Barnum’s insurance was worth only $40,000, and he estimated the value of the lost Museum collection at $400,000. This disastrous fire tempted Barnum to retire. He considered devoting the rest of his years to East Bridgeport, possibly with the autobiography as recreation, and when he asked his friend Horace Greeley for advice, Greeley said, “Accept this fire as a notice to quit, and go a-fishing.” But fishing requires solitude and quiet, repose and a fatalistic satisfaction with whatever chance throws in the way. Fish are not caught by publicity, and that was the only bait Barnum had ever previously used. He wrote in his autobiography that his temptation to retire was offset by two worthy considerations. More than one hundred and fifty men were thrown ruthlessly out of employment by the fire, and would be kept out of employment, he thought, if he were to retire; also, he was long since convinced that his Museum was an institution, and that New York needed such an one as he had provided for more than twenty years. It may also have occurred to him, although he does not say so, that a museum was a profitable investment for capital. Barnum’s insurance was not his only asset after the fire. His wife still owned the lease to the Museum property, which had increased tremendously in value since he had renewed it fifteen years before. A real estate agent offered the lease for sale at $225,000, and James Gordon Bennett bought it for $200,000 with the intention of building a new home for the _New York Herald_. Bennett also purchased the land on which the Museum stood and the building for $500,000, and soon afterwards he read in other newspapers that he had paid the largest sum for a piece of property of its size that had ever been paid for any property in any city in the world. He was more frightened than flattered by this statement, and he arbitrarily canceled the purchase. Then he attempted to get his $200,000 back from Barnum, but Barnum had already invested the money in bonds, and he refused to take back the lease.