Page:A French Volunteer of the War of Independence.djvu/188

164 not amount to more than ten thousand francs.

But he and his wife had the patience and perseverance of beavers, which when their huts have been carried away by a flood, immediately set to work to reconstruct them. They began to work for their own living, and that of their family. My brother, who when he was rich had cultivated for his own pleasure his taste for the arts and sciences, now utilized his acquirements as adjuncts to the business he was trying to found. Drawing, mechanics, chemistry, agriculture, mineralogy, and mathematics,—he had studied all; and he found or made opportunities to employ all his knowledge.

I cannot, without emotion, and without feeling faith in that Providence which has said, "Aid yourself and I will aid you," think of this tiny rill of water which became a rolling river of Pactolus, these small efforts which in ten years developed into a thriving industry. To the praise of human nature let it be said, that from the very beginning of his industrial and commercial