However, one is subjected to frequent annoyances from wrong connections at the Central Office, and sometimes grave errors are made.

Once, through a serious blunder, or a mischievous joke, I lost a dinner in my Legation in Washington.

My valet received a telephone message from a lady friend inviting me to dine at her house.

I gladly accepted the invitation, and at the appointed time drove to her home, only to find that there was no dinner-party on, and that I should have to go hungry.
With some trades, in order to create a new market, commercial travellers or "drummers" give their goods away for nothing.

Experience has proved that what they lose at the start they recover in the course of time, receiving in addition triple or tenfold more business than the cost of the original outlay.