How many stories I could tell you of this unintentional, odd homeliness of manner and life, from which he never departed, and which those around him found it impossible to depart from, even in respect to the style of the coffin in which he was laid, and the procession which followed him to the beautiful cemetery!  His dress was always that of a man of the humblest fortunes; and Dame Gossip says that he was so fond of his old coat, that, when a change became absolutely necessary, his daughters were obliged to prepare the new one, and substitute it for the old whilst he was asleep, so that in the morning he should put it on unconsciously, or, if he discovered the change; must wear the new or none.  The same dame has it that a youth, who afterward became his son-in-law, having caught sight somewhere of one of the old man’s daughters, desired to know her, and that, in the park, which was open to all, he met the old gentleman, whom he supposed to be the gardener, and offered him a bribe, if he would bring the lady out among the roses.  The old man accepted the bribe, and returned with the lady, whom, with a sly twinkle of the eye, he introduced as “my daughter” to the blushing youth.  And again it is told, that once, on a very warm day, the old man, having to wait for a friend, sat down on a stone just outside of his own gate, took off his hat, and, closing his eyes, dozed a little.  When he got up, he found a silver quarter in his hat.  Whether it was put there by some one who really thought he was an object of charity, or by a wag, the old man appreciated the joke, and, with a smile, put it into the pocket out of which had to come forty thousand dollars for annual taxes.  These stories may or may not be true; but in some sense such stories have a certain truth, whether invented or not.  They can live and circulate only in a community where they are characteristic of the person of whom they are told.  Generous men are not pursued by stories of parsimony; mean men never hear even untrue stories of their generosity.

And this last remark leads me to speak of the relation in which the wealthiest man of the West stood to the throngs of the poor and the suffering who surrounded him.

If, in the city, you had gone to the President of the Boorioboola-Gha Sewing-Circle, or to the Tract-Society Rooms, or to the clergy, and inquired whether the city’s richest man was charitable, you would have received an ominous shrug in reply.  Vainly have they gone to him for any such charities.  Vainly did they go to him for some “poor, but worthy and Christian woman.”

“I will give nothing,” he replied; “there are enough who will give to her; what I have to give shall go to the unworthy poor, whom none will help,—­the Devil’s poor, Sir,—­those whom Christians leave to the Devil.”

Many a minister has been sorely puzzled by the receipt of a fifty-dollar bill “for the relief of the depraved.”  His office was constantly thronged with outcasts, who were generally relieved by small sums.  In his relations with these people, his simplicity and eccentricity were noted by all who knew him.  Among many stories which I know to be true, I select the following.