Used Up


I am tempted to believe, that few--very few men can start in the

world--say at twenty, with a replete invoice of honesty, free and

easy--kind, generous--good-natured disposition, and keep it up, until

they greet their fortieth year. There are, doubtless, plenty of men--I

hope there are, who would be entirely and perfectly generous-hearted,

if they could, with any degree of consistency; and I know there are

multitudes w
o wouldn't exhibit an honorable or manly trait, of any

human description, if they could. That class thrive best, it appears to

me--if the accumulation of dollars and dimes be Webster, Walker, or

Scriptural interpretation of that sense--in this sublunary world.

Meanness and dishonesty win what good nature and honesty lose, hence the

more thrift to the former, and the less gain, pecuniarily considered, to

the latter. The subject is very prolific, and as my present purpose is

as much to point a humorous sketch as to adorn a moral, I needs must

cut speculative philosophistics for facts, in the case of my friend John

Jenks, an emphatic--"used up" good fellow.



Jenks started in this world with a first-rate opinion of himself and the

rest of mankind. No man ever started with a larger capital of good

nature, human benevolence, and common honesty, than honest John. Few men

ever started with better general prospects, for "a good time," and

plenty of it, than Jenks. He graduated with honor to himself and the

Institute of his native State, and with but little knowledge beyond the

college library and the social circles of his immediate friends. At

twenty-three, John Jenks went into business on his own hook.



Of course John soon formed various and many business acquaintances; he

learned that men were brothers--should love, honor, and respect one

another, from precepts set him at his father's fireside. He formed the

opinion, that this brotherhood was not to be alienated in matters of

business, for he never refused to act kindly to all; he freely loaned

his autograph and purse to his business acquaintances; but, being

backed up by a snug business capital, he seldom felt the necessity of

claiming like accommodation, or he would have gotten his eye teeth cut

cheaper and sooner.



"Jenks," said a business man, stopping in at Jenks' counting room one

September morning, "Perkins & Ball, I see, have stopped--gone to

smash!"



"Have they?" quickly responded Jenks.



"They have, and a good many fingers will be burnt by them," replied the

informant. "By the way, Barclay says you have some of their paper on

hand; is it true?" continued the man.



"I have some, not much," answered Jenks--"not enough at all events to

create any alarm as to their willingness or ability to take it up."



But in looking over his "accounts," Jenks found a considerably larger

amount of Perkins & Ball's paper on hand, than an experienced business

man might have contemplated with entire Christian resignation. The

gazette, in the course of a few days, gave publicity to the smash of

the house of Perkins, Ball & Co. There was a buzz "on 'change;" those

losers by the smash were bitter in their denunciatory remarks, while

those gaining by the transaction snickered in their sleeves and kept

mum. Jenks heard all, and said nothing. He reasoned, that if the firm

were smashed by imprudences, or through dishonest motives, they were

getting "an elegant sufficiency" of public and private vituperation,

without his aid. Though far from his thoughts of entering into such

"lists," and inclined to hold on and see how things come out--Jenks,

for the credit of common humanity, seldom recapitulated the amount, by

discounting, &c.--he was likely to be in for, if P. & B. were really

"done gone." This resolve, like some rules, worked both ways.



As "honest John" was drawing on his gloves to leave his commercial

institution, after the above occurrences had had some ten days' grace;

one evening, the senior partner of the house of Perkins & Ball came in.

