Mysterious League. It held meetings in our big vault, which they
called the donjon keep, and, naturally, when one of them was going on,
boys were scarcer around the office than hen's teeth. The object of
the league, as I shook it out of the head leaguer by the ear, was to
catch the head bookkeeper, whom the boys didn't like, and whom they
called the black caitiff, alone in the vault some night while he was
putting away his books, slam the door, and turn the combination on
him. Tucked away in a corner of the vault, they had a message for him,
written in red ink, on a sheep's skull, telling him to tremble, that
he was in the hands of the Mysterious League, and that he would be led
at midnight to the torture chamber. I learned afterward that when the
bookkeeper had reached in his desk to get a pen, a few days before, he
had pulled out a cold, clammy, pickled pig's foot, on which was
printed: "Beware! first you will lose a leg!"
I simply mention the Mysterious League in passing. Of course, boys
will be boys, but you mustn't let them be too cussed boyish during
business hours. A slow boy can waste a lot of the time of a
five-thousand-dollar man whose bell he's answering; and a careless boy
can mislay a letter or drop a paper that will ball up the work of the
most careful man in the office.
It's really harder to tell what you're getting when you hire a boy
than when you hire a man. I found that out for keeps a few years ago,
when I took on the Angel Child. He was the son of rich parents, who
weren't quite rich enough to buy chips and sit in the game of the
no-limit millionaires. So they went in for what they called the simple
life. I want to say right here that I'm a great believer in the simple
life, but some people are so blamed simple about it that they're
idiotic. The world is full of rich people who talk about leading the
simple life when they mean the stingy life. They are the kind that are
always giving poorer people a chance to chip in an even share with
them toward defraying the expenses of the charities and the
entertainments which they get up. They call it "affording those in
humbler walks an opportunity to keep up their self-respect," but what
they really mean is that it helps them to keep down their own
expenses.
The Angel Child's mother was one of these women who talk to people
that aren't quite so rich as she in the tone of one who's commending a
worthy charity; but who hangs on the words of a richer woman like a
dog that hopes a piece of meat is going to be thrown at it, and yet
isn't quite sure that it won't get a kick instead. As a side-line, she
made a specialty of trying to uplift the masses, and her husband
furnished the raw material for the uplifting, as he paid his men less
and worked 'em harder than any one else in Chicago.
Well, one day this woman came into my office, bringing her only son
with her. He was a solemn little cuss, but I didn't get much chance to
size him up, because his ma started right in to explain how he'd been
raised--no whipping, no--but I cut it short there, and asked her to
get down to brass tacks, as I was very busy trying to see that
70,000,000 people were supplied with their daily pork. So she
explained that she wanted me to give the Angel Child a job in my
office during his summer vacation, so that he could see how the other
half lived, and at the same time begin to learn self-reliance.
I was just about to refuse, when it occurred to me that if he had
never really had a first-class whipping it was a pity not to put him
in the way of getting one. So I took him by the hand and led him to
headquarters for whippings, the bench in the shipping department,
where a pretty scrappy lot of boys were employed to run errands, and
told the boss to take him on.
I wasn't out of hearing before one kid said, "I choose him," and
another, whom they called the Breakfast-Food Baby, because he was so
strong, answered, "Naw; I seen him first."
I dismissed the matter from my mind then, but a few days later, when I
was walking through the shipping department, it occurred to me that I
might as well view the remains of the Angel Child, if they hadn't been
removed to his late residence. I found him sitting in the middle of
the bench, looking a little sad and lonesome, but all there. The other
boys seemed to be giving him plenty of room, and the Breakfast-Food
Baby, with both eyes blacked, had edged along to the end of the bench.
I beckoned to the Angel Child to follow me to my private office.
"What does this mean, young man?" I asked, when he got there. "Have
you been fighting?"
"Yes, sir," he answered, sort of brightening up.
"Which one?"
"Michael and Patrick the first day, sir."
"Did you lick 'em?"
