Chapter 44: The Beano
  Now and then a transient gleam of sunshine penetrated the gloom in which the lives of the philanthropists were passed. The cheerless monotony was sometimes enlivened with a little innocent merriment. Every now and then there was a funeral which took Misery and Crass away for the whole afternoon, and although they always tried to keep the dates secret, the men generally knew when they were gone.
 Sometimes the people in whose houses they were working regaled them with tea, bread and butter, cake or other light refreshments, and occasionally even with beer - very different stuff from the petrifying liquid they bought at the Cricketers for twopence a pint. At other places, where the people of the house were not so generously disposed, the servants made up for it, and entertained them in a similar manner without the knowledge of their masters and mistresses. Even when the mistresses were too cunning to permit of this, they were seldom able to prevent the men from embracing the domestics, who for their part were quite often willing to be embraced; it was an agreeable episode that helped to vary the monotony of their lives, and there was no harm done.
 It was rather hard lines on the philanthropists sometimes when they happened to be working in inhabited houses of the better sort. They always had to go in and out by the back way, generally through the kitchen, and the crackling and hissing of the poultry and the joints of meat roasting in the ovens, and the odours of fruit pies and tarts, and plum puddings and sage and onions, were simply maddening. In the back-yards of these houses there were usually huge stacks of empty beer, stout and wine bottles, and others that had contained whisky, brandy or champagne.
 The smells of the delicious viands that were being prepared in the kitchen often penetrated into the dismantled rooms that the philanthropists were renovating, sometimes just as they were eating their own wretched fare out of their dinner basket, and washing it down with draughts of the cold tea or the petrifying liquid they sometimes brought with them in bottles.
 Sometimes, as has been said, the people of the house used to send up some tea and bread and butter or cakes or other refreshments to the workmen, but whenever Hunter got to know of it being done he used to speak to the people about it and request that it be discontinued, as it caused the men to waste their time.
 But the event of the year was the Beano, which took place on the last Saturday in August, after they had been paying in for about four months. The cost of the outing was to be five shillings a head, so this was the amount each man had to pay in, but it was expected that the total cost - the hire of the brakes and the cost of the dinner - would come out at a trifle less than the amount stated, and in that case the surplus would be shared out after the dinner. The amount of the share-out would be greater or less according to other circumstances, for it generally happened that apart from the subscriptions of the men, the Beano fund was swelled by charitable donations from several quarters, as will be seen later on.
 When the eventful day arrived, the hands, instead of working till one, were paid at twelve o’clock and rushed off home to have a wash and change.
 The brakes were to start from the ‘Cricketers’ at one, but it was arranged, for the convenience of those who lived at Windley, that they were to be picked up at the Cross Roads at one-thirty.
 There were four brakes altogether - three large ones for the men and one small one for the accommodation of Mr Rushton and a few of his personal friends, Didlum, Grinder, Mr Toonarf, an architect and Mr Lettum, a house and estate Agent. One of the drivers was accompanied by a friend who carried a long coachman’s horn. This gentleman was not paid to come, but, being out of work, be thought that the men would be sure to stand him a few drinks and that they would probably make a collection for him in return for his services.
 Most of the chaps were smoking twopenny cigars, and had one or two drinks with each other to try to cheer themselves up before they started, but all the same it was a melancholy procession that wended its way up the hill to Windley. To judge from the mournful expression on the long face of Misery, who sat on the box beside the driver of the first large brake, and the downcast appearance of the majority of the men, one might have thought that it was a funeral rather than a pleasure party, or that they were a contingent of lost souls being conducted to the banks of the Styx. The man who from time to time sounded the coachman’s horn might have passed as the angel sounding the last trump, and the fumes of the cigars were typical of the smoke of their torment, which ascendeth up for ever and ever.
 A brief halt was made at the Cross Roads to pick up several of the men, including Philpot, Harlow, Easton, Ned Dawson, Sawkins, Bill Bates and the Semi-drunk. The two last-named were now working for Smeariton and Leavit, but as they had been paying in from the first, they had elected to go to the Beano rather than have their money back. The Semi-drunk and one or two other habitual boozers were very shabby and down at heel, but the majority of the men were decently dressed. Some had taken their Sunday clothes out of pawn especially for the occasion. Others were arrayed in new suits which they were going to pay for at the rate of a shilling a week. Some had bought themselves second-hand suits, one or two were wearing their working clothes brushed and cleaned up, and some were wearing Sunday clothes that had not been taken out of pawn for the simple reason that the pawnbrokers would not take them in. These garments were in what might be called a transition stage - old-fashioned and shiny with wear, but yet too good to take for working in, even if their owners had been in a position to buy some others to take their place for best. Crass, Slyme and one or two of the single men, however, were howling swells, sporting stand-up collars and bowler hats of the latest type, in contradistinction to some of the others, who were wearing hats of antique patterns, and collars of various shapes with jagged edges. Harlow had on an old straw hat that his wife had cleaned up with oxalic acid, and Easton had carefully dyed the faded binding of his black bowler with ink. Their boots were the worst part of their attire: without counting Rushton and his friends, there were thirty-seven men altogether, including Nimrod, and there were not half a dozen pairs of really good boots amongst the whole crowd.
 When all were seated a fresh start was made. The small brake, with Rushton, Didlum, Grinder and two or three other members of the Band, led the way. Next came the largest brake with Misery on the box. Beside the driver of the third brake was Payne, the foreman carpenter. Crass occupied a similar position of honour on the fourth brake, on the back step of which was perched the man with the coachman’s horn.
 Crass - who had engaged the brakes - had arranged with the drivers that the cortege should pass through the street where he and Easton lived, and as they went by Mrs Crass was standing at the door with the two young men lodgers, who waved their handkerchiefs and shouted greetings. A little further on Mrs Linden and Easton’s wife were standing at the door to see them go by. In fact, the notes of the coachman’s horn alarmed most of the inhabitants, who crowded to their windows and doors to gaze upon the dismal procession as it passed.
 The mean streets of Windley were soon left far behind and they found themselves journeying along a sunlit, winding road, bordered with hedges of hawthorn, holly and briar, past rich, brown fields of standing corn, shimmering with gleams of gold, past apple-orchards where bending boughs were heavily loaded with mellow fruits exhaling fragrant odours, through the cool shades of lofty avenues of venerable oaks, whose overarched and interlacing branches formed a roof of green, gilt and illuminated with quivering spots and shafts of sunlight that filtered through the trembling leaves; over old mossy stone bridges, spanning limpid streams that duplicated the blue sky and the fleecy clouds; and then again, stretching away to the horizon on every side over more fields, some rich with harvest, others filled with drowsing cattle or with flocks of timid sheep that scampered away at the sound of the passing carriages. Several times they saw merry little companies of rabbits frisking gaily in and out of the hedges or in the fields beside the sheep and cattle. At intervals, away in the distance, nestling in the hollows or amid sheltering trees, groups of farm buildings and stacks of hay; and further on, the square ivy-clad tower of an ancient church, or perhaps a solitary windmill with its revolving sails alternately flashing and darkening in the rays of the sun. Past thatched wayside cottages whose inhabitants came out to wave their hands in friendly greeting. Past groups of sunburnt, golden-haired children who climbed on fences and five-barred gates, and waved their hats and cheered, or ran behind the brakes for the pennies the men threw down to them.
 From time to time the men in the brakes made half-hearted attempts at singing, but it never came to much, because most of them were too hungry and miserable. They had not had time to take any dinner and would not have taken any even if they had the time, for they wished to reserve their appetites for the banquet at the Queen Elizabeth, which they expected to reach about half past three. However, they cheered up a little after the first halt - at the Blue Lion, where most of them got down and had a drink. Some of them, including the Semi-drunk, Ned Dawson, Bill Bates and Joe Philpot - had two or three drinks, and felt so much happier for them that, shortly after they started off again, sounds of melody were heard from the brake the three first named rode in - the one presided over by Crass - but it was not very successful, and even after the second halt - about five miles further on - at the Warrior’s Head, they found it impossible to sing with any heartiness. Fitful bursts of song arose from time to time from each of the brakes in turn, only to die mournfully away. It is not easy to sing on an empty stomach even if one has got a little beer in it; and so it was with most of them. They were not in a mood to sing, or to properly appreciate the scenes through which they were passing. They wanted their dinners, and that was the reason why this long ride, instead of being a pleasure, became after a while, a weary journey that seemed as if it were never coming to an end.
 The next stop was at the Bird in Hand, a wayside public house that stood all by itself in a lonely hollow. The landlord was a fat, jolly-looking man, and there were several customers in the bar - men who looked like farm-labourers, but there were no other houses to be seen anywhere. This extraordinary circumstance exercised the minds of our travellers and formed the principal topic of conversation until they arrived at the Dew Drop Inn, about half an hour afterwards. The first brake, containing Rushton and his friends, passed on without stopping here. The occupants of the second brake, which was only a little way behind the first, were divided in opinion whether to stop or go on. Some shouted out to the driver to pull up, others ordered him to proceed, and more were undecided which course to pursue - a state of mind that was not shared by the coachman, who, knowing that if they stopped somebody or other would be sure to stand him a drink, had no difficulty whatever in coming to a decision, but drew rein at the inn, an example that was followed by both the other carriages as they drove up.
 It was a very brief halt, not more than half the men getting down at all, and those who remained in the brakes grumbled so much at the delay that the others drank their beer as quickly as possible and the journey was resumed once more, almost in silence. No attempts at singing, no noisy laughter; they scarcely spoke to each other, but sat gloomily gazing out over the surrounding country.
 Instructions had been given to the drivers not to stop again till they reached the Queen Elizabeth, and they therefore drove past the World Turned Upside Down without stopping, much to the chagrin of the landlord of that house, who stood at the door with a sickly smile upon his face. Some of those who knew him shouted out that they would give him a call on their way back, and with this he had to be content.
 They reached the long-desired Queen Elizabeth at twenty minutes to four, and were immediately ushered into a large room where a round table and two long ones were set for dinner - and they were set in a manner worthy of the reputation of the house.
 The cloths that covered the tables and the serviettes, arranged fanwise in the drinking glasses, were literally as white as snow, and about a dozen knives and forks and spoons were laid for each person. Down the centre of the table glasses of delicious yellow custard and cut-glass dishes of glistening red and golden jelly alternated with vases of sweet-smelling flowers.
 The floor of the dining-room was covered with oilcloth - red flowers on a pale yellow ground; the pattern was worn off in places, but it was all very clean and shining. Whether one looked at the walls with the old-fashioned varnished oak paper, or at the glossy piano standing across the corner near the white-curtained window, at the shining oak chairs or through the open casement doors that led into the shady garden beyond, the dominating impression one received was that everything was exquisitely clean.
 The landlord announced that dinner would be served in ten minutes, and while they were waiting some of them indulged in a drink at the bar - just as an appetizer - whilst the others strolled in the garden or, by the landlord’s invitation, looked over the house. Amongst other places, they glanced into the kitchen, where the landlady was superintending the preparation of the feast, and in this place, with its whitewashed walls and red-tiled floor, as in every other part of the house, the same absolute cleanliness reigned supreme.
 ‘It’s a bit differint from the Royal Caff, where we got the sack, ain’t it?’ remarked the Semi-drunk to Bill Bates as they made their way to the dining-room in response to the announcement that dinner was ready.
 ‘Not arf!’ replied Bill.
 Rushton, with Didlum and Grinder and his other friends, sat at the round table near the piano. Hunter took the head of the longer of the other two tables and Crass the foot, and on either side of Crass were Bundy and Slyme, who had acted with him as the Committee who had arranged the Beano. Payne, the foreman carpenter, occupied the head of the other table.
 The dinner was all that could be desired; it was almost as good as the kind of dinner that is enjoyed every day by those persons who are too lazy to work but are cunning enough to make others work for them.
 There was soup, several entrees, roast beef, boiled mutton, roast turkey, roast goose, ham, cabbage, peas, beans and sweets galore, plum pudding, custard, jelly, fruit tarts, bread and cheese and as much beer or lemonade as they liked to pay for, the drinks being an extra; and afterwards the waiters brought in cups of coffee for those who desired it. Everything was up to the knocker, and although they were somewhat bewildered by the multitude of knives and forks, they all, with one or two exceptions, rose to the occasion and enjoyed themselves famously. The excellent decorum observed being marred only by one or two regrettable incidents. The first of these occurred almost as soon as they sat down, when Ned Dawson who, although a big strong fellow, was not able to stand much beer, not being used to it, was taken ill and had to be escorted from the room by his mate Bundy and another man. They left him somewhere outside and he came back again about ten minutes afterwards, much better but looking rather pale, and took his seat with the others.
 The turkeys, the roast beef and the boiled mutton, the peas and beans and the cabbage, disappeared with astonishing rapidity, which was not to be wondered at, for they were all very hungry from the long drive, and nearly everyone made a point of having at least one helping of everything there was to be had. Some of them went in for two lots of soup. Then for the next course, boiled mutton and ham or turkey: then some roast beef and goose. Then a little more boiled mutton with a little roast beef. Each of the three boys devoured several times his own weight of everything, to say nothing of numerous bottles of lemonade and champagne ginger beer.
 Crass frequently paused to mop the perspiration from his face and neck with his serviette. In fact everybody had a good time. There was enough and to spare of everything to eat, the beer was of the best, and all the time, amid the rattle of the crockery and the knives and forks, the proceedings were enlivened by many jests and flashes of wit that continuously kept the table in a roar.
 ‘Chuck us over another dollop of that there white stuff, Bob,’ shouted the Semi-drunk to Crass, indicating the blancmange.
 Crass reached out his hand and took hold of the dish containing the ‘white stuff’, but instead of passing it to the Semi-drunk, he proceeded to demolish it himself, gobbling it up quickly directly from the dish with a spoon.
 ‘Why, you’re eating it all yerself, yer bleeder,’ cried the Semi-drunk indignantly, as soon as he realized what was happening.
 ‘That’s all right, matey,’ replied Crass affably as he deposited the empty dish on the table. ‘It don’t matter, there’s plenty more where it come from. Tell the landlord to bring in another lot.’
 Upon being applied to, the landlord, who was assisted by his daughter, two other young women and two young men, brought in several more lots and so the Semi-drunk was appeased.
 As for the plum-pudding - it was a fair knock-out; just like Christmas: but as Ned Dawson and Bill Bates had drunk all the sauce before the pudding was served, they all had to have their first helping without any. However, as the landlord brought in another lot shortly afterwards, that didn’t matter either.
 As soon as dinner was over, Crass rose to make his statement as secretary. Thirty-seven men had paid five shillings each: that made nine pounds five shillings. The committee had decided that the three boys - the painters’ boy, the carpenters’ boy and the front shop boy - should be allowed to come half-price: that made it nine pounds twelve and six. In addition to paying the ordinary five-shilling subscription, Mr Rushton had given one pound ten towards the expenses. (Loud cheers.) And several other gentlemen had also given something towards it. Mr Sweater, of the Cave, one pound. (Applause.) Mr Grinder, ten shillings in addition to the five-shilling subscription. (Applause.) Mr Lettum, ten shillings, as well as the five-shilling subscription. (Applause.) Mr Didlum, ten shillings in addition to the five shillings. (Cheers.) Mr Toonarf, ten shillings as well as the five-shilling subscription. They had also written to some of the manufacturers who supplied the firm with materials, and asked them to give something: some of ’em had sent half a crown, some five shillings, some hadn’t answered at all, and two of ’em had written back to say that as things is cut so fine nowadays, they didn’t hardly get no profit on their stuff, so they couldn’t afford to give nothing; but out of all the firms they wrote to they managed to get thirty-two and sixpence altogether, making a grand total of seventeen pounds.
 As for the expenses, the dinner was two and six a head, and there was forty-five of them there, so that came to five pounds twelve and six. Then there was the hire of the brakes, also two and six a head, five pound twelve and six, which left a surplus of five pound fifteen to be shared out (applause), which came to three shillings each for the thirty-seven men, and one and fourpence for each of the boys. (Loud and prolonged cheers.)
 Crass, Slyme and Bundy now walked round the tables distributing the share-out, which was very welcome to everybody, especially those who had spent nearly all their money during the journey from Mugsborough, and when this ceremony was completed, Philpot moved a hearty vote of thanks to the committee for the manner in which they had carried out their duties, which was agreed to with acclamation. Then they made a collection for the waiters, and the three waitresses, which amounted to eleven shillings, for which the host returned thanks on behalf of the recipients, who were all smiles.
 Then Mr Rushton requested the landlord to serve drinks and cigars all round. Some had cigarettes and the teetotallers had lemonade or ginger beer. Those who did not smoke themselves took the cigar all the same and gave it to someone else who did. When all were supplied there suddenly arose loud cries of ‘Order!’ and it was seen that Hunter was upon his feet.
 As soon as silence was obtained, Misery said that he believed that everyone there present would agree with him, when he said that they should not let the occasion pass without drinking the ’ealth of their esteemed and respected employer, Mr Rushton. (Hear, hear.) Some of them had worked for Mr Rushton on and off for many years, and as far as THEY was concerned it was not necessary for him (Hunter) to say much in praise of Mr Rushton. (Hear, hear.) They knew Mr Rushton as well as he did himself and to know him was to esteem him. (Cheers.) As for the new hands, although they did not know Mr Rushton as well as the old hands did, he felt sure that they would agree that as no one could wish for a better master. (Loud applause.) He had much pleasure in asking them to drink Mr Rushton’s health. Everyone rose.
