with another note, expressing strongly my sense of the favour.
When we next met in the House, he spoke to me (which he had
never done before), and with great civility; and he ever after
manifested a readiness to serve me on all occasions, so that we
became great friends, and our friendship continued to his death.
This is another instance of the truth of an old maxim I had learned,
which says, "He that has once done you a kindness will be more
ready to do you another, than he whom you yourself have obliged."
And it shows how much more profitable it is prudently to remove,
than to resent, return, and continue inimical proceedings.
In 1737, Colonel Spotswood, late governor of Virginia, and then
postmaster-general, being dissatisfied with the conduct of his
deputy at Philadelphia, respecting some negligence in rendering,
and inexactitude of his accounts, took from him the commission and offered
it to me. I accepted it readily, and found it of great advantage;
for, tho' the salary was small, it facilitated the correspondence
that improv'd my newspaper, increas'd the number demanded, as well
as the advertisements to be inserted, so that it came to afford
me a considerable income. My old competitor's newspaper declin'd
proportionably, and I was satisfy'd without retaliating his refusal,
while postmaster, to permit my papers being carried by the riders.
Thus he suffer'd greatly from his neglect in due accounting; and I
mention it as a lesson to those young men who may be employ'd in
managing affairs for others, that they should always render accounts,
and make remittances, with great clearness and punctuality.
The character of observing such a conduct is the most powerful
of all recommendations to new employments and increase of business.
I began now to turn my thoughts a little to public affairs,
beginning, however, with small matters. The city watch was
one of the first things that I conceiv'd to want regulation.
It was managed by the constables of the respective wards in turn;
the constable warned a number of housekeepers to attend him for
the night. Those who chose never to attend paid him six shillings
a year to be excus'd, which was suppos'd to be for hiring substitutes,
but was, in reality, much more than was necessary for that purpose,
and made the constableship a place of profit; and the constable,
for a little drink, often got such ragamuffins about him as a watch,
that respectable housekeepers did not choose to mix with.
Walking the rounds, too, was often neglected, and most of the nights
spent in tippling. I thereupon wrote a paper, to be read in Junto,
representing these irregularities, but insisting more particularly
on the inequality of this six-shilling tax of the constables,
respecting the circumstances of those who paid it, since a poor
widow housekeeper, all whose property to be guarded by the watch
did not perhaps exceed the value of fifty pounds, paid as much as
the wealthiest merchant, who had thousands of pounds worth of goods
in his stores.