[Footnote 19: "I remember well when I used to write out the monthly
pay-roll and came to Mr. Scott's name for $125. I wondered what he did
with it all. I was then getting thirty-five." (Andrew Carnegie in
speech at Reunion of U.S. Military Telegraph Corps, March 28, 1907.)]
And here comes in one of the sweet incidents of our early life in
America. The principal member of our small Swedenborgian Society was
Mr. David McCandless. He had taken some notice of my father and
mother, but beyond a few passing words at church on Sundays, I do not
remember that they had ever been brought in close contact. He knew
Aunt Aitken well, however, and now sent for her to say that if my
mother required any money assistance at this sad period he would be
very pleased to advance whatever was necessary. He had heard much of
my heroic mother and that was sufficient.
One gets so many kind offers of assistance when assistance is no
longer necessary, or when one is in a position which would probably
enable him to repay a favor, that it is delightful to record an act of
pure and disinterested benevolence. Here was a poor Scottish woman
bereft of her husband, with her eldest son just getting a start and a
second in his early teens, whose misfortunes appealed to this man, and
who in the most delicate manner sought to mitigate them.
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