 ‘Musical honours, chaps,’ shouted Crass, waving his glass and leading off the singing which was immediately joined in with great enthusiasm by most of the men, the Semi-drunk conducting the music with a table knife:
  For he’s a jolly good fellow, For he’s a jolly good fellow, For he’s a jolly good fel-ell-O, And so say all of us, So ’ip, ’ip, ’ip, ’ooray! So ’ip, ’ip, ’ip, ’ooray!
  For he’s a jolly good fellow, For ’e’s a jolly good fellow For ’e’s a jolly good fel-ell-O, And so say all of us.
 ‘Now three cheers!’ shouted Crass, leading off.
  Hip, hip, hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hip, hooray! Hip, hip, hip, hooray!
 Everyone present drank Rushton’s health, or at any rate went through the motions of doing so, but during the roar of cheering and singing that preceded it several of the men stood with expressions of contempt or uneasiness upon their faces, silently watching the enthusiasts or looking at the ceiling or on the floor.
 ‘I will say this much,’ remarked the Semidrunk as they all resumed their seats - he had had several drinks during dinner, besides those he had taken on the journey - I will say this much, although I did have a little misunderstanding with Mr Hunter when I was workin’ at the Royal Caff, I must admit that this is the best firm that’s ever worked under me.’
 This statement caused a shout of laughter, which, however, died away as Mr Rushton rose to acknowledge the toast to his health. He said that he had now been in business for nearly sixteen years and this was - he believed - the eleventh outing he had had the pleasure of attending. During all that time the business had steadily progressed and had increased in volume from year to year, and he hoped and believed that the progress made in the past would be continued in the future. (Hear, hear.) Of course, he realized that the success of the business depended very largely upon the men as well as upon himself; he did his best in trying to get work for them, and it was necessary - if the business was to go on and prosper - that they should also do their best to get the work done when he had secured it for them. (Hear, hear.) The masters could not do without the men, and the men could not live without the masters. (Hear, hear.) It was a matter of division of labour: the men worked with their hands and the masters worked with their brains, and one was no use without the other. He hoped the good feeling which had hitherto existed between himself and his workmen would always continue, and he thanked them for the way in which they had responded to the toast of his health.
 Loud cheers greeted the conclusion of this speech, and then Crass stood up and said that he begged to propose the health of Mr ’Unter. (Hear, hear.) He wasn’t going to make a long speech as he wasn’t much of a speaker. (Cries of ‘You’re all right,’ ‘Go on,’ etc.) But he felt sure as they would all hagree with him when be said that - next to Mr Rushton - there wasn’t no one the men had more respect and liking for than Mr ’Unter. (Cheers.) A few weeks ago when Mr ’Unter was laid up, many of them began to be afraid as they was going to lose ’im. He was sure that all the ’ands was glad to ’ave this hoppertunity of congratulating him on his recovery (Hear, hear) and of wishing him the best of ’ealth in the future and hoping as he would be spared to come to a good many more Beanos.
 Loud applause greeted the conclusion of Crass’s remarks, and once more the meeting burst into song:
  For he’s a jolly good fellow For he’s a jolly good fellow. For he’s a jolly good fellow, And so say all of us. So ’ip, ’ip, ’ip, ’ooray! So ’ip, ’ip, ’ip, ’ooray!
 When they had done cheering, Nimrod rose. His voice trembled a little as he thanked them for their kindness, and said that he hoped he deserved their goodwill. He could only say that as he was sure as he always tried to be fair and considerate to everyone. (Cheers.) He would now request the landlord to replenish their glasses. (Hear, hear.)
 As soon as the drinks were served, Nimrod again rose and said he wished to propose the healths of their visitors who had so kindly contributed to their expenses - Mr Lettum, Mr Didlum, Mr Toonarf and Mr Grinder. (Cheers.) They were very pleased and proud to see them there (Hear, hear), and he was sure the men would agree with him when he said that Messrs Lettum, Didlum, Toonarf and Grinder were jolly good fellows.
 To judge from the manner in which they sang the chorus and cheered, it was quite evident that most of the hands did agree. When they left off, Grinder rose to reply on behalf of those included in the toast. He said that it gave them much pleasure to be there and take part in such pleasant proceedings and they were glad to think that they had been able to help to bring it about. It was very gratifying to see the good feeling that existed between Mr Rushton and his workmen, which was as it should be, because masters and men was really fellow workers - the masters did the brain work, the men the ’and work. They was both workers, and their interests was the same. He liked to see men doing their best for their master and knowing that their master was doing his best for them, that he was not only a master, but a friend. That was what he (Grinder) liked to see - master and men pulling together - doing their best, and realizing that their interests was identical. (Cheers.) If only all masters and men would do this they would find that everything would go on all right, there would be more work and less poverty. Let the men do their best for their masters, and the masters do their best for their men, and they would find that that was the true solution of the social problem, and not the silly nonsense that was talked by people what went about with red flags. (Cheers and laughter.) Most of those fellows were chaps who was too lazy to work for their livin’. (Hear, hear.) They could take it from him that, if ever the Socialists got the upper hand there would just be a few of the hartful dodgers who would get all the cream, and there would be nothing left but ’ard work for the rest. (Hear. hear.) That’s wot hall those hagitators was after: they wanted them (his hearers) to work and keep ’em in idleness. (Hear, hear.) On behalf of Mr Didlum, Mr Toonarf, Mr Lettum and himself, he thanked them for their good wishes, and hoped to be with them on a sim’ler occasion in the future.
 Loud cheers greeted the termination of his speech, but it was obvious from some of the men’s faces that they resented Grinder’s remarks. These men ridiculed Socialism and regularly voted for the continuance of capitalism, and yet they were disgusted and angry with Grinder! There was also a small number of Socialists - not more than half a dozen altogether - who did not join in the applause. These men were all sitting at the end of the long table presided over by Payne. None of them had joined in the applause that greeted the speeches, and so far neither had they made any protest. Some of them turned very red as they listened to the concluding sentences of Grinder’s oration, and others laughed, but none of them said anything. They knew before they came that there was sure to be a lot of ’Jolly good fellow’ business and speechmaking, and they had agreed together beforehand to take no part one way or the other, and to refrain from openly dissenting from anything that might be said, but they had not anticipated anything quite so strong as this.
 When Grinder sat down some of those who had applauded him began to jeer at the Socialists.
 ‘What have you got to say to that?’ they shouted. ‘That’s up against yer!’
 ‘They ain’t got nothing to say now.’
 ‘Why don’t some of you get up and make a speech?’
 This last appeared to be a very good idea to those Liberals and Tories who had not liked Grinder’s observations, so they all began to shout ‘Owen!’ ‘Owen!’ ‘Come on ’ere. Get up and make a speech!’ ‘Be a man!’ and so on. Several of those who had been loudest in applauding Grinder also joined in the demand that Owen should make a speech, because they were certain that Grinder and the other gentlemen would be able to dispose of all his arguments; but Owen and the other Socialists made no response except to laugh, so presently Crass tied a white handkerchief on a cane walking-stick that belonged to Mr Didlum, and stuck it in the vase of flowers that stood on the end of the table where the Socialist group were sitting.
 When the noise had in some measure ceased, Grinder again rose. ‘When I made the few remarks that I did, I didn’t know as there was any Socialists ’ere: I could tell from the look of you that most of you had more sense. At the same time I’m rather glad I said what I did, because it just shows you what sort of chaps these Socialists are. They’re pretty artful - they know when to talk and when to keep their mouths shut. What they like is to get hold of a few ignorant workin’ men in a workshop or a public house, and then they can talk by the mile - reg’ler shop lawyers, you know wot I mean - I’m right and everybody else is wrong. (Laughter.) You know the sort of thing I mean. When they finds theirselves in the company of edicated people wot knows a little more than they does theirselves, and who isn’t likely to be misled by a lot of claptrap, why then, mum’s the word. So next time you hears any of these shop lawyers’ arguments, you’ll know how much it’s worth.’
 Most of the men were delighted with this speech, which was received with much laughing and knocking on the tables. They remarked to each other that Grinder was a smart man: he’d got the Socialists weighed up just about right - to an ounce.
 Then, it was seen that Barrington was on his feet facing Grinder and a sudden, awe-filled silence fell.
 ‘It may or may not be true,’ began Barrington, ‘that Socialists always know when to speak and when to keep silent, but the present occasion hardly seemed a suitable one to discuss such subjects.
 ‘We are here today as friends and want to forget our differences and enjoy ourselves for a few hours. But after what Mr Grinder has said I am quite ready to reply to him to the best of my ability.
 ‘The fact that I am a Socialist and that I am here today as one of Mr Rushton’s employees should be an answer to the charge that Socialists are too lazy to work for their living. And as to taking advantage of the ignorance and simplicity of working men and trying to mislead them with nonsensical claptrap, it would have been more to the point if Mr Grinder had taken some particular Socialist doctrine and had proved it to be untrue or misleading, instead of adopting the cowardly method of making vague general charges that he cannot substantiate. He would find it far more difficult to do that than it would be for a Socialist to show that most of what Mr Grinder himself has been telling us is nonsensical claptrap of the most misleading kind. He tells us that the employers work with their brains and the men with their hands. If it is true that no brains are required to do manual labour, why put idiots into imbecile asylums? Why not let them do some of the hand work for which no brains are required? As they are idiots, they would probably be willing to work for even less than the ideal "living wage". If Mr Grinder had ever tried, he would know that manual workers have to concentrate their minds and their attention on their work or they would not be able to do it at all. His talk about employers being not only the masters but the "friends" of their workmen is also mere claptrap because he knows as well as we do, that no matter how good or benevolent an employer may be, no matter how much he might desire to give his men good conditions, it is impossible for him to do so, because he has to compete against other employers who do not do that. It is the bad employer - the sweating, slave-driving employer - who sets the pace and the others have to adopt the same methods - very often against their inclinations - or they would not be able to compete with him. If any employer today were to resolve to pay his workmen not less wages than he would be able to live upon in comfort himself, that he would not require them to do more work in a day than he himself would like to perform every day of his own life, Mr Grinder knows as well as we do that such an employer would be bankrupt in a month; because he would not be able to get any work except by taking it at the same price as the sweaters and the slave-drivers.
 ‘He also tells us that the interests of masters and men are identical; but if an employer has a contract, it is to his interest to get the work done as soon as possible; the sooner it is done the more profit he will make; but the more quickly it is done, the sooner will the men be out of employment. How then can it be true that their interests are identical?
 ‘Again, let us suppose that an employer is, say, thirty years of age when he commences business, and that he carries it on for twenty years. Let us assume that he employs forty men more or less regularly during that period and that the average age of these men is also thirty years at the time the employer commences business. At the end of the twenty years it usually happens that the employer has made enough money to enable him to live for the remainder of his life in ease and comfort. But what about the workman? All through those twenty years they have earned but a bare living wage and have had to endure such privations that those who are not already dead are broken in health.
 ‘In the case of the employer there had been twenty years of steady progress towards ease and leisure and independence. In the case of the majority of the men there were twenty years of deterioration, twenty years of steady, continuous and hopeless progress towards physical and mental inefficiency: towards the scrap-heap, the work-house, and premature death. What is it but false, misleading, nonsensical claptrap to say that their interests were identical with those of their employer?
 ‘Such talk as that is not likely to deceive any but children or fools. We are not children, but it is very evident that Mr Grinder thinks that we are fools.
 ‘Occasionally it happens, through one or more of a hundred different circumstances over which he has no control, or through some error of judgement, that after many years of laborious mental work an employer is overtaken by misfortune, and finds himself no better and even worse off than when he started; but these are exceptional cases, and even if he becomes absolutely bankrupt he is no worse off than the majority of the workmen.
 ‘At the same time it is quite true that the real interests of employers and workmen are the same, but not in the sense that Mr Grinder would have us believe. Under the existing system of society but a very few people, no matter how well off they may be, can be certain that they or their children will not eventually come to want; and even those who think they are secure themselves, find their happiness diminished by the knowledge of the poverty and misery that surrounds them on every side.
 ‘In that sense only is it true that the interests of masters and men are identical, for it is to the interest of all, both rich and poor, to help to destroy a system that inflicts suffering upon the many and allows true happiness to none. It is to the interest of all to try and find a better way.’
 Here Crass jumped up and interrupted, shouting out that they hadn’t come there to listen to a lot of speechmaking - a remark that was greeted with unbounded applause by most of those present. Loud cries of ‘Hear, hear!’ resounded through the room, and the Semi-drunk suggested that someone should sing a song.
 The men who had clamoured for a speech from Owen said nothing, and Mr Grinder, who had been feeling rather uncomfortable, was secretly very glad of the interruption.
 The Semi-drunk’s suggestion that someone should sing a song was received with unqualified approbation by everybody, including Barrington and the other Socialists, who desired nothing better than that the time should be passed in a manner suitable to the occasion. The landlord’s daughter, a rosy girl of about twenty years of age, in a pink print dress, sat down at the piano, and the Semi-drunk, taking his place at the side of the instrument and facing the audience, sang the first song with appropriate gestures, the chorus being rendered enthusiastically by the full strength of the company, including Misery, who by this time was slightly drunk from drinking gin and ginger beer:
  ‘Come, come, come an’ ’ave a drink with me Down by the ole Bull and Bush. Come, come, come an’ shake ’ands with me Down by the ole Bull and Bush. Wot cheer me little Germin band! Fol the diddle di do! Come an’ take ’old of me ’and Come, come, come an’ ’ave a drink with me, Down by the old Bull and Bush, Bush! Bush!’
 Protracted knocking on the tables greeted the end of the song, but as the Semi-drunk knew no other except odd verses and choruses, he called upon Crass for the next, and that gentleman accordingly sang ‘Work, Boys, Work’ to the tune of ‘Tramp, tramp, tramp, the boys are marching’. As this song is the Marseillaise of the Tariff Reform Party, voicing as it does the highest ideals of the Tory workmen of this country, it was an unqualified success, for most of them were Conservatives.
  ‘Now I’m not a wealthy man, But I lives upon a plan Wot will render me as ’appy as a King; An’ if you will allow, I’ll sing it to you now, For time you know is always on the wing.
  Work, boys, work and be contented So long as you’ve enough to buy a meal. For if you will but try, you’ll be wealthy - bye and bye - If you’ll only put yer shoulder to the wheel.’
 ‘Altogether, boys,’ shouted Grinder, who was a strong Tariff Reformer, and was delighted to see that most of the men were of the same way of thinking; and the ‘boys’ roared out the chorus once more:
  Work, boys, work and be contented So long as you’ve enough to buy a meal For if you will but try, you’ll be wealthy - bye and bye If you’ll only put your shoulder to the wheel.
 As they sang the words of this noble chorus the Tories seemed to become inspired with lofty enthusiasm. It is of course impossible to say for certain, but probably as they sang there arose before their exalted imaginations, a vision of the Past, and looking down the long vista of the years that were gone, they saw that from their childhood they had been years of poverty and joyless toil. They saw their fathers and mothers, weaned and broken with privation and excessive labour, sinking unhonoured into the welcome oblivion of the grave.
 And then, as a change came over the spirit of their dream, they saw the Future, with their own children travelling along the same weary road to the same kind of goal.
 It is possible that visions of this character were conjured up in their minds by the singing, for the words of the song gave expression to their ideal of what human life should be. That was all they wanted - to be allowed to work like brutes for the benefit of other people. They did not want to be civilized themselves and they intended to take good care that the children they had brought into the world should never enjoy the benefits of civilization either. As they often said:
 ‘Who and what are our children that they shouldn’t be made to work for their betters? They’re not Gentry’s children, are they? The good things of life was never meant for the likes of them. Let ’em work! That’s wot the likes of them was made for, and if we can only get Tariff Reform for ’em they will always be sure of plenty of it - not only Full Time, but Overtime! As for edication, travellin’ in furrin’ parts, an’ enjoying life an’ all sich things as that, they was never meant for the likes of our children - they’re meant for Gentry’s children! Our children is only like so much dirt compared with Gentry’s children! That’s wot the likes of us is made for - to Work for Gentry, so as they can ’ave plenty of time to enjoy theirselves; and the Gentry is made to ’ave a good time so as the likes of us can ’ave Plenty of Work.’
 There were several more verses, and by the time they had sung them all, the Tories were in a state of wild enthusiasm. Even Ned Dawson, who had fallen asleep with his head pillowed on his arms on the table, roused himself up at the end of each verse, and after having joined in the chorus, went to sleep again.
 At the end of the song they gave three cheers for Tariff Reform and Plenty of Work, and then Crass, who, as the singer of the last song, had the right to call upon the next man, nominated Philpot, who received an ovation when he stood up, for he was a general favourite. He never did no harm to nobody, and he was always wiling to do anyone a good turn whenever he had the opportunity. Shouts of ‘Good old Joe’ resounded through the room as he crossed over to the piano, and in response to numerous requests for ‘The old song’ he began to sing ‘The Flower Show’:
  ‘Whilst walkin’ out the other night, not knowing where to go I saw a bill upon a wall about a Flower Show.
