After conducting his business for some years, Mr. Jerome organized the Jerome Clock-Making Company, of New Haven. It began its operations with a large capital, and conducted them upon an extensive scale. In a few years Mr. Jerome retired from the active management of its affairs, but continued nominally at its head as its president. He built for himself an elegant mansion in New Haven, where he gathered about him his family and the friends which his sterling qualities and upright character had drawn to him, and here he hoped to pass the remainder of his days.
He was doomed to a bitter disappointment. Although nominally at the head of the Clock Company, he left its control entirely to his partners, who, by injudicious management, brought it at length to the verge of bankruptcy. They made energetic efforts to ward off the final catastrophe, but without success, and in 1860, almost before Mr. Jerome was aware of the full extent of the trouble, the Company was ruined. Its liabilities were heavy, and every dollar's worth of Jerome's property was taken to meet them. Honest to the core, he gave up every thing. His elegant mansion was sold, and he