ad something of an artist's passion in these things;
he went about, a little bent and peaky, calculating and planning and
hissing through his teeth, and feeling not only that he was getting on,
but that he was getting on in the most exemplary way. Manifestly,
anybody in his line of business who wanted to be leisurely, or to be
generous, who possessed any broader interests than the shop, who
troubled to think about the nation or the race or any of the deeper
mysteries of life, was bound to go down before him. He dealt privately
with every appetite--until his marriage no human being could have
suspected him of any appetite but business--he disposed of every
distracting impulse with unobtrusive decision; and even his political
inclination towards Radicalism sprang chiefly from an irritation with
the legal advantages of landlordism natural to a man who is frequently
leasing shops.

At school Sir Isaac had not been a particularly prominent figure; his
disposition at cricket to block and to bowl "sneaks" and "twisters"
under-arm had raised his average rather than his reputation; he had
evaded fights and dramatic situations, and protected himself upon
occasions of unavoidable violence by punching with his white knuckles
held in a peculiar and vicious manner. He had always been a little
insensitive to those graces of style, in action if not in art, which
appeal so strongly to the commoner sort of English mind; he played first
for safety, and that assured, for the uttermost advantage. These
tendencies became more marked with maturity. When he took up tennis for
his health's sake he developed at once an ungracious service that had
to be killed like vermin; he developed an instinct for the deadest ball
available, and his returns close up to the net were like assassinations.
Indeed, he was inherently incapable of any vision beyond the express
prohibitions and permissions of the rules of the games he played, or
beyond the laws and institutions under which he lived. His idea of
generosity was the undocumented and unqualified purchase of a person by
payments made in the form of a gift.

And this being the quality of Sir Isaac's mind, it followed that his
interpretations of the relationship of marriage were simple and strict.
A woman, he knew, had to be wooed to be won, but when she was won, she
was won. He did not understand wooing after that was settled. There was
the bargain and her surrender. He on his side had to keep her, dress