I believe in every man looking out for himself." You will see by the dialogue, that the characters I here introduce are the antipodes of each other.

They had both been pupils in the same school, and in after life, being engaged as grocers, they frequently met and renewed their acquaintance.

They were both established in business, having passed the threshold of that important event, "Setting out in life." As far as their outward life was concerned, they were acquaintances; but to each other's inner life they were strangers.

John Anderson has a fine robust constitution, good intellectual abilities, and superior business faculties.

He is eager, keen and alert, and if there is one article of faith that moulds and colors all his life more than anything else, it is a firm and unfaltering belief in the "main chance." He has made up his mind to be rich, and his highest ideal of existence may be expressed in four words--_getting on in life_.