Page:Life of Isaiah V Williamson.djvu/101

Rh all were given to various charities during his lifetime.

While Williamson's charities were usually bestowed secretly, coming as something of a surprise to the beneficiaries, there were numerous occasions when he openly made them conditional, in order to get other people stirred up. On one occasion, for instance, when he was asked to give $10,000 to the Home for Incurables—to which he had given before, and in which he was deeply interested—for the purpose of purchasing additional ground adjoining the Home, he replied to the committee that if they would raise $5000 from other people by a certain time, he would give the other $5000. This was accomplished, and thus the circle of the Home's friends and supporters was enlarged.

From the time that it became publicly known that he was a large giver he was, of course, beset on all sides by appeals, and his mail brought begging letters from all over the world, some of them absurd or impudent—the common experience of men and women known to be wealthy or generous-minded. Many of these requests, both distant and