repeated the experiment, and, being in a position to know what he was
doing, with considerable success. By the time that he was thirty he
found himself possessed of a fortune of something over twenty-five
thousand pounds. Then (and this shows the wise and practical nature of
the man) he stopped speculating and put out his money in such a fashion
that it brought him a safe and clear four per cent.

By this time Smith, being an excellent man of business, was well up in
the service of his bank--as yet only a clerk, it is true, but one who
drew his four hundred pounds a year, with prospects. In short, he was in
a position to marry had he wished to do so. As it happened, he did not
wish--perhaps because, being very friendless, no lady who attracted him
crossed his path; perhaps for other reasons.

Shy and reserved in temperament, he confided only in himself. None, not
even his superiors at the bank or the Board of Management, knew how
well off he had become. No one visited him at the flat which he was
understood to occupy somewhere in the neighbourhood of Putney; he
belonged to no club, and possessed not a single intimate. The blow which
the world had dealt him in his early days, the harsh repulses and the
rough treatment he had then experienced, sank so deep into his sensitive
soul that never again did he seek close converse with his kind. In fact,
while still young, he fell into a condition of old-bachelorhood of a
refined type.

Soon, however, Smith discovered--it was after he had given up
speculating--that a man must have something to occupy his mind. He tried
philanthropy, but found himself too sensitive for a business which
so often resolves itself into rude inquiry as to the affairs of other
people. After a struggle, therefore, he compromised with his conscience