I heard of one case in which a father actually carried my idea
into practice. He wanted his son to learn how little confidence was to
be placed in glowing prospectuses and flaming articles, and found
him five hundred pounds which he was to invest according to his
lights. The father expected he would lose the money; but it did not
turn out so in practice, for the boy took so much pains and played
so cautiously that the money kept growing and growing till the
father took it away again, increment and all- as he was pleased to
say, in self defence.
I had made my own mistakes with money about the year 1846, when
everyone else was making them. For a few years I had been so scared
and had suffered so severely, that when (owing to the good advice of
the broker who had advised my father and grandfather before me) I came
out in the end a winner and not a loser, I played no more pranks,
but kept henceforward as nearly in the middle the middle rut as I
could. I tried in fact to keep my money rather than to make more of
it. I had done with Ernest's money as with my own-that is to say I had
let it alone after investing it in Midland ordinary stock according to
Miss Pontifex's instructions.
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