There is no position in life in which a man receives so much distinguished¹ attention as when he is a bankrupt,—a bankrupt, that is, of celebrity². It seems as though he had then realized the legitimate³ ends of trade, and was brought forth⁴ in order that those men might do him honour with whom he had been good enough to have dealings on a large scale. Robinson was at first cowed when he was called upon to see men who were now becoming aware that they would not receive more than 2s. 9d. in the pound out of all the hundreds that were owed to them. But this feeling very soon wore off, and he found himself laughing and talking with Giles the stationer, and Burrows⁵ the printer, and Sloman the official assignee, as though a bankruptcy⁶ were an excellent joke; and as though he, as one of the bankrupts, had by far the best of it. These men were about to lose, or rather had lost, large sums of money; but, nevertheless, they took it all as a matter of course, and were perfectly⁷ good-humoured. No word of reproach fell from their lips, and when they asked George Robinson to give them the advantage of his recognized talents in drawing up the bills for the sale, they put it to him quite as a favour; and Sloman, the assignee, went so far as to suggest that he should be remunerated for his work.

"If I can only be of any service to you," said Robinson, modestly.

"Of the greatest service," said Mr. Giles. "A tremendous sacrifice, you know,—enormous liabilities,—unreserved sale,—regardless of cost; and all that sort of thing."

"Lord bless you!" said Mr. Burrows. "Do you think he doesn't understand how to do all that better than you can tell him? You'll draw out the headings of the posters; won't you, Mr. Robinson?"

"And put the numbers and figures into the catalogue," suggested Mr. Sloman. "The best way is to put 'em down at about cost price. We find we can generally do 'em at that, if we can only get the people to come sharp enough." And then, as the evening had fallen upon them, at their labours, they

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