James now knew the value of a dollar in theory, how many cents there were in a dollar, and how many mills in a cent; and yet he had little more conception of its practical value than a red Indian, for he had not received any wages nor bought anything above the value of a penny loaf or a bit of cheese. At length, looking up wistfully in the face of Mr. Whitman, he asked,—
“According to what you might buy. They would buy a good deal of some articles and not much of others; they would buy about twenty-four bushels of wheat and thirty of corn, but they would not buy a great deal of coffee, or indigo, or broadcloth, or silk.”
“I’d buy a gun and lots of powder and shot,” said Bertie.
“That would depend upon circumstances. In the western part of Ohio, of wild land, one hundred and eighty acres—more than half as much as I have got here.”
“O my! how much is an acre? I know what the arithmetic says, one hundred and sixty square poles. But how big a piece is it?”
“That little pasture where the colt is measures about an acre. One of those dollars would buy ten pieces of land as big as that pasture out there; but you must recollect it is wild land, all woods, no house, no road: you have to cut the trees down before you can grow anything on it.”
“I know grandfather has told me ‘twas just so once where this house stands. But would it buy any land here?”
“Yes, it will buy an acre, buy two, perhaps three of some land; of most land it would not buy one.”
“It would buy a yoke of little steers, and quite a lot of sheep.”
“But why don’t you buy a gun? You love to shoot,” said Bertie.
“That’s right, James,” said grandfather, “then you will have something under your feet that will last as long as you will, and longer, too. Not that I would say that it don’t pay a man who can shoot to buy a gun; but every thing in its place.”
James had now something to put in his chest, and went up stairs to deposit the money there. When he came back Mr. Conly explained to him the source of values, and told him that land became valuable by being settled, made accessible by roads, productive of crops and cattle, and by mills being built to grind the grain and manufacture the timber.
“When I go trading, James, I’ll take you with me, and then you will learn the prices of things, and after a while I’ll send you to trade as I often do Peter and Bertie,” said Mr. Whitman.