  So I thought the flowers I’d go and see to pass away the night. And when I got into that Show it was a curious sight. So with your kind intention and a little of your aid, Tonight some flowers I’ll mention which I hope will never fade.’
  Omnes: To-night some flowers I’ll mention which I hope will never fade.’
 There were several more verses, from which it appeared that the principal flowers in the Show were the Rose, the Thistle and the Shamrock.
 When he had finished, the applause was so deafening and the demands for an encore so persistent that to satisfy them he sang another old favourite - ‘Won’t you buy my pretty flowers?’
  ‘Ever coming, ever going, Men and women hurry by, Heedless of the tear-drops gleaming, In her sad and wistful eye How her little heart is sighing Thro’ the cold and dreary hours, Only listen to her crying, "Won’t you buy my pretty flowers?"’
 When the last verse of this sang had been sung five er six times, Philpot exercised his right of nominating the next singer, and called upon Dick Wantley, who with many suggestive gestures and grimaces sang ‘Put me amongst the girls’, and afterwards called upon Payne, the foreman carpenter, who gave ‘I’m the Marquis of Camberwell Green’.
 There was a lot of what music-hall artists call ‘business’ attached to his song, and as he proceeded, Payne, who was ghastly pale and very nervous, went through a lot of galvanic motions and gestures, bowing and scraping and sliding about and flourishing his handkerchief in imitation of the courtly graces of the Marquis. During this performance the audience maintained an appalling silence, which so embarrassed Payne that before he was half-way through the song he had to stop because he could not remember the rest. However, to make up for this failure he sang another called ‘We all must die, like the fire in the grate’. This also was received in a very lukewarm manner by the crowd, same of whom laughed and others suggested that if he couldn’t sing any better than that, the sooner HE was dead the better.
 This was followed by another Tory ballad, the chorus being as follows:
  His clothes may be ragged, his hands may be soiled. But where’s the disgrace if for bread he has toiled. His ’art is in the right place, deny it no one can The backbone of Old England is the honest workin’ man.’
 After a few more songs it was decided to adjourn to a field at the rear of the tavern to have a game of cricket. Sides were formed, Rushton, Didlum, Grinder, and the other gentlemen taking part just as if they were only common people, and while the game was in progress the rest played ring quoits or reclined on the grass watching the players, whilst the remainder amused themselves drinking beer and playing cards and shove-ha’penny in the bar parlour, or taking walks around the village sampling the beer at the other pubs, of which there were three.
 The time passed in this manner until seven o’clock, the hour at which it had been arranged to start on the return journey; but about a quarter of an hour before they set out an unpleasant incident occurred.
 During the time that they were playing cricket a party of glee singers, consisting of four young girls and five men, three of whom were young fellows, the other two being rather elderly, possibly the fathers of some of the younger members of the party, came into the field and sang several part songs for their entertainment. Towards the close of the game most of the men had assembled in this field, and during a pause in the singing the musicians sent one of their number, a shy girl about eighteen years of age - who seemed as if she would rather that someone else had the task - amongst the crowd to make a collection. The girl was very nervous and blushed as she murmured her request, and held out a straw hat that evidently belonged to one of the male members of the glee party. A few of the men gave pennies, some refused or pretended not to see either the girl or the hat, others offered to give her some money for a kiss, but what caused the trouble was that two or three of those who had been drinking more than was good for them dropped the still burning ends of their cigars, all wet with saliva as they were, into the hat and Dick Wantley spit into it.
 The girl hastily returned to her companions, and as she went some of the men who had witnessed the behaviour of those who had insulted her, advised them to make themselves scarce, as they stood a good chance of getting a thrashing from the girl’s friends. They said it would serve them dam’ well right if they did get a hammering.
 Partly sobered by fear, the three culprits sneaked off and hid themselves, pale and trembling with terror, under the box seats of the three brakes. They had scarcely left when the men of the glee party came running up, furiously demanding to see those who had insulted the girl. As they could get no satisfactory answer, one of their number ran back and presently returned, bringing the girl with him, the other young women following a little way behind.
 She said she could not see the men they were looking for, so they went down to the public house to see if they could find them there, some of the Rushton’s men accompanying them and protesting their indignation.
 
 The time passed quickly enough and by half past seven the brakes were loaded up again and a start made for the return journey.
 They called at all the taverns on the road, and by the time they reached the Blue Lion half of them were three sheets in the wind, and five or six were very drunk, including the driver of Crass’s brake and the man with the bugle. The latter was so far gone that they had to let him lie down in the bottom of the carriage amongst their feet, where he fell asleep, while the others amused themselves by blowing weird shrieks out of the horn.
 There was an automatic penny-in-the-slot piano at the Blue Lion and as that was the last house of the road they made a rather long stop there, playing hooks and rings, shove-ha’penny, drinking, singing, dancing and finally quarrelling.
 Several of them seemed disposed to quarrel with Newman. All sorts of offensive remarks were made at him in his hearing. Once someone ostentatiously knocked his glass of lemonade over, and a little later someone else collided violently with him just as he was in the act of drinking, causing his lemonade to spill all over his clothes. The worst of it was that most of these rowdy ones were his fellow passengers in Crass’s brake, and there was not much chance of getting a seat in either of the other carriages, for they were overcrowded already.
 From the remarks he overheard from time to time, Newman guessed the reason of their hostility, and as their manner towards him grew more menacing, he became so nervous that he began to think of quietly sneaking off and walking the remainder of the way home by himself, unless he could get somebody in one of the other brakes to change seats with him.
 Whilst these thoughts were agitating his mind, Dick Wantley suddenly shouted out that he was going to go for the dirty tyke who had offered to work under price last winter.
 It was his fault that they were all working for sixpence halfpenny and he was going to wipe the floor with him. Some of his friends eagerly offered to assist, but others interposed, and for a time it looked as if there was going to be a free fight, the aggressors struggling hard to get at their inoffensive victim.
 Eventually, however, Newman found a seat in Misery’s brake, squatting on the floor with his back to the horses, thankful enough to be out of reach of the drunken savages, who were now roaring out ribald songs and startling the countryside, as they drove along, with unearthly blasts on the coach horn.
 Meantime, although none of them seemed to notice it, the brake was travelling at a furious rate, and swaying about from side to side in a very erratic manner. It would have been the last carriage, but things had got a bit mixed at the Blue Lion and, instead of bringing up the rear of the procession, it was now second, just behind the small vehicle containing Rushton and his friends.
 Crass several times reminded them that the other carriage was so near that Rushton must be able to hear every word that was said, and these repeated admonitions at length enraged the Semi-drunk, who shouted out that they didn’t care a b—r if he could hear. Who the bloody hell was he? To hell with him!
 ‘Damn Rushton, and you too!’ cried Bill Bates, addressing Crass. ‘You’re only a dirty toe-rag! That’s all you are - a bloody rotter! That’s the only reason you gets put in charge of jobs - ’cos you’re a good nigger-driver! You’re a bloody sight worse than Rushton or Misery either! Who was it started the one-man, one-room dodge, eh? Why, you, yer bleeder!’
 ‘Knock ’im orf ’is bleedin’ perch,’ suggested Bundy.
 Everybody seemed to think this was a very good idea, but when the Semi-drunk attempted to rise for the purpose of carrying it out, he was thrown down by a sudden lurch of the carriage on the top of the prostrate figure of the bugle man and by the time the others had assisted him back to his seat they had forgotten all about their plan of getting rid of Crass.
 Meantime the speed of the vehicle had increased to a fearful rate.
 Rushton and the other occupants of the little wagonette in front had been for some time shouting to them to moderate the pace of their horses, but as the driver of Crass’s brake was too drunk to understand what they said he took no notice, and they had no alternative but to increase their own speed to avoid being run down. The drunken driver now began to imagine that they were trying to race him, and became fired with the determination to pass them. It was a very narrow road, but there was just about room to do it, and he had sufficient confidence in his own skill with the ribbons to believe that he could get past in safety.
 The terrified gesticulations and the shouts of Rushton’s party only served to infuriate him, because he imagined that they were jeering at him for not being able to overtake them. He stood up on the footboard and lashed the horses till they almost flew over the ground, while the carriage swayed and skidded in a fearful manner.
 In front, the horses of Rushton’s conveyance were also galloping at top speed, the vehicle bounding and reeling from one side of the road to the other, whilst its terrified occupants, whose faces were blanched with apprehension, sat clinging to their seats and to each other, their eyes projecting from the sockets as they gazed back with terror at their pursuers, some of whom were encouraging the drunken driver with promises of quarts of beer, and urging on the homes with curses and yells.
 Crass’s fat face was pallid with fear as he clung trembling to his seat. Another man, very drunk and oblivious of everything, was leaning over the side of the brake, spewing into the road, while the remainder, taking no interest in the race, amused themselves by singing - conducted by the Semi-drunk - as loud as they could roar:
  ‘Has anyone seen a Germin band, Germin Band, Germin Band? I’ve been Iookin’ about, Pom - Pom, Pom, Pom, Pom!
  ‘I’ve searched every pub, both near and far, Near and far, near and far, I want my Fritz, What plays tiddley bits On the big trombone!’
 The other two brakes had fallen far behind. The one presided over by Hunter contained a mournful crew. Nimrod himself, from the effects of numerous drinks of ginger beer with secret dashes of gin in it, had become at length crying drunk, and sat weeping in gloomy silence beside the driver, a picture of lachrymose misery and but dimly conscious of his surroundings, and Slyme, who rode with Hunter because he was a fellow member of the Shining Light Chapel. Then there was another paperhanger - an unhappy wretch who was afflicted with religious mania; he had brought a lot of tracts with him which he had distributed to the other men, to the villagers of Tubberton and to anybody else who would take them.
 Most of the other men who rode in Nimrod’s brake were of the ‘religious’ working man type. Ignorant, shallow-pated dolts, without as much intellectuality as an average cat. Attendants at various PSAs and ‘Church Mission Halls’ who went every Sunday afternoon to be lectured on their duty to their betters and to have their minds - save the mark! - addled and stultified by such persons as Rushton, Sweater, Didlum and Grinder, not to mention such mental specialists as the holy reverend Belchers and Boshers, and such persons as John Starr.
 At these meetings none of the ‘respectable’ working men were allowed to ask any questions, or to object to, or find fault with anything that was said, or to argue, or discuss, or criticize. They had to sit there like a lot of children while they were lectured and preached at and patronized. Even as sheep before their shearers are dumb, so they were not permitted to open their mouths. For that matter they did not wish to be allowed to ask any questions, or to discuss anything. They would not have been able to. They sat there and listened to what was said, but they had but a very hazy conception of what it was all about.
 Most of them belonged to these PSAs merely for the sake of the loaves and fishes. Every now and then they were awarded prizes - Self-help by Smiles, and other books suitable for perusal by persons suffering from almost complete obliteration of the mental faculties. Besides other benefits there was usually a Christmas Club attached to the ‘PSA’ or ‘Mission’ and the things were sold to the members slightly below cost as a reward for their servility.
 They were for the most part tame, broken-spirited, poor wretches who contentedly resigned themselves to a life of miserable toil and poverty, and with callous indifference abandoned their offspring to the same fate. Compared with such as these, the savages of New Guinea or the Red Indians are immensely higher in the scale of manhood. They are free! They call no man master; and if they do not enjoy the benefits of science and civilization, neither do they toil to create those things for the benefit of others. And as for their children - most of those savages would rather knock them on the head with a tomahawk than allow them to grow up to be half-starved drudges for other men.
 But these were not free: their servile lives were spent in grovelling and cringing and toiling and running about like little dogs at the behest of their numerous masters. And as for the benefits of science and civilization, their only share was to work and help to make them, and then to watch other men enjoy them. And all the time they were tame and quiet and content and said, ‘The likes of us can’t expect to ’ave nothing better, and as for our children wot’s been good enough for us is good enough for the likes of them.’
 But although they were so religious and respectable and so contented to be robbed on a large scale, yet in small matters, in the commonplace and petty affairs of their everyday existence, most of these men were acutely alive to what their enfeebled minds conceived to be their own selfish interests, and they possessed a large share of that singular cunning which characterizes this form of dementia.
 That was why they had chosen to ride in Nimrod’s brake - because they wished to chum up with him as much as possible, in order to increase their chances of being kept on in preference to others who were not so respectable.
 Some of these poor creatures had very large heads, but a close examination would have shown that the size was due to the extraordinary thickness of the bones. The cavity of the skull was not so large as the outward appearance of the head would have led a casual observer to suppose, and even in those instances where the brain was of a fair size, it was of inferior quality, being coarse in texture and to a great extent composed of fat.
 Although most of them were regular attendants at some place of so-called worship, they were not all teetotallers, and some of them were now in different stages of intoxication, not because they had had a great deal to drink, but because - being usually abstemious - it did not take very much to make them drunk.
 From time to time this miserable crew tried to enliven the journey by singing, but as most of them only knew odd choruses it did not come to much. As for the few who did happen to know all the words of a song, they either had no voices or were not inclined to sing. The most successful contribution was that of the religious maniac, who sang several hymns, the choruses being joined in by everybody, both drunk and sober.
 The strains of these hymns, wafted back through the balmy air to the last coach, were the cause of much hilarity to its occupants who also sang the choruses. As they had all been brought up under ‘Christian’ influences and educated in ‘Christian’ schools, they all knew the words: ‘Work, for the night is coming’, ‘Turn poor Sinner and escape Eternal Fire’, ‘Pull for the Shore’ and ‘Where is my Wandering Boy?’
 The last reminded Harlow of a song he knew nearly all the words of, ‘Take the news to Mother’, the singing of which was much appreciated by all present and when it was finished they sang it all over again, Philpot being so affected that he actually shed tears; and Easton confided to Owen that there was no getting away from the fact that a boy’s best friend is his mother.
 In this last carriage, as in the other two, there were several men who were more or less intoxicated and for the same reason - because not being used to taking much liquor, the few extra glasses they had drunk had got into their heads. They were as sober a lot of fellows as need be at ordinary times, and they had flocked together in this brake because they were all of about the same character - not tame, contented imbeciles like most of those in Misery’s carnage, but men something like Harlow, who, although dissatisfied with their condition, doggedly continued the hopeless, weary struggle against their fate.
 They were not teetotallers and they never went to either church or chapel, but they spent little in drink or on any form of enjoyment - an occasional glass of beer or a still rarer visit to a music-hall and now and then an outing more or less similar to this being the sum total of their pleasures.
 These four brakes might fitly be regarded as so many travelling lunatic asylums, the inmates of each exhibiting different degrees and forms of mental disorder.
 The occupants of the first - Rushton, Didlum and Co. - might be classed as criminal lunatics who injured others as well as themselves. In a properly constituted system of society such men as these would be regarded as a danger to the community, and would be placed under such restraint as would effectually prevent them from harming themselves or others. These wretches had abandoned every thought and thing that tends to the elevation of humanity. They had given up everything that makes life good and beautiful, in order to carry on a mad struggle to acquire money which they would never be sufficiently cultured to properly enjoy. Deaf and blind to every other consideration, to this end they had degraded their intellects by concentrating them upon the minutest details of expense and profit, and for their reward they raked in their harvest of muck and lucre along with the hatred and curses of those they injured in the process. They knew that the money they accumulated was foul with the sweat of their brother men, and wet with the tears of little children, but they were deaf and blind and callous to the consequences of their greed. Devoid of every ennobling thought or aspiration, they grovelled on the filthy ground, tearing up the flowers to get at the worms.
 In the coach presided over by Crass, Bill Bates, the Semi-drunk and the other two or three habitual boozers were all men who had been driven mad by their environment. At one time most of them had been fellows like Harlow, working early and late whenever they got the chance, only to see their earnings swallowed up in a few minutes every Saturday by the landlord and all the other host of harpies and profitmongers, who were waiting to demand it as soon as it was earned. In the years that were gone, most of these men used to take all their money home religiously every Saturday and give it to the ‘old girl’ for the house, and then, lo and behold, in a moment, yea, even in the twinkling of an eye, it was all gone! Melted away like snow in the sun! and nothing to show for it except an insufficiency of the bare necessaries of life! But after a time they had become heartbroken and sick and tired of that sort of thing. They hankered after a little pleasure, a little excitement, a little fun, and they found that it was possible to buy something like those in quart pots at the pub. They knew they were not the genuine articles, but they were better than nothing at all, and so they gave up the practice of giving all their money to the old girl to give to the landlord and the other harpies, and bought beer with some of it instead; and after a time their minds became so disordered from drinking so much of this beer, that they cared nothing whether the rent was paid or not. They cared but little whether the old girl and the children had food or clothes. They said, ‘To hell with everything and everyone,’ and they cared for nothing so long as they could get plenty of beer.
 The occupants of Nimrod’s coach have already been described and most of them may correctly be classed as being similar to cretin idiots of the third degree - very cunning and selfish, and able to read and write, but with very little understanding of what they read except on the most common topics.
