Mr. B. was a manufacturer, and he employeed some five or six thousand men. He used to say that these men were not forced to work for him; that they were at perfect liberty to accept or reject the terms; that, so far as he was concerned, he would just as soon commit larceny or robbery as to force a man to work for him. "Every laborer under my roof," he used to say, "is as free to choose as I am." Mr B. believed in absolutely free trade; thought it an outrage to interfere with the free interplay of forces; said that every man should buy, or at least have the privilege of buying, where he could buy cheapest, and should have the privilege of selling where he could get the most. He insisted that a man who has labor to sell has the right to sell it to the best advantage, and that the purchaser has the right to buy it at the lowest price. He did not enslave men--he hired them. Some said that he took advantage of their necessities; but he answered that he created no necessities, that he was not responsible for their condition, that he did not make them poor, that he found them poor and gave them work, and gave them the same wages that he could employ others for. He insisted that he was absolutely just to all; he did not give one man more than another, and he never refused to employ a man on account of the man's religion or politics; all that he did was simply to employ that man if the man wished to be employed, and give him the wages, no more and no less, that some other man of like capacity was willing to work for. Mr. B. also said that the price of the article manufactured by him fixed the wages of the persons employed, and that he, Mr. B., was not responsible for the price of the article he manufactured; consequently he was not responsible for the wages of the workmen. He agreed to pay them a certain price, he taking the risk of selling his articles, and he paid them regularly just on the day he agreed to pay them, and if they were not satisfied with the wages, they were at perfect liberty to leave. One of his private sayings was: "The poor ye have always with you." And from this he argued that some men were made poor so that others could be generous. "Take poverty and suffering from the world," he said, "and you destroy sympathy and generosity." Mr. B. made a large amount of money. Many of his workmen complained that their wages did not allow them to live in comfort. Many had large families, and therefore but little to eat. Some of them lived in crowded rooms. Many of the children were carried off by disease; but Mr. B. took the ground that all these people had the right to go, that he did not force them to remain, that if they were not healthy it was not his fault, and that whenever it pleased Providence to remove a child, or one of the parents, he, Mr. B., was not responsible.