the fact is that sometimes it is and sometimes it is not. Owing to the
above delusion the proprietor of land can always borrow money at four
per cent, and other proprietors are often driven to give
ten--twenty--thirty.

So John Meadows lent mighty little upon land, but much upon oat-ricks,
wagons, advantageous leases and such things, solid as land and more
easily convertible into cash.

Thus without risk he got his twenty per cent. Not that he appeared in
these transactions--he had too many good irons in the fire to let
himself be called a usurer.

He worked this business as three thousand respectable men are working
it in this nation. He had a human money-bag, whose strings he went
behind a screen and pulled.

The human money-bag of Meadows was Peter Crawley.

This Peter Crawley, some years before our tale, lay crushed beneath a
barrowful of debts--many of them to publicans. In him others saw a
cunning fool and a sot--Meadows an unscrupulous tool. Meadows wanted
a tool, and knew the cheapest way to get the thing was to buy it, so
he bought up all Crawley's debts, sued him, got judgments out against
him, and raising the ax of the law over Peter's head with his right
hand, offered him the left hand of fellowship with his left. Down on
his knees went Crawley and resigned his existence to this great man.

Human creatures, whose mission it is to do whatever a man secretly
bids them, are not entitled to long and interesting descriptions.