Page:Robert Barr - Lord Stranleigh Philanthropist.djvu/27

 a man to state it publicly, so I gave him fair notice and attacked some of his favourite interests on the Stock Exchange. On Settlement Day he was thirty thousand pounds to the bad, while I was richer by that amount. This was all as it should be; nevertheless, I caught myself, for the first time in my life, feeling an unholy joy at the accumulating of money. That frightened me. I saw that if I went on I should become like all the rest, raking money together into my bank account not because I needed it, but for the mere pleasure of handling the rake. I also caught a glimpse of the haggard face of my opponent, and realised he had lost money he could not afford to lose, while I gained cash I didn't need. I understood for the first time the tension a man like my adversary must go through when a sum of even that size is in the balance. I had just determined before you came in to study the other side of the question.

"It is said that all the wrecks in the Atlantic ultimately gather in the Saragossa Sea. I resolved to find the Saragossa Sea of business, and observe the human wreckage accumulated there. I want to see the men of affairs who may have been successful or unsuccessful financially. I want to see them, not with a hawk-like predatory gleam in their eyes, as I have