CHAPTER TEN.
A HARD FIGHT.
Across the wide Atlantic-- It drives me almost frantic, To watch the breakers breaking, and hear their dull, low roar!-- My soul is winging madly; And my eyes are peering sadly, As I span the long, long distance from my home-girt shore! I was disgusted with America in more ways than one.
Being of a hopeful, castle-building temperament, I had sanguinely thought that I would meet with employment there at once; and, be able to master in some unknown, mysterious way, the great art of money-making, on the very instant that I landed in the New World! I really imagined it, I think, to be an enchanted place, where every newly-arrived person became magically changed into a sort of Midas on a small scale; transforming everything he touched, if not into gold--the days of California were now over--at all events into Washington "eagles," or Mexican silver dollars, or even greenbacks, which were better than nothing, although greasy and not acknowledged at their nominal value.
Upon my word, I really believe that that was my secret opinion concerning America before I actually crossed the Atlantic! Probably, I would not have told you so had you asked me then; but I think that was my real idea about it.

It was to me an Eldorado, where ill-luck was undreamt of; and where I should be able to heap up riches without the slightest out-of-the-way exertion on my part, in an incredibly short space of time:--riches that would enable me to return home, in the character of a millionaire, in a year or two at the outside, and claim Min's hand from the then-unresisting Mrs Clyde! Was I not a fool?
Pray, say so, if you think it .-- _I_ won't mind, bless you! for, I know that there are more such in the world besides myself, eh?
I soon found out my mistake.
Not only was the cost of living excessively high--I had to pay twelve dollars a week for a bedroom in Brooklyn, an adjacent suburb, with "board" of which I did not partake very frequently, through an inherent dislike to bad cookery--but employment of any description was so difficult to be obtained that for every vacant situation advertised in the New York papers there were several hundred applicants, amongst whom an Englishman stood a very poor chance of being selected when competing with native citizens.
Do you know, Transatlantica is about the very worst quarter of the globe for an educated man to go to, who has no scientific attainments, such as a knowledge of chemistry and engineering--which may occasionally stand him in good stead.
For skilled artisans, or those brought up to a regular trade, there are good wages to be had, and constant work; but a "gentleman," or clerk-- unless he intends reversing the whole training of his life, which he will find an extremely difficult thing to do--had far better go and break stones on the highways at home, than think to improve his condition by emigrating to America! There are some men who can throw off all old associations and the habits in which they have been bred from boyhood, but, not one in a thousand-- though I have myself seen an Oxford graduate acting as an hotel tout in Cincinnati and the son of a "Bart, of the British Empire" driving a mud cart in Chicago!--neither of these, either, had been brought down by drinking, that general curse of exiled Englishmen in ill-luck.
I had good introductions; and yet, although I met with great hospitality in being asked out to dinner, I could never get any employment put in my way.
A dinner is a dinner, certainly, and a very good thing in itself--not to be sneezed at, either, in the Empire City, let me tell you; for, there, you can have as neat a repast served, whether in private houses or at the Great Delmonico's of "Fourteenth Street," as you would meet with at one or _two_ haunts I wot of in the Palais Royale.

Still, I leave it to yourself, a dinner is but a poor "quid" to him lacking the "quo" of an immediate fortune--is it not?
Matters began to grow serious with me; for, my income having amounted to _nil_ since my landing in the new world, my assets were gradually diminishing.

I had only a few pounds left; as my expenditure for lodging alone was at the rate of over two guineas a week; and Monsieur Parole d'Honneur's loan, which I looked upon only in the light of trading capital, I had determined not to touch on for personal need.
What should I do?
I went to one of the American gentlemen to whom I had been introduced, and laid my position before him.

He advised me, as he had previously advised me, to "look about" me.
I had "looked about me" already for some three months--without anything coming of it; however, I looked about me now again, and ?--met Brown of Philadelphia! "Brown of Philadelphia" was one who is known among our "cousins" as a "live" man.