essentially low. He could have understood knocking a man
over the head with a fire shovel and taking his money,
but not borrowing it.

So the Duke had come to America, where borrowing is
notoriously easy. Any member of the Mausoleum Club, for
instance, would borrow fifty cents to buy a cigar, or
fifty thousand dollars to buy a house, or five millions
to buy a railroad with complete indifference, and pay it
back, too, if he could, and think nothing of it. In fact,
ever so many of the Duke's friends were known to have
borrowed money in America with magical ease, pledging
for it their seats or their pictures, or one of their
daughters--anything.

So the Duke knew it must be easy. And yet, incredible as
it may seem, he had spent four days in New York, entertained
everywhere, and made much of, and hadn't borrowed a cent.
He had been asked to lunch in a Riverside palace, and,
fool that he was, had come away without so much as a
dollar to show for it. He had been asked to a country
house on the Hudson, and, like an idiot--he admitted it
himself--hadn't asked his host for as much as his train
fare. He had been driven twice round Central Park in a
motor and had been taken tamely back to his hotel not a
dollar the richer. The thing was childish, and he knew
it. But to save his life the Duke didn't know how to
begin. None of the things that he was able to talk about
seemed to have the remotest connection with the subject
of money. The Duke was able to converse reasonably well