A Queer Race: The Story of a Strange People — page 18: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A QUEER RACE. 15 turn from foreign climes he settled dewn in Liverpool, took a big house in Abercrombie Square, entertained largely, and lived expensively. When | was about six- teen, and a pupil at Uppingham School, my father (w ag had been a free liv er) died suddenly of apoplexy, and § investigation of his affairs resulted in the painful dig covery ‘that, after payment of his habilities, the residue of his estate would only provide my mother and myself with an income of something less than two bundred a year. So we had to give up our fine honse in Abercrombie Square and go into lodzings, and I left Uppingham and began to earn my own living—literaliy, for after I was seventeen I did not cost my mother a penny. The calling I took up was not of my own choosing. Had my father lhved a httle longer, or left us better off, I should have gone into the army. I did subsequently join the volunteers, and after serving for a whie in the artillery, became first heutenant and then captain in a rifle regiment. In the circumstances, however, I was glad to accept the offer of Mr. Combie, of the firm of Combie, Nelson & Co., ship and insurance brokers, to take me into his office and push me forward, ‘if I showed myself:smart,”’ as he was sure I would. I justified his confidence, and ke kept his word. Al- though I would mach rather have been a soldier, I had sense enough to give my mind to the insurance business, and ina comparatively short time I became familiar with all the intricacies of general average and particular aver- age, the draughting of policies, aid the rest; and if I did not, as Captain Peyton had told Tom Bolsover, know ‘Lloyd’s Register’ off by heart, there was not a sea- going ship belonging to the port of Liverpool whose age, classification, and character (which meant, in many in- stances, the ‘character of her owners) Il could not tell without referring to the book. The partners often consulted me as to the premiums they ought to charge, and the risks which it was prudent for them to take; they gave me a salary which made m mother and ‘myself very comfortable, and had f sey patient and waited a few years, I should doubtless have become a member of the firm. But I was ambitious; aud when the newly constituted Oriental and Qecidental Murine Insurance Company invited me to become their Eomichbooks:.¢co m