" As old Andrew McPhail put it:
"Link's there, an' he knows the bank an' books, an' just how things
stand"; and so when he sold his hogs he put the whole sum-over-
fifteen hundred dollars-into the bank. The McIlvaines and the
Binghams did the same, and the bank was at once firmly
established among the farmers.
Only two people held out against Sanford, old Freeme Cole and
Mrs. Bingham, Lincoln's mother; but they didn't count, for Freeme
hadn't a cent, and Mrs. Bingham was too unreasoning in her
opposition. She could only say:
"I don't like him, that's all. I knowed a man back in New York that
curled his mustaches just that way, an' he wa'n't no earthiy good."
It might have been said by a cynic that Banker Sanford had all the
virtues of a defaulting bank cashier. He had no bad habits beyond
smoking. He was genial, companionable, and especially ready to
help when sickness came. When old Freeme Cole got down with
delirium tremens that winter, Sanford was one of the most heroic
of nurses, and the service was so clearly disinterested and
maguanimous that everyone spoke of it.
His wife and he were included in every dance or picnic; for Mrs.
Sanford was as great a favorite as the banker himself, she was so
sincere, and her gray eyes were so charmingly frank, and then she
said "such funny things.
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