 As for those who rode with Harlow in the last coach, most of them, as has been already intimated, were men of similar character to himself. The greater number of them fairly good workmen and - unlike the boozers in Crass’s coach - not yet quite heartbroken, but still continuing the hopeless struggle against poverty. These differed from Nimrod’s lot inasmuch as they were not content. They were always complaining of their wretched circumstances, and found a certain kind of pleasure in listening to the tirades of the Socialists against the existing social conditions, and professing their concurrence with many of the sentiments expressed, and a desire to bring about a better state of affairs.
 Most of them appeared to be quite sane, being able to converse intelligently on any ordinary subject without discovering any symptoms of mental disorder, and it was not until the topic of Parliamentary elections was mentioned that evidence of their insanity was forthcoming. It then almost invariably appeared that they were subject to the most extraordinary hallucinations and extravagant delusions, the commonest being that the best thing that the working people could do to bring about an improvement in their condition, was to continue to elect their Liberal and Tory employers to make laws for and to rule over them! At such times, if anyone ventured to point out to them that that was what they had been doing all their lives, and referred them to the manifold evidences that met them wherever they turned their eyes of its folly and futility, they were generally immediately seized with a paroxysm of the most furious mania, and were with difficulty prevented from savagely assaulting those who differed from them.
 They were usually found in a similar condition of maniacal excitement for some time preceding and during a Parliamentary election, but afterwards they usually manifested that modification of insanity which is called melancholia. In fact they alternated between these two forms of the disease. During elections, the highest state of exalted mania; and at ordinary times - presumably as a result of reading about the proceedings in Parliament of the persons whom they had elected - in a state of melancholic depression, in their case an instance of hope deferred making the heart sick.
 This condition occasionally proved to be the stage of transition into yet another modification of the disease - that known as dipsomania, the phase exhibited by Bill Bates and the Semi-drunk.
 Yet another form of insanity was that shown by the Socialists. Like most of their fellow passengers in the last coach, the majority of these individuals appeared to be of perfectly sound mind. Upon entering into conversation with them one found that they reasoned correctly and even brilliantly. They had divided their favourite subject into three parts. First; an exact definition of the condition known as Poverty. Secondly; a knowledge of the causes of Poverty; and thirdly, a rational plan for the cure of Poverty. Those who were opposed to them always failed to refute their arguments, and feared, and nearly always refused, to meet them in fair fight - in open debate - preferring to use the cowardly and despicable weapons of slander and misrepresentation. The fact that these Socialists never encountered their opponents except to defeat them, was a powerful testimony to the accuracy of their reasonings and the correctness of their conclusions - and yet they were undoubtedly mad. One might converse with them for an indefinite time on the three divisions of their subject without eliciting any proofs of insanity, but directly one inquired what means they proposed to employ in order to bring about the adoption of their plan, they replied that they hoped to do so by reasoning with the others!
 Although they had sense enough to understand the real causes of poverty, and the only cure for poverty, they were nevertheless so foolish that they entertained the delusion that it is possible to reason with demented persons, whereas every sane person knows that to reason with a maniac is not only fruitless, but rather tends to fix more deeply the erroneous impressions of his disordered mind.
 The wagonette containing Rushton and his friends continued to fly over the road, pursued by the one in which rode Crass, Bill Bates, and the Semi-drunk; but notwithstanding all the efforts of the drunken driver, they were unable to overtake or pass the smaller vehicle, and when they reached the foot of the hill that led up to Windley the distance between the two carriages rapidly increased, and the race was reluctantly abandoned.
 When they reached the top of the hill Rushton and his friends did not wait for the others, but drove off towards Mugsborough as fast as they could.
 Crass’s brake was the next to arrive at the summit, and they halted there to wait for the other two conveyances and when they came up all those who lived nearby got out, and some of them sang ‘God Save the King’, and then with shouts of ‘Good Night’, and cries of ‘Don’t forget six o’clock Monday morning’, they dispersed to their homes and the carriages moved off once more.
 At intervals as they passed through Windley brief stoppages were made in order to enable others to get out, and by the time they reached the top of the long incline that led down into Mugsborough it was nearly twelve o’clock and the brakes were almost empty, the only passengers being Owen and four or five others who lived down town. By ones and twos these also departed, disappearing into the obscurity of the night, until there was none left, and the Beano was an event of the past.
 
 Chapter 45
 The Great Oration
  The outlook for the approaching winter was - as usual - gloomy in the extreme. One of the leading daily newspapers published an article prophesying a period of severe industrial depression. ‘As the warehouses were glutted with the things produced by the working classes, there was no need for them to do any more work - at present; and so they would now have to go and starve until such time as their masters had sold or consumed the things already produced.’ Of course, the writer of the article did not put it exactly like that, but that was what it amounted to. This article was quoted by nearly all the other papers, both Liberal and Conservative. The Tory papers - ignoring the fact that all the Protectionist countries were in exactly the same condition, published yards of misleading articles about Tariff Reform. The Liberal papers said Tariff Reform was no remedy. Look at America and Germany - worse than here! Still, the situation was undoubtedly very serious - continued the Liberal papers - and Something would have to be done. They did not say exactly what, because, of course, they did not know; but Something would have to be done - tomorrow. They talked vaguely about Re-afforestation, and Reclaiming of Foreshores, and Sea walls: but of course there was the question of Cost! that was a difficulty. But all the same Something would have to be done. Some Experiments must be tried! Great caution was necessary in dealing with such difficult problems! We must go slow, and if in the meantime a few thousand children die of starvation, or become ‘rickety’ or consumptive through lack of proper nutrition it is, of course, very regrettable, but after all they are only working-class children, so it doesn’t matter a great deal.
 Most of the writers of these Liberal and Tory papers seemed to think that all that was necessary was to find ‘Work’ for the ‘working’ class! That was their conception of a civilized nation in the twentieth century! For the majority of the people to work like brutes in order to obtain a ‘living wage’ for themselves and to create luxuries for a small minority of persons who are too lazy to work at all! And although this was all they thought was necessary, they did not know what to do in order to bring even that much to pass! Winter was returning, bringing in its train the usual crop of horrors, and the Liberal and Tory monopolists of wisdom did not know what to do!
 Rushton’s had so little work in that nearly all the hands expected that they would be slaughtered the next Saturday after the ‘Beano’ and there was one man - Jim Smith he was called - who was not allowed to live even till then: he got the sack before breakfast on the Monday morning after the Beano.
 This man was about forty-five years old, but very short for his age, being only a little over five feet in height. The other men used to say that Little Jim was not made right, for while his body was big enough for a six-footer, his legs were very short, and the fact that he was rather inclined to be fat added to the oddity of his appearance.
 On the Monday morning after the Beano he was painting an upper room in a house where several other men were working, and it was customary for the coddy to shout ‘Yo! Ho!’ at mealtimes, to let the hands know when it was time to leave off work. At about ten minutes to eight, Jim had squared the part of the work he had been doing - the window - so he decided not to start on the door or the skirting until after breakfast. Whilst he was waiting for the foreman to shout ‘Yo! Ho!’ his mind reverted to the Beano, and he began to hum the tunes of some of the songs that had been sung. He hummed the tune of ‘He’s a jolly good fellow’, and he could not get the tune out of his mind: it kept buzzing in his head. He wondered what time it was? It could not be very far off eight now, to judge by the amount of work he had done since six o’clock. He had rubbed down and stopped all the woodwork and painted the window. A jolly good two hours’ work! He was only getting sixpence-halfpenny an hour and if he hadn’t earned a bob he hadn’t earned nothing! Anyhow, whether he had done enough for ’em or not he wasn’t goin’ to do no more before breakfast.
 The tune of ‘He’s a jolly good fellow’ was still buzzing in his head; he thrust his hands deep down in his trouser pockets, and began to polka round the room, humming softly:
  ‘I won’t do no more before breakfast! I won’t do no more before breakfast! I won’t do no more before breakfast! So ’ip ’ip ’ip ’ooray! So ’ip ’ip ’ip ’ooray So ’ip ’ip ’ooray! I won’t do no more before breakfast - etc.’
 ‘No! and you won’t do but very little after breakfast, here!’ shouted Hunter, suddenly entering the room.
 ‘I’ve bin watchin’ of you through the crack of the door for the last ’arf hour; and you’ve not done a dam’ stroke all the time. You make out yer time sheet, and go to the office at nine o’clock and git yer money; we can’t afford to pay you for playing the fool.’
 Leaving the man dumbfounded and without waiting for a reply, Misery went downstairs and after kicking up a devil of a row with the foreman for the lack of discipline on the job, he instructed him that Smith was not to be permitted to resume work after breakfast. Then he rode away. He had come in so stealthily that no one had known anything of his arrival until they heard him bellowing at Smith.
 The latter did not stay to take breakfast but went off at once, and when he was gone the other chaps said it served him bloody well right: he was always singing, he ought to have more sense. You can’t do as you like nowadays you know!
 Easton - who was working at another job with Crass as his foreman - knew that unless some more work came in he was likely to be one of those who would have to go. As far as he could see it was only a week or two at the most before everything would be finished up. But notwithstanding the prospect of being out of work so soon he was far happier than he had been for several months past, for he imagined he had discovered the cause of Ruth’s strange manner.
 This knowledge came to him on the night of the Beano. When he arrived home he found that Ruth had already gone to bed: she had not been well, and it was Mrs Linden’s explanation of her illness that led Easton to think that he had discovered the cause of the unhappiness of the last few months. Now that he knew - as he thought - he blamed himself for not having been more considerate and patient with her. At the same time he was at a loss to understand why she had not told him about it herself. The only explanation he could think of was the one suggested by Mrs Linden - that at such times women often behaved strangely. However that might be, he was glad to think he knew the reason of it all, and he resolved that he would be more gentle and forebearing with her.
 The place where he was working was practically finished. It was a large house called ‘The Refuge’, very similar to ‘The Cave’, and during the last week or two, it had become what they called a ‘hospital’. That is, as the other jobs became finished the men were nearly all sent to this one, so that there was quite a large crowd of them there. The inside work was all finished - with the exception of the kitchen, which was used as a mess room, and the scullery, which was the paint shop.
 Everybody was working on the job. Poor old Joe Philpot, whose rheumatism had been very bad lately, was doing a very rough job - painting the gable from a long ladder.
 But though there were plenty of younger men more suitable for this, Philpot did not care to complain for fear Crass or Misery should think he was not up to his work. At dinner time all the old hands assembled in the kitchen, including Crass, Easton, Harlow, Bundy and Dick Wantley, who still sat on a pail behind his usual moat.
 Philpot and Harlow were absent and everybody wondered what had become of them.
 Several times during the morning they had been seen whispering together and comparing scraps of paper, and various theories were put forward to account for their disappearance. Most of the men thought they must have heard something good about the probable winner of the Handicap and had gone to put something on. Some others thought that perhaps they had heard of another ‘job’ about to be started by some other firm and had gone to inquire about it.
 ‘Looks to me as if they’ll stand a very good chance of gettin’ drowned if they’re gone very far,’ remarked Easton, referring to the weather. It had been threatening to rain all the morning, and during the last few minutes it had become so dark that Crass lit the gas, so that - as he expressed it - they should be able to see the way to their mouths. Outside, the wind grew more boisterous every moment; the darkness continued to increase, and presently there succeeded a torrential downfall of rain, which beat fiercely against the windows, and poured in torrents down the glass. The men glanced gloomily at each other. No more work could be done outside that day, and there was nothing left to do inside. As they were paid by the hour, this would mean that they would have to lose half a day’s pay.
 ‘If it keeps on like this we won’t be able to do no more work, and we won’t be able to go home either,’ remarked Easton.
 ‘Well, we’re all right ’ere, ain’t we?’ said the man behind the moat; ‘there’s a nice fire and plenty of heasy chairs. Wot the ’ell more do you want?’
 ‘Yes,’ remarked another philosopher. ‘If we only had a shove-ha’penny table or a ring board, I reckon we should be able to enjoy ourselves all right.’
 Philpot and Harlow were still absent, and the others again fell to wondering where they could be.
 ‘I see old Joe up on ’is ladder only a few minutes before twelve,’ remarked Wantley.
 Everyone agreed that it was a mystery.
 At this moment the two truants returned, looking very important.
 Philpot was armed with a hammer and carried a pair of steps, while Harlow bore a large piece of wallpaper which the two of them proceeded to tack on the wall, much to the amusement of the others, who read the announcement opposite written in charcoal.
 Every day at meals since Barrington’s unexpected outburst at the Beano dinner, the men had been trying their best to ‘kid him on’ to make another speech, but so far without success. If anything, he had been even more silent and reserved than before, as if he felt some regret that he had spoken as he had on that occasion. Crass and his disciples attributed Barrington’s manner to fear that he was going to get the sack for his trouble and they agreed amongst themselves that it would serve him bloody well right if ’e did get the push.
 When they had fixed the poster on the wall, Philpot stood the steps in the corner of the room, with the back part facing outwards, and then, everything being ready for the lecturer, the two sat down in their accustomed places and began to eat their dinners, Harlow remarking that they would have to buck up or they would be too late for the meeting; and the rest of the crowd began to discuss the poster.
 ‘Wot the ’ell does PLO mean?’ demanded Bundy, with a puzzled expression.
 ‘Plain Layer On,’ answered Philpot modestly.
 ‘’Ave you ever ’eard the Professor preach before?’ inquired the man on the pail, addressing Bundy.
 ‘Only once, at the Beano,’ replied that individual; ‘an’ that was once too often!’
 ‘Finest speaker I ever ’eard,’ said the man on the pail with enthusiasm. ‘I wouldn’t miss this lecture for anything: this is one of ’is best subjects. I got ’ere about two hours before the doors was opened, so as to be sure to get a seat.’
 ‘Yes, it’s a very good subject,’ said Crass, with a sneer. ‘I believe most of the Labour Members in Parliament is well up in it.’
 ‘And wot about the other members?’ demanded Philpot. ‘Seems to me as if most of them knows something about it too.’
 ‘The difference is,’ said Owen, ‘the working classes voluntarily pay to keep the Labour Members, but whether they like it or not, they have to keep the others.’
 ‘The Labour members is sent to the ’Ouse of Commons,’ said Harlow, ‘and paid their wages to do certain work for the benefit of the working classes, just the same as we’re sent ’ere and paid our wages by the Bloke to paint this ’ouse.’
 ‘Yes,’ said Crass; ‘but if we didn’t do the work we’re paid to do, we should bloody soon get the sack.’
  Imperial Bankquet Hall ‘The Refuge’ on Thursday at 12.30 prompt
  Professor Barrington WILL DELIVER A
  ORATION
  ENTITLED
  THE GREAT SECRET, OR HOW TO LIVE WITHOUT WORK
 The Rev. Joe Philpot PLO (Late absconding secretary of the light refreshment fund) Will take the chair and anything else he can lay his hands on.
  At The End Of The Lecture A MEETING WILL BE ARRANGED And carried out according to theMarquis of Queensbury’s Rules.
  A Collection will be took upin aid of the cost of printing
 ‘I can’t see how we’ve got to keep the other members,’ said Slyme; ‘they’re mostly rich men, and they live on their own money.’
 ‘Of course,’ said Crass. ‘And I should like to know where we should be without ’em! Talk about us keepin’ them! It seems to me more like it that they keeps us! The likes of us lives on rich people. Where should we be if it wasn’t for all the money they spend and the work they ’as done? If the owner of this ’ouse ’adn’t ’ad the money to spend to ’ave it done up, most of us would ’ave bin out of work this last six weeks, and starvin’, the same as lots of others ’as been.’
 ‘Oh yes, that’s right enough,’ agreed Bundy. ‘Labour is no good without Capital. Before any work can be done there’s one thing necessary, and that’s money. It would be easy to find work for all the unemployed if the local authorities could only raise the money.’
 ‘Yes; that’s quite true,’ said Owen. ‘And that proves that money is the cause of poverty, because poverty consists in being short of the necessaries of life: the necessaries of life are all produced by labour applied to the raw materials: the raw materials exist in abundance and there are plenty of people able and willing to work; but under present conditions no work can be done without money; and so we have the spectacle of a great army of people compelled to stand idle and starve by the side of the raw materials from which their labour could produce abundance of all the things they need - they are rendered helpless by the power of Money! Those who possess all the money say that the necessaries of life shall not be produced except for their profit.’
 ‘Yes! and you can’t alter it,’ said Crass, triumphantly. ‘It’s always been like it, and it always will be like it.’
 ‘’Ear! ’Ear!’ shouted the man behind the moat. ‘There’s always been rich and poor in the world, and there always will be.’
 Several others expressed their enthusiastic agreement with Crass’s opinion, and most of them appeared to be highly delighted to think that the existing state of affairs could never be altered.
 ‘It hasn’t always been like it, and it won’t always be like it,’ said Owen. ‘The time will come, and it’s not very far distant, when the necessaries of life will be produced for use and not for profit. The time is coming when it will no longer be possible for a few selfish people to condemn thousands of men and women and little children to live in misery and die of want.’
 ‘Ah well, it won’t be in your time, or mine either,’ said Crass gleefully, and most of the others laughed with imbecile satisfaction.
 ‘I’ve ’eard a ’ell of a lot about this ’ere Socialism,’ remarked the man behind the moat, ‘but up to now I’ve never met nobody wot could tell you plainly exactly wot it is.’
