tience he felt he had
abused. What was his relief when his creditor accosted him gayly with,
"Well, Mr. Goodyear, what can I do for you to-day?" His first thought
was, that an insult was intended, so preposterous did it seem that
this man could really desire to aid him further. Satisfied that the
offer was well meant, he told his friend that he had come out that
morning in search of food for his family, and that a loan of fifteen
dollars would greatly oblige him. The money was instantly produced,
which enabled him to postpone his visit to the pawnbroker for several
days. The pawnbroker was still, however, his frequent resource all
that year, until the few remains of his late brief prosperity had all
disappeared.

But he never for a moment let go his hold upon India-rubber. A timely
loan of a hundred dollars from an old friend enabled him to remove his
family to Staten Island, near the abandoned India-rubber factory.
Having free access to the works, he and his wife contrived to
manufacture a few articles of his improved cloth, and to sell enough
to provide daily bread. His great object there was to induce the
directors of the suspended Company to recommence operations upon his
new process. But so completely sickened were they of the very name of
a material which had involved them in so much loss and discredit, that
during the six months of his residence on the Island he never
succeeded in persuading one man to do so much as come to the factory
and look at his specimens. There were thousands of dollars' worth of
machinery there, but not a single shareholder cared even to know the
condition of the property. This was the more remarkable, since he was
unusually endowed by nature with the power to inspire other men with
his own confidence. The magnates of Staten Island, however, involved
as they were in the general shipwreck of property and credit, were
inexorably deaf to his eloquence.

As he had formerly exhausted Philadelphia, so now New York seemed
exhausted. He became even an object of ridicule. He was regarded as an
India-rubber monomaniac. One of his New York friends having been asked
how Mr. Goodyear could be recognized in the street, replied: "If you
see a man with an India-rubber coat on, India-rubber shoes, an
India-rubber cap, and in his pocket an India-rubber purse, with not a
cent in it, that is he." He was in the habit then of wearing his
material in every form, with the twofold view of testing and
advertisi