Greetings were cordial, and in the private office of Jenks, an hour's

discourse took place between the merchants; which, in brief

transcription, may be summed up in the fact, that Jenks received a

two-third indemnification on all his liabilities for the smashed

house of P. & B., which the senior partner assured him, arose from the

fact of his, Jenks', gentlemanly forbearance in not joining the clamor

against them, in the adverse hour, nor pushing his claims, when he had

reason to believe that they were down; quite down at the heel. Jenks

"hoped" he should never be found on the wrong or even doubtful side of

humanity, gentlemanly courtesy, or Christian kindness; they shook hands

and parted; the senior partner of the exploded firm requesting, and

Jenks agreeing, to say every thing he could towards sustaining the honor

of the house of P. & B., and recreating its now almost extinguished

credit. Those who fought the bankrupt merchants most got the least, and

because Jenks preserved an undisturbed serenity, when it was known that

he was as deeply a loser, they supposed, as any one, they were staggered

at his philosophy, or amused at his extreme good nature. This latter

result seemed the most popular and accepted notion of Jenks' character,

and proved the ground-work of his pecuniary destruction.



The firm of Perkins & Ball crept up again; Jenks had, on all occasions,

spoken in the most favorable terms of the firm; he not only freely

endorsed again for them, but stood their referee generally. In the

meantime, Jenks' celebrity for good nature and open-heartedness had

drawn around him a host of patrons and admirers. Jenks' name became a

circulating medium for half his business acquaintances. If Brown was

short in his cash account, five hundred or a thousand dollars----



"Just run over to Jenks'," he'd say to his clerk; "ask him to favor me

with a check until the middle of the week." It was done.



"Terms--thirty days with good endorsed paper," was sufficient for the

adventurous Smith to buy and depend on Jenks' autograph to secure

the goods. When in funds, Bingle went where he chose; when a little

short, Jenks had his patronage. Jenks kept but few memorandums of acts

of kindness he daily committed; hence when the evil effects of them

began to revolve upon him--if not mortified or ashamed of his

"bargains," he at least was astounded at the results. Brown, whose due

bills or memorandums Jenks held, to the amount of seven thousand

dollars, accommodation loans, took an apoplectic, one warm summer's

day, after taking a luxurious dinner. Jenks had hardly learned that

Brown's affairs were pronounced in a state of deferred bankruptcy, when

the first rumor reached him that Smith had bolted, after a heavy

transaction in "woolens"--Jenks his principal endorser--Smith not

leaving assets or assigns to the amount of one red farthing.



"By Jove!" poor Jenks muttered, as he tremulously seated himself in his

back counting room--"that's shabby in Smith--very shabby."



The next morning's Gazette informed the community that Bingle had

failed--liabilities over $200,000--prospects barely giving hopes of ten

per cent, all around; and even this hope, upon Jenks' investigation,

proved a forlorn one; by a modus operandi peculiar to the heartless,

self-devoted, they got all, Jenks and the few of his ilk, got

nothing!



For the first time in his life, Jenks became pecuniarily moody. For the

first time, in the course of his mercantile career, of some six years,

the force of reflection convinced him, that he had not acted his part

judiciously, however "well done" it might be, in point of honor and

manliness.



The next day Jenks devoted to a scrutiny of his accounts in general with

the business world. He found things a great deal "mixed up;" his

balance-sheet exhibited large surplusages accumulated on the score of

his leniency and good nature; by the credit of those with whom he held

business relations. A council of war, or expediency, rather,--solus,

convinced Jenks, he had either mistaken his business qualifications, or

formed a very vague idea of the soul--manners and customs of the

business world; and he broke up his council, a sadder if not a wiser

man.



"By Jove, this is discouraging; I'll have to do a very disagreeable

thing, very disagreeable thing: make an assignment!"



"Who'd thought John Jenks would ever come to that?" that individual

muttered to himself, as he proceeded to his hotel. And ere he reached

his plate, at the tea-table, a servant whispered that a gentleman with a

message was out in the "office" of the hotel, anxious to see Mr. Jenks.



"Mr. Jenks--John Jenks, I believe, sir?" began the person, as poor

Jenks, now on the tapis for more ill news, approached the person in

waiting.



"Precisely, that's my name, sir," Jenks responded.



"Then," continued the stranger, "I've disagreeable business with you,

Mr. Jenks; I hold your arrest!"