"I had rather the better of it," he answered, as precise as a slice of
cold-boiled Boston.
"And the second?"
"Why, the rest of 'em, sir."
"Including the Breakfast-Food--er, James?"
He nodded. "James is very strong, sir, but he lacks science. He drew
back as if he had a year to hit me, and just as he got good and ready
to strike, I pasted him one in the snoot, and followed that up with a
left jab in the eye."
I hadn't counted on boxing lessons being on the bill of fare of the
simple life, and it raised my hopes still further to see from that
last sentence how we had grafted a little Union Stock Yards on his
Back Bay Boston. In fact, my heart quite warmed to the lad; but I
looked at him pretty severely, and only said:
"Mark you, young man, we don't allow any fighting around here; and if
you can't get along without quarrelling with the boys in the shipping
department, I'll have to bring you into these offices, where I can
have an eye on your conduct."
There were two or three boys in the main office who were spoiling for
a thrashing, and I reckoned that the Angel Child would attend to their
cases; and he did. He was cock of the walk in a week, and at the same
time one of the bulliest, daisiest, most efficient, most respectful
boys that ever worked for me. He put a little polish on the other
kids, and they took a little of the extra shine off him. He's in
Harvard now, but when he gets out there's a job waiting for him, if
he'll take it.
That was a clear case of catching an angel on the fly, or of
entertaining one unawares, as the boy would have put it, and it taught
me not to consider my prejudices or his parents in hiring a boy, but
to focus my attention on the boy himself, when he was the one who
would have to run the errands. The simple life was a pose and pretense
with the Angel Child's parents, and so they were only a new brand of
snob; but the kid had been caught young and had taken it all in
earnest; and so he was a new breed of boy, and a better one than I'd
ever hired before.
Your affectionate father,
JOHN GRAHAM.
No. 11
From John Graham, at Mount Clematis, Michigan, to his son, Pierrepont,
at the Union Stock Yards, Chicago. The young man has sent the old man
a dose of his own medicine, advice, and he is proving himself a good
doctor by taking it.
XI
MOUNT CLEMATIS, January 25, 1900.
_Dear Pierrepont_: They've boiled everything out of me except the
original sin, and even that's a little bleached, and they've taken
away my roll of yellow-backs, so I reckon they're about through with
me here, for the present. But instead of returning to the office, I
think I'll take your advice and run down to Florida for a few weeks
and have a "try at the tarpon," as you put it. I don't really need a
tarpon, or want a tarpon, and I don't know what I could do with a
tarpon if I hooked one, except to yell at him to go away; but I need a
burned neck and a peeled nose, a little more zest for my food, and a
little more zip about my work, if the interests of the American hog
are going to be safe in my hands this spring. I don't seem to have so
much luck as some fellows in hooking these fifty-pound fish lies, but
I always manage to land a pretty heavy appetite and some big nights'
sleep when I strike salt water. Then I can go back to the office and
produce results like a hen in April with eggs at eleven cents a dozen.
[Illustration: I don't really need a tarpon ... but I need a burned
neck and a peeled nose]
Health is like any inheritance--you can spend the interest in work and
play, but you mustn't break into the principal. Once you do, and it's
only a matter of time before you've got to place the remnants in the
hands of a doctor as receiver; and receivers are mighty partial to
fees and mighty slow to let go. But if you don't work with him to get
the business back on a sound basis there's no such thing as any
further voluntary proceedings, and the remnants become remains.
It's a mighty simple thing, though, to keep in good condition, because
about everything that makes for poor health has to get into you right
under your nose. Yet a fellow'll load up with pie and buckwheats for
breakfast and go around wondering about his stomach-ache, as if it
were a put-up job that had been played on him when he wasn't looking;
or he'll go through his dinner pickling each course in a different
brand of alcohol, and sob out on the butler's shoulder that the booze
isn't as pure as it used to be when he was a boy; or he'll come home
at midnight singing "The Old Oaken Bucket," and act generally as if
all the water in the world were in the well on the old homestead, and
the mortgage on that had been foreclosed; or from 8 P.M. to 3 G.X.
he'll sit in a small game with a large cigar, breathing a blend of
light-blue cigarette smoke and dark-blue cuss-words, and next day,
when his heart beats four and skips two, and he has that queer,
hopping sensation in the knees, he'll complain bitterly to the other
clerks that this confining office work is killing him.
