"How much have you got in Cohoon's?" Priam asked Alice, after they had
looked through the report together.

"All I have is in Cohoon's," said she, "except this house. Father left
it like that. He always said there was nothing like a brewery. I've
heard him say many and many a time a brewery was better than consols. I
think there's 200 £5 shares. Yes, that's it. But of course they're worth
much more than that. They're worth about £12 each. All I know is they
bring me in £150 a year as regular as the clock. What's that there,
after 'broke up in confusion'?"

She pointed with her finger to a paragraph, and he read in a low voice
the fluctuations of Cohoon's Ordinary Shares during the afternoon. They
had finished at £6 5s. Mrs. Henry Leek had lost over £1,000 in about
half-a-day.

"They've always brought me in £150 a year," she insisted, as though she
had been saying: "It's always been Christmas Day on the 25th of
December, and of course it will be the same this year."

"It doesn't look as if they'd bring you in anything this time," said he.

"Oh, but Henry!" she protested.

Beer had failed! That was the truth of it. Beer had failed. Who would
have guessed that beer could fail in England? The wisest, the most
prudent men in Lombard Street had put their trust in beer, as the last
grand bulwark of the nation; and even beer had failed. The foundations
of England's greatness were, if not gone, going. Insufficient to argue