ay, lives on credit and
is perpetually in debt. He purchases his weekly goods on the security of
hoeing, harvest, or piece work, and his wages are continually absorbed in
payment of instalments, just as the tenant-farmer's income is too often
absorbed in the payment of interest and instalments of his loans. No one
seems ever to pay without at least a threat of the County Court, which
thus occupies a position like a firm appointed to perpetually liquidate a
vast estate. It is for ever collecting shillings and half-crowns.

This is one aspect of the County Court; the other is its position with
respect to property. It is the great arbitrator of property--of houses and
land, and deeds and contracts. Of recent years the number of the owners of
land has immensely increased--that is, of small pieces--and the litigation
has correspondingly grown. There is enough work for a man of high legal
ability in settling causes of this character alone, without any 'horse
case' with thirty witnesses, or any dispute that involves the conflict of
personal testimony.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE BANK. THE OLD NEWSPAPER

The most imposing building in a certain country market town is the old
Bank, so called familiarly to distinguish it from the new one. The
premises of the old Bank would be quite unapproached in grandeur, locally,
were it not for the enterprise of the new establishment. Nothing could be
finer than the facade of the old Bank, which stands out clear and elegant
in its fresh paint among the somewhat dingy houses and shops of the main
street. It is rather larger in size, more lofty, and has the advantage of
being a few yards nearer to the railway station. But the rival institution
runs it very close. It occupies a corner on the very verge of the
market-place--its door facing the farmer as he concludes his deal--and it
is within a minute of the best hotels, where much business is done. It is
equally white and clean with fresh paint, and equally elegant in design.

A stranger, upon a nice consideration of the circumstances, might find a
difficulty in deciding on which to bestow his patronage; and perhaps the
chief recommendation of the old establishment lies in the fact that it is
the older of the two. The value of antiquity was never better understood
than in these modern days. Shrewd men of business have observed that the
quality of being ancient is the foundation of credit. Men believe in that
which has been long establ