The day was Thursday, the date July the twenty-second. We had beenchicken-farmers for a whole week, and things were beginning to settledown to a certain extent. The coops were finished. They were notmasterpieces, and I have seen chickens pause before them in deepthought, as who should say, "Now what?" but they were coops within themeaning of the Act, and we induced hens to become tenants.

　　The hardest work had been the fixing of the wire-netting. This was thedepartment of the Hired Man and myself, Ukridge holding himselfproudly aloof. While Beale and I worked ourselves to a fever in thesun, the senior partner of the firm sat on a deck-chair in the shade,offering not unkindly criticism and advice and from time to timeabusing his creditors, who were numerous. For we had hardly been inresidence a day before he began to order in a vast supply of necessaryand unnecessary things, all on credit. Some he got from the village,others from neighbouring towns. Axminster he laid heavily undercontribution. He even went as far afield as Dorchester. He had apersuasive way with him, and the tradesmen seemed to treat him like afavourite son. The things began to pour in from all sides,--groceries,whisky, a piano, a gramophone, pictures. Also cigars in greatprofusion. He was not one of those men who want but little here below.

　　As regards the financial side of these transactions, his method wassimple and masterly. If a tradesman suggested that a small cheque onaccount would not be taken amiss, as one or two sordid fellows did, hebecame pathetic.

　　"Confound it, sir," he would say with tears in his voice, laying ahand on the man's shoulders in a wounded way, "it's a trifle hard,when a gentleman comes to settle in your neighbourhood, that youshould dun him for money before he has got the preliminary expensesabout the house off his back." This sounded well, and suggested thedisbursement of huge sums for rent. The fact that the house had beenlent him rent free was kept with some care in the background. Havingweakened the man with pathos, he would strike a sterner note. "Alittle more of this," he would go on, "and I'll close my account. Why,damme, in all my experience I've never heard anything like it!" Uponwhich the man would apologise, and go away, forgiven, with a largeorder for more goods.

　　By these statesmanlike methods he had certainly made the place verycomfortable. I suppose we all realised that the things would have tobe paid for some day, but the thought did not worry us.

　　"Pay?" bellowed Ukridge on the only occasion when I ventured to bringup the unpleasant topic, "of course we shall pay. Why not? I don'tlike to see this faint-hearted spirit in you, old horse. The moneyisn't coming in yet, I admit, but we must give it time. Soon we shallbe turning over hundreds a week, hundreds! I'm in touch with all thebig places,--Whiteley's, Harrod's, all the nibs. Here I am, I said tothem, with a large chicken farm with all the modern improvements. Youwant eggs, old horses, I said: I supply them. I will let you have somany hundred eggs a week, I said; what will you give for them? Well,I'll admit their terms did not come up to my expectations altogether,but we must not sneer at small prices at first.