Blithers than it is to pay Russia? Not a bit of it. As you have said, I am not a philanthropist. I shall exact full and prompt payment. I prefer to collect from the prosperous, however, and not from the poor. It goes against the grain. That's why I want to see you rich and powerful—as well as honest."     

       "I grant you it is splendid philosophy," said Robin. "But are you not forgetting that even the best of Americans are sometimes failures when it comes to laying up treasure?"     

       "As individuals, yes; but not as a class. You will not deny that we are the richest people in the world. On the other hand I do not pretend to say that we are a people of one strain of blood. We represent a mixture of many strains, but underneath them all runs the full stream that makes us what we are: Americans. You can't get away from that. Yes, I do advise you to marry an American girl."     

       "In other words, I am to make a business of it," said Robin, tolerantly.     

       "It isn't beyond the range of possibility that you should fall in love with an American girl, is it? You wouldn't call that making a business of       it, would you?"     

       "You may rest assured, Mr. Blithers, that I shall marry to please myself and no one else," said Robin, regarding him with a coldness that for an instant affected the millionaire uncomfortably.     

       "Well," said Mr. Blithers, after a moment of hard thinking, "it may interest you to know that I married for love."     

       "It does interest me," said Robin. "I am glad that you did."     

       "I was a comparatively poor man when I married. The girl I married was well-off in her own right. She had brains as well. We worked together to lay the foundation for a—well, for the fortune we now possess. A fortune, I may add, that is to go, every dollar of it, to my daughter. It represents nearly five hundred million dollars. The greatest king in the world to-day is poor in comparison to that vast estate. My daughter will one day be the richest woman in the world."     

       "Why are you taking the pains to enlighten me as to your daughter's future, Mr. Blithers?"     

       "Because I regard you as a 

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