friends, my persecutors, and the public generally--seems to demand that the story should be briefly but plainly told. The event itself has passed away and with it the passions and excitements that were born of it; and I certainly have no desire now to deal in personalities or to go into the question of the motives which influenced those who were interested, any farther than may be strictly essential to a fair and candid statement of the case.