"I suppose you call the leasehold system one of our great institutions?" David questioned.
"Well, and what then?"
"I don't see much advantage in living under it," was the reply.
"You might have something a great deal worse," the squire said angrily. "The high-and-mighty airs some of you people take on are simply outrageous."
"We don't ask for any favours," David said meekly. "But we've a right to live as well as other people."
"Nobody denies your right, that I know of."
"But what am I to do now that my little farm is gone? All the savings of a lifetime, and all the toil of the last dozen years, fall into your pocket."
"I grant that the luck has been against you in this matter. But we have no right to complain of the ways of Providence. The luck might just as easily have gone against me as against you."
"I don't believe in mixing luck and Providence up in that way," David answered, with averted eyes. "But, as far as I can see, what you call luck couldn't possibly have gone against you."
"Why not?"