“In what form?”
“In the form of ingots.”
“How much gold have you got? What’s its value?”
“Now, governor, I put it to you, as one man to another, you’re a little unreasonable. Didn’t I tell you that unless I can multiply a hundred and twenty-three decimal-whatever-it-happens-to-be, I can’t even estimate it? I asked—I hope with courtesy—the favor of your assistance in calculating the value of my gold, but you began to talk about infant schools. You see, I have got a mine down in Cornwall that holds two thousand tons of gold.”
“Nonsense,” interrupted the governor, waxing impatient. “There are no gold mines in Cornwall.”
“Sir, I did not say there were. The mine I speak of is a copper mine.”
“I have had enough of this fooling, my lord, and I think I have already bade you farewell.”
“Then you don’t want my gold?”
“How many pounds of raw gold have you got?”
“Pounds? Oh, I don’t estimate my gold in pounds. I hold at present upward of two thousand tons.”