Alex was a wealthy man - rich by her standards.
According to a common Indian belief a wealthy man who dies without an heir returns to guard his wealth in the form of a serpent, and Italian superstition supposed that to find a serpent's skin brought good luck (Leland) .2 No singular preference for jewels on the part of serpents will explain the belief, and creatures like the jackdaw which have this weakness do not enjoy this prominence in folk-lore.
His father, who was a wealthy man and possessed at any rate a smattering of Greek, Latin and French, was thought to have demeaned himself by marrying the daughter of an Andover tradesman, who afterwards retired to a country house near Reading, where young Jeremy spent many happy days.