Page:Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son.djvu/366

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A SELF-MADE MERCHANT'S

and began to cry again. Begged me to take Toby out of pickle and to bury him in the garden. I reasoned with her, and in the end I made her see that any obsequies for Toby, with pork at eight cents a pound, would be a pretty expensive funeral for us. But first and last she had managed to take my appetite away so that I didn't want any roast pork for dinner or cold pork for supper. That night I took what was left of Toby to a store keeper at the Crossing, who I knew would be able to gaze on his hams without bursting into tears, and got a pretty fair price for him.

I simply mention Toby in passing, as an example of why I believe women weren't cut out for business—at least for the pork-packing business. I've had dealings with a good many of them, first and last, and it's been my experience that when they've got a weak case they add their sex to it and win, and that when they've got a strong case they subtract their sex from it and deal with you

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