ing young man, the son of
the Reverend Doctor George C. Lorimer, a worthy Baptist preacher.

"Keep at it--do not be discouraged, Melville--a preacher's son is
usually an improvement on the sire," said Philip D. Armour to Melville
Stone, who was born at Hudson, McLean County, Illinois, the son of a
Presiding Elder.

"I'm not worrying," replied the genealogical Stone. "You and I were both
born in log houses, which puts us straight in line for the Presidency."
"Right you are, Melville, for a log house is built on the earth, and not
in the clouds." Then this came to Armour, and he could not resist the
temptation to fire it: "Boys, all buildings that really endure are built
from the ground up, never from the clouds down."

No living man ever handed out more gratuitous advice than Philip Armour.
He was the greatest preacher in Chicago. With every transaction, he
passed out a premium in way of palaver. He loved the bustle of business,
but into the business he butted a lot of talk--helpful, good-natured,
kindly, paternal talk, and often there was a suspicion that he talked
for the same reason that prizefighters spar for time. "Here, Robbins,
get off this telegram, and remember that if the rolling stone gathers no
moss, it at least acquires a bit of polish."

"Say, Urion, if you make a success as my lawyer you have got to get into
the rings of Orion; be there yourself, the same as the man that's to be
hanged. You can't send a substitute."

To Comes--now Secretary of Armour and Company--"I suppose if I told you
to jump into the lake you'd do it. Use your head, young man--use your
skypiece!" And he did. This preaching habit was never pedantic, stiff
or formal--it gushed out as the waters gushed forth from the rock after
Moses had given it a few stiff raps with his staff. Armour called people
by their first names as if they all belonged to his family, as they
really did, for all mankind to him were one. He thought in millions,
where other big men thought in hundreds of thousands, or average men
thought in dozens.

"Hiram," he once said to the Reverend Hiram W. Thomas--for when he met
you, you imagined he had been looking for you to tell you
something--"Hiram, I like to hear you preach, for you are so deliberate
that as you speak I am laying bets with myself as to which of a dozen
things you are going to say. You supply me lots of fun. I can travel
around the world before you get to your firstly."

For all preachers he had a