em.

"Let's begin, anyway. _To Messrs. Tarry & Knott. Dear Sirs_--No, I'm
hanged if I'll call them dear. Ridiculous convention! They're not
dear--except in their charges. I say, that's not bad. No, just put
_Gentlemen_. But that's absurd too. They're not gentlemen, the swine!
They're anything but gentlemen, they're blackguards, swindlers, liars.
Seriously, Miss Tappit, I ask you, isn't it monstrous? Here am I, an
old customer, with burst pipes doing endless damage, and they can't
send anyone till to-morrow. Really, you know, it's the limit. I know
about the War and all that. I make every allowance. But I still say
it's the limit. Well, we must put the thing in the third person, I
suppose, if I'm not to call them either 'dear' or 'gentlemen.' _Mr.
Horace Bristowe presents his comp_--Good Heavens! he does nothing of
the kind--_Mr. Horace Bristowe begs to_--Begs! Of course I don't beg.
This really is becoming idiotic. Can't one write a letter like an
honest man, instead of all this flunkey business? Begin again: _To
Messrs. Tarry & Nott. Mr. Horace Bristowe considers that he has been
treated with a lack of consideration_--no, we can't have 'considers'
and 'consideration' so near together. What's another word for
'consideration'?--_treated with a lack of--a lack of_--Well, we'll
keep 'consideration' and alter 'considers.' Begin again: _Mr. Horace
Bristowe thinks_--no, that's not strong enough--_believes_--no. Ah,
I've got it--_Mr. Horace Bristowe holds that he has been treated by
you with a lack of consideration which_--I wonder if 'which' is better
than 'that'--_a lack of consideration that, considering his long_--no,
we can't have 'considering' just after 'consideration'--_that_--no,
_which--which--in view of his long record as_--What I want to say is
that it's an infernal shame that after all these years, in which I've
put business in their way and paid them scores of pounds, they should
treat me in this scurvy fashion, that's what I mean. The swine! I tell
you, Miss Tappit, it's infamous. I--(and so on).

The No-Nonsense Efficient businessman, so clear-headed and capable
that it is his continual surprise that he is not in the Cabinet
without the preliminary of an election, handles his correspondence
very differently. He presses a button for Miss Pether. She is really
Miss Carmichael, but it is a rule in this model office that the typist
takes a dynastic name, and Pether now goes with the typewriter, just
as all office