"
"And none of the other houses," suggested Dick, "were any good at
all?"
"There were drawbacks, Dick," I explained. "There was a house in
Essex; it was one of the first your mother and I inspected. I nearly
shed tears of joy when I read the advertisement. It had once been a
priory. Queen Elizabeth had slept there on her way to Greenwich. A
photograph of the house accompanied the advertisement. I should not
have believed the thing had it been a picture. It was under twelve
miles from Charing Cross. The owner, it was stated, was open to
offers."
"All humbug, I suppose," suggested Dick.
"The advertisement, if anything," I replied, "had under-estimated the
attractiveness of that house. All I blame the advertisement for is
that it did not mention other things. It did not mention, for
instance, that since Queen Elizabeth's time the neighbourhood had
changed. It did not mention that the entrance was between a public-
house one side of the gate and a fried-fish shop on the other; that
the Great Eastern Railway-Company had established a goods depot at
the bottom of the garden; that the drawing-room windows looked out on
extensive chemical works, and the dining-room windows, which were
round the corner, on a stonemason's yard. The house itself was a
dream."
"But what is the sense of it?" demanded Dick. "What do house agents
think is the good of it? Do they think people likely to take a house
after reading the advertisement without ever going to see it?"
"I asked an agent once that very question," I replied.
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