Albert Moore, at the age of twenty-five, took Alice Warren for his
wife. He had been in the army--fought through from Bull's Bluff to
Richmond--had come out with a captain's commission. He had come from
the army with but little money; but he had a good trade, a stout pair
of hands, and had borrowed no trouble for the future. Alice had saved
up a few hundred dollars from her wages as a teacher, and when the
twain had become husband and wife they found, upon a careful
inventory, that they had enough to furnish a small house comfortably.
Albert proposed that they should hire a tenement in the city; but
Alice thought they had better secure a pretty cottage in the
suburbs--a cottage which they might, perhaps, in time, make their
own.
Albert had no disposition to argue the question, so the cottage was
found and secured. It was a pleasant, rural location, and so connected
with the city by rail, that Albert found no difficulty in going to and
from his workshop.
During her five years' experience in school-teaching Alice had learned
many things, and having been an orphan from an early age, she had made
the problems of real life one of her chief studies; and what she had
learned in this latter department served her well in her new station.
After marriage she found Albert to be just the man she had known him
to be in other years. He was kind to a fault; free-hearted and
generous; ready always to answer the call of friendship; and prone to
pluck the flowers that bloom to-day, regardless of what may be
nurtured to bloom to-morrow.
They had been married but a few months when Alice found he was cutting
his garments according to his daily supply of cloth. Not a shred was
he likely to save up from the cuttings for an extra garment for a
rainy day to come.
"Albert," she said to him one evening, "do you know we ought to be
laying up a little something?"
Albert looked up from his paper and waited for his wife to explain.
"I think I heard you tell Mr. Greenough that you had no money--that
you had paid out your last dollar this very afternoon?"
"Exactly, my dear; but you know to-morrow is pay-day."
"And you have spent your last month's earnings?"
"Yes."
A brief silence ensued, which Albert broke.
"Come, Alice, you've got something on your mind. Out with it--I'll
listen."
And then Alice, in a smiling, pleasant way, went on to tell her
husband that they ought to be laying up something.
Albert smiled in turn, and asked how such a thing could be done when
it cost all he earned to live.
"You earn three dollars and a half a day," said Alice.
"Yes."
"George Summers earns only three dollars a day."
"You are right."
"And yet he lives and does not run in debt."
"But he is forced to deny himself many little comforts which we
enjoy."
"And the one great comfort which we might enjoy we are throwing away."
"How is that, Alice."
"The comfort of a little sum in the bank, which we should see growing
toward the answering of future wants."
Albert could not see how it was to be done; and Alice feared that a
lesson of empty words might be wasted. She knew that his ambition
needed a substantial prop. Never, of his own accord, would he commence
to save by littles. He did not estimate money in that way. Had some
kind fairy dropped into his hand a five-twenty bond for five hundred
dollars, he would have put it away gladly; and with such a nest-egg in
the start, he might have sought to add to the store. But he could see
no hope in a dollar bill, and much less could he discover the nucleus
of a grand saving in a fifty-cent piece.
With Alice it was different. From her meager earnings as
school-teacher she had in less than five years, saved up three hundred
dollars; and the first saving she had put by was a silver dime. She
knew what little by little could do, and she was determined to show it
to her husband. She must be patient and persevering, and these
qualities she possessed in an eminent degree. It was to be the grand
undertaking of the first years of her married life, and to do it she
would bend every available energy. She planned that if possible she
would get hold of that fifty cents every day; or, if she could not do
that she would do the best she could.
Generous, frank, loyal, and loving, Albert was an easy prey to the
wiles of a wife loyal and loving as himself. He gave her money when
she asked for it; and she asked for it when she thought he had any to
give.
And here let me say that Alice knew her husband would not run in debt.
That was an evil they both arrayed themselves against in the outset.
When Albert's purse was empty he bought nothing; but when it was full
he was apt to buy more than he needed. Alice knew all this and
governed herself accordingly.
"I think," said Alice, one evening, "that I must fix over my old brown
cashmere for winter, I should like a new one, but I don't suppose you
can afford it."
