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20, 1861.] Villas, Arethusa Park. Omnibuses to the Bank, 4d. No Agents need apply.

“Why, John,” added she, “that makes nearly 140l. a year. Only think of that!”

“Nonsense, my dear,” I returned. “You must have made a mistake. The advertisement means 27l. odd as the income, and that is rather more than five per cent.”

“It does not say 27l. annual income, I tell you,” she returned; “but 27¾ per cent.”

I read the advertisement myself. There it was clear enough. Twenty-seven and three-quarters per cent. on an investment of 500l.

“Ah!” I replied, “some tumble-down cottages, I dare say.”

“But it says let to tenants of the highest respectability.”

“Well,” I rejoined, “I should consider those who paid their rent, tenants of the very highest respectability, to whatever station of life they may belong.”

“Nonsense, John,” said my wife. “Artisans don’t want omnibuses to the Bank at fourpence.”

Upon second consideration I acknowledged she was right. Artisans do not usually take fourpenny rides every morning.

“There seems a genuineness about it, too,” she added. “No agents need apply. At any rate, it is worth looking after. It’s time we did something with the money.”

The money here alluded to was 500l., which I had received under the will of a deceased aunt, and of course it was necessary that we should invest it in the most advantageous manner. I was doing tolerably well in the cheesemongery line, and was paying my way, which is something in these hard times. I did not want the capital in my business, and we were consequently upon the look out how to make the most of it. My wife had examined the “Times” supplement every evening for a couple of months, and we had answered several advertisements, but nothing seemed likely to suit.

“What do you say, John?” continued she. “Shall we go and look at the property?”

I agreed to this proposition, and on the morrow we visited Arethusa Park. We had some little difficulty in finding Mr. Jollybold, described in the advertisement as “on the premises.” As Arethusa Park contained some fifty or sixty houses, we didn’t know which house to apply to, and after making various inquiries without effect, I looked in at the Freeholders’ Arms, a large flaring public house in the vicinity, and by a curious coincidence Mr. Jollybold was there in the parlour. He was a huge fellow with a very red face, and husky voice.

“I have called, Mr. Jollybold,” I said, “in answer to your advertisement.”

“Just so,” replied Mr. Jollybold.

“Would you be kind enough to show me and my wife the property?” I said. “She is waiting outside.”

“With pleasure,” returned Mr. Jollybold, tossing off the remains of a glass of brandy and water.

“Would you be kind enough,” I began, as we walked down the park towards Arethusa Villas, “to explain to us how so large a per-centage as 27¾ per cent. is to be made? Is it quite genuine, or is it a trick in the advertisement? We know that people advertise all sorts of things now-a-days, so that we hardly know how to give credit to honest representations.”

“Perhaps you don’t know much about house property?” said Mr. Jollybold.

“No,” I said. “The fact is, I have never yet dabbled in bricks and mortar, but having had a legacy left me of about the sum you mention, I thought I might possibly—if all things suited—try the nature of the investment.”

“Just so!” replied Mr. Jollybold. “And you’ll find it a speculation unequalled at the present day. I only wish I had more money to put in it, and I’d very soon make my fortune.”

“I should think you would,” said my wife, “if near 30 per cent. is made of money.”

“Thirty per cent!” cried Mr. Jollybold, “not 30 but 300! Why, look here,” he said, pointing to some houses on an adjoining estate. “The man who took that land had the whole five acres for 100l. a-year, and relet it at 600l. a-year. He sold his improved rents for near upon 12,000l. Can California or Australia beat that?”

“Well, no,” I said, “I should think not. But is there anything, Mr. Jollybold, to be done in a similar way with the property we are come to look at?”

“To be open and candid,” replied Mr. Jollybold, “I don’t think there is. You might, perhaps, put a couple or three pound on the ground-rent of each house if you wanted to sell, but as you’ll do pretty well as it is, I should advise you to keep ’em. This is the property,” said he, stopping before four large semi-detached houses, with long flights of steps, porticoes, and fine cornices and balustrades at the top.

“Why, you don’t mean to say these four houses are to be sold for 500l.!” I exclaimed with astonishment.

“I do,” returned Mr. Jollybold, “and no nonsense about it either.”

“But I certainly cannot understand you. Why these houses let, I should think, for 50l. or 60l. a-year!”

“65l. a piece—260l. a year for the lot,” said Mr. Jollybold.

“Then there’s ground-rent,” I said, “to be deducted.”

“That’s 10l. a house,” he replied, “and a very low rent too for such houses.”

“But I don’t yet quite understand, Mr. Jollybold, how you make out with an outlay of 500l. I am to get 27¾ per cent.?”

“Perhaps not. Not being acquainted with the ins and outs of house property, you don’t very likely understand what the ‘equity of redemption’ means?”

“Equity of redemption,” I said, “no, I don’t.”

“Well that’s what I’ve got to sell,” returned Mr. Jollybold. “You don’t expect to buy the land when you get a lease, do you? but you have the use of the land all the time you pay the ground-rent, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I said, “until the lease is out.”

“Just so,” returned Mr. Jollybold; “and when