It was a time to draw in horns. Barbara and I had ordered a new car; and in a spirit of prudence we decided to cancel the order. Sam Dainton—I hope, without his mother’s knowledge—gave me £300 for my place in the waiting-list and made another £300 within two days by selling it to one of the Jews against whom I was so indefatigably warned. After this one experience of practical finance and of an “agency-business” as conducted by Sam, I went back to the unassailable heights of theory; and for the next six months, until other cares claimed my attention, I watched the unreal boom of 1919 changing to the unreal slump of 1920. The one was no better justified than the other. While the country clamoured for houses, the building trade clamoured for work; domestic servants were not to be procured, and the figures of unemployment rose steeply. Every other country, I read, was working overtime; and our own exports threatened to dry up. “Ever heard of a man called Keynes, George?,” my uncle asked on my return, tossing me _The Economic Consequences of the Peace_. “Yes. I sent my copy to your friend Dainton. It was the least I could do after the literature that his good lady has been pouring in on me.” “What Keynes preaches from inside knowledge is what I’ve been preaching to you since the armistice.” “It’s what our worthy Wright and every other economist would have preached, if he’d had the figures before him,” I answered. “But have you seen Keynes’ reception in the press? This country’s still drunk from armistice night. _People won’t listen._”