 ‘Yes; that’s what I should like to know too,’ said Easton.
 ‘Socialism mean "What’s yours is mine, and what’s mine’s me own,"’ observed Bundy, and during the laughter that greeted this definition Slyme was heard to say that Socialism meant Materialism, Atheism and Free Love, and if it were ever to come about it would degrade men and women to the level of brute beasts. Harlow said Socialism was a beautiful ideal, which he for one would be very glad to see realized, and he was afraid it was altogether too good to be practical, because human nature is too mean and selfish. Sawkins said that Socialism was a lot of bloody rot, and Crass expressed the opinion - which he had culled from the delectable columns of the Obscurer - that it meant robbing the industries for the benefit of the idle and thriftless.
 
 Philpot had by this time finished his bread and cheese, and, having taken a final draught of tea, he rose to his feet, and crossing over to the corner of the room, ascended the pulpit, being immediately greeted with a tremendous outburst of hooting, howling and booing, which he smilingly acknowledged by removing his cap from his bald head and bowing repeatedly. When the storm of shrieks, yells, groans and catcalls had in some degree subsided, and Philpot was able to make himself heard, he addressed the meeting as follows:
 ‘Gentlemen: First of all I beg to thank you very sincerely for the magnificent and cordial reception you have given me on this occasion, and I shall try to deserve your good opinion by opening the meeting as briefly as possible.
 ‘Putting all jokes aside, I think we’re all agreed about one thing, and that is, that there’s plenty of room for improvement in things in general. (Hear, hear.) As our other lecturer, Professor Owen, pointed out in one of ’is lectures and as most of you ’ave read in the newspapers, although British trade was never so good before as it is now, there was never so much misery and poverty, and so many people out of work, and so many small shopkeepers goin’ up the spout as there is at this partickiler time. Now, some people tells us as the way to put everything right is to ’ave Free Trade and plenty of cheap food. Well, we’ve got them all now, but the misery seems to go on all around us all the same. Then there’s other people tells us as the ‘Friscal Policy" is the thing to put everything right. ("Hear, hear" from Crass and several others.) And then there’s another lot that ses that Socialism is the only remedy. Well, we all know pretty well wot Free Trade and Protection means, but most of us don’t know exactly what Socialism means; and I say as it’s the dooty of every man to try and find out which is the right thing to vote for, and when ’e’s found it out, to do wot ’e can to ’elp to bring it about. And that’s the reason we’ve gorn to the enormous expense of engaging Professor Barrington to come ’ere this afternoon and tell us exactly what Socialism is.
 ‘’As I ’ope you’re all just as anxious to ’ear it as I am myself, I will not stand between you and the lecturer no longer, but will now call upon ’im to address you.’
 Philpot was loudly applauded as he descended from the pulpit, and in response to the clamorous demands of the crowd, Barrington, who in the meantime had yielded to Owen’s entreaties that he would avail himself of this opportunity of proclaiming the glad tidings of the good time that is to be, got up on the steps in his turn.
 Harlow, desiring that everything should be done decently and in order, had meantime arranged in front of the pulpit a carpenter’s sawing stool, and an empty pail with a small piece of board laid across it, to serve as a seat and a table for the chairman. Over the table he draped a large red handkerchief. At the right he placed a plumber’s large hammer; at the left, a battered and much-chipped jam-jar, full of tea. Philpot having taken his seat on the pail at this table and announced his intention of bashing out with the hammer the brains of any individual who ventured to disturb the meeting, Barrington commenced:
 ‘Mr Chairman and Gentlemen. For the sake of clearness, and in order to avoid confusing one subject with another, I have decided to divide the oration into two parts. First, I will try to explain as well as I am able what Socialism is. I will try to describe to you the plan or system upon which the Co-operative Commonwealth of the future will be organized; and, secondly, I will try to tell you how it can be brought about. But before proceeding with the first part of the subject, I would like to refer very slightly to the widespread delusion that Socialism is impossible because it means a complete change from an order of things which has always existed. We constantly hear it said that because there have always been rich and poor in the world, there always must be. I want to point out to you first of all, that it is not true that even in its essential features, the present system has existed from all time; it is not true that there have always been rich and poor in the world, in the sense that we understand riches and poverty today.
 ‘These statements are lies that have been invented for the purpose of creating in us a feeling of resignation to the evils of our condition. They are lies which have been fostered by those who imagine that it is to their interest that we should be content to see our children condemned to the same poverty and degradation that we have endured ourselves.
 I do not propose - because there is not time, although it is really part of my subject - to go back to the beginnings of history, and describe in detail the different systems of social organization which evolved from and superseded each other at different periods, but it is necessary to remind you that the changes that have taken place in the past have been even greater than the change proposed by Socialists today. The change from savagery and cannibalism when men used to devour the captives they took in war - to the beginning of chattel slavery, when the tribes or clans into which mankind were divided - whose social organization was a kind of Communism, all the individuals belonging to the tribe being practically social equals, members of one great family - found it more profitable to keep their captives as slaves than to eat them. The change from the primitive Communism of the tribes, into the more individualistic organization of the nations, and the development of private ownership of the land and slaves and means of subsistence. The change from chattel slavery into Feudalism; and the change from Feudalism into the earlier form of Capitalism; and the equally great change from what might be called the individualistic capitalism which displaced Feudalism, to the system of Co-operative Capitalism and Wage Slavery of today.’
 ‘I believe you must ’ave swollered a bloody dictionary,’ exclaimed the man behind the moat.
 ‘Keep horder" shouted Philpot, fiercely, striking the table with the hammer, and there were loud shouts of ‘Chair’ and ‘Chuck ’im out,’ from several quarters.
 When order was restored, the lecturer proceeded:
 ‘So it is not true that practically the suite state of affairs as we have today has always existed. It is not true that anything like the poverty that prevails at present existed at any previous period of the world’s history. When the workers were the property of their masters, it was to their owners’ interest to see that they were properly clothed and fed; they were not allowed to be idle, and they were not allowed to starve. Under Feudalism also, although there were certain intolerable circumstances, the position of the workers was, economically, infinitely better than it is today. The worker was in subjection to his Lord, but in return his lord had certain responsibilities and duties to perform, and there was a large measure of community of interest between them.
 ‘I do not intend to dwell upon this pout at length, but in support of what I have said I will quote as nearly as I can from memory the words of the historian Froude.
 ‘"I do not believe," says Mr Froude, "that the condition of the people in Mediaeval Europe was as miserable as is pretended. I do not believe that the distribution of the necessaries of life was as unequal as it is at present. If the tenant lived hard, the lord had little luxury. Earls and countesses breakfasted at five in the morning, on salt beef and herring, a slice of bread and a draught of ale from a blackjack. Lords and servants dined in the same hall and shared the same meal."
 ‘When we arrive at the system that displaced Feudalism, we find that the condition of the workers was better in every way than it is at present. The instruments of production - the primitive machinery and the tools necessary for the creation of wealth - belonged to the skilled workers who used them, and the things they produced were also the property of those who made them.
 ‘In those days a master painter, a master shoemaker, a master saddler, or any other master tradesmen, was really a skilled artisan working on his own account. He usually had one or two apprentices, who were socially his equals, eating at the same table and associating with the other members of his family. It was quite a common occurrence for the apprentice - after he had attained proficiency in his work - to marry his master’s daughter and succeed to his master’s business. In those days to be a "master" tradesman meant to be master of the trade, not merely of some underpaid drudges in one’s employment. The apprentices were there to master the trade, qualifying themselves to become master workers themselves; not mere sweaters and exploiters of the labour of others, but useful members of society. In those days, because there was no labour-saving machinery the community was dependent for its existence on the productions of hand labour. Consequently the majority of the people were employed in some kind of productive work, and the workers were honoured and respected citizens, living in comfort on the fruits of their labour. They were not rich as we understand wealth now, but they did not starve and they were not regarded with contempt, as are their successors of today.
 ‘The next great change came with the introduction of steam machinery. That power came to the aid of mankind in their struggle for existence, enabling them to create easily and in abundance those things of which they had previously been able to produce only a bare sufficiency. A wonderful power - equalling and surpassing the marvels that were imagined by the writers of fairy tales and Eastern stories - a power so vast - so marvellous, that it is difficult to find words to convey anything like an adequate conception of it.
 ‘We all remember the story, in The Arabian Nights, of Aladdin, who in his poverty became possessed of the Wonderful Lamp and - he was poor no longer. He merely had to rub the Lamp - the Genie appeared, and at Aladdin’s command he produced an abundance of everything that the youth could ask or dream of. With the discovery of steam machinery, mankind became possessed of a similar power to that imagined by the Eastern writer. At the command of its masters the Wonderful Lamp of Machinery produces an enormous, overwhelming, stupendous abundance and superfluity of every material thing necessary for human existence and happiness. With less labour than was formerly required to cultivate acres, we can now cultivate miles of land. In response to human industry, aided by science and machinery, the fruitful earth teems with such lavish abundance as was never known or deemed possible before. If you go into the different factories and workshops you will see prodigious quantities of commodities of every kind pouring out of the wonderful machinery, literally like water from a tap.
 ‘One would naturally and reasonably suppose that the discovery or invention of such an aid to human industry would result in increased happiness and comfort for every one; but as you all know, the reverse is the case; and the reason of that extraordinary result, is the reason of all the poverty and unhappiness that we see around us and endure today - it is simply because - the machinery became the property of a comparatively few individuals and private companies, who use it not for the benefit of the community but to create profits for themselves.
 ‘As this labour-saving machinery became more extensively used, the prosperous class of skilled workers gradually disappeared. Some of the wealthier of them became distributers instead of producers of wealth; that is to say, they became shopkeepers, retailing the commodities that were produced for the most part by machinery. But the majority of them in course of time degenerated into a class of mere wage earners, having no property in the machines they used, and no property in the things they made.
 ‘They sold their labour for so much per hour, and when they could not find any employer to buy it from them, they were reduced to destitution.
 ‘Whilst the unemployed workers were starving and those in employment not much better off, the individuals and private companies who owned the machinery accumulated fortunes; but their profits were diminished and their working expenses increased by what led to the latest great change in the organization of the production of the necessaries of life - the formation of the Limited Companies and the Trusts; the decision of the private companies to combine and co-operate with each other in order to increase their profits and decrease their working expenses. The results of these combines have been - an increase in the quantities of the things produced: a decrease in the number of wage earners employed - and enormously increased profits for the shareholders.
 ‘But it is not only the wage-earning class that is being hurt; for while they are being annihilated by the machinery and the efficient organization of industry by the trusts that control and are beginning to monopolize production, the shopkeeping classes are also being slowly but surely crushed out of existence by the huge companies that are able by the greater magnitude of their operations to buy and sell more cheaply than the small traders.
 ‘The consequence of all this is that the majority of the people are in a condition of more or less abject poverty - living from hand to mouth. It is an admitted fact that about thirteen millions of our people are always on the verge of starvation. The significant results of this poverty face us on every side. The alarming and persistent increase of insanity. The large number of would-be recruits for the army who have to be rejected because they are physically unfit; and the shameful condition of the children of the poor. More than one-third of the children of the working classes in London have some sort of mental or physical defect; defects in development; defects of eyesight; abnormal nervousness; rickets, and mental dullness. The difference in height and weight and general condition of the children in poor schools and the children of the so-called better classes, constitutes a crime that calls aloud to Heaven for vengeance upon those who are responsible for it.
 ‘It is childish to imagine that any measure of Tariff Reform or Political Reform such as a paltry tax on foreign-made goods or abolishing the House of Lords, or disestablishing the Church - or miserable Old Age Pensions, or a contemptible tax on land, can deal with such a state of affairs as this. They have no House of Lords in America or France, and yet their condition is not materially different from ours. You may be deceived into thinking that such measures as those are great things. You may fight for them and vote for them, but after you have got them you will find that they will make no appreciable improvement in your condition. You will still have to slave and drudge to gain a bare sufficiency of the necessaries of life. You will still have to eat the same kind of food and wear the same kind of clothes and boots as now. Your masters will still have you in their power to insult and sweat and drive. Your general condition will be just the same as at present because such measures as those are not remedies but red herrings, intended by those who trail them to draw us away from the only remedy, which is to be found only in the Public Ownership of the Machinery, and the National Organization of Industry for the production and distribution of the necessaries of life, not for the profit of a few but for the benefit of all!
 ‘That is the next great change; not merely desirable, but imperatively necessary and inevitable! That is Socialism!
 ‘It is not a wild dream of Superhuman Unselfishness. No one will be asked to sacrifice himself for the benefit of others or to love his neighbours better than himself as is the case under the present system, which demands that the majority shall unselfishly be content to labour and live in wretchedness for the benefit of a few. There is no such principle of Philanthropy in Socialism, which simply means that even as all industries are now owned by shareholders, and organized and directed by committees and officers elected by the shareholders, so shall they in future belong to the State, that is, the whole people - and they shall be organized and directed by committees and officers elected by the community.
 ‘Under existing circumstances the community is exposed to the danger of being invaded and robbed and massacred by some foreign power. Therefore the community has organized and owns and controls an Army and Navy to protect it from that danger. Under existing circumstances the community is menaced by another equally great danger - the people are mentally and physically degenerating from lack of proper food and clothing. Socialists say that the community should undertake and organize the business of producing and distributing all these things; that the State should be the only employer of labour and should own all the factories, mills, mines, farms, railways, fishing fleets, sheep farms, poultry farms and cattle ranches.
 ‘Under existing circumstances the community is degenerating mentally and physically because the majority cannot afford to have decent houses to live in. Socialists say that the community should take in hand the business of providing proper houses for all its members, that the State should be the only landlord, that all the land and all the houses should belong to the whole people...
 ‘We must do this if we are to keep our old place in the van of human progress. A nation of ignorant, unintelligent, half-starved, broken-spirited degenerates cannot hope to lead humanity in its never-ceasing march onward to the conquest of the future.
  ‘Vain. mightiest fleet of iron framed; Vain the all-shattering guns Unless proud England keep, untamed, The stout hearts of her sons.
 ‘All the evils that I have referred to are only symptoms of the one disease that is sapping the moral, mental and physical life of the nation, and all attempts to cure these symptoms are foredoomed to failure, simply because they are the symptoms and not the disease. All the talk of Temperance, and the attempts to compel temperance, are foredoomed to failure, because drunkenness is a symptom, and not the disease.
 ‘India is a rich productive country. Every year millions of pounds worth of wealth are produced by her people, only to be stolen from them by means of the Money Trick by the capitalist and official class. Her industrious sons and daughters, who are nearly all tdtal abstainers, live in abject poverty, and their misery is not caused by laziness or want of thrift, or by Intemperance. They are poor for the same reason that we are poor - Because we are Robbed.
 ‘The hundreds of thousands of pounds that are yearly wasted in well-meant but useless charity accomplish no lasting good, because while charity soothes the symptoms it ignores the disease, which is - the PRIVATE OWNERSHIP of the means of producing the necessaries of life, and the restriction of production, by a few selfish individuals for their own profit. And for that disease there is no other remedy than the one I have told you of - the PUBLIC OWNERSHIP and cultivation of the land, the PUBLIC OWNERSHIP OF the mines, railways, canals, ships, factories and all the other means of production, and the establishment of an Industrial Civil Service - a National Army of Industry - for the purpose of producing the necessaries, comforts and refinements of life in that abundance which has been made possible by science and machinery - for the use and benefit of THE WHOLE OF THE PEOPLE.’
 ‘Yes: and where’s the money to come from for all this?’ shouted Crass, fiercely.
 ‘Hear, hear,’ cried the man behind the moat.
 ‘There’s no money difficulty about it,’ replied Barrington. ‘We can easily find all the money we shall need.’
 ‘Of course,’ said Slyme, who had been reading the Daily Ananias, ‘there’s all the money in the Post Office Savings Bank. The Socialists could steal that for a start; and as for the mines and land and factories, they can all be took from the owners by force.’
 ‘There will be no need for force and no need to steal anything from anybody.’
 ‘And there’s another thing I objects to,’ said Crass. ‘And that’s all this ’ere talk about hignorance: wot about all the money wots spent every year for edication?’
 ‘You should rather say - "What about all the money that’s wasted every year on education?" What can be more brutal and senseless than trying to "educate" a poor little, hungry, ill-clad child? Such so-called "instruction" is like the seed in the parable of the Sower, which fell on stony ground and withered away because it had no depth of earth; and even in those cases where it does take root and grow, it becomes like the seed that fell among thorns and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it bore no fruit.
 ‘The majority of us forget in a year or two all that we learnt at school because the conditions of our lives are such as to destroy all inclination for culture or refinement. We must see that the children are properly clothed and fed and that they are not made to get up in the middle of the night to go to work for several hours before they go to school. We must make it illegal for any greedy, heartless profit-hunter to hire them and make them labour for several hours in the evening after school, or all day and till nearly midnight on Saturday. We must first see that our children are cared for, as well as the children of savage races, before we can expect a proper return for the money that we spend on education.’
 ‘I don’t mind admitting that this ’ere scheme of national ownership and industries is all right if it could only be done,’ said Harlow, ‘but at present, all the land, railways and factories, belongs to private capitalists; they can’t be bought without money, and you say you ain’t goin’ to take ’em away by force, so I should like to know how the bloody ’ell you are goin’ to get ’em?’
