It must not be imagined, however, that these new luxuries gravely interfered with the general tenor of his life. His wife perceived, indeed, that something was easier in their fortunes, that the cash necessary for her good deeds (and this was never extravagant) was always present and was given without grudging. His ample and ready manner impressed his neighbours with some advance in life. But nothing very greatly changed about him. He lived in the same house, with the same staff of servants; he entertained no more at home, for he was shy of meeting new friends, and but little more in the City, where also his acquaintance was restricted. This wise demeanour resulted in a continual accumulation, for it is not difficult in a man of this substance to buy and sell with prudence upon the smaller scale. Mr. Clutterbuck for five years continued a sensible examination of markets, buying what was obviously cheap, selling what even the mentally deficient could perceive to be dear, and though he missed, or rather did not attempt, many considerable opportunities (among which should honourably be mentioned Hudson Bays, and the rise in the autumn of 1907 of the London and North Western Railway shares),[2] the general trend of his judgment was accurate. For two years he maintained a slight but sufficient growth in his capital, and he entered what was to prove a new phase of his life in the year 1910 with a property, not merely upon paper, but in rapidly negotiable securities, of over £60,000, a solid outlook on the world, and a knowledge of the market which, while it did not pretend to subtle or occult relations with the heads of finance, still less to an exalted view of European politics, was minute and experienced. It was under these conditions that such an increment of wealth came to him as only befalls men who have earned the apparent accident of fortune by permanent and uncompromising labour. In the April of that momentous year 1910, Mr. Clutterbuck suddenly achieved a financial position of such eminence as those who have not toiled and thought and planned are too often tempted to believe fortuitous. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 1: The present price of sixpence a share is, in the opinion of the author, merely nominal, and any one with a few pounds to spare would do well to buy, for further Government action in connection with the docks has been rendered inevitable by the necessity of admitting new ships of the _Dreadnought_ type for repair to plates after firing.] [Footnote 2: After the fruitful interference of the Board of Trade.] CHAPTER III It was certain, as the month of April 1910 proceeded, that a demand would suddenly be made upon English capital for the exploitation of the Manatasara Syndicate's concession upon the Upper Congo.