It was like the cask of Danaides into which the public had been pleased to pour its deposits.

That they were gone was clear; and the bankruptcy proceedings which followed were like a sinister farce, bursts of laughter in a setting of mute anguish--that of the depositors; hundreds of thousands of them.

The laughter was irresistible; the accompaniment of the bankrupt's public examination.
I don't know if it was from utter lack of all imagination or from the possession in undue proportion of a particular kind of it, or from both--and the three alternatives are possible--but it was discovered that this man who had been raised to such a height by the credulity of the public was himself more gullible than any of his depositors.

He had been the prey of all sorts of swindlers, adventurers, visionaries and even lunatics.

Wrapping himself up in deep and imbecile secrecy he had gone in for the most fantastic schemes: a harbour and docks on the coast of Patagonia, quarries in Labrador--such like speculations.