 ‘We certainly don’t propose to buy them with money, for the simple reason that there is not sufficient money in existence to pay for them.
 ‘If all the gold and silver money in the World were gathered together into one heap, it would scarcely be sufficient to buy all the private property in England. The people who own all these things now never really paid for them with money - they obtained possession of them by means of the "Money Trick" which Owen explained to us some time ago.’
 ‘They obtained possession of them by usin’ their brain,’ said Crass. ‘Exactly,’ replied the lecturer. ‘They tell us themselves that that is how they got them away from us; they call their profits the "wages of intelligence". Whilst we have been working, they have been using their intelligence in order to obtain possession of the things we have created. The time has now arrived for us to use our intelligence in order to get back the things they have robbed us of, aid to prevent them from robbing us any more. As for how it is to be done, we might copy the methods that they have found so successful.’
 ‘Oh, then you DO mean to rob them after all,’ cried Slyme, triumphantly. ‘If it’s true that they robbed the workers, and if we’re to adopt the same method then we’ll be robbers too!’
 ‘When a thief is caught having in his possession the property of others it is not robbery to take the things away from him and to restore them to their rightful owners,’ retorted Barrington.
 ‘I can’t allow this ’ere disorder to go on no longer,’ shouted Philpot, banging the table with the plumber’s hammer as several men began talking at the same time.
 ‘There will be plenty of tuneropperty for questions and opposition at the hend of the horation, when the pulpit will be throwed open to anyone as likes to debate the question. I now calls upon the professor to proceed with the second part of the horation: and anyone wot interrupts will get a lick under the ear-’ole with this’ - waving the hammer - ‘and the body will be chucked out of the bloody winder.’
 Loud cheers greeted this announcement. It was still raining heavily, so they thought they might as well pass the time listening to Barrington as in any other way.
 ‘A large part of the land may be got back in the same way as it was taken from us. The ancestors of the present holders obtained possession of it by simply passing Acts of Enclosure: the nation should regain possession of those lands by passing Acts of Resumption. And with regard to the other land, the present holders should be allowed to retain possession of it during their lives and then it should revert to the State, to be used for the benefit of all. Britain should belong to the British people, not to a few selfish individuals. As for the railways, they have already been nationalized in some other countries, and what other countries can do we can do also. In New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Japan and some other countries some of the railways are already the property of the State. As for the method by which we can obtain possession of them, the difficulty is not to discover a method, but rather to decide which of many methods we shall adopt. One method would be to simply pass an Act declaring that as it was contrary to the public interest that they should be owned by private individuals, the railways would henceforth be the property of the nation. All railways servants, managers and officials would continue in their employment; the only difference being that they would now be in the employ of the State. As to the shareholders -’
 ‘They could all be knocked on the ’ead, I suppose,’ interrupted Crass.
 ‘Or go to the workhouse,’ said Slyme.
 ‘Or to ’ell,’ suggested the man behind the moat.
 ‘- The State would continue to pay to the shareholders the same dividends they had received on an average for, say, the previous three years. These payments would be continued to the present shareholders for life, or the payments might be limited to a stated number of years and the shares would be made non-transferable, like the railway tickets of today. As for the factories, shops, and other means of production and distribution, the State must adopt the same methods of doing business as the present owners. I mean that even as the big Trusts and companies are crushing - by competition - the individual workers and small traders, so the State should crush the trusts by competition. It is surely justifiable for the State to do for the benefit of the whole people that which the capitalists are already doing for the profit of a few shareholders. The first step in this direction will be the establishment of Retail Stores for the purpose of supplying all national and municipal employees with the necessaries of life at the lowest possible prices. At first the Administration will purchase these things from the private manufacturers, in such large quantities that it will be able to obtain them at the very cheapest rate, and as there will be no heavy rents to pay for showy shops, and no advertising expenses, and as the object of the Administration will be not to make profit, but to supply its workmen and officials with goods at the lowest price, they will be able to sell them much cheaper than the profit-making private stores.
 ‘The National Service Retail Stores will be for the benefit of only those in the public service; and gold, silver or copper money will not be accepted in payment for the things sold. At first, all public servants will continue to be paid in metal money, but those who desire it will be paid all or part of their wages in paper money of the same nominal value, which will be accepted in payment for their purchases at the National Stores and at the National Hotels, Restaurants and other places which will be established for the convenience of those in the State service. The money will resemble bank-notes. It will be made of a special very strong paper, and will be of all value, from a penny to a pound.
 ‘As the National Service Stores will sell practically everything that could be obtained elsewhere, and as twenty shillings in paper money will be able to purchase much more at the stores than twenty shillings of metal money would purchase anywhere else, it will not be long before nearly all public servants will prefer to be paid in paper money. As far as paying the salaries and wages of most of its officials and workmen is concerned, the Administration will not then have any need of metal money. But it will require metal money to pay the private manufacturers who supply the goods sold in the National Stores. But - all these things are made by labour; so in order to avoid having to pay metal money for them, the State will now commence to employ productive labour. All the public land suitable for the purpose will be put into cultivation and State factories will be established for manufacturing food, boots, clothing, furniture and all other necessaries and comforts of life. All those who are out of employment and willing to work, will be given employment on these farms and in these factories. In order that the men employed shall not have to work unpleasantly hard, and that their hours of labour may be as short as possible - at first, say, eight hours per day - and also to make sure that the greatest possible quantity of everything shall be produced, these factories and farms will be equipped with the most up-to-date and efficient labour-saving machinery. The people employed in the farms and factories will be paid with paper money... The commodities they produce will go to replenish the stocks of the National Service Stores, where the workers will be able to purchase with their paper money everything they need.
 ‘As we shall employ the greatest possible number of labour-saving machines, and adopt the most scientific methods in our farms and factories, the quantities of goods we shall be able to produce will be so enormous that we shall be able to pay our workers very high wages - in paper money - and we shall be able to sell our produce so cheaply, that all public servants will be able to enjoy abundance of everything.
 ‘When the workers who are being exploited and sweated by the private capitalists realize how much worse off they are than the workers in the employ of the State, they will come and ask to be allowed to work for the State, and also, for paper money. That will mean that the State Army of Productive Workers will be continually increasing in numbers. More State factories will be built, more land will be put into cultivation. Men will be given employment making bricks, woodwork, paints, glass, wallpapers and all kinds of building materials and others will be set to work building - on State land - beautiful houses, which will be let to those employed in the service of the State. The rent will be paid with paper money.
 ‘State fishing fleets will be established and the quantities of commodities of all kinds produced will be so great that the State employees and officials will not be able to use it all. With their paper money they will be able to buy enough and more than enough to satisfy all their needs abundantly, but there will still be a great and continuously increasing surplus stock in the possession of the State.
 ‘The Socialist Administration will now acquire or build fleets of steam trading vessels, which will of course be manned and officered by State employees - the same as the Royal Navy is now. These fleets of National trading vessels will carry the surplus stocks I have mentioned, to foreign countries, and will there sell or exchange them for some of the products of those countries, things that we do not produce ourselves. These things will be brought to England and sold at the National Service Stores, at the lowest possible price, for paper money, to those in the service of the State. This of course will only have the effect of introducing greater variety into the stocks - it will not diminish the surplus: and as there would be no sense in continuing to produce more of these things than necessary, it would then be the duty of the Administration to curtail or restrict production of the necessaries of life. This could be done by reducing the hours of the workers without reducing their wages so as to enable them to continue to purchase as much as before.
 ‘Another way of preventing over production of mere necessaries and comforts will be to employ a large number of workers producing the refinements and pleasures of life, more artistic houses, furniture, pictures, musical instruments and so forth.
 ‘In the centre of every district a large Institute or pleasure house could be erected, containing a magnificently appointed and decorated theatre; Concert Hall, Lecture Hall, Gymnasium, Billiard Rooms, Reading Rooms, Refreshment Rooms, and so on. A detachment of the Industrial Army would be employed as actors, artistes, musicians, singers and entertainers. In fact everyone that could be spared from the most important work of all - that of producing the necessaries of life - would be employed in creating pleasure, culture, and education. All these people - like the other branches of the public service - would be paid with paper money, and with it all of them would be able to purchase abundance of all those things which constitute civilization.
 ‘Meanwhile, as a result of all this, the kind-hearted private employers and capitalists would find that no one would come and work for them to be driven and bullied and sweated for a miserable trifle of metal money that is scarcely enough to purchase sufficient of the necessaries of life to keep body and soul together.
 ‘These kind-hearted capitalists will protest against what they will call the unfair competition of State industry, and some of them may threaten to leave the country and take their capital with them... As most of these persons are too lazy to work, and as we will not need their money, we shall be very glad to see them go. But with regard to their real capital - their factories, farms, mines or machinery - that will be a different matter... To allow these things to remain idle and unproductive would constitute an injury to the community. So a law will be passed, declaring that all land not cultivated by the owner, or any factory shut down for more than a specified time, will be taken possession of by the State and worked for the benefit of the community... Fair compensation will be paid in paper money to the former owners, who will be granted an income or pension of so much a year either for life or for a stated period according to circumstances and the ages of the persons concerned.
 ‘As for the private traders, the wholesale and retail dealers in the things produced by labour, they will be forced by the State competition to close down their shops and warehouses - first, because they will not be able to replenish their stocks; and, secondly, because even if they were able to do so, they would not be able to sell them. This will throw out of work a great host of people who are at present engaged in useless occupations; the managers and assistants in the shops of which we now see half a dozen of the same sort in a single street; the thousands of men and women who are slaving away their lives producing advertisements, for, in most cases, a miserable pittance of metal money, with which many of them are unable to procure sufficient of the necessaries of life to secure them from starvation.
 ‘The masons, carpenters, painters. glaziers, and all the others engaged in maintaining these unnecessary stores and shops will all be thrown out of employment, but all of them who are willing to work will be welcomed by the State and will be at once employed helping either to produce or distribute the necessaries and comforts of life. They will have to work fewer hours than before... They will not have to work so hard - for there will be no need to drive or bully, because there will be plenty of people to do the work, and most of it will be done by machinery - and with their paper money they will be able to buy abundance of the things they help to produce. The shops and stores where these people were formerly employed will be acquired by the State, which will pay the former owners fair compensation in the same manner as to the factory owners. Some of the buildings will be utilized by the State as National Service Stores, others transformed into factories and others will be pulled down to make room for dwellings, or public buildings... It will be the duty of the Government to build a sufficient number of houses to accommodate the families of all those in its employment, and as a consequence of this and because of the general disorganization and decay of what is now called "business", all other house property of all kinds will rapidly depreciate in value. The slums and the wretched dwellings now occupied by the working classes - the miserable, uncomfortable, jerry-built "villas" occupied by the lower middle classes and by "business" people, will be left empty and valueless upon the hands of their rack renting landlords, who will very soon voluntarily offer to hand them and the ground they stand upon to the state on the same terms as those accorded to the other property owners, namely - in return for a pension. Some of these people will be content to live in idleness on the income allowed them for life as compensation by the State: others will devote themselves to art or science and some others will offer their services to the community as managers and superintendents, and the State will always be glad to employ all those who are willing to help in the Great Work of production and distribution.
 ‘By this time the nation will be the sole employer of labour, and as no one will be able to procure the necessaries of life without paper money, and as the only way to obtain this will be working, it will mean that every mentally and physically capable person in the community will be helping in the great work of PRODUCTION and DISTRIBUTION. We shall not need as at present, to maintain a police force to protect the property of the idle rich from the starving wretches whom they have robbed. There will be no unemployed and no overlapping of labour, which will be organized and concentrated for the accomplishment of the only rational object - the creation of the things we require... For every one labour-saving machine in use today, we will, if necessary, employ a thousand machines! and consequently there will be produced such a stupendous, enormous, prodigious, overwhelming abundance of everything that soon the Community will be faced once more with the serious problem of OVER-PRODUCTION.
 ‘To deal with this, it will be necessary to reduce the hours of our workers to four or five hours a day... All young people will be allowed to continue at public schools and universities and will not be required to take any part in the work or the nation until they are twenty-one years of age. At the age of forty-five, everyone will be allowed to retire from the State service on full pay... All these will be able to spend the rest of their days according to their own inclinations; some will settle down quietly at home, and amuse themselves in the same ways as people of wealth and leisure do at the present day - with some hobby, or by taking part in the organization of social functions, such as balls, parties, entertainments, the organization of Public Games and Athletic Tournaments, Races and all kinds of sports.
 ‘Some will prefer to continue in the service of the State. Actors, artists, sculptors, musicians and others will go on working for their own pleasure and honour... Some will devote their leisure to science, art, or literature. Others will prefer to travel on the State steamships to different parts of the world to see for themselves all those things of which most of us have now but a dim and vague conception. The wonders of India and Egypt, the glories of Rome, the artistic treasures of the continent and the sublime scenery of other lands.
 ‘Thus - for the first time in the history of humanity - the benefits and pleasures conferred upon mankind by science and civilization will be enjoyed equally by all, upon the one condition, that they shall do their share of the work, that is necessary in order to, make all these things possible.
 ‘These are the principles upon which the CO-OPERATIVE COMMONWEALTH of the future will be organized. The State in which no one will be distinguished or honoured above his fellows except for Virtue or Talent. Where no man will find his profit in another’s loss, and we shall no longer be masters and servants, but brothers, free men, and friends. Where there will be no weary, broken men and women passing their joyless lives in toil and want, and no little children crying because they are hungry or cold.
 ‘A State wherein it will be possible to put into practice the teachings of Him whom so many now pretend to follow. A society which shall have justice and co-operation for its foundation, and International Brotherhood and love for its law.
  ‘Such are the days that shall be! but What are the deeds of today, In the days of the years we dwell in, That wear our lives away? Why, then, and for what we are waiting? There are but three words to speak "We will it," and what is the foreman but the dream strong wakened and weak? ‘Oh, why and for what are we waiting, while our brothers droop and die? And on every wind of the heavens, a wasted life goes by. ‘How long shall they reproach us, where crowd on crowd they dwell Poor ghosts of the wicked city, gold crushed, hungry hell? ‘Through squalid life they laboured in sordid grief they died Those sons of a mighty mother, those props of England’s pride. They are gone, there is none can undo it, nor save our souls from the curse, But many a million cometh, and shall they be better or worse?
  ‘It is We must answer and hasten and open wide the door, For the rich man’s hurrying terror, and the slow foot hope of the poor, Yea, the voiceless wrath of the wretched and their unlearned discontent, We must give it voice and wisdom, till the waiting tide be spent Come then since all things call us, the living and the dead, And o’er the weltering tangle a glimmering light is shed.’
 As Barrington descended from the Pulpit and walked back to his accustomed seat, a loud shout of applause burst from a few men in the crowd, who stood up and waved their caps and cheered again and again. When order was restored, Philpot rose and addressed the meeting:
 ‘Is there any gentleman wot would like to ask the Speaker a question?’
 No one spoke and the Chairman again put the question without obtaining any response, but at length one of the new hands who had been ‘taken on’ about a week previously to replace another painter who had been sacked for being too slow - stood up and said there was one point that he would like a little more information about. This man had two patches on the seat of his trousers, which were also very much frayed and ragged at the bottoms of the legs: the lining of his coat was all in rags, as were also the bottoms of the sleeves; his boots were old and had been many times mended and patched; the sole of one of them had begun to separate from the upper and he had sewn these parts together with a few stitches of copper wire. He had been out of employment for several weeks and it was evident from the pinched expression of his still haggard face that during that time he had not had sufficient to eat. This man was not a drunkard, neither was he one of those semi-mythical persons who are too lazy to work. He was married and had several children. One of them, a boy of fourteen years old, earned five shillings a week as a light porter at a Grocer’s.
 Being a householder the man had a vote, but he had never hitherto taken much interest in what he called ‘politics’. In his opinion, those matters were not for the likes of him. He believed in leaving such difficult subjects to be dealt with by his betters. In his present unhappy condition he was a walking testimonial to the wisdom and virtue and benevolence of those same ‘betters’ who have hitherto managed the affairs of the world with results so very satisfactory for themselves.
 ‘I should like to ask the speaker,’ he said, ‘supposin’ all this that ’e talks about is done - what’s to become of the King, and the Royal Family, and all the Big Pots?’
 ‘’Ear, ’ear,’ cried Crass, eagerly - and Ned Dawson and the man behind the moat both said that that was what they would like to know, too.
 ‘I am much more concerned about what is to become of ourselves if these things are not done,’ replied Barrington. ‘I think we should try to cultivate a little more respect of our own families and to concern ourselves a little less about "Royal" Families. I fail to see any reason why we should worry ourselves about those people; they’re all right - they have all they need, and as far as I am aware, nobody wishes to harm them and they are well able to look after themselves. They will fare the same as the other rich people.’
 ‘I should like to ask,’ said Harlow, ‘wot’s to become of all the gold and silver and copper money? Wouldn’t it be of no use at all?’
