, until the end of his days.
Poor old chap! When I shut my eyes I can imagine him in his
frayed clothes, with his white hair and his eager face,
racing madly across rain-wet meadows for the imaginary pot
of gold. That is what we have all been doing, Dorry, and had
our combination been ever so strong and our feet ever so
swift, we never should have found it.

"For I realize a great many things now that none of us
realized at the start. The cost of producing a paper is very
great, and there were many things that we did not know of at
all. Perny knows all about it now, and has figured it out
for me and Van, so that we see clearly at last that no
matter how much money we had started with, or how capable we
were, we should only have failed, for, unless we changed our
plans and charged higher for the paper and gave less
premiums, the more subscribers we got the more we should
have lost. It is some consolation to know that, for we might
have lost a hundred thousand dollars very easily in a year
if we had had it, or had raised it by subscription, as we
tried to do. Your little thousand would have been but a drop
in the ocean, and would have lasted only a few days. So I
send back the draft to you, now that everything is ended and
you cannot refuse to take it. As for my part of the
assessments, I managed to keep up and a little more, for I
was still in favor of going on when the others had reached
the limit of their means.

"And now comes the hardest part of all. For oh, Dorry dear,
I am going to do what I once said I would do if anything
happened to me, or if the paper failed and ruined us all. I
am going to release you. I could not think, Dorry, after all
that has passed, of letting you come here now to share my
poverty. For that is what it is, dear--just poverty; and
poverty in a big city is more humiliating and deadening to
all the joys of life than it can possibly be elsewhere. I
have nothing now but my hands, Dorry, and they are of little
value, for times have changed and there is much less work
than formerly. I have less even than that, because there are
some debts that have accumulated and must be paid.

"I never realized what riches were until I had them,--I mean
until I thought I had them, which was the same thing while