'Oh, you'll get rich,' declared Nancy, laughing. 'No doubt about
it.'

'There was a spot down the South Western Railway where we wanted to
stick up a board, a great big board, as ugly as they make 'em. It
was in a man's garden; a certain particular place, where the trains
slow, and folks have time to read the advertisement and meditate on
it. That chap wouldn't listen. What! spoil his garden with our
da----with our confounded board! not for five hundred a year! Well,
I went down, and I talked to him--'

'Like a father,' put in Nancy.

'Just so, like a father. "Look here," said I, "my dear sir, you're
impeding the progress of civilisation. How could we have become what
we are without the modern science and art of advertising? Till
advertising sprang up, the world was barbarous. Do you suppose
people kept themselves clean before they were reminded at every
corner of the benefits of soap? Do you suppose they were healthy
before every wall and hoarding told them what medicine to take for
their ailments? Not they indeed! Why, a man like you--an
enlightened man, I see it in your face (he was as ugly as Ben's
bull-dog), ought to be proud of helping on the age." And I made him
downright ashamed of himself. He asked me to have a bit of dinner,
and we came to terms over the cheese.'

In this strain did Luckworth Crewe continue to talk across the
gloomy solitudes of Soho. And Nancy would on no account have had him
cease. She was fascinated by his rough vigour and by his visions of