There is all the difference in the world in towns and the crowds you gather in them. This crowd was willing to be amused, came to be amused, and had made up its mind not to be disappointed. They were with us from start to finish, and when we “counted up the house” found the collection amounted to within a fraction of twenty dollars. After paying for the hall, and some little incidental expenses, we had remaining about three dollars and a half apiece, and a large stock of confidence in the future. That party was a wise one in its day and generation. The weather was delightful, the roads good, the moon near to full; for these reasons, and others, we took a promenade after the show was out. In other words, we saved the expense of a hotel bill, and went on to the next town, getting what rest we wanted in a friendly haystack along the road. While the Milton Brothers’ combination lasted we paid the hotels less money, and lived better, than I had thought possible. We had generally got in too late for dinner, and an order for supper was enough to insure the moral support of the landlord. Probably he was disappointed that he did not see the color of our money, but that was no matter. The business was grand while it lasted, and I continued to be a showman for some time. We went from town to town, walking when the distance was not too great, riding in box-cars sometimes, giving entertainments similar to the first, occupying halls when we could get them, but content with an empty store or dining room in the hotel at which we temporarily stopped. Sometimes, of course, there was very little profit, but oftener there was a fair dividend. Before long we had accumulated at least twenty dollars apiece. Passing through a large town, we succeeded in getting hold of a quantity of old lithographs and pictorial sheets. With these posters and a few small streamers and dodgers we billed a smaller town not far away for a “Grand Theatrical Entertainment,” charging regular prices of admission. Success was with us. After counting up the house, and deducting expenses, we found we were on the sunny side of fifty dollars. Such a result as this was too much for us. We began to think that our time had come. Bob Milton talked of telegraphing for “people” to join us on ahead; and all of us figured up the cost of putting a show on the road that would carry eight or ten actors, and play the larger towns.