Page:Life of Isaiah V Williamson.djvu/78

60 one eye and his queue, his odd coat and characteristic speech, always enlisted the young countryman's interest and admiration. He thought often of the fact that Stephen Girard had not accomplished large financial results until he was past forty. For ten years, he listened to all that was said of Girard, and during that ten years, until Girard died in 1831, he watched him as a young beginner always watches the older business leaders of their time. Girard's life and work, unconsciously at first but admittedly afterward, greatly influenced young Williamson's course of life. His conscience now was keenly alive to what Girard had done—after he was forty—and to the fact that he himself had stopped before he was forty doing anything but what he pleased. That he was forty now and might possibly do his best work, were he willing, haunted him as though he heard voices, like Jeanne d'Arc, bidding him to not throw away his best years.

He had what the Quakers call "a concern."

As in all his extremities, for good counsel he sought the advice of his cousin, Peter