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Waiting for dead men’s shoes is a slow and not very sure business; sometimes it pays and sometimes it don’t. I know a genius who lost by it, and his case will bear repeating, for there is both morality and fun in it.

Lev Smith, a native of “the Eastern shore” of Maryland, and a resident of a small town in the lower part of Delaware, began life on a very limited capital, and because of a natural disposition indigenous to the climate and customs of his native place–general apathy and unmitigated patience peculiar to people raised on fish and Johnny-cake, amid the stunted pine swamps and sand-hills of that Lord-forsaken country–Lev never increased it. Lev had an uncle, an old bachelor, without “chick or child,” and was reported to be pretty well off. Old man Gunter was proverbially mean, and as usual, heartily despised by one half of the people who knew him. He had a small estate, had lived long, and by his close-fisted manner of life, it was believed that Gunter had laid by a pretty considerable pile of the root of all evil, for something or somebody; and one day Lev Smith, the nephew, came to the conclusion that as the old man was getting quite shaky and must soon resign his interests in all worldly gear, he would volunteer to console the declining years of his dear old uncle, by his own pleasant company and encouragement, and the old man very gladly accepted the proposals of Lev, to cut wood, dig, scratch and putter around his worn out and dilapidated farm. Uncle Gunter had but two negroes; through starvation and long service he had worn them about out; he had little or no “stock” upon his farm, quite as scant an assortment of utensils, few fences, and in fact, to any actively disposed individual, the general appearance and state of affairs about old Gunter’s place would have given the double-breasted blues. But Lev Smith had come to loaf and lounge, and not to display any very active or patriotic evolutions, so he was not so much disheartened by his uncle’s dilapidated farm, as he was annoyed by the beggarly way the old man lived, and the assiduous desire he seemed to manifest for Lev to be stirring around, gathering chips, patching fences, cutting brush; from morn till night, he and the two superannuated cuffies; and the old man barely raising enough to keep soul and body of the party together.

At first, the job he had undertaken proved almost too much for Lev Smith’s constitution, but the great object in view consoled him, and the more he saw of the old man’s meanness, the more and more he took it for granted that his uncle had necessarily hoarded up treasure; but, after three years’ drudgery, Lev’s courage was on the point of breaking down; the only stay left seemed the fact that now he had served so long a time, so patiently and lovingly, and the old man apparently upon his very last legs–it seemed a ruthless waste of his golden dreams to give out, so he made up his mind to–wait a little longer. Another year rolled on; Uncle Gunter got indeed low, and the lower he got the more assiduous got nephew Smith, and even the neighbors wondered how a young man could stick on, and put up with such a miserly, mean, selfish and penurious old curmudgeon as old Joe Gunter. Gunter himself was apprized of the great indulgence and wonderful patience of his nephew, and not unfrequently said, in a groaning voice:

“Ah, my dear Levi, you’re a good boy; I wish to the Lord it was in your poor, miserable, wretched old uncle’s distressed power to–“

“Never mind, never mind, Uncle Joe,” Lev would most deceitfully respond; “I ask nothing for myself; what I do, I do willingly!”