"Good God!" exclaimed Jenks; "my arrest? What for?"



"There's the writ, sir; you can read it."



"A writ? Why, God bless you, man, I don't owe a dollar in the world,

but what I can liquidate in ten minutes!"



"Oh, it's not debt, sir; you may see by the writ it's felony!"



If the man had drawn and cocked a revolver at Jenks, the effect upon his

nervous system could not have been more startling or powerful. But he

recovered his self-possession, and learned with dismay, that he was

arrested--yes, arrested as an accessory to a grand scheme of fraud and

general villany, on the part of Smith, a conclusion arrived at, by those

most interested, upon discovery that Jenks had pronounced Smith "good,"

and endorsed for him in sums total, enormously, far beyond Jenks' actual

ability to make good!



It was in vain Jenks declared, and no man before ever dreamed of

doubting his word, his entire ability to meet all liabilities of his own

and others, for whom he kindly become responsible; for when the bulk

of Smith's paper with Jenks' endorsement was thrust at him, he gave

in; saw clearly that he was the victim of a heartless forger.



But his calmness, in the midst of his affliction, triumphed, and he

rested comparatively easy in jail that night, awaiting the bright future

of to-morrow, when his established character, and "troops of friends"

should set all right. But, poor Jenks, he reckoned indeed without his

host; to-morrow came, but not "a friend in need;" they saw, in their

far-reaching wisdom, a sinking ship, and like sagacious rats, they

deserted it!



"I always thought Jenks a very good-natured, or a very deep man," said

one.



"I knew he was too generous to last long!" said another.



"I told him he was green to endorse as freely as he did," echoed a

third.



"Good fellow," chimed a fourth--"but devilish imprudent."



"He knows what he's at!" cunningly retorted a fifth, and so the good

but misguided Jenks was disposed of by his "troops of friends!"



But Perkins & Ball--they had got up again, were flourishing; they, Jenks

felt satisfied, would not show the "white feather," and the thought came

to him, in his prison, as merrily as the reverse of that fond hope

made him sad and sorrowful, when at the close of day, his attorney

informed him, that Perkins & Ball regretted his perplexing situation,

but proffered him no aid or comfort. They said, sad experience had shown

them, that there were no "bowels of compassion" in the world for the

fallen; men must trust to fortune, God, and their own exertions, to

defeat ill luck and rise from difficulties; they had done so; Mr.

Jenks must not despair, but surmount his misfortunes with a stout heart

and a clear conscience, and profit, as they had, by reverses!



"Profit!" said Jenks, in a bitter tone, "profit by reverses as they

have!"



"Why, Powers," he continued to his counsel, "do you know that if I had

been a tithe part as base and conscienceless as they are now, Perkins

& Ball would be beggars, if not inmates of this prison! Yes, sir, my

casting vote, of all the rest, would have done it. But no matter; I had

hoped to find, in a community where I had been useful, generous and

just, friends enough for all practical purposes, without carrying my

business difficulties to the fireside of my parents and other relations.

But that I must do now; if, if they fail me, then---- I cave!"



Two days after that conference of the lawyer and the merchant, "honest

John" learned, with sorrow, that his father was dead; estate involved,

and his friends at home in no favorable mood in reference to what they

heard of John Jenks and his "bad management" in the city.



John Jenks--heard no more--he "caved!" as he agreed to.



We pass over Jenks' Smithsonian difficulty, which a prudent lawyer and

discerning jury brought out all right.



We come to 1850--some fifteen or eighteen years after John Jenks

"caved." The John Jenks of 183- had been ruined by his good nature, set

adrift moneyless, in a manner, with even a spotted reputation to begin

with; he "profited by his reverses," he was now a man of family--fifty,

fat, and wealthy, and altogether the meanest and most selfish man you

ever saw!



Jenks freely admits his originality is entirely--"used up!" The reader

may affix the moral of my sketch--at leisure.



More

;