ice for something or other, followed me even here. A
certain hardware dealer in Albany, with whom I had become acquainted,
proposed to buy one of my recipes, and to go into an extensive
manufacture of the medicine. He had read and heard of the fortunes that
had been made in patent medicines, by those who understand the business,
and he thought he would see if he could not get rich in a year or less
in the same way.

After some solicitation I sold him the recipe for one thousand dollars,
receiving six hundred dollars down, and a promise of the balance when
the first returns from sales of the medicine came in. I also entered
into a contract to show the man how to make the medicine, and to give
him such advice and assistance in his new business as I could. My
hardware friend understood his legitimate business better than he did
that which he had undertaken, and although be learned how to manufacture
the medicine he did not know how to sell it; and after trying it a few
weeks, and doing next to nothing, he turned upon me as the author of his
misfortunes and sued me for damages.

Incidental to this, and only incidental, is the following: Shortly after
I purchased my property, as I was very fond of calling my little farm,
in Rensselaer County, I was in Albany one day when it occurred to
me that I wanted a carpet for my parlor. I went to the store of a
well-known carpet-dealer, and asked to be shown some of his goods.
While I was going through the establishment I came across a man who
was industriously sewing together the lengths of a cut carpet, and I
recognized in him one of my fellow convicts at Windsor. He, however, did
not know me, and I doubt if he could have been convinced of my identity
as the wretch who plied the broom in the halls of the prison. To him,
as he glanced at me, I was only a well-dressed gentleman whom the
proprietor was courteously showing through the establishment in the
hope of securing a good customer. It was this little circumstance, I
think--my chance meeting with my old fellow-prisoner, and my changed
circumstances and appearance which put me beyond recognition by
him--that prompted me to the somewhat brazen business that followed:

"I only came in to look to-day," I said to the carpet-dealer; "for the
precise sum of money in my pocket at present is eighteen pence, and no
more; but if you will cut me off forty yards of that piece of carpeting,
and trust me for it, I will pay your bill in a few da