The Athens post. [volume] (Athens, Tenn.) 1848-1917, 1858-03-12
ENTERPRIsING MAN.

young man just liberated from the ap-
premiership Of common clerk, conceives
the idea Of becoming immensely rich in a
few years, and resolves to open q wholesale
dry goods store, or perhaps large banking
house. From his late employers he receives
fiattering letters Of recommendation, Just as
quack medicines receive puffs from newspa-
pers; and from his mereaptile acquaintance
he begs testimonials, just as bad actors beg
applause from the galleries of theatres.
Armed thus with both the sword and
shield Of the commercial imposter, he obtains
credit; borrows money; opens a splendid es-
tablishment; employs a dozen dashing clerks;
marries bell who must be attended BY q
train Of liveried menials; rents a first class
house on the most fashionable avenue; re-
ceives on deposit the earnings Of laborers and
seamstresses; drives splendid span of blood.
ed horses; gives dinners, evening parties, and
birth day balls; buys box tickets at the thea.
tire; heads the list whenever complimentary
benefit is rendered to favorite actress; oc-
eupies front pew at church; never offers
less than hundred dollars at a donation
party; spends the summer at Newport or
Saratoga; announces his intention to visit
Paris and London the ensuing spring; bor-
rows, and borrows, and borrows, till he can
borrow no more-and then there is a star
tling rumor that failure has occurred, in
volving in ruin hundreds of industrious and
economical people. The telegraph sends the
astounding intelligence all over the country,
editors consult their dictionaries for words
to utter their regret and astonishment, com,
merciul men tender their sympathy and ex-
press renewed confidence in the integrity of
their unfortunate brother, and the cheated
poor again commence their weary journey at
the bottom of their steep and rugged path of
life.
The author of all this wasteful extrava
gance and this glittering falsehood, and all
pompous lberality, and all This snobbsh ad-
miration, and all this undeserved sympathy.
and all this piteously abused confidence, ab-
sents himself from public assemblies till the
nine days tempest has blown over. and then
comes forth to seek some new field of opera.
tion, and play the same game over again.
The shivering beggar who steals web Of
flannel is promptly arrested and punished
No sympathisng crowd follows him to the
grim entrance of the solitary and dreaded
abode Of counterfeiters, thieves, and assas
sins. No sorrowful paragraph reluctantly
tells how, in an evil hour, he committed the
unfortunate deed. And yet how small his
poor offense seems alongside Of the enormous
crimes Of the wicked and reckless vagabond
who steals the value Of many thousand webs
of flannel; who, though he never earned the
daily food of starveling dog, yet often
squandered in single nights licentious riot,
more than a whole years wages of an indus
trious man; who beggared hundreds Of fami-
lies whose humble dwellings he was not wor
thy to enter; and whoa bankrupt debtor,
yet wasting the substance of others with the
most shameful extravaganza, and covered all
over with the recent stains of treachery,
falsehood. fraud, and extorton-goes off the
stage be dsgraced, not only unpunished, but
with the sympathy of most whom he did not
robS