His family
cost him a great deal of money. The old man gave it to them
cheerfully, but he himself would take only a roll and a cup of coffee
for breakfast, and, when he got down to the store he felt so poor that
he would take a chew of tobacco and make it last him for the rest of
the day. Actually, that man didn't eat enough. And his clothes--well,
he would dress his daughters in silks but he would wear a hand-me-down
until the warp on the under side of his sleeves would wear clear down
to the woof. He would wear the bottoms off his trousers until the
tailor tucked them under clear to his shoe tops. Smile? I never saw
the old man smile in my life when I first met him on my trips. It
would always take me nearly a whole day to get him thawed out, and the
least thing would make him freeze up again.
"I remember one time I went to see him--you recall him, old man
Samuels--and, after a great deal of coaxing, got him to come into my
sample room in the afternoon. This was a hard thing to do because if
he was busy in the store he would not leave and if he wasn't busy, he
would say to me, 'Vat's de use of buying, Maircus? You see, I doan
sell nodding.
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