He built with his own hands a log house of four rooms, with chimneys at
each end, and wide fireplaces. With grim humor he called the place,
"Hard-scrabble." But he liked the place. He liked the freedom of it,
with his horses and other live stock. Despite its hardships he
welcomed it as an escape from the petty exactions of military life.
Nevertheless, he could not make it pay. He did not have sufficient
capital or bodily strength to succeed. An attack of chills and fever,
in 1858, put the finishing touch to this episode, and he sold his stock
and farm the following spring.
During the ensuing few months he moved from pillar to post, trying
various ventures and succeeding with none. The fates seemed against
him. In St. Louis, whither he had drifted, he was regarded with open
scorn as, what we would now designate, a "down-and-out." One reason
for his poor success lay in the fact that he was a Northerner, and the
city was seething with talk of secession. The clouds of Civil War were
already gathering, and men began to distrust each his neighbor.
At this juncture his father, who seems rather to have turned against
him also, came to his relief. He offered Ulysses a position in his
leather business, now in charge of the younger boys. Ulysses
thankfully accepted, although the pay was only fifty dollars a month.
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