Leaving Mr. Weed, I went to Grassy Plain, a mile northwest of Bethel, and secured a situation as clerk in the store of James S. Keeler & Lewis Whitlock at six dollars a month and my board. I lived with Mrs. Jerusha Wheeler and her daughters, Jerusha and Mary, and found an excellent home. I chose my uncle, Alanson Taylor, as my guardian. I did my best to please my employers and soon gained their confidence and esteem and was regarded by them as an active clerk and a ‘cute trader. They afforded me many facilities for making money on my own account and I soon entered upon sundry speculations and succeeded in getting a small sum of money ahead. I made a very remarkable trade at one time for my employers by purchasing, in their absence, a whole wagon load of green glass bottles of various sizes, for which I paid in unsalable goods at very profitable prices. How to dispose of the bottles was then the problem, and as it was also desirable to get rid of a large quantity of tin ware which had been in the shop for years and was considerably “shop-worn,” I conceived the idea of a lottery in which the highest prize should be twenty-five dollars, payable in any goods the winner desired, while there were to be fifty prizes of five dollars each, payable in goods, to be designated in the scheme. Then there were one hundred prizes of one dollar each, one hundred prizes of fifty cents each, and three hundred prizes of twenty-five cents each. It is unnecessary to state that the minor prizes consisted mainly of glass and tin ware; the tickets sold like wildfire, and the worn tin and glass bottles were speedily turned into cash. As my mother continued to keep the village tavern at Bethel, I usually went home on Saturday night and stayed till Monday morning, going to church with my mother on Sunday. This habit was the occasion of an experience of momentous consequence to me. One Saturday evening, during a violent thunder shower, Miss Mary Wheeler, a milliner, sent me word that there was a girl from Bethel at her house, who had come up on horseback to get a new bonnet; that she was afraid to go back alone; and if I was going to Bethel that evening she wished me to escort her customer. I assented, and went over to “Aunt Rushia’s” where I was introduced to “Chairy” (Charity) Hallett, a fair, rosy-cheeked, buxom girl, with beautiful white teeth. I assisted her to her saddle, and mounting my own horse, we trotted towards Bethel.