he had won. The cashier met him with a smile.

"Where is my money?" asked Girard, triumphantly.

"The money is mine," replied the cashier. "Come and see."

He led the merchant to an unused room of the bank, and there, to his
dismay, Girard saw the walls and ceiling covered with spots of ink,
which the cashier had dashed on them with a brush.

"Do you mean to say there are a million of dots here?" he cried,
angrily.

"Count them, and see," replied his subordinate, laughing. "You know the
wager was a million of dots with ink."

"But I expected you would make them with the pen."

"I did not undertake any thing of the kind."

The joke was too good, and the merchant not only paid the amount of the
wager, but the cost of cleaning the walls.

In 1810 the question of renewing the charter of the old Bank of the
United States was actively discussed. Girard was a warm friend of that
institution, which he believed had been the cause of a very great part
of the prosperity of the country, and was firmly convinced that Congress
would renew the charter. In this belief he ordered the Barings, of
London, to invest all his funds in their hands in shares of the Bank of
the United States, which was done, during the following year, to the