Futile were also the merchant’s attempts, to convince Siddhartha that he should eat his bread.  Siddhartha ate his own bread, or rather they both ate other people’s bread, all people’s bread.  Siddhartha never listened to Kamaswami’s worries and Kamaswami had many worries.  Whether there was a business-deal going on which was in danger of failing, or whether a shipment of merchandise seemed to have been lost, or a debtor seemed to be unable to pay, Kamaswami could never convince his partner that it would be useful to utter a few words of worry or anger, to have wrinkles on the forehead, to sleep badly.  When, one day, Kamaswami held against him that he had learned everything he knew from him, he replied:  “Would you please not kid me with such jokes!  What I’ve learned from you is how much a basket of fish costs and how much interests may be charged on loaned money.  These are your areas of expertise.  I haven’t learned to think from you, my dear Kamaswami, you ought to be the one seeking to learn from me.”

Indeed his soul was not with the trade.  The business was good enough to provide him with the money for Kamala, and it earned him much more than he needed.  Besides from this, Siddhartha’s interest and curiosity was only concerned with the people, whose businesses, crafts, worries, pleasures, and acts of foolishness used to be as alien and distant to him as the moon.  However easily he succeeded in talking to all of them, in living with all of them, in learning from all of them, he was still aware that there was something which separated him from them and this separating factor was him being a Samana.  He saw mankind going trough life in a childlike or animallike manner, which he loved and also despised at the same time.  He saw them toiling, saw them suffering, and becoming gray for the sake of things which seemed to him to entirely unworthy of this price, for money, for little pleasures, for being slightly honoured, he saw them scolding and insulting each other, he saw them complaining about pain at which a Samana would only smile, and suffering because of deprivations which a Samana would not feel.

He was open to everything, these people brought his way.  Welcome was the merchant who offered him linen for sale, welcome was the debtor who sought another loan, welcome was the beggar who told him for one hour the story of his poverty and who was not half as poor as any given Samana.  He did not treat the rich foreign merchant any different than the servant who shaved him and the street-vendor whom he let cheat him out of some small change when buying bananas.  When Kamaswami came to him, to complain about his worries or to reproach him concerning his business, he listened curiously and happily, was puzzled by him, tried to understand him, consented that he was a little bit right, only as much as he considered indispensable, and turned away from him, towards the next person who would ask for him.  And there were many who came to him, many to do business with him, many to cheat him, many to draw some secret out of him, many to appeal to his sympathy, many to get his advice.  He gave advice, he pitied, he made gifts, he let them cheat him a bit, and this entire game and the passion with which all people played this game occupied his thoughts just as much as the gods and Brahmans used to occupy them.