supposition that we were situated thus or thus
in money matters; when this breaks down there must be a restatement of the
social problem so far as we are concerned; we have been obtaining esteem under
false pretenses. Granted, then, that the three most serious losses which a man
can suffer are those affecting money, health, and reputation, loss of money is
far the worst; then comes ill health, and then loss of reputation; but loss of
reputation is a bad third, for if a man keeps health and money unimpaired, it
will be generally found that his loss of reputation is due to breaches of
parvenues conventions only, and not to violations of those older, better
established canons whose authority is unquestionable; in this case a man may
grow a new reputation as easily as a lobster grows a new claw, or if he have
health and money may thrive in great peace of mind without any reputation at
all. The only chance for a man who has lost his money is that he shall still be
young enough to stand uprooting and transplanting without more than temporary
derangement, and this I believed my godson still to be.
    By the prison rules he might receive and send a letter after he had been in
gaol three months, and might also receive one visit from a friend; when he
received my letter he at once asked me to come and see him - which of course I
did. I found him very much changed, and still so feeble that the exertion of
coming from the infirmary to the cell in which I was allowed to see him, and the
agitation of seeing me were too much for him. At first he quite broke down, and
I was so pained at the state in which I found him that I was on the point of
breaking my instructions then and there; I contented myself however for the
time, with assuring him that I would help him as soon as he came out of prison,
and that when he had made up his mind what he would do, he was to come to me for
what money might be necessary, if he could not get it from his father. To make
it easier for him I told him that his aunt on her deathbed had desired me to do
something of this sort should emergency arise, so that he would only be taking
what his aunt had left him.
    »Then,« said he, »I will not take the £100 from my father, and I will never
see him or my mother again.«
    I said, »Take the £100, Ernest, and as much more as you can get