It required, however, long experience to acquire this knowledge.

Those who were too busy, or bought too little to gain it, took their chances and were generally unfortunate, getting the least and worst for the most money.

It was the merest chance if persons not experienced in shopping received the value of their money." "But why did you put up with such a shockingly inconvenient arrangement when you saw its faults so plainly ?" Edith asked me.
"It was like all our social arrangements," I replied.

"You can see their faults scarcely more plainly than we did, but we saw no remedy for them." "Here we are at the store of our ward," said Edith, as we turned in at the great portal of one of the magnificent public buildings I had observed in my morning walk.

There was nothing in the exterior aspect of the edifice to suggest a store to a representative of the nineteenth century.