Of course, with all the care in the world, a fellow's likely to catch
things, but there's no sense in sending out invitations to a lot of
miscellaneous microbes and pretending when they call that it's a
surprise party. Bad health hates a man who is friendly with its
enemies--hard work, plain food, and pure air. More men die from worry
than from overwork; more stuff themselves to death than die of
starvation; more break their necks falling down the cellar stairs than
climbing mountains. If the human animal reposed less confidence in his
stomach and more in his legs, the streets would be full of healthy men
walking down to business. Remember that a man always rides to his
grave; he never walks there.
When I was a boy, the only doubt about the food was whether there
would be enough of it; and there wasn't any doubt at all about the
religion. If the pork barrel was full, father read a couple of extra
Psalms at morning prayers, to express our thankfulness; and if it was
empty, he dipped into Job for half an hour at evening prayers, to
prove that we were better off than some folks. But you don't know what
to eat these days, with one set of people saying that only beasts eat
meat, and another that only cattle eat grain and green stuff; or what
to believe, with one crowd claiming that there's nothing the matter
with us, as the only matter that we've got is in our minds; and
another crowd telling us not to mind what the others say, because
they've got something the matter with their minds. I reckon that what
this generation really needs is a little less pie and a little more
piety.
I dwell on this matter of health, because when the stomach and liver
ain't doing good work, the brain can't. A good many men will say that
it's none of your business what they do in their own time, but you
want to make it your business, so long as it affects what they do in
your time. For this reason, you should never hire men who drink after
office hours; for it's their time that gets the effects, and your time
that gets the after-effects. Even if a boss grants that there's fun in
drinking, it shouldn't take him long to discover that he's getting the
short end of it, when all the clerks can share with him in the morning
is the head and the hangover.
I might add that I don't like the effects of drinking any more than
the after-effects; and for this reason you should never hire men who
drink during business hours. When a fellow adds up on whisky, he's apt
to see too many figures; and when he subtracts on beer, he's apt to
see too few.
It may have been the case once that when you opened up a bottle for a
customer he opened up his heart, but booze is a mighty poor salesman
nowadays. It takes more than a corkscrew to draw out a merchant's
order. Most of the men who mixed their business and their drinks have
failed, and the new owners take their business straight. Of course,
some one has to pay for the drinks that a drummer sets up. The drummer
can't afford it on his salary; the house isn't really in the
hospitality business; so, in the end, the buyer always stands treat.
He may not see it in his bill for goods, but it's there, and the smart
ones have caught on to it.
After office hours, the number of drinks a fellow takes may make a
difference in the result to his employer, but during business hours
the effect of one is usually as bad as half a dozen. A buyer who
drinks hates a whisky breath when he hasn't got one himself, and a
fellow who doesn't drink never bothers to discover whether he's being
talked to by a simple or a compound breath. He knows that some men who
drink are unreliable, and that unreliable men are apt to represent
unreliable houses and to sell unreliable goods, and he hasn't the time
or the inclination to stop and find out that this particular salesman
has simply had a mild snort as an appetizer and a gentle soother as a
digester. So he doesn't get an order, and the house gets a black eye.
This is a very, very busy world, and about the only person who is
really interested in knowing just how many a fellow has had is his
wife, and she won't always believe him.