 ‘It would be of far more use under Socialism than it is at present. The State would of course become possessed of a large quantity of it in the early stages of the development of the Socialist system, because - at first - while the State would be paying all its officers and productive workers in paper, the rest of the community - those not in State employ - would be paying their taxes in gold as at present. All travellers on the State railways - other than State employees - would pay their fares in metal money, and gold and silver would pour into the State Treasury from many other sources. The State would receive gold and silver and - for the most part - pay out paper. By the time the system of State employment was fully established, gold and silver would only be of value as metal and the State would purchase it from whoever possessed and wished to sell it - at so much per pound as raw material: instead of hiding it away in the vaults of banks, or locking it up in iron safes, we shall make use of it. Some of the gold will be manufactured into articles of jewellery, to be sold for paper money and worn by the sweethearts and wives and daughters of the workers; some of it will be beaten out into gold leaf to be used in the decoration of the houses of the citizens and of public buildings. As for the silver, it will be made into various articles of utility for domestic use. The workers will not then, as now, have to eat their food with poisonous lead or brass spoons and forks, we shall have these things of silver and if there is not enough silver we shall probably have a non-poisonous alloy of that metal.’
 ‘As far as I can make out,’ said Harlow, ‘the paper money will be just as valuable as gold and silver is now. Well, wot’s to prevent artful dodgers like old Misery and Rushton saving it up and buying and selling things with it, and so livin’ without work?’
 ‘Of course,’ said Crass, scornfully. ‘It would never do!’
 ‘That’s a very simple matter; any man who lives without doing any useful work is living on the labour of others, he is robbing others of part of the result of their labour. The object of Socialism is to stop this robbery, to make it impossible. So no one will be able to hoard up or accumulate the paper money because it will be dated, and will become worthless if it is not spent within a certain time after its issue. As for buying and selling for profit - from whom would they buy? And to whom would they sell?’
 ‘Well, they might buy some of the things the workers didn’t want, for less than the workers paid for them, and then they could sell ’em again.’
 ‘They’d have to sell them for less than the price charged at the National Stores, and if you think about it a little you’ll see that it would not be very profitable. It would be with the object of preventing any attempts at private trading that the Administration would refuse to pay compensation to private owners in a lump sum. All such compensations would be paid, as I said, in the form of a pension of so much per year.
 ‘Another very effective way to prevent private trading would be to make it a criminal offence against the well-being of the community. At present many forms of business are illegal unless you take out a licence; under Socialism no one would be allowed to trade without a licence, and no licences would be issued.’
 ‘Wouldn’t a man be allowed to save up his money if he wanted to, demanded Slyme with indignation.
 ‘There will be nothing to prevent a man going without some of the things he might have if he is foolish enough to do so, but he would never be able to save up enough to avoid doing his share of useful service. Besides, what need would there be for anyone to save? One’s old age would be provided for. No one could ever be out of employment. If one was ill the State hospitals and Medical Service would be free. As for one’s children, they would attend the State Free Schools and Colleges and when of age they would enter the State Service, their futures provided for. Can you tell us why anyone would need or wish to save?’
 Slyme couldn’t.
 ‘Are there any more questions?’ demanded Philpot.
 ‘While we are speaking of money,’ added Barrington, ‘I should like to remind you that even under the present system there are many things which cost money to maintain, that we enjoy without having to pay for directly. The public roads and pavements cost money to make and maintain and light. So do the parks, museums and bridges. But they are free to all. Under a Socialist Administration this principle will be extended - in addition to the free services we enjoy now we shall then maintain the trains and railways for the use of the public, free. And as time goes on, this method of doing business will be adopted in many other directions.’
 ‘I’ve read somewhere,’ said Harlow, ‘that whenever a Government in any country has started issuing paper money it has always led to bankruptcy. How do you know that the same thing would not happen under a Socialist Administration?’
 ‘’Ear, ’ear,’ said Crass. ‘I was just goin’ to say the same thing.’
 ‘If the Government of a country began to issue large amounts of paper money under the present system,’ Barrington replied, ‘it would inevitably lead to bankruptcy, for the simple reason that paper money under the present system - bank-notes, bank drafts, postal orders, cheques or any other form - is merely a printed promise to pay the amount - in gold or silver - on demand or at a certain date. Under the present system if a Government issues more paper money than it possesses gold and silver to redeem, it is of course bankrupt. But the paper money that will be issued under a Socialist Administration will not be a promise to pay in gold or silver on demand or at any time. It will be a promise to supply commodities to the amount specified on the note, and as there could be no dearth of those things there could be no possibility of bankruptcy.’
 ‘I should like to know who’s goin’ to appoint the hofficers of this ’ere hindustrial harmy,’ said the man on the pail. ‘We don’t want to be bullied and chivied and chased about by a lot of sergeants and corporals like a lot of soldiers, you know.’
 ‘’Ear. ’ear,’ said Crass. ‘You must ’ave some masters. Someone’s got to be in charge of the work.’
 ‘We don’t have to put up with any bullying or chivying or chasing now, do we?’ said Barrington. ‘So of course we could not have anything of that sort under Socialism. We could not put up with it at all! Even if it were only for four or five hours a day. Under the present system we have no voice in appointing our masters and overseers and foremen - we have no choice as to what master we shall work under. If our masters do not treat us fairly we have no remedy against them. Under Socialism it will be different; the workers will be part of the community; the officers or managers and foremen will be the servants of the community, and if any one of these men were to abuse his position he could be promptly removed. As for the details of the organization of the Industrial Army, the difficulty is, again, not so much to devise a way, but to decide which of many ways would be the best, and the perfect way will probably be developed only after experiment and experience. The one thing we have to hold fast to is the fundamental principle of State employment or National service. Production for use and not for profit. The national organization of industry under democratic control. One way of arranging this business would be for the community to elect a Parliament in much the same way as is done at present. The only persons eligible for election to be veterans of the industrial Army, men and women who had put in their twenty-five years of service.
 ‘This Administrative Body would have control of the different State Departments. There would be a Department of Agriculture, a Department of Railways and so on, each with its minister and staff.
 ‘All these Members of Parliament would be the relatives - in some cases the mothers and fathers of those in the Industrial Service, and they would be relied upon to see that the conditions of that service were the best possible.
 ‘As for the different branches of the State Service, they could be organized on somewhat the same lines as the different branches of the Public Service are now - like the Navy, the Post Office and as the State Railways in some other countries, or as are the different branches of the Military Army, with the difference that all promotions will be from the ranks, by examinations, and by merit only. As every recruit will have had the same class of education they will all have absolute equality of opportunity and the men who would attain to positions of authority would be the best men, and not as at present, the worst.’
 ‘How do you make that out?’ demanded Crass.
 ‘Under the present system, the men who become masters and employers succeed because they are cunning and selfish, not because they understand or are capable of doing the work out of which they make their money. Most of the employers in the building trade for instance would be incapable of doing any skilled work. Very few of them would be worth their salt as journeymen. The only work they do is to scheme to reap the benefit of the labour of others.
 ‘The men who now become managers and foremen are selected not because of their ability as craftsmen, but because they are good slave-drivers and useful producers of profit for their employers.’
 ‘How are you goin’ to prevent the selfish and cunnin’, as you call ’em, from gettin’ on top THEN as they do now?’ said Harlow.
 ‘The fact that all workers will receive the same pay, no matter what class of work they are engaged in, or what their position, will ensure our getting the very best man to do all the higher work and to organize our business.’
 Crass laughed: ‘What! Everybody to get the same wages?’
 ‘Yes: there will be such an enormous quantity of everything produced, that their wages will enable everyone to purchase abundance of everything they require. Even if some were paid more than others they would not be able to spend it. There would be no need to save it, and as there will be no starving poor, there will be no one to give it away to. If it were possible to save and accumulate money it would bring into being an idle class, living on their fellows: it would lead to the downfall of our system, and a return to the same anarchy that exists at present. Besides, if higher wages were paid to those engaged in the higher work or occupying positions of authority it would prevent our getting the best men. Unfit persons would try for the positions because of the higher pay. That is what happens now. Under the present system men intrigue for and obtain or are pitchforked into positions for which they have no natural ability at all; the only reason they desire these positions is because of the salaries attached to them. These fellows get the money and the work is done by underpaid subordinates whom the world never hears of. Under Socialism, this money incentive will be done away with, and consequently the only men who will try for these positions will be those who, being naturally fitted for the work, would like to do it. For instance a man who is a born organizer will not refuse to undertake such work because he will not be paid more for it. Such a man will desire to do it and will esteem it a privilege to be allowed to do it. He will revel in it. To think out all the details of some undertaking, to plan and scheme and organize, is not work for a man like that. It is a pleasure. But for a man who has sought and secured such a position, not because he liked the work, but because he liked the salary - such work as this would be unpleasant labour. Under Socialism the unfit man would not apply for that post but would strive after some other for which he was fit and which he would therefore desire and enjoy. There are some men who would rather have charge of and organize and be responsible for work than do it with their hands. There are others who would rather do delicate or difficult or artistic work, than plain work. A man who is a born artist would rather paint a frieze or a picture or carve a statue than he would do plain work, or take charge of and direct the labour of others. And there are another sort of men who would rather do ordinary plain work than take charge, or attempt higher branches for which they have neither liking or natural talent.
 ‘But there is one thing - a most important point that you seem to entirely lose sight of, and that is, that all these different kinds and classes are equal in one respect - THEY ARE ALL EQUALLY NECESSARY. Each is a necessary and indispensable part of the whole; therefore everyone who has done his full share of necessary work is justly entitled to a full share of the results. The men who put the slates on are just as indispensable as the men who lay the foundations. The work of the men who build the walls and make the doors is just as necessary as the work of the men who decorate the cornice. None of them would be of much use without the architect, and the plans of the architect would come to nothing, his building would be a mere castle in the air, if it were not for the other workers. Each part of the work is equally necessary, useful and indispensable if the building is to he perfected. Some of these men work harder with their brains than with their hands and some work harder with their hands than with their brains, BUT EACH ONE DOES HIS FULL SHARE OF THE WORK. This truth will be recognized and acted upon by those who build up and maintain the fabric of our Co-operative Commonwealth. Every man who does his full share of the useful and necessary work according to his abilities shall have his full share of the total result. Herein will be its great difference from the present system, under which it is possible for the cunning and selfish ones to take advantage of the simplicity of others and rob them of part of the fruits of their labour. As for those who will be engaged in the higher branches, they will be sufficiently rewarded by being privileged to do the work they are fitted for and enjoy. The only men and women who are capable of good and great work of any kind are those who, being naturally fit for it, love the work for its own sake and not for the money it brings them. Under the present system, many men who have no need of money produce great works, not for gain but for pleasure: their wealth enables them to follow their natural inclinations. Under the present system many men and women capable of great works are prevented from giving expression to their powers by poverty and lack of opportunity: they live in sorrow and die heartbroken, and the community is the loser. These are the men and women who will be our artists, sculptors, architects, engineers and captains of industry.
 ‘Under the present system there are men at the head of affairs whose only object is the accumulation of money. Some of them possess great abilities and the system has practically compelled them to employ those abilities for their own selfish ends to the hurt of the community. Some of them have built up great fortunes out of the sweat and blood and tears of men and women and little children. For those who delight in such work as this, there will be no place in our Co-operative Commonwealth.’
 ‘Is there any more questions?’ demanded Philpot.
 ‘Yes,’ said Harlow. ‘If there won’t be no extry pay and if anybody will have all they need for just doing their part of the work, what encouragement will there be for anyone to worry his brains out trying to invent some new machine, or make some new discovery?’
 ‘Well,’ said Barrington, ‘I think that’s covered by the last answer, but if it were found necessary - which is highly improbable - to offer some material reward in addition to the respect, esteem or honour that would be enjoyed by the author of an invention that was a boon to the community, it could be arranged by allowing him to retire before the expiration of his twenty-five years service. The boon he had conferred on the community by the invention, would be considered equivalent to so many years work. But a man like that would not desire to cease working; that sort go on working all their lives, for love. There’s Edison for instance. He is one of the very few inventors who have made money out of their work; he is a rich man, but the only use his wealth seems to be to him is to procure himself facilities for going on with his work; his life is a round of what some people would call painful labour: but it is not painful labour to him; it’s just pleasure, he works for the love of it. Another way would be to absolve a man of that sort from the necessity of ordinary work, so as to give him a chance to get on with other inventions. It would be to the interests of the community to encourage him in every way and to place materials and facilities at his disposal.
 ‘But you must remember that even under the present system, Honour and Praise are held to be greater than money. How many soldiers would prefer money to the honour of wearing the intrinsically valueless Victoria Cross?
 ‘Even now men think less of money than they do of the respect, esteem or honour they are able to procure with it. Many men spend the greater part of their lives striving to accumulate money, and when they have succeeded, they proceed to spend it to obtain the respect of their fellow-men. Some of them spend thousands of pounds for the honour of being able to write "MP" after their names. Others buy titles. Others pay huge sums to gain admission to exclusive circles of society. Others give the money away in charity, or found libraries or universities. The reason they do these things is that they desire to be applauded and honoured by their fellow-men.
 ‘This desire is strongest in the most capable men - the men of genius. Therefore, under Socialism the principal incentive to great work will be the same as now - Honour and Praise. But, under the present system, Honour and Praise can be bought with money, and it does not matter much how the money was obtained.
 ‘Under Socialism it will be different. The Cross of Honour and the Laurel Crown will not be bought and sold for filthy lucre. They will be the supreme rewards of Virtue and of Talent.’
 ‘Anyone else like to be flattened Out?’ inquired Philpot.
 ‘What would you do with them what spends all their money in drink?’ asked Slyme.
 ‘I might reasonably ask you, "What’s done with them or what you propose to do with them now?" There are many men and women whose lives are so full of toil and sorrow and the misery caused by abject poverty, who are so shut out from all that makes life worth living, that the time they spend in the public house is the only ray of sunshine in their cheerless lives. Their mental and material poverty is so great that they are deprived of and incapable of understanding the intellectual and social pleasures of civilization... Under Socialism there will be no such class as this. Everyone will be educated, and social life and rational pleasure will be within the reach of all. Therefore we do not believe that there will be such a class. Any individuals who abandoned themselves to such a course would be avoided by their fellows; but if they became very degraded, we should still remember that they were our brother men and women, and we should regard them as suffering from a disease inherited from their uncivilized forefathers and try to cure them by placing them under some restraint: in an institute for instance.’
 ‘Another good way to deal with ’em,’ said Harlow, ‘would be to allow them double pay, so as they could drink themselves to death. We could do without the likes of them.’
 ‘Call the next case,’ said Philpot.
 ‘This ’ere abundance that you’re always talking about,’ said Crass, you can’t be sure that it would be possible to produce all that. You’re only assoomin’ that it could be done.’
 Barrington pointed to the still visible outlines of the ‘Hoblong’ that Owen had drawn on the wall to illustrate a previous lecture.
 ‘Even under the present silly system of restricted production, with the majority of the population engaged in useless, unproductive, unnecessary work, and large numbers never doing any work at all, there is enough produced to go all round after a fashion. More than enough, for in consequence of what they call "Over-Production", the markets are periodically glutted with commodities of all kinds, and then for a time the factories are closed and production ceases. And yet we can all manage to exist - after a fashion. This proves that if productive industry were organized on the lines advocated by Socialists there could be produced such a prodigious quantity of everything, that everyone could live in plenty and comfort. The problem of how to produce sufficient for all to enjoy abundance is already solved: the problem that then remains is - How to get rid of those whose greed and callous indifference to the sufferings of others, prevents it being done.’
 ‘Yes! and you’ll never be able to get rid of ’em, mate,’ cried Crass, triumphantly - and the man with the copper wire stitches in his boot said that it couldn’t be done.
 ‘Well, we mean to have a good try, anyhow,’ said Barrington.
 Crass and most of the others tried hard to think of something to say in defence of the existing state of affairs, or against the proposals put forward by the lecturer; but finding nothing, they maintained a sullen and gloomy silence. The man with the copper wire stitches in his boot in particular appeared to be very much upset; perhaps he was afraid that if the things advocated by the speaker ever came to pass he would not have any boots at all. To assume that he had some such thought as this, is the only rational way to account for his hostility, for in his case no change could have been for the worse unless it reduced him to almost absolute nakedness and starvation.
 To judge by their unwillingness to consider any proposals to alter the present system, one might have supposed that they were afraid of losing something, instead of having nothing to lose - except their poverty.
 It was not till the chairman had made several urgent appeals for more questions that Crass brightened up: a glad smile slowly spread over and illuminated his greasy visage: he had at last thought of a most serious and insurmountable obstacle to the establishment of the Co-operative Commonwealth.
 ‘What,’ he demanded, in a loud voice, ‘what are you goin’ to do, in this ’ere Socialist Republic of yours, with them wot WON’T WORK’!"
 As Crass flung this bombshell into the Socialist camp, the miserable, ragged-trousered crew around him could scarce forbear a cheer; but the more intelligent part of the audience only laughed.
 ‘We don’t believe that there will be any such people as that,’ said Barrington.
 ‘There’s plenty of ’em about now, anyway,’ sneered Crass.
 ‘You can’t change ’uman nature, you know,’ cried the man behind the moat, and the one who had the copper wire stitches in his boot laughed scornfully.
