Of courthe not. Couldn't very well thell
the whole rathe, ath it were, for a couple of hundred poundth, after
that. Didn't theem worth it."
There were many things Forty-eight Bloomsbury Square came gradually to
the conclusion were not worth the doing:--Snatching at the gravy;
pouncing out of one's turn upon the vegetables and helping oneself to
more than one's fair share; manoeuvering for the easy-chair; sitting
on the evening paper while pretending not to have seen it--all
such-like tiresome bits of business. For the little one made out of
it, really it was not worth the bother. Grumbling everlastingly at
one's food; grumbling everlastingly at most things; abusing
Pennycherry behind her back; abusing, for a change, one's
fellow-boarders; squabbling with one's fellow-boarders about nothing
in particular; sneering at one's fellow-boarders; talking scandal of
one's fellow-boarders; making senseless jokes about one's
fellow-boarders; talking big about oneself, nobody believing one--all
such-like vulgarities. Other boarding-houses might indulge in them:
Forty-eight Bloomsbury Square had its dignity to consider.
The truth is, Forty-eight Bloomsbury Square was coming to a very good
opinion of itself: for the which not Bloomsbury Square so much as the
stranger must be blamed. The stranger had arrived at Forty-eight
Bloomsbury Square with the preconceived idea--where obtained from
Heaven knows--that its seemingly commonplace, mean-minded,
coarse-fibred occupants were in reality ladies and gentlemen of the
first water; and time and observation had apparently only strengthened
this absurd idea.
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