Chapter 9

by Herman Melville

　　TWO BUSINESS MEN TRANSACT A LITTLE BUSINESS."Pray, sir, have you seen a gentleman with a weed hereabouts, rathera saddish gentleman? Strange where he can have gone to. I was talkingwith him not twenty minutes since."By a brisk, ruddy-cheeked man in a tasseled traveling-cap, carryingunder his arm a ledger-like volume, the above words were addressed tothe collegian before introduced, suddenly accosted by the rail to whichnot long after his retreat, as in a previous chapter recounted, he hadreturned, and there remained."Have you seen him, sir?"Rallied from his apparent diffidence by the genial jauntiness of thestranger, the youth answered with unwonted promptitude: "Yes, a personwith a weed was here not very long ago.""Saddish?""Yes, and a little cracked, too, I should say.""It was he. Misfortune, I fear, has disturbed his brain. Now quick,which way did he go?""Why just in the direction from which you came, the gangway yonder.""Did he? Then the man in the gray coat, whom I just met, said right: hemust have gone ashore. How unlucky!"He stood vexedly twitching at his cap-tassel, which fell over by hiswhisker, and continued: "Well, I am very sorry. In fact, I had somethingfor him here."--Then drawing nearer, "you see, he applied to me forrelief, no, I do him injustice, not that, but he began to intimate, youunderstand. Well, being very busy just then, I declined; quite rudely,too, in a cold, morose, unfeeling way, I fear. At all events, not threeminutes afterwards I felt self-reproach, with a kind of prompting, veryperemptory, to deliver over into that unfortunate man's hands aten-dollar bill. You smile. Yes, it may be superstition, but I can'thelp it; I have my weak side, thank God. Then again," he rapidly wenton, "we have been so very prosperous lately in our affairs--by we, Imean the Black Rapids Coal Company--that, really, out of my abundance,associative and individual, it is but fair that a charitable investmentor two should be made, don't you think so?""Sir," said the collegian without the least embarrassment, "do Iunderstand that you are officially connected with the Black Rapids CoalCompany?""Yes, I happen to be president and transfer-agent.""You are?""Yes, but what is it to you? You don't want to invest?""Why, do you sell the stock?""Some might be bought, perhaps; but why do you ask? you don't want toinvest?""But supposing I did," with cool self-collectedness, "could you do upthe thing for me, and here?""Bless my soul," gazing at him in amaze, "really, you are quite abusiness man. Positively, I feel afraid of you.""Oh, no need of that.--You could sell me some of that stock, then?""I don't know, I don't know. To be sure, there are a few shares underpeculiar circumstances bought in by the Company; but it would hardly bethe thing to convert this boat into the Company's office. I think youhad better defer investing. So," with an indifferent air, "you have seenthe unfortunate man I spoke of?""Let the unfortunate man go his ways.--What is that large book you havewith you?""My transfer-book. I am subpoenaed with it to court.""Black Rapids Coal Company," obliquely reading the gilt inscription onthe back; "I have heard much of it. Pray do you happen to have with youany statement of the condition of your company.""A statement has lately been printed.""Pardon me, but I am naturally inquisitive. Have you a copy with you?""I tell you again, I do not think that it would be suitable to convertthis boat into the Company's office.--That unfortunate man, did yourelieve him at all?""Let the unfortunate man relieve himself.--Hand me the statement.""Well, you are such a business-man, I can hardly deny you. Here,"handing a small, printed pamphlet.The youth turned it over sagely."I hate a suspicious man," said the other, observing him; "but I mustsay I like to see a cautious one.""I can gratify you there," languidly returning the pamphlet; "for, as Isaid before, I am naturally inquisitive; I am also circumspect. Noappearances can deceive me. Your statement," he added "tells a very finestory; but pray, was not your stock a little heavy awhile ago? downwardtendency? Sort of low spirits among holders on the subject of thatstock?""Yes, there was a depression. But how came it? who devised it? The'bears,' sir. The depression of our stock was solely owing to thegrowling, the hypocritical growling, of the bears.""How, hypocritical?""Why, the most monstrous of all hypocrites are these bears: hypocritesby inversion; hypocrites in the simulation of things dark instead ofbright; souls that thrive, less upon depression, than the fiction ofdepression; professors of the wicked art of manufacturing depressions;spurious Jeremiahs; sham Heraclituses, who, the lugubrious day done,return, like sham Lazaruses among the beggars, to make merry over thegains got by their pretended sore heads--scoundrelly bears!""You are warm against these bears?""If I am, it is less from the remembrance of their stratagems as to ourstock, than from the persuasion that these same destroyers ofconfidence, and gloomy philosophers of the stock-market, though false inthemselves, are yet true types of most destroyers of confidence andgloomy philosophers, the world over. Fellows who, whether in stocks,politics, bread-stuffs, morals, metaphysics, religion--be it