the problem of commercial success. Trained to business from boyhood,
he had allowed it to become his life, and he took it very seriously.
It was to him an absorbing game--his vocation, and not a means to some
ulterior end. He had already accumulated enough to maintain his family
in affluence, but he no more thought of retiring from trade than would
a veteran whist-player wish to throw up a handful of winning cards.
The events of the world, the fluctuations in prices, over which he had
no control, brought to his endeavor the elements of chance, and it was
his mission to pit against these uncertainties untiring industry and
such skill and foresight as he possessed.

His domestic life was favorable to his ruling passion. Mary Alden, at
the time of her marriage, was a quiet girl, whose early life had been
shadowed by sorrow. She had seen her father pass away in his prime,
and her mother become in consequence a sad and failing woman.
The young girl rallied from these early years of depression into
cheerfulness, and thoroughly enjoyed what some might regard as a
monotonous life; but she never developed any taste for the diversions
of society. Thus it may be surmised that Mr. Muir encountered no
distractions after business hours. He ever found a good dinner
awaiting him, and his wife held herself in readiness to do what
he wished during the evening, so far as the claims of the children
permitted. Therefore there were few more contented men in the city
than he, and the name of Henry Muir had become a synonym among his
acquaintances for methodical business habits.

In character and antecedents his younger brother, Graydon Muir, who
was also an inmate of his family, presented many marked contrasts to
the elder man. He had received a liberal education, and had graduated
at a city college. He had developed into one of the best products