I was moody and unhappy.

You have given me more pleasure than I can tell you." "It will seem little enough to-morrow, I dare say," replied Benoni.
"That is the way with pleasures.

But you should get them all the same, when you can, and grasp them as tightly as a drowning man grasps a straw.

Pleasures and money, money and pleasures." Nino did not understand the tone in which his host made this last remark.

He had learned different doctrines from me.
"Why do you speak so selfishly, after showing that you can give pleasure so freely, and telling me that we are all brothers ?" he asked.
"If you are not in a hurry, I will explain to you that money is the only thing in this world worth having," said Benoni, drinking another cup of the wine, which appeared to have no effect whatever on his brain.
"Well ?" said Nino, curious to hear what he had to say.
"In the first place, you will allow that from the noblest moral standpoint a man's highest aim should be to do good to his fellow-creatures?
Yes, you allow that.