The only possible pleasure or advantage the most persistent of the smaller creditors could derive from attending the meeting, was the opportunity it afforded him of bemoaning his own hard fortune, and the wickedness of Mortomley in having omitted to settle his little account at all events. It did not signify in the least that to these lamentations no one listened, unless, indeed, some man gifted with a louder voice and greater powers of endurance than his neighbours compelled the attention of the trustee, who was always able to silence him with some calm and plausible answer,--the indignant creditor had spoken aloud and "given them a piece of his mind straight out,"--while, so far as Mr. Swanland was concerned, his experience had taught him that these ebullitions were all so many safety valves which prevented the possibility of any serious explosion damaging his interests. At last it became patent even to the representative man who always announces his intention of "attending the meeting personally," of "seeing to his own matters for hisself," and who generally tells the assembled company that all he wants is his money--and his money he will have--that the large creditors were with the trustee; and as the trustee, they considered, must be friendly to Mortomley, there was no use in pushing opposition further. And indeed there was not. A certain number of creditors who did not "wish to do Mr. Mortomley any harm," who had found Mr. Mortomley a very fair dealing gentleman, and hoped he would get through his trouble all right, had readily agreed to everything Mr. Benning's managing clerk proposed in Mr. Mortomley's interest, and the result was that the amount required and the numbers required to carry a majority had all been made up long before the meeting. Nevertheless, as he blandly suggested, Mr. Swanland liked to see unanimity amongst the creditors. Kleinwort backing him up with a remark to the effect that "the goods of one was for the goods of all." "If I get my money," he observed to one splenetic individual, "you get your money. If I get not mine, you get not yours; but look how big is mine besides your little dot; and I am content to wait and believe. Be you content too." Over the choice of the gentlemen who were to form the committee of management, and who were popularly supposed to be placed on a higher pinnacle of power than that occupied by Mr. Swanland, there proved, however, more difficulty than the trustee bargained for. Not that it mattered materially to him; but opposition in any shape chafed a temper by no means angelic, induced to a certain degree, perhaps, by a digestion far from good.