DON QUIXOTE

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a rich man; and he would have been so in reality had he been as clever in
preserving his property as he was in spending it. This tendency of his to
be liberal and profuse he had acquired from having been a soldier in his
youth, for the soldier's life is a school in which the niggard becomes
free-handed and the free-handed prodigal; and if any soldiers are to be
found who are misers, they are monsters of rare occurrence. My father
went beyond liberality and bordered on prodigality, a disposition by no
means advantageous to a married man who has children to succeed to his
name and position. My father had three, all sons, and all of sufficient
age to make choice of a profession. Finding, then, that he was unable to
resist his propensity, he resolved to divest himself of the instrument
and cause of his prodigality and lavishness, to divest himself of wealth,
without which Alexander himself would have seemed parsimonious; and so
calling us all three aside one day into a room, he addressed us in words
somewhat to the following effect:

"My sons, to assure you that I love you, no more need be known or said