f hell."

The residue of this section of Mr. Wheelwright's biography is soon
told. With the flames of his store, were his fortunes for the time
being extinguished; and his father soon afterward found himself to be
as destitute of property as when he first entered the valley of the
Mohawk, with only an adz, a pod-auger, and an axe upon his shoulder.
The trusty clerk soon afterward sickened, even unto death, and in his
last moments disclosed various delinquencies which had hastened his
employer's ruin;--for all of which he was readily forgiven by the
really kind-hearted man whom he had so deeply wronged, and from his
penitence it is to be hoped he was also forgiven by Him against whom he
had yet more grievously sinned.

The merchants of New-York are proverbially liberal to unfortunate
debtors; the tale of Mr. Wheelwright's misfortunes excited their lively
sympathies; and they generously released him from all those obligations
which neither he nor his indorsers could pay. And thus amid the frowns
of adversity ended the mercantile career of the subject of this memoir.

CHAPTER VII.

HOW FORTUNE AGAIN SMILED, AND THEN FROWNED UPON HIM.

"----Fortune is merry,
And in this mood will give us any thing."--_Shakspeare._

"Full oft 'tis seen our mere defects
Prove our commodities."--_Idem._

"----A motley company,
Blacklegs, and thieves, and would-be gentlemen."--_Idem._

"The lottery of my destiny bars me the right of voluntary
choosing."--_Idem._

The succeeding stage in the life of my hero and friend, was marked by
no very striking or extraordinary event; but the incidents attending it
were nevertheless quite characteristic of his varying fortunes. It so
happened that in adjusting the results of his mercantile experiment,
Mr. Wheelwright became possessed of a questionable claim upon the
government, for property said to have been destroyed by the enemy on
the northern frontier, during the late war with Great Britain. It came
into his hands by way of satisfaction for a debt due from a country
merchant; and although the chances were as twenty to one, either that
it had already been paid, or that it had no existence in equity, or
that even if ever so just, like the claim for Amy Dardin's celebrated
blood-horse, the period of two generations would be consumed in
petitioning for relief, yet he determined forthwith to proceed to the
federal capital, and prosecute his suit before the august m