CHAPTER LI.
The One Half-Crown--Merit in Patience--Cementer of Friendship--Dreadful Perplexity--The Usual Guttural--Armenian Letters--Much Indebted to You--Pure Helplessness--Dumb People.
One morning on getting up I discovered that my whole worldly wealth was reduced to one half-crown--throughout that day I walked about in considerable distress of mind; it was now requisite that I should come to a speedy decision with respect to what I was to do; I had not many alternatives, and, before I had retired to rest on the night of the day in question, I had determined that I could do no better than accept the first proposal of the Armenian, and translate, under his superintendence, the Haik Esop into English.
I reflected, for I made a virtue of necessity, that, after all, such an employment would be an honest and honourable one; honest, inasmuch as by engaging in it I should do harm to nobody; honourable, inasmuch as it was a literary task, which not every one was capable of executing.

It was not everyone of the booksellers' writers of London who was competent to translate the Haik Esop.

I determined to accept the offer of the Armenian.
Once or twice the thought of what I might have to undergo in the translation from certain peculiarities of the Armenian's temper almost unsettled me; but a mechanical diving of my hand into my pocket, and the feeling of the solitary half-crown, confirmed me; after all, this was a life of trial and tribulation, and I had read somewhere or other that there was much merit in patience, so I determined to hold fast in my resolution of accepting the offer of the Armenian.
But all of a sudden I remembered that the Armenian appeared to have altered his intentions towards me: he appeared no longer desirous that I should render the Haik Esop into English for the benefit of the stock-jobbers on Exchange, but rather that I should acquire the rudiments of doing business in the Armenian fashion, and accumulate a fortune, which would enable me to make a figure upon 'Change with the best of the stock-jobbers.

"Well," thought I, withdrawing my hand from my pocket, whither it had again mechanically dived, "after all, what would the world, what would this city be, without commerce?
I believe the world, and particularly this city, would cut a very poor figure without commerce; and there is something poetical in the idea of doing business after the Armenian fashion, dealing with dark-faced Lascars and Rabbins of the Sephardim.

Yes, should the Armenian insist upon it, I would accept a seat at the desk, opposite the Moldavian clerk.