Spirit of Jefferson. [volume] (Charles Town, Va. [W. Va.]) 1844-1948, 1886-10-12

and sold ON credit)-prices that were
shaped by the sad necessity of some
shaking millionaire, some mercantile
shipwreck, some old craft loaded to
the waters edge, ready to go to the
bottom with rotten asets, but living
and pressing liabilities that demand
his money or his goods; next day
they come from a big, proud shop
good credit, big stock, but bending
before the crushing weight of a hun.
dred thousand protested paper of its
customers friendship is one thing.
business another, within twenty-four
hours this money must come, twenty
thousand lacking, after exhausting
every Effort and device, the alterna-
tive-honor or dishonor; and though
misfortune may come, infamy never
and the goods belong to that man
who has cash to plank down on the
spot.
Creator of the universel how ma-S
ny of us from the age of flaxen hair
until frosts of fifty winters have
waded through these ages of unuttera
able mental agony, simply because
we delivered the goods without value
received instead of raking in the ever;
lasting and Almighty Dollar. And
the underground, they who are 10
come after us, and who are crowding
us off the stage of busy life into the
unknown, instead of needing these
signals of warning and reading Alright
these ominous lessons of hard and
terrible experience, and profiting by
them, will repeat the errors, blunder
in the broad light of day, and where
the road forks, take the wrong one,
they will, in spite of the old story
staring them in the face of mercan-
tile tragedy under the guise of friend
ship, sign the fatal negotiable, and
with absolute certainty will stake
their earthly chances of life's pre-
cious prime in the lottery blanks of
the book of fate-the fatal Ledger
and though these words way fall un-
heded now, the inevitable hour will
come at last.
The brains, the energy and ambi-
ton, with their grand and earnest
lessons of experience, seem to go
down into the grave with the master
l-ninety-sig out of every hundred
of these four Ridley was one, Clafiin
another-the Ridley boys, worth five
millions, are fighting as though they
hadn't ''single dollar to their name,"
building a palace that, in this city,
where the ground is sold by the
square inch, with all its floors will
equal, If not surpass our own, some
four and a-hnlf acres, and the grand
old master who laid the first corner
stone rests in eternal sleep in Green
wood. And the great Claflin con-
cern, with it's illimitable capacity of
brains, credit and enterprise is trying
to rival the high-water figures once
attained by that unapproachable Iner-
camille meteor-A. L. Stewart
Times have changed some since then,
and other comercial giants line the
grand doldthoroughfare-Broadway-- old
whilst on the front, flank and rear
belch forth sledgehammers from live
cash concerns, and every foot of
ground is contested, so that it is not
Stewart once had.
II yOu csn saw hNe PeI Ceut- OH yOuI FuI-
chases. and sell your goods below the lowest
level OF your market, your prohts ana sales
rapidly and largely increasing, you viii not be
long in proving what power and wealth and
prosperity lay In that little word = Cash, VIII
VIII teach In lessons never 70 6e forgotten the
vast value 70 merchant. the knowledge how
70 buy right under that diamond rule, CGsh
Do'on The unanswerable quotations OF thls
circular were made NJ the mill whose waters
could not run mp hiL, at the factory standing
on the - ragged edge" OF bankruptcy, and Under
the fall OF the hammer, Tor the money down
before delvery. these are the sledgehatn-
ners that shlyer IKE glass tnat unfortunate
VINO; hopeless OF destlpy, ana needIng NOT inc
deadly signals OF warning, aarkenlng tne sky
above and shaking the earth bencath. pursues
the old beaten roadi these are the cfueloIes
that crush the credit system ana place upon
your brow the unfading laures OF priceless
victory.
| There are many merchants who believe that
success lay In the direction OF big profits
whilst the true theory Is TO make your profits
in buying, so as 20 undersell oil competition,
and control the trade, and the vast aggregate
of your business viii constiiute the real fonn-
dation OF your popularity and prosperity: Or
ganlze your business upon this basis OF the al-
mighty dollar, pay cash and sell Tor nothing