Naturally, when you expect so much from your men, they have a right
to expect a good deal from you. If you want them to feel that your
interests are theirs, you must let them see that their interests are
yours. There are a lot of fellows in the world who are working just for
glory, but they are mostly poets, and you needn't figure on finding
many of them out at the Stock Yards. Praise goes a long way with a good
man, and some employers stop there; but cash goes the whole distance,
and if you want to keep your growing men with you, you mustn't expect
them to do all the growing. Small salaries make slow workers and
careless clerks; because it isn't hard to get an underpaid job. But a
well-paid man sticketh closer than a little brother-in-law-to-be to the
fellow who brings the candy. For this reason, when I close the books at
the end of the year, I always give every one, from the errand boys up,
a bonus based on the size of his salary and my profits. There's no way
I've ever tried that makes my men take an interest in the size of my
profits like giving them a share. And there's no advertisement for a
house like having its men going around blowing and bragging because
they're working for it.
Again, if you insist that your men shan't violate the early-closing
ordinance, you must observe one yourself. A man who works only half a
day Saturday can usually do a day and half's work Monday. I'd rather
have my men hump themselves for nine hours than dawdle for ten.
Of course, the world is full of horses who won't work except with the
whip, but that's no reason for using it on those who will. When I get
a critter that hogs my good oats and then won't show them in his gait,
I get rid of him. He may be all right for a fellow who's doing a
peddling business, but I need a little more speed and spirit in mine.
A lot of people think that adversity and bad treatment is the test of
a man, and it is--when you want to develop his strength; but
prosperity and good treatment is a better one when you want to develop
his weakness. By keeping those who show their appreciation of it and
firing those who don't, you get an office full of crackerjacks.
While your men must feel all the time that they've got a boss who can
see good work around a corner, they mustn't be allowed to forget that
there's no private burying-ground on the premises for mistakes. When a
Western town loses one of its prominent citizens through some careless
young fellow's letting his gun go off sudden, if the sheriff buys a
little rope and sends out invitations to an inquest, it's apt to make
the boys more reserved about exchanging repartee; and if you pull up
your men sharp when you find them shooting off their mouths to
customers and getting gay in their correspondence, it's sure to cut
down the mortality among our old friends in the trade. A clerk's never
fresh in letters that the boss is going to see.
The men who stay in the office and plan are the brains of your
business; those who go out and sell are its arms; and those who fill
and deliver the orders are its legs. There's no use in the brains
scheming and the arms gathering in, if the legs are going to deliver
the goods with a kick.
That's another reason why it's very important for you to be in the
office early. You can't personally see every order filled, and tell
whether it was shipped promptly and the right goods sent, but when the
telegrams and letters are opened, you can have all the kicks sorted
out, and run through them before they're distributed for the day.
That's where you'll meet the clerk who billed a tierce of hams to the
man who ordered a box; the shipper who mislaid Bill Smith's order for
lard, and made Bill lose his Saturday's trade through the delay; the
department head who felt a little peevish one morning and so wrote
Hardin & Co., who buy in car-lots, that if they didn't like the smoke
of the last car of Bacon Short Clears they could lump it, or words to
that effect; and that's where you'll meet the salesman who played a
sure thing on the New Orleans track and needs twenty to get to the
next town, where his check is waiting. Then, a little later, when you
make the rounds of the different departments to find out how it
happened, the heads will tell you all the good news that was in the
morning's mail.
Of course, you can keep track of your men in a sneaking way that will
make them despise you, and talk to them in a nagging spirit that will
make them bristle when they see you. But it's your right to know and
your business to find out, and if you collect your information in an
open, frank manner, going at it in the spirit of hoping to find
everything all right, instead of wanting to find something all wrong;
and if you talk to the responsible man with an air of "here's a place
where we can get together and correct a weakness in our business"--not
my business--instead of with an "Ah! ha! I've-found-you-out"
expression, your men will throw handsprings for your good opinion.
Never nag a man tinder any circumstances; fire him.
A good boss, in these days when profits are pared down to the quick,
can't afford to have any holes, no matter how small, in his
management; but there must be give enough in his seams so that every
time he stoops down to pick up a penny he won't split his pants. He
must know how to be big, as well as how to be small.
