It was at the very latter end of the quarter when this legal ukase was placed in Mr. Pringle's hands, and that gentleman, examining his capital, found it consist of thirty-seven shillings, a silver threepence, and a penny,--which sums were to provide his dinners, cigars, and general pleasures for a fortnight. Clearly, then, out of this no compromise could be effected; he could not even go through that performance so dear to the hard-pressed debtor, which is temporarily so soothing and in the end so futile, known as paying "something on account." A five-pound note has the same effect on a tradesman to whom twenty pounds are owing as a wet brush on a very bad hat,--it creates a temporary gleam of comfort, _but nothing more_. Mr. Pringle had not even this resource: if he were summoned to the County Court, and if the investigation were reported, as it was sure to be, in _The Dalston Dreadnought and De Beauvoir Town Looker-on_, he should get horribly chaffed by his comrades, perhaps pitched into by the Board, and it would bring all his other creditors down on him. So something must be done, and cash must be raised at once. Mr. Pringle did not know where to turn: he had never been a borrower, and hated the idea of asking money favours from his friends; moreover, in real truth, he would not have known whom to turn to, had he been so minded. Prescott, his Pylades, was by no means overburdened with money--indeed, Kinchenton's income only sufficed for the keeping up of his modest establishment and for the schooling of Percy; while Dibb, Crump, Boppy, or any of the other office men, were utterly impracticable in such a case. Finally, he determined that he must "do a bill;" an act of which he had hitherto been innocent, and towards the proper accomplishment of which he thought it best to take the advice of Mr. Rittman.