 ‘Yes, I know there are plenty such now,’ rejoined Barrington. ‘It’s only what is to be expected, considering that practically all workers live in poverty, and are regarded with contempt. The conditions under which most of the work is done at present are so unpleasant and degrading that everyone refuses to do any unless they are compelled; none of us here, for instance, would continue to work for Rushton if it were not for the fact that we have either to do so or starve; and when we do work we only just earn enough to keep body and soul together. Under the present system everybody who can possibly manage to do so avoids doing any work, the only difference being that some people do their loafing better than others. The aristocracy are too lazy to work, but they seem to get on all right; they have their tenants to work for them. Rushton is too lazy to work, so he has arranged that we and Nimrod shall work instead, and he fares much better than any of us who do work. Then there is another kind of loafers who go about begging and occasionally starving rather than submit to such abominable conditions as are offered to them. These last are generally not much worse off than we are and they are often better off. At present, people have everything to gain and but little to lose by refusing to work. Under Socialism it would be just the reverse; the conditions of labour would be so pleasant, the hours of obligatory work so few, and the reward so great, that it is absurd to imagine that any one would be so foolish as to incur the contempt of his fellows and make himself a social outcast by refusing to do the small share of work demanded of him by the community of which he was a member.
 ‘As for what we should do to such individuals if there did happen to be some, I can assure you that we would not treat them as you treat them now. We would not dress them up in silk and satin and broadcloth and fine linen: we would not embellish them, as you do, with jewels of gold and jewels of silver and with precious stones; neither should we allow them to fare sumptuously every day. Our method of dealing with them would be quite different from yours. In the Co-operative Commonwealth there will be no place for loafers; whether they call themselves aristocrats or tramps, those who are too lazy to work shall have no share in the things that are produced by the labour of others. Those who do nothing shall have nothing. If any man will not work, neither shall he eat. Under the present system a man who is really too lazy to work may stop you in the street and tell you that he cannot get employment. For all you know, he may be telling the truth, and if you have any feeling and are able, you will help him. But in the Socialist State no one would have such an excuse, because everyone that was willing would be welcome to come and help in the work of producing wealth and happiness for all, and afterwards he would also be welcome to his full share of the results.’
 ‘Any more complaints?’ inquired the chairman, breaking the gloomy silence that followed.
 ‘I don’t want anyone to think that I am blaming any of these present-day loafers,’ Barrington added. ‘The wealthy ones cannot be expected voluntarily to come and work under existing conditions and if they were to do so they would be doing more harm than good - they would be doing some poor wretches out of employment. They are not to be blamed; the people who are to blame are the working classes themselves, who demand and vote for the continuance of the present system. As for the other class of loafers - those at the bottom, the tramps and people of that sort, if they were to become sober and industrious tomorrow, they also would be doing more harm than good to the other workers; it would increase the competition for work. If all the loafers in Mugsborough could suddenly be transformed into decent house painters next week, Nimrod might be able to cut down the wages another penny an hour. I don’t wish to speak disrespectfully of these tramps at all. Some of them are such simply because they would rather starve than submit to the degrading conditions that we submit to, they do not see the force of being bullied and chased, and driven about in order to gain semi-starvation and rags. They are able to get those without working; and I sometimes think that they are more worthy of respect and are altogether a nobler type of beings than a lot of broken-spirited wretches like ourselves, who are always at the mercy of our masters, and always in dread of the sack.’
 ‘Any more questions?’ said the chairman.
 ‘Do you mean to say as the time will ever come when the gentry will mix up on equal terms with the likes of us?’ demanded the man behind the moat, scornfully.
 ‘Oh, no,’ replied the lecturer. When we get Socialism there won’t be any people like us. Everybody will be civilized.’
 The man behind the moat did not seem very satisfied with this answer, and told the others that he could not see anything to laugh at.
 ‘Is there any more questions?’ cried Philpot. ‘Now is your chance to get some of your own back, but don’t hall speak at once.’
 ‘I should like to know who’s goin’ to do all the dirty work?’ said Slyme. ‘If everyone is to be allowed to choose ’is own trade, who’d be fool enough to choose to be a scavenger, a sweep, a dustman or a sewer man? nobody wouldn’t want to do such jobs as them and everyone would be after the soft jobs.’
 ‘Of course,’ cried Crass, eagerly clutching at this last straw. ‘The thing sounds all right till you comes to look into it, but it wouldn’t never work!’
 ‘It would be very easy to deal with any difficulty of that sort,’ replied Barrington, ‘if it were found that too many people were desirous of pursuing certain callings, it would be known that the conditions attached to those kinds of work were unfairly easy, as compared with other lines, so the conditions in those trades would be made more severe. A higher degree of skill would be required. If we found that too many persons wished to be doctors, architects, engineers and so forth, we would increase the severity of the examinations. This would scare away all but the most gifted and enthusiastic. We should thus at one stroke reduce the number of applicants and secure the very best men for the work - we should have better doctors, better architects, better engineers than before.
 ‘As regards those disagreeable tasks for which there was a difficulty in obtaining volunteers, we should adopt the opposite means. Suppose that six hours was the general thing; and we found that we could not get any sewer men; we should reduce the hours of labour in that department to four, or if necessary to two, in order to compensate for the disagreeable nature of the work.
 ‘Another way out of such difficulties would be to have a separate division of the Industrial army to do all such work, and to make it obligatory for every man to put in his first year of State service as a member of this corps. There would be no hardship in that. Everyone gets the benefit of such work; there would be no injustice in requiring everyone to share. This would have the effect also of stimulating invention; it would be to everyone’s interest to think out means of doing away with such kinds of work and there is no doubt that most of it will be done by machinery in some way or other. A few years ago the only way to light up the streets of a town was to go round to each separate gas lamp and light each jet, one at a time: now, we press a few buttons and light up the town with electricity. In the future we shall probably be able to press a button and flush the sewers.’
 ‘What about religion?’ said Slyme. ‘I suppose there won’t be no churches nor chapels; we shall all have to be atheists.’
 ‘Everybody will be perfectly free to enjoy their own opinions and to practise any religion they like; but no religion or sect will be maintained by the State. If any congregation or body of people wish to have a building for their own exclusive use as a church or chapel or lecture hall it will be supplied to them by the State on the same terms as those upon which dwelling houses will be supplied; the State will construct the special kind of building and the congregation will have to pay the rent, the amount to be based on the cost of construction, in paper money of course. As far as the embellishment or decoration of such places is concerned, there will of course be nothing to prevent the members of the congregation if they wish from doing any such work as that themselves in their own spare time of which they will have plenty.’
 ‘If everybody’s got to do their share of work, where’s the minister and clergymen to come from?’
 ‘There are at least three ways out of that difficulty. First, ministers of religion could be drawn from the ranks of the Veterans - men over forty-five years old who had completed their term of State service. You must remember that these will not be worn out wrecks, as too many of the working classes are at that age now. They will have had good food and clothing and good general conditions all their lives; and consequently they will be in the very prime of life. They will be younger than many of us now are at thirty; they will be ideal men for the positions we are speaking of. All well educated in their youth, and all will have had plenty of leisure for self culture during the years of their State service and they will have the additional recommendation that their congregation will not be required to pay anything for their services.
 ‘Another way: If a congregation wished to retain the full-time services of a young man whom they thought specially gifted but who had not completed his term of State service, they could secure him by paying the State for his services; thus the young man would still remain in State employment, he would still continue to receive his pay from the National Treasury, and at the age of forty-five would be entitled to his pension like any other worker, and after that the congregation would not have to pay the State anything.
 ‘A third - and as it seems to me, the most respectable way - would be for the individual in question to act as minister or pastor or lecturer or whatever it was, to the congregation without seeking to get out of doing his share of the State service. The hours of obligatory work would be so short and the work so light that he would have abundance of leisure to prepare his orations without sponging on his co-religionists.’
 ‘’Ear, ’ear!’ cried Harlow.
 ‘Of course,’ added Barrington, ‘it would not only be congregations of Christians who could adopt any of these methods. It is possible that a congregation of agnostics, for instance, might want a separate building or to maintain a lecturer.’
 ‘What the ’ell’s an agnostic?’ demanded Bundy.
 ‘An agnostic,’ said the man behind the moat, ‘is a bloke wot don’t believe nothing unless ’e see it with ’is own eyes.’
 ‘All these details,’ continued the speaker, ‘of the organization of affairs and the work of the Co-operative Commonwealth, are things which do not concern us at all. They have merely been suggested by different individuals as showing some ways in which these things could be arranged. The exact methods to be adopted will be decided upon by the opinion of the majority when the work is being done. Meantime, what we have to do is to insist upon the duty of the State to provide productive work for the unemployed, the State feeding of schoolchildren, the nationalization or Socialization of Railways; Land; the Trusts, and all public services that are still in the hands of private companies. If you wish to see these things done, you must cease from voting for Liberal and Tory sweaters, shareholders of companies, lawyers, aristocrats, and capitalists; and you must fill the House of Commons with Revolutionary Socialists. That is - with men who are in favour of completely changing the present system. And in the day that you do that, you will have solved the poverty "problem". No more tramping the streets begging for a job! No more hungry children at home. No more broken boots and ragged clothes. No more women and children killing themselves with painful labour whilst strong men stand idly by; but joyous work and joyous leisure for all.’
 ‘Is there any more questions?’ cried Philpot.
 ‘Is it true,’ said Easton, ‘that Socialists intend to do away with the Army and Navy?’
 ‘Yes; it is true. Socialists believe in International Brotherhood and peace. Nearly all wars are caused by profit-seeking capitalists, seeking new fields for commercial exploitation, and by aristocrats who make it the means of glorifying themselves in the eyes of the deluded common people. You must remember that Socialism is not only a national, but an international movement and when it is realized, there will be no possibility of war, and we shall no longer seed to maintain an army and navy, or to waste a lot of labour building warships or manufacturing arms and ammunition. All those people who are now employed will then be at liberty to assist in the great work of producing the benefits of civilization; creating wealth and knowledge and happiness for themselves and others - Socialism means Peace on earth and goodwill to all mankind. But in the meantime we know that the people of other nations are not yet all Socialists; we do not forget that in foreign countries - just the same as in Britain - there are large numbers of profit seeking capitalists, who are so destitute of humanity, that if they thought it could be done successfully and with profit to themselves they would not scruple to come here to murder and to rob. We do not forget that in foreign countries - the same as here - there are plenty of so-called "Christian" bishops and priests always ready to give their benediction to any such murderous projects, and to blasphemously pray to the Supreme Being to help his children to slay each other like wild beasts. And knowing and remembering all this, we realize that until we have done away with capitalism, aristocracy and anti-Christian clericalism, it is our duty to be prepared to defend our homes and our native land. And therefore we are in favour of maintaining national defensive forces in the highest possible state of efficiency. But that does not mean that we are in favour of the present system of organizing those forces. We do not believe in conscription, and we do not believe that the nation should continue to maintain a professional standing army to be used at home for the purpose of butchering men and women of the working classes in the interests of a handful of capitalists, as has been done at Featherstone and Belfast; or to be used abroad to murder and rob the people of other nations. Socialists advocate the establishment of a National Citizen Army, for defensive purposes only. We believe that every able bodied man should be compelled to belong to this force and to undergo a course of military training, but without making him into a professional soldier, or taking him away from civil life, depriving him of the rights of citizenship or making him subject to military "law" which is only another name for tyranny and despotism. This Citizen Army could be organized on somewhat similar lines to the present Territorial Force, with certain differences. For instance, we do not believe - as our present rulers do - that wealth and aristocratic influence are the two most essential qualifications for an efficient officer; we believe that all ranks should be attainable by any man, no matter how poor, who is capable of passing the necessary examinations, and that there should be no expense attached to those positions which the Government grant, or the pay, is not sufficient to cover. The officers could be appointed in any one of several ways: They might be elected by the men they would have to command, the only qualification required being that they had passed their examinations, or they might be appointed according to merit - the candidate obtaining the highest number of marks at the examinations to have the first call on any vacant post, and so on in order of merit. We believe in the total abolition of courts martial, any offence against discipline should be punishable by the ordinary civil law - no member of the Citizen Army being deprived of the rights of a citizen.’
 ‘What about the Navy?’ cried several voices.
 ‘Nobody wants to interfere with the Navy except to make its organization more democratic - the same as that of the Citizen Army - and to protect its members from tyranny by entitling them to be tried in a civil court for any alleged offence.
 ‘It has been proved that if the soil of this country were scientifically cultivated, it is capable of producing sufficient to maintain a population of a hundred millions of people. Our present population is only about forty millions, but so long as the land remains in the possession of persons who refuse to allow it to be cultivated we shall continue to be dependent on other countries for our food supply. So long as we are in that position, and so long as foreign countries are governed by Liberal and Tory capitalists, we shall need the Navy to protect our overseas commerce from them. If we had a Citizen Army such as I have mentioned, of nine or ten millions of men and if the land of this country was properly cultivated, we should be invincible at home. No foreign power would ever be mad enough to attempt to land their forces on our shores. But they would now be able to starve us all to death in a month if it were not for the Navy. It’s a sensible and creditable position, isn’t it?’ concluded Barrington. ‘Even in times of peace, thousands of people standing idle and tamely starving in their own fertile country, because a few land "Lords" forbid them to cultivate it.’
 ‘Is there any more questions?’ demanded Philpot, breaking a prolonged silence.
 ‘Would any Liberal or Tory capitalist like to get up into the pulpit and oppose the speaker?’ the chairman went on, finding that no one responded to his appeal for questions.
 The silence continued.
 ‘As there’s no more questions and no one won’t get up into the pulpit, it is now my painful duty to call upon someone to move a resolution.’
 ‘Well, Mr Chairman,’ said Harlow, ‘I may say that when I came on this firm I was a Liberal, but through listenin’ to several lectures by Professor Owen and attendin’ the meetings on the hill at Windley and reading the books and pamphlets I bought there and from Owen, I came to the conclusion some time ago that it’s a mug’s game for us to vote for capitalists whether they calls theirselves Liberals or Tories. They’re all alike when you’re workin’ for ’em; I defy any man to say what’s the difference between a Liberal and a Tory employer. There is none - there can’t be; they’re both sweaters, and they’ve got to be, or they wouldn’t be able to compete with each other. And since that’s what they are, I say it’s a mug’s game for us to vote ’em into Parliament to rule over us and to make laws that we’ve got to abide by whether we like it or not . There’s nothing to choose between ’em, and the proof of it is that it’s never made much difference to us which party was in or which was out. It’s quite true that in the past both of ’em have passed good laws, but they’ve only done it when public opinion was so strong in favour of it that they knew there was no getting out of it, and then it was a toss up which side did it.
 ‘That’s the way I’ve been lookin’ at things lately, and I’d almost made up my mind never to vote no more, or to trouble myself about politics at all, because although I could see there was no sense in voting for Liberal or Tory capitalists, at the same time I must admit I couldn’t make out how Socialism was going to help us. But the explanation of it which Professor Barrington has given us this afternoon has been a bit of an eye opener for me, and with your permission I should like to move as a resolution, "That it is the opinion of this meeting that Socialism is the only remedy for Unemployment and Poverty."’
 The conclusion of Harlow’s address was greeted with loud cheers from the Socialists, but most of the Liberal and Tory supporters of the present system maintained a sulky silence.
 ‘I’ll second that resolution,’ said Easton.
 ‘And I’ll lay a bob both ways,’ remarked Bundy. The resolution was then put, and though the majority were against it, the Chairman declared it was carried unanimously.
 By this time the violence of the storm had in a great measure abated, but as rain was still falling it was decided not to attempt to resume work that day. Besides, it would have been too late, even if the weather had cleared up.
 ‘P’raps it’s just as well it ’as rained,’ remarked one man. ‘If it ’adn’t some of us might ’ave got the sack tonight. As it is, there’ll be hardly enough for all of us to do tomorrer and Saturday mornin’ even if it is fine.’
 This was true: nearly all the outside was finished, and what remained to be done was ready for the final coat. Inside all there was to do was to colour wash the walls and to give the woodwork of the kitchen and scullery the last coat of paint.
 It was inevitable - unless the firm had some other work for them to do somewhere else - that there would be a great slaughter on Saturday.
 ‘Now,’ said Philpot, assuming what he meant to be the manner of a school teacher addressing children, ‘I wants you hall to make a speshall heffort and get ’ere very early in the mornin’ - say about four o’clock - and them wot doos the most work tomorrer, will get a prize on Saturday.’
 ‘What’ll it be, the sack?’ inquired Harlow.
 ‘Yes,’ replied Philpot, ‘and not honly will you get a prize for good conduck tomorrer, but if you all keep on workin’ like we’ve bin doing lately till you’re too hold and wore hout to do. any more, you’ll be allowed to go to a nice workhouse for the rest of your lives! and each one of you will be given a title - "Pauper!"’
 And they laughed!
 Although the majority of them had mothers or fathers or other near relatives who had already succeeded to the title - they laughed!
 As they were going home, Crass paused at the gate, and pointing up to the large gable at the end of the house, he said to Philpot:
 ‘You’ll want the longest ladder - the 65, for that, tomorrow.’
 Philpot looked up at the gable.
 It was very high.
 
 Chapter 46
 The ‘Sixty-five’
  The next morning after breakfast, Philpot, Sawkins, Harlow and Barrