“No. He knew nothing of the vacancy until he was notified of his appointment.” “That is a little singular,” remarked Loring, wondering for the moment how a man of so little importance, and no very distinguished ability, should be voluntarily tendered a high professorship in Bowdoin College. But the wonder did not occupy his mind very long. It passed away with the thought of his old school-friend. Great activity and energy in a business already firmly established, in which was ample capital, made Loring the possessor, in a few years, of quite a handsome property. Ambitious of a more rapid increase of fortune, and believing that he ought to have the entire benefit of his activity, energy, and capacity for trade, he withdrew from the house in which he was a partner, and commenced business alone. He did not err in his calculations. The results was as favorable as he had expected. Money came in more rapidly, and with its accumulation rose his ideas of his own importance, until he looked down upon every man whose coffers were not quite as full as his own, at the same time that he felt himself to be as good as any millionaire in the land. It is a little singular how the mere possession of money raises a man’s ideas of his own importance, and causes him to think meanly of all who are not favored with any considerable portion of this world’s goods. Upon what a slender basis of real worth do men sometimes build a towering structure of self-conceit! Wealth is very rarely the correspondent of solid virtue and sterling merit in those who possess it; not that men of wealth are less virtuous or meritorious as a class, but wealth, upon which most persons value themselves, is not the true standard for estimating the man. It never gives quality to the heart, principles to the mind, nor to the understanding rational intelligence. As Mr. Loring continued to grow richer, his ideas of his own importance continued to rise, until he felt himself quite an “exclusive” in society. At the age of forty, he determined to take a trip across the Atlantic, and see the world abroad. He must spend some time in London, Paris and Italy. In order to be prepared for this journey, he brushed up his French, and spent his leisure time in reading about the places he proposed to visit. So far as his knowledge of matters and things in his own country, out of the mercantile sphere, was concerned, it was very limited. Even in politics he was not very well posted up. As to what was doing in literature and science, he was altogether ignorant. He was a successful merchant, and that was about all that could be said of him.