Page:Robert Barr - Lord Stranleigh Philanthropist.djvu/13

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LORD STRANLEIGH,
PHILANTHROPIST.




CHAPTER I.

BORROWING STRANLEIGH'S NAME.

There comes a period in the life of every man when, no matter how successful he may have been, he thinks for the moment he has chosen the wrong career. The comedian yearns to play Hamlet, and the world-renowned portrayer of the melancholy prince imagines he could set audiences in a roar of laughter. The carpenter regrets that he did not select the trade of blacksmith, and the blacksmith, as he mops his perspiring brow over red-hot irons, hankers for the ice business, while the ice man wishes he dealt in coal.

Young Lord Stranleigh began to realise the futile part he played in the affairs of the world at the

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