ctures,
teaches habits of promptness. Every young man should have a watch
which is a good timekeeper; one that is _nearly_ right encourages bad
habits, and is an expensive investment at any price.

"Oh, how I do appreciate a boy who is always on time!" says H. C.
Brown. "How quickly you learn to depend on him, and how soon you find
yourself intrusting him with weightier matters! The boy who has
acquired a reputation for punctuality has made the first contribution
to the capital that in after years makes his success a certainty."

Promptness is the mother of confidence and gives credit. It is the
best possible proof that our own affairs are well ordered and well
conducted, and gives others confidence in our ability. The man who is
punctual, as a rule, will keep his word, and may be depended upon.

A conductor's watch is behind time, and a terrible railway collision
occurs. A leading firm with enormous assets becomes bankrupt, simply
because an agent is tardy in transmitting available funds, as ordered.
An innocent man is hanged because the messenger bearing a reprieve
should have arrived five minutes earlier. A man is stopped five
minutes to hear a trivial story and misses a train or steamer by one
minute.

Grant decided to enlist the moment that he learned of the fall of
Sumter. When Buckner sent him a flag of truce at Fort Donelson, asking
for the appointment of commissioners to consider terms of capitulation,
he promptly replied: "No terms except an unconditional and immediate
surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your
works." Buckner replied that circumstances compelled him "to accept
the ungenerous and unchivalrous terms which you propose."

The man who, like Napoleon, can on the instant seize the most important
thing and sacrifice the others, is sure to win.

Many a wasted life dates its ruin from a lost five minutes. "Too late"
can be read between the lines on the tombstone of many a man who has
failed. A few minutes often makes all the difference between victory
and defeat, success and failure.

CHAPTER XV

WHAT A GOOD APPEARANCE WILL DO

Let thy attire be comely but not costly.--LIVY.

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not expressed in fancy; rich not gaudy;
For the apparel oft proclaims the man.
SHAKESPEARE.

I hold that gentleman to be the best dressed whose dress no one
observes.--ANTHONY TROLLOPE.

As a general thing an individ