Albert looked grieved. The idea that he could not afford his wife a
new dress!
But such a one as she wanted would cost twenty-five or thirty dollars.
"If you want it, get it," said Albert emphatically. "I will let you
have twenty dollars from this month's pay, and the balance you shall
have next month."
Alice got the thirty dollars, but she did not get the new dress. By
the outlay of five dollars for new trimmings she contrived to fix over
the brown cashmere so that it looked every bit as good as new.
And so Alice worked. Sometimes she asked her husband for ten cents,
sometimes for fifty cents, sometimes for a dollar, and sometimes for
more, and at the end of a year, upon carefully reckoning up, she found
that she had managed to get hold of rather more than fifty cents a
day; but she had done it by denying herself of many things, some of
which seemed really needful.
The result of the first year's effort inspired Alice with new life and
vigor. She had saved one hundred and fifty dollars, and had invested
it in government funds. Through the influence of a dear friend who was
in a banking establishment, and to whom she had confided her secret,
she was enabled to get the bonds at their face value.
It was only a little at a time--sometimes a very little--but those
littles multiplied by other littles, grew amazingly. The husbandman
who would sit himself down by a hill of corn, and wait to see the
tender blades put forth would be disheartened; but he knows if he
plants the tiny seed, and cultivates it as he ought, the harvest of
golden grain will come at length.
Albert and Alice were married in the spring of 1865. It was on an
evening of August, 1870, that Albert came home. He had been notified
that they must leave the cottage. They must give up the pleasant home,
and lose the little garden they had cultivated with so much fondness
and care.
"The owner wishes to sell," he exclaimed; "and has an offer. He asks
two thousand dollars, and must have five hundred down."
Alice's eyes gleamed with radiant delight.
She had been thinking for some time that she must let her husband into
her secret. It had begun to wear upon her. And now the time had come
as by providential interposition.
She got up and went away to her cabinet, and when she came back she
brought a little book in her hand.
"Albert!" said she, "lets you and I buy the cottage."
Albert looked at her in amazement; and directly it flashed upon him
that there was too much solemnity in her look and tone for badinage.
Something that he had noticed during the past few months came back to
him, and he trembled with the weight of suspense that fell upon him.
Alice then showed her book--that she had more than eight hundred
dollars in the bank. The ice was broken--she told her story in
glowing words. She told how she had saved up little by little, and how
she had at length found herself able to purchase a fifty-dollar bond.
And then she told how her uncle in the banking-house had taken charge
of her investment; and how, under his management, the interest had
accrued in amazing volume.
But the grand result was not the chief thing. The chief thing was the
beginning--was the very little which had been religiously saved until
the second little could be added to it.
And now, as a result of his wife's careful and tireless working,
Albert found something upon which his ambition could take a fair
start. He never could himself, from so small a commencement, have
reared the pile; but with the structure started, and its proportions
all blocked out, he could help on the work. He could see how it was
done--and not only that, but the demonstration was before him that
the thing could be done.
One year has elapsed since Albert Moore received the lesson from his
wife, and joining hands with her, and bending his energies in the same
direction, he has accomplished during the twelve months what would
have seemed to him a marvel in the earlier time. He has laid by more
than fifty cents a day; and the cigars, and the beer, and the other
condiments of life which he has surrendered to the work, are not
missed--rather, he holds they are so many enemies conquered. And
Albert can improve his home with cheerful heart, and he can set out
new trees and vines in his garden with bright promises, because he
sees, day by day, the pretty cottage growing more and more his own.
The end approaches a little at a time--little by little it
approaches, but surely, nevertheless; and there is a great and
satisfying joy even in the labor and in the anticipation.
O deem not they are blest alone
Whose lives a peaceful tenor keep;
For God, who pities man, hath shown
A blessing for the eyes that weep.
The light of smiles shall fill again
The lids that overflow with tears,
And weary hours of woe and pain
Are promises of happier years.
For God has marked each sorrowing day,
And numbered every secret tear,
And heaven's long age of bliss shall pay
For all his children suffer here.
--_William Cullen Bryant._