Some years ago, I knew a firm who did business under the name of
Foreman & Sowers. They were a regular business vaudeville team--one
big and broad-gauged in all his ideas; the other unable to think in
anything but boys' and misses' sizes. Foreman believed that men got
rich in dollars; Sowers in cents. Of course, you can do it in either
way, but the first needs brains and the second only hands. It's been
my experience that the best way is to go after both the dollars and
the cents.
Well, sir, these fellows launched a specialty, a mighty good thing,
the Peep o' Daisy Breakfast Food, and started in to advertise. Sowers
wanted to use inch space and sell single cases; Foreman kicked because
full pages weren't bigger and wanted to sell in car-lots, leaving the
case trade to the jobbers. Sowers only half-believed in himself, and
only a quarter in the food, and only an eighth in advertising. So he
used to go home nights and lie awake with a living-picture exhibit of
himself being kicked out of his store by the sheriff; and out of his
house by the landlord; and, finally, off the corner where he was
standing with his hat out for pennies, by the policeman. He hadn't a
big enough imagination even to introduce into this last picture a
sport dropping a dollar bill into his hat. But Foreman had a pretty
good opinion of himself, and a mighty big opinion of the food, and he
believed that a clever, well-knit ad. was strong enough to draw teeth.
So he would go home and build steam-yachts and country places in his
sleep.
Naturally, the next morning, Sowers would come down haggard and
gloomy, and grow gloomier as he went deeper into the mail and saw how
small the orders were. But Foreman would start out as brisk and busy
as a humming-bird, tap the advertising agent for a new line of credit
on his way down to the office, and extract honey and hope from every
letter.
Sowers begged him, day by day, to stop the useless fight and save the
remains of their business. But Foreman simply laughed. Said there
wouldn't be any remains when he was ready to quit. Allowed that he
believed in cremation, anyway, and that the only way to fix a brand on
the mind of the people was to burn it in with money.
Sowers worried along a few days more, and then one night, after he had
been buried in the potter's field, he planned a final stroke to stop
Foreman, who, he believed, didn't know just how deep in they really
were. Foreman was in a particular jolly mood the next morning, for he
had spent the night bidding against Pierrepont Morgan at an auction
sale of old masters; but he listened patiently while Sowers called off
the figures in a sort of dirge-like singsong, and until he had wailed
out his final note of despair, a bass-drum crash, which he thought
would bring Foreman to a realizing sense of their loss, so to speak.
"That," Sowers wound up, "makes a grand total of $800,000 that we have
already lost."
Foreman's head drooped, and for a moment he was deep in thought, while
Sowers stood over him, sad, but triumphant, in the feeling that he had
at last brought this madman to his senses, now that his dollars were
gone.
"Eight hundred thou!" the senior partner repeated mechanically. Then,
looking up with a bright smile, he exclaimed: "Why, old man, that
leaves us two hundred thousand still to spend before we hit the
million mark!"
They say that Sowers could only gibber back at him; and Foreman kept
right on and managed some way to float himself on to the million mark.
There the tide turned, and after all these years it's still running
his way; and Sowers, against his better judgment, is a millionaire.
I simply mention Foreman in passing. It would be all foolishness to
follow his course in a good many situations, but there's a time to
hold on and a time to let go, and the limit, and a little beyond, is
none too far to play a really good thing. But in business it's quite
as important to know how to be a good quitter as a good fighter. Even
when you feel that you've got a good thing, you want to make sure that
it's good enough, and that you're good enough, before you ask to have
the limit taken off. A lot of men who play a nice game of authors get
their feelings hurt at whist, and get it in the neck at poker.
You want to have the same principle in mind when you're handling the
trade. Sometimes you'll have to lay down even when you feel that your
case is strong. Often you'll have to yield a point or allow a claim
when you know you're dead right and the other fellow all wrong. But
there's no sense in getting a licking on top of a grievance.