In working the smaller towns I found that a rumor circulated to the effect that I was a foreign detective on the trail of some noted criminal was of great assistance. It would work a sort of undercurrent in my favor and give me prestige with a customer I otherwise could not get. It was really amusing at times to watch the crowds whispering to each other and sizing me up as I walked down the street. The thought of having a real live detective in their midst would always arouse their curiosity. Thus, in selling books, and especially encyclopedias, I varied my canvass to suit my respective locations. I found that I had to be constantly on the watch to adapt the method of my approach to the nature of the individual. One man had to be taken by storm; another would surrender only after the slow process of a long continued siege. With some I made a strong argument upon subjects with which they were not supposed to be intimately acquainted; with others I had to call attention to the very points which they oftenest touched in their every-day life. With lawyers I had to confine my remarks a great deal to legal questions and debates; with doctors, to medicine and surgery; with ministers, to theology and the sciences and it was generally safe to ply a school teacher with such things as art, poetry and the classics, or a newspaper man with matters of general information. For merchants I had a little song about free trade or tariff, income taxes, imports and exports, the price of grain and the like, and to mechanics, blacksmiths and builders I talked of machines and materials. Again, there were others who seemed to want to get away as far as possible from the grooves in which their own lives were running, and these people I had at a decided disadvantage unless their range of reading was a great deal wider than that of the average of their class. Here is an instance of my manner of approaching customers: I would walk rapidly into a man’s office, as though it was the place I had been looking for all the time. I would state that I was directed to him as a gentleman well versed in literature and learning, and as that sort of sympathy was what I desired to meet in my business I thought I would run in as I was passing by, see him, introduce myself, and promise him a call by and by. Then I would start for the door, but stop as I turned the knob, make some suggestion in regard to his being considered authority on literature, start for the door again, and draw him into questioning me, asking me of what books I was speaking, and the like. Then I was safe. If I could get a man who was able to purchase to ask me questions, and then listen to what I had to say, I was reasonably certain of a sale.