Nebraska advertiser. [volume] (Brownville, Nemaha County, N.T. [Neb.]) 1856-1882, 1860-02-23
The "Sell Out' Fever.

Do you know Jenkins? He hain't liv.
ed here long; came from t'other place,
where he staid but a little while. If you
know Jenkins. you are aware that be
amt quite satisfied here, and talks of
'selling out, and hunting up better To-
cation. This viii make his tenth reno
val within the past fifteen years. You
see, Jenkins is an energetic and go-ahead
individual, who is intent upon making his
"pile" Of a sudden. The usual way of
acquiring riches, with experience and
gray hairs, is not the way for Jenkins
He was a farmers boy-was given a
good piece of land, and a good start of
"stock things" But this raising a crop
only once a year was too slow business,
and our jenkins "sells out, gets a stock
Of goods, partly on credit, and turns mer-
chant. Six months thereafter, and when
his goods were we'll sold out, and rather
unJudicious credit given, and Jenkins
notes began to fall due, he concludes
store-keeping is a miserable business,
and he 'sells OUT pretty we'll plucked, ard
rents hotel and goes to tavern keeping
Thence he imagines he has talent, by
talking to travellers, and school teachers,
and bar-room politicians; and "sells out''
tavern-keeping, leaving portion Of his
rent unpaid. and turns to studying law or
physic, with a surreptitiOus design Of
practicing. But soon he wonders at the
miserable llUe it affords him-and is en-
vious Of and denounees the old lawyers
and doctors Of the town, who are entitled
to the public confidence and patronage
they are receiving, because Of their life.
long devotedness to their profession.
Having exhausted the round Of pursuit
in his native town and vicinity, jenkins
"sells out" finally all his remaining little
stuff, including ''lock, stock, and barrel, -
AMI emigrates. He discovers that Texas
or California is Just the place for him,
and off he goes, with wife and children,
and just money enough to get them there
by deck passage.
Now, when our jenkins gets to Texas,
it looks quite fine at first. For he is
nan of considerable energy and hope
but he is ever killed up by his want of
steady perseyerance-of a balance wheel.
He soon finds that money is as scarce,
and crops as slow, and times as "ight,"
if not "a little tighter" than they were
back in good old Sucker" Then the
new country and climate had its draw
backs.
And wife was homesick, and the child
ren dissatisfied and sickly. At length
jenkins groaned for his old home, and
his old father sent him on means enough
to get back to the Prairie State, as thin
as slab, and as poor as a church mouse.
jenkins then began to work around at
length rented cheap farm, "sold out"
and went to teaming, and then to work
ing in a saw mill, where he was struck
by log and crushed to death.
Poor Jenkins, having lived hard, died.
His children were left as legacies TO
friends and the poor house. And vet,
Jenkins brothers and other neighbors'
boys, not bit more talented OF industri-
ous than he, were living on their good
farms, doing well and independent
They had stuck to their business, and had
never taken the sell out fever. so disas-
trous to many in the West and in fact in
all the States.
Look around you, upon every hand, IN
city and country, and we see this fever
raging and destroying. Il is one Of the
fatal by-paths that decoys the energies of
Americans from legitimate, regular and
prosperous business occupation.-.7lton
Democrat.