“Good heavens, man!––don’t you know that land is not exchanged without an Agreement for Sale, or a Deed?”
“How should I know?” answered the innocent. “I never bought land before. If I pay the price for an article, it should be mine, shouldn’t it?”
“If the man you pay is honest,” replied Phil, “but he isn’t always honest, hence Agreements and Deeds.
“Next time you buy a ranch, Mr. Hannington, take my advice and hire a lawyer to see the deal through for you.”
“No more bally rawnches for me, Phil. And it is possibly just as well I lost this one, because I have learned that one has to grub and mess among caterpillars and all those dirty little insects and worms they call bugs, which keep getting on the fruit trees, eating up the bally stuff you are trying to grow. I simply cawn’t stand the slimy, squashy little reptiles, you know!”
“I am afraid you are destined to meet them in other places besides ranches,” remarked Phil.
“I have found them on my dinner table before now!”
“How disgusting!” exclaimed the horrified Englishman.
“What are you going to tackle next? Don’t you think you had better get a job for a while, working for wages, until you get acclimatised; and so conserve your money until you have had the necessary experience?”
“Not so long as my old dad is willing to foot the bills! The least he can do is to keep me going here. It is cheaper for him than letting me gad about between London, Paris and the Riviera. Besides, my mother would 110 die of shame if she fawncied her boy Percy was working for wages like a common labouring bounder.”