I am like a horse in a quicksand: every effort I make but sinks me deeper." Some of his neighbors took the benefit of the bankrupt-law which was passed to give relief.

General Keith was urged to do likewise, but he declined.
"Though I cannot pay my debts," he said, "the least I can do is to acknowledge that I owe them.

I am unwilling to appear, even for a short time, to be denying what I know to be a fact." He gave up everything that he owned, reserving nothing that would bring in money.
When Elphinstone was sold, it brought less than the debts on it.

The old plate, with the Keith coat-of-arms on it, from which generations of guests had been served, and which old Richard, the butler, had saved during the war, went for its weight in silver.

The library had been pillaged until little of it remained.