do. It is to my interest to treat you right. My firm is merely the one
from which you and I together select your goods. Ought I not to see
that they give you the right things at the right prices? If I treat
you right, and my firm does not, you will follow me to another; if I
treat you wrong I'll lose both your confidence and my job."

That man today gives me all of his business; I got him by _being
square_.

By being over-conscientious, however, a salesman sometimes will not
let his customer buy enough. This is frequently to the disadvantage of
the merchant. To sell goods a merchant must have goods; to have them
he must buy them. The stingy man has no business in business. Many a
man becomes a merchant and, because he is either too close-fisted or
hasn't enough capital or credit with which to buy goods, is awakened,
some fine morning, by the tapping on his front door of the Sheriff's
hammer. A man may think that if he goes into business his friends will
buy "any old thing, just because it's me"; but he will find out that
when he goes to separate his friends from their coin he must give them
the kind of goods they want. The successful merchant is the man who
carries the stock.

One of my old friends, who was a leading hat salesman of St. Louis,
once told me the following experience:

"Several years ago I was out in western Texas on a team trip. It was a
flush year; cattle were high. I had been having a good time; you know
how it goes--the more one sells the more he wants to sell and can
sell. I heard of a big cattleman who was also running a cross-roads
grocery store. He wanted to put in dry goods, shoes and hats. His