claim; the law will adjudge it to me, and I will take it. Have you
any right to complain?"

"Others will have, if I have not. If you seize upon my goods, and
force a sale of them for one-fourth of what they are worth, you
injure the interests of my other creditors. They have rights, as
well as yourself."

"Let them look after them, then, as I am looking after mine. It is
as much as I can do to see to my own interests. But it's no use for
you to talk. If you can pay the money or give security, well--if I
not, things will have to take their course."

"On this you are resolved?"

"I am."

"Even with the certainty of entirely breaking me up?"

"That, I have before told you, is your own look-out, not mine."

"All I have to say, then, is," remarked Layton, as he turned away,
"that I sincerely hope you may, never be placed in my situation; or,
if so unfortunate, that you may have a more humane man to deal with
than I have."

"Thank you!" was cuttingly replied, "but you needn't waste sympathy
on me in advance. I never expect to be in your position. I would
sell the shirt off of my back before I would allow a man to ask me
for a dollar justly his due, without promptly paying him."