Anecdotes of public men; by John W. Forney.

BIOGRAPHY. 409
ly valley in which it was set like a picture, comes back to me
an instructive and pleasing memory. And when we reflect
upon the incomes of many of our American manufacturers and
capitalists, especially as we visit the busy centres in which they
and their workmen live, we can not repress the prayer that the
time may come, and come soon, when the contrast between the
luxury of the employer and the poverty of the employed, in this
country, may not be as startling as it is to-day. In other words,
that while the riches of the one are almost incalculably increased,
the comforts of the other should be as carefully considered and
cultivated. The example of the great English manufacturer,
Crossley, whose name, like that of Girard, the greatest of the
benefactors of Philadelphia, will be remembered and revered
as long as the town of Halifax stands, ought to be copied largely in the United States.
[January 5, I873.]
AH! if men of note could only realize how much their true
fame depended on their biographies, written by themselves.
Two late instances will suffice to prove the point. Had Charles
Dickens and Edwin Forrest kept fair records of their experiences, what treasures they would have left to posterity! The
French translator of Dickens's works once asked him for a few
particulars of his life. He replied that:he kept them for himself. I never met Forrest that I did not implore him to invite
my faithful short-hand writer to report the story of his life, as he
could only tell it himself; but the answer. always was:-" Not
now; some time when we both have more leisure we will undertake it together." Alas! his light, like that of Dickens, was
quenched in a second. Both these men were unrivaled talkS