Chambersburg, Pa., August, 1859.
Dear Friend, —
I forgot to say yesterday that your shipments of freight are received all in
apparent safety; but the bills are very high, and I begin to be apprehensive of
getting into a tight spot for want of a little more funds, notwithstanding my
anxiety to make my money hold out. As it will cost no more expense for you to
solicit for me a little more assistance while attending to your other business,
say two or three hundred dollars in New York, — drafts payable to the order of
I. Smith & Sons, — will you not sound my Eastern or Western friends in regard
to it? It was impossible for me to foresee the exact amount I should be obliged
to pay out for everything. Now that arrangements are so nearly completed, I
begin to feel almost certain that I can squeeze through with that amount. All
my accounts are squared up to the present time; but how I can keep my little
wheels in motion for a few days more I am beginning to feel at a loss. It is
terribly humiliating to me to begin soliciting of friends again; but as the
harvest opens before me with increasing encouragements, I may not allow a
feeling of delicacy to deter me from asking the little further aid I expect to
need. What I must have to carry me through I shall need within a very few days,
if I am obliged to call direct for further help; so you will please expect
something quite definite very soon. I have endeavored to economize in every
possible way; and I will not ask for a dollar until I am driven to do so. I
have a trifle over one hundred and eighty dollars on hand, but am afraid I
cannot possible make it reach. I am highly gratified with all our arrangements
up to the present time, and feel certain that no time has yet been lost. One
freight is principally here, but will have to go a little further. Our hands,
so far, are coming forward promptly, and better than I expected, as we have
called on them. We have to move with all caution.
SOURCE: Franklin B. Sanborn, The Life and Letters of
John Brown, p. 535-6
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