Incidentally, a gratifying thing happened, something in the nature of a compliment or a concession, which he attributed to the snobbish eagerness of Americans to pay homage to his nobility.

Fatuous Storri; he should never have looked for compliment or concession or snobbish adulation in a plain lend-and-borrow traffic of dollars and cents! Men will buy a coat of arms; but they will not take a coat of arms in pawn.

No; Storri, instead of feeling flattered, should have grown suspicious when the gentleman from whom he borrowed those five hundred thousand proposed to let him have the full value of his securities if in return he were given the right to confiscate should the loans not be repaid on the nail.

Why not?
The new arrangement meant no real risk; the security might always be sold in case of default.

And under the arrangement offered, Storri's credit would be enlarged by twenty per cent.