"Oh, what's the matter, ma'am?" cried the hired girl.
Mrs Sprague, her eyes blinded with tears, pointed to the packing-case, whereon was stenciled in large black letters: "BILL INSIDE."
When you do not intend to pay a bill there is nothing like being decisive in your refusal. The other day a bookseller had an "account rendered" returned to him with the following reply scrawled across the billhead: "Dear Sir—I never ordered this beastly book. If I did, you didn't send it. If you sent it, I never got it. If I got it, I paid for it. If I didn't, I won't. Now go and hang yourself, you fathead.—Yours very respectfully, John Jones."
PATIENT—"Doctor, what I need is something to stir me up—something to put me in fighting-trim. Did you put anything like that in this prescription?"
DOCTOR—"No. You will find that in the bill."—Judge.
See also Debts; Collecting of accounts.