HISTORY OF THE GREAT CHAPTER I AN INSERT ON THE SAGE FORTUNE Russell Sage was mellow with experience when Gould was still in his verdant youth; years before Gould began his predacious career, Sage had the reputation among the knowing of being an old hand at political and financial corruption. Was this reputation justified? And did Sage garner his first millions by illicit methods? Certain of his biographers glide nimbly over these questions, while others tell their ready-made advocates' tale; how by his thrift and enterprise, his marvelous business astuteness, and his imposing array of other mercantile virtues and faculties he made his great fortune.1 It would denote a lack of fidelity to these accounts were the word "sterling" omitted in connection with virtues; in the case of our multimillionaires virtues must necessarily be "sterling virtues." Were it not that the same stock phrases abound in all of these eulogies, they might provoke a gush of emotion, so touching are they, and often pathetic. But the moment the test of examination is applied they turn out to be sheer inventions. 1 For example: See "America's Successful Men," Vol. i, containing a laudatory sketch of Sage. In fact, all such works betray their own obvious worthlessness. SAGE'S GREAT DEFECT. One of the expected virtues, however, Sage grievously lacked, and it was by reason of this omission that he was the subject of gibes and harsh criticism throughout his life. So far as the methods that he used in getting together his millions went, he was not attacked; on the contrary, in his later years at any rate, he was represented as a very shrewd man who made his money by legitimate means. It was his niggardliness which proved the ground for his unpopularity. The severe economy preached as one of the great stepping stones to fortune, was condemned after the fortune had been acquired. A certain state of public mind or standard had been built up almost requiring that the millionaire should be a "good spender "; he should live sumptuously, blaze forth in glitter, and have some pet philanthropy. Sage's recusant quality classified him as quite distinctive among the very rich men of his time. No selfindulgence for him, no extravagance, no expensive hobbies or splurges. He was a man who displeased his class and violated its canons; to such it seemed that he made wealth odious to the masses by declining to invest it with that generosity which, it was supposed, softened the popular hostility to the system allowing its accumulation. Hence arose an undue rasping criticism of his personality. Nearly all of the millionaires of his day, after piling up their heaps, gloried in some costly conceit or resplendent show. None of this finery or foolery for the crustaceous Sage. He spent just enough to allow himself a comfortable domicile on Fifth avenue, one of the thoroughfares of the rich in New York city; aside from this moderate expenditure, he was notoriously parsimonious; his very clothes were the jest of the coun try. Had he yielded to the prevalent custom of buying the reputation of philanthropist and "benefactor of mankind" by impressive donations or endowments (to be recouped by further pillage) he would infallibly have been otherwise judged. He made no attempt, however, to propitiate harsh public opinion; be it said to his credit that he was unshakenly faithful to his sordid ideals; at no time did he curry praise or essay to conciliate by flinging out as a social bribe morsels to charity or philanthropy. Where his compeers (whatever their motives) confused or deceived the public estimate of them and their ways by distributing largess every now and then, he made no advances or pretensions; in the respect that he candidly idolized money, moralizing and sham almsgiving, cant and humbuggery were absent in his composition. HIS CAREER AT THE START. Sage was born of farmer folk in 1816 in Oneida. County, New York, in an environment of poverty and cramping horizon. There is a paucity of information about his youthful days. We learn that as a boy his dominant yearning was for money, and that he developed a remarkable capacity for sharp trading. He clerked in his brother's grocery store at Troy, doubtless, we may reasonably surmise, learning all of the profitable little tricks of dealing with customers which an ef |