Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1877-07-18
A Mothers Influence.

Ex-senator Pratt was engaged at the time
of his death in preparing for the Logansport |
Star series of personal recollections. The |
following is the last that he wrote, and will |
be read with peculiar interest:
at was late in the fall of 1885 that, hav- |
ing collected for different mercantile firms |
in Cincinnati about two thousand dollars |
Calvin Fletcher sent me from indianapolis |
to Cincinnati on horseback, by the Law
renceburg road, to deliver to the parties in
terested the money so collected. As | was
passing the branch bank, then recently es.
tablished, on the morning of my departure,
the cashier hailed me, and brought out some
bundles of bank-bills folded up, and slowed
them away in my saddle-bags, and handed
me letters to the banks to whom the pack
ages were to be delivered. He stunned me
by saying they amounted to twenty thou.
sand dollars. 1t was great surprise to me
to be trusted with the charge of so much
money.
"Surprise soon yielded to different senti-
ment when came to think of the RESPONSE
bility had incurred. The staple products
of the state, in those primitive days, were
corn and hogs. Corn, not bearing trans
portation, was usually committed into hogs
and whiskey. There was no mode of getting
the hogs to market, when fattened, except
by driving them. Cincinnati was then, as
now, the principal market in the West, to
which they were driven for sale and slaughter.
1t thus happened that, at that season of the
year, all the thoroughfares leading to that
city were filled with droves of hogs AS the
day advanced, the sun melted the frozen
roads, and the passage of so many droves
made one vast mud-puddle. The road
travelled was the main road leading through
Shelbyville, Greensburg and Lawrenceburg.
Every tributary road on the route furnished
its contribution of hogs, so that was really
never out of sight OF detached parties OF
well-fatted porkers all travelling with happy
Inconsistencies to common doom. 1t
may be imagined what appearance they and
their drivers presented it was that of a
fresh bath III mud.
Nearly every house on the road was "A
house of entertainment in those days, when
the gainful spirit had no other form of man
Hesitation but there were certain ones OF
established reputation and most frequented
My first days ride carried me to one OF
these, Hawkins Tavern twenty miles out
from Indianapolis, and six miles this side OF
Shelbyville. The house was filled and run
ming over that night with hog drivers. |
great concern was with my saddle-bags, con
tanning twenty-five thousand dollars OF
paper treasure. To take special care OF
them was to invite attention. Of course
there was no safe or other place of deposit.
The only way was to throw them down in
the common pile of baggage, and do nothing
to excite suspicion that they held anything
beyond what was common for travellers to
carry in the way OF personal baggage. |
was never a success at assembling, and to
dissemble here was to be wise and true to
my employers.
:" | leave it TO moralists who will not COM
promise with the sin OF deceit on any terms
to say just what young fellow should an
sweI if questioned about the contents of his
saddle-bags. have always felt great char
ity for Peter, when addressed by that imper-
tinent maid as he sat by the fire in the judg-
ment hall. The Christian world have very
generally condemned Peter for having denied
his Master upon that trying occasion, but |
can't help thinking he acted up to average
human nature. For four days, for four
watchful nights, | was on that miserable
road, tormented with the possession of SO
much wealth. | never spent a more I'M
happy period. | once stood in small room
in the treasury department, set apart for the
deposit of United States bonds by the ma.
ton banks as security to their bill-holders,
and for the government deposits with them
There were within my reach bonds calling
Tor four hundred million dollars. | think
that heavy responsibility rested on the
conscience OF the men charged with their
safe custody; but it was nothing in com
parison with the sense of the responsibility
felt, for the government has provided these
|
their trust light. There was moment, a
supreme and critical one, when the voice OF
the tempter penetrated my ear. 1t was the
old tempter that sung in the ear OF Eve.
1t was when reached the crown of those
imperial hills that overlook the Ohio river
when approaching Lawrenceburg from the
interior. This noble stream was the grea
artery of commerce at that day, before {
railroad west OF Massachusetts, had beer
built. What a gay spectacle it presented
flashing in the bright sunlight, covered witt
fatboats, with rats, with gay painted steam
ers ascending and descending, and transport
ing their passengers in brief time to the Gul
, OF Mexico, the gateway to all parts of thu
world. | had but to sell my horse aud g
: aboard of one of these with the treasure, auC
! was absolutely beyond the reach of pursuit
There were no telegraphs then flashing
intelligence by an agency more subtle than
steam, and far outrunning it no extradi
2 ton treaties requiring foreign government
, to return the felon. The world was befor
, me, aud at the age OF twenty-one, with fee
BILE ties connecting me with those left be
= hind, | was in possession of fortune 10
those early days. recall the fact that thi
; thought was tenant of my mind for Inc
r ment, and moment only. Bless God, !
4 found no hospitable Judgment any longer
t And what think you, gentle reader, were tn
t associate thoughts that came to my rescue
r Away over rivers and mountains, a thousan
Y miles distant, in an humble farmhouse, on
/ bench, an aged mother reading to her DO
b from the oracles of God."-Erchange.