On the other side it was agreed that the Jerome Company should exchange its stock with the Terry & Barnum stockholders and thus absorb that company and unite the entire business in East Bridgeport. It was scarcely a month before the secretary wrote me that the company would soon be in condition to “snap its fingers at the banks.” Nevertheless, three months after the consolidation of the companies, a reference to my memoranda showed that I had already become responsible for the stipulated sum of $110,000. I was then called upon in New York by the agent who wanted five notes of $5,000 each and I declined to furnish them, unless I should receive in return an equal amount in my own cancelled notes, since he assured me they were cancelling these “every week.” The cancelled notes were brought to me next day and I renewed them. This I did frequently, always receiving cancelled notes, till finally my confidence in the company became so established that I did not ask to see the notes that had been taken up, but furnished new accommodation paper as it was called for. By and by I heard that the banks began to hesitate about discounting my paper, and knowing that I was good for $110,000 several times over, I wondered what was the matter, till the discovery came at last that my notes had not been taken up as was represented, and that some of the blank date notes had been made payable in twelve, eighteen, and twenty-four months. Further investigation revealed the frightful fact that I had endorsed for the clock company to the extent of more than half a million dollars, and most of the notes had been exchanged for old Jerome Company notes due to the banks and other creditors. My agent who made these startling discoveries came back to me with the refreshing intelligence that I was a ruined man! Not quite; I had the mountain of Jerome debts on my back, but I found means to pay every claim against me at my bank, all my store and shop debts, notes to the amount of $40,000, which banks in my neighborhood, relying upon my personal integrity, had discounted for the Clock Company, and then I--failed! What a dupe had I been! Here was a great company pretending to be worth $587,000, asking temporary assistance to the amount of $110,000, coming down with a crash, so soon as my helping hand was removed, and sweeping me down with it. It failed; and even after absorbing my fortune, it paid but from twelve to fifteen per cent of its obligations, while, to cap the climax, it never removed to East Bridgeport at all, notwithstanding this was the only condition which ever prompted me to advance one dollar to the rotten concern!