Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 48.djvu/438

406  to the latter a very uncertain subsistence. Nor does the capitalist have credit for the fact that, without him, labor would not be so productive, and for the further fact that his share is taken from a product that was created largely through his direction, his enterprise, and his resources. It makes a vast difference whether an army has a skillful general at the head, or only an ordinary leader.

On the other hand, the employee should remember that, as things are now constituted, there is no employment without the use of capital. He must not consider the capitalist as his enemy, but rather as his friend. Nor should he close his organizations against all who do not work with their hands. His own day of labor measures eight or ten hours. There are other laborers in the field to whom a day's work means from twelve to sixteen hours. They are none the less laborers because they work with their heads, and it is a narrow definition of the "workingman" that rules them out.

When De Tocqueville studied the institutions of the United States, in 1835, he gave a broad view of labor as he wrote, "Every honest occupation in the United States is honorable." The same view must be taken by both the capitalist and the workingman before true sympathy between them can be assured. Until that day comes, neither profit-sharing nor any other form of effort will be able to bridge the chasm.



UTHORITIES differ as to the year in which was born. The first General Catalogue of Williams College, published in 1880, puts "æt. 65," after the year of his death. In Durfee's Williams Biographical Annals the year of his birth is given as 1709, while, according to Prof. Jules Marcou, in Science, Prof. Emmons always stated to his children that he was born in 1800. His sister has informed the writer that 1799 is the correct year. The month and day were May 16th, and the place was Middlefield, Mass. He was an only son, but had two sisters older and two younger than he. Prof. Emmons's father, who also bore the name of Ebenezer, was a farmer. His mother's maiden name was Mary Mack. The Rev. Dr. Nathaniel Emmons, who was quite a noted preacher in his day, was an uncle. The first ancestor in America of this branch of the family came from England, and settled at East Haddam on the Connecticut River. A brother who came with him settled in Boston,

Young Eben's interest in Nature appeared at an early age. The doors in his room were covered with bugs and butterflies 