Not that I mean to assert that the judges
of Portugal Street are hard upon the
embarrassed tradesman, or the involved young
gentleman whose ignorance of the world and
refined tastes have led him into temporary
pecuniary difficulties: common gratitude, if
no higher feeling, restrains me from spreading
such an erroneous and unjust impression.
Portugal Street is good, but—and I speak
from experience, for I have tried both—
White Washerton is better. I should not
recommend Harrogate for medicinal waters; I
should not recommend Melton Mowbray for
pork pies—Banbury for tarts—Epping for
sausages—or Chichester for rumpsteak
puddings; but, for a perfect, easy, and rapid
relief from a mass of insolvent debt,
combined with rural life, field sports, and the
advantages of neighbouring marine bathing, I
know of no place like White Washerton under
the sun. To call the judge who presides over
White Washerton insolvents, kind, gentlemanly,
and lenient, is to use terms too weak
to convey the proper idea of his treatment of
them. He is thoughtful for the debtor;
sympathising for the debtor; and fatherly to
the debtor. It may be—and report says it is
—that he has himself suffered from the
obtrusive competition of trade, and knows how
difficult it is to resist the overwhelming
flood of wines, clothes, jewels, and cash, that
sweeps over the young man of position. In
every dashing young insolvent who comes
before him, he sees a reflected picture of his
own youth; in every opposing creditor, a
copy of the two-faced harpies—fawning on
one side, snarling on the other—who
alternately wheedled and threatened him when
he was a petitioner in a similar court to that
in which he now presides as a judge. It
may be, that the receipt of a large annual
salary for little work, developes the benevolent
side of a man's character, and causes
him to serve out large quantities of that
unstrained mercy which blesses the giver,
without taking anything out of his pocket.
Any way, explain it how we will, or leave it
unexplained, White Washerton, in
addition to all its various local advantages,
possesses an insolvent commissioner whose
Christian charity requires only to be fully
known, to leave Portugal Street a barren
waste, and the metropolitan Dracos biting
their solitary nails in the awful silence of a
deserted law-court. I may be unwise in
communicating my knowledge to the indebted
public in general; but a strong desire to
benefit my fellow-creatures has overcome
every selfish consideration, and I record my
experiences regardless of the results.

At ten, thirty, A.M., this morning, I stood
in the streets of White Washerton a debtor
to the extent of from forty to fifty thousand
pounds. At six, thirty, P.M., this evening, I
am sitting waiting for dinner, in the bow
window of the Racket Club, as free from
debt as the crossing-sweeper before the door.
There has been no personal annoyance from
the idle curiosity of friends; there is no
irritating report in the copy of the evening
newspaper which I hold in my hand: I have
drunk the legal waters of oblivion, far from
the prying eyes of obtruding witnesses, in
the tree-shadowed Court of the rural city of
White Washerton; and as I left an altered
man, in a first-class express carriage in the
middle of the day, I saw in an over-due
Parliamentary train, the stern faces of some of
my dilatory creditors, who had made up
their minds to oppose at the eleventh hour,
when my examination had closed soon
after the tenth. The way in which all
this was arranged shall be immediately
explained.

When I was in a most embarrassing
position; with so many writs served upon
me, that I could not distinguish the several
suits; those for wine, from those for jewels;
those for money debts of my own, from
liabilities entered into to oblige obliging friends—
my eye rested, one morning at breakfast,
upon the following advertisement in the
colums of a leading paper:

To THE EMBARRASSED.—How many a noble-hearted
young man has sunk into an early grave under the
oppressive load of accumulated debt, and all for the
want of a little timely advice and assistance! Let all
those who are suffering from pecuniary embarrassments,
and who wish to be relieved without
publicity or personal annoyance, apply at once to Mr.
Ledger, negotiator, No. 2, Paradise Gardens, Gray's
Inn Lane.

I need scarcely say that I applied at once
to Mr. Ledger, and found him a very shrewd,
affable, agreeable, comforting, business man.
I laid a plain statement of my affairs before
him, and we soon found that everything
was on what he called the debit, and
nothing (except just enough to pay expenses)
on what he also called the credit side.
That night (this is only ten days ago) I went
down by arrangement to White Washerton,
and took prepared lodgings at the house
of a brother of Mr. Ledger's—Mr. Erasmus
Ledger, Solicitor, Tin Square. I found
everything very elegant and comfortable.
Miss Ledger sang Italian songs, and played
German sonatas to amuse us of an evening;
and, in the day, I took exercise with
the cricket-club, or joined pic-nic parties
with the young lady and her friends. How
different was all this from the gloomy Jewish
sponging-houses of Chancery Lane! I had
all the comforts of society and a home, while
I was acquiring by residence the rights of a
White Washerton citizen.

Two days of this agreeable life was
sufficient to complete the first stage in the
Ledger process; and, at the end of this time,
it was necessary that I should be arrested.
I was arrested at the hands of an intimate
friend, and lodged in the clean, well-ventilated
gaol of White Washerton for five days; which