what itmay--trump up their black panics in the naturally-quiet brightness,solely with a view to some sort of covert advantage. That corpse ofcalamity which the gloomy philosopher parades, is but hisGood-Enough-Morgan.""I rather like that," knowingly drawled the youth. "I fancy these gloomysouls as little as the next one. Sitting on my sofa after a champagnedinner, smoking my plantation cigar, if a gloomy fellow come to me--whata bore!""You tell him it's all stuff, don't you?""I tell him it ain't natural. I say to him, you are happy enough, andyou know it; and everybody else is as happy as you, and you know that,too; and we shall all be happy after we are no more, and you know that,too; but no, still you must have your sulk.""And do you know whence this sort of fellow gets his sulk? not fromlife; for he's often too much of a recluse, or else too young to haveseen anything of it. No, he gets it from some of those old plays he seeson the stage, or some of those old books he finds up in garrets. Ten toone, he has lugged home from auction a musty old Seneca, and sets aboutstuffing himself with that stale old hay; and, thereupon, thinks itlooks wise and antique to be a croaker, thinks it's taking a stand-wayabove his kind.""Just so," assented the youth. "I've lived some, and seen a good manysuch ravens at second hand. By the way, strange how that man with theweed, you were inquiring for, seemed to take me for some softsentimentalist, only because I kept quiet, and thought, because I had acopy of Tacitus with me, that I was reading him for his gloom, insteadof his gossip. But I let him talk. And, indeed, by my manner humoredhim.""You shouldn't have done that, now. Unfortunate man, you must have madequite a fool of him.""His own fault if I did. But I like prosperous fellows, comfortablefellows; fellows that talk comfortably and prosperously, like you. Suchfellows are generally honest. And, I say now, I happen to have asuperfluity in my pocket, and I'll just----""----Act the part of a brother to that unfortunate man?""Let the unfortunate man be his own brother. What are you dragging himin for all the time? One would think you didn't care to register anytransfers, or dispose of any stock--mind running on something else. Isay I will invest.""Stay, stay, here come some uproarious fellows--this way, this way."And with off-handed politeness the man with the book escorted hiscompanion into a private little haven removed from the brawling swellswithout.Business transacted, the two came forth, and walked the deck."Now tell me, sir," said he with the book, "how comes it that a younggentleman like you, a sedate student at the first appearance, shoulddabble in stocks and that sort of thing?""There are certain sophomorean errors in the world," drawled thesophomore, deliberately adjusting his shirt-collar, "not the least ofwhich is the popular notion touching the nature of the modern scholar,and the nature of the modern scholastic sedateness.""So it seems, so it seems. Really, this is quite a new leaf in myexperience.""Experience, sir," originally observed the sophomore, "is the onlyteacher.""Hence am I your pupil; for it's only when experience speaks, that I canendure to listen to speculation.""My speculations, sir," dryly drawing himself up, "have been chieflygoverned by the maxim of Lord Bacon; I speculate in those philosophieswhich come home to my business and bosom--pray, do you know of any othergood stocks?""You wouldn't like to be concerned in the New Jerusalem, would you?""New Jerusalem?""Yes, the new and thriving city, so called, in northern Minnesota. Itwas originally founded by certain fugitive Mormons. Hence the name. Itstands on the Mississippi. Here, here is the map," producing a roll."There--there, you see are the public buildings--here the landing--therethe park--yonder the botanic gardens--and this, this little dot here, isa perpetual fountain, you understand. You observe there are twentyasterisks. Those are for the lyceums. They have lignum-vitae rostrums.""And are all these buildings now standing?""All standing--bona fide.""These marginal squares here, are they the water-lots?""Water-lots in the city of New Jerusalem? All terra firma--you don'tseem to care about investing, though?""Hardly think I should read my title clear, as the law students say,"yawned the collegian."Prudent--you are prudent. Don't know that you are wholly out, either.At any rate, I would rather have one of your shares of coal stock thantwo of this other. Still, considering that the first settlement was bytwo fugitives, who had swum over naked from the opposite shore--it's asurprising place. It is, bona fide.--But dear me, I must go. Oh, if bypossibility you should come across that unfortunate man----""--In that case," with drawling impatience, "I will send for thesteward, and have him and his misfortunes consigned overboard.""Ha ha!--now were some gloomy philosopher here, some theological bear,forever taking occasion to growl down the stock of human nature (withulterior views, d'ye see, to a fat benefice in the gift of theworshipers of Ariamius), he would pronounce that the sign of a hardeningheart and a softening brain. Yes, that would be his sinisterconstruction. But it's nothing more than the oddity of a genialhumor--genial but dry. Confess it. Good-bye."