Page:A thousand years hence. Being personal experiences (IA thousandyearshen00gree).djvu/88

 temporary material abode, what more is that deserted tenement, either to its former occupant, or to other people, than any other edifice that a tenant may have occupied and quitted! If there is any one mortal thing I despise and detest more than another, it is cant about this very question; and I must admit that, with all our boasted progress, we are not yet quite free of it at times, even in such an everyday phase of our life and business. There are, however, some odd encounters on occasions. For instance, when Brown's step-grandmother died not long ago—a remarkably old and portly lady, who had accumulatively secured her own goodly share of phosphates and other valuables in the chemico-provision line—I was not by any means the only one bent upon a lot so decidedly over-average. In fact, I had had my eye, preparatorily, on the old lady for some time. Not that I—I ever—even for one moment—of course not—the thing is absurd. I had the greatest respect for her. But, really, the sad event being, of course, an ever nearing certainty, unless one's weather eye is always open in these business days of merciless competition, one inevitably goes to the wall. In short, I was resolved upon the lot, and got it, and handsomely indeed it cut up for me all round. I rather wondered at Brown's timid bidding, with all his ascertaining opportunities. But I refrained from vexing him about my profits. And, again, what an odd conjuncture for friend Brown, if he should be smacking his lips, some day, over a chop at the public luncheon bar, direct from the component atoms of the old lady!

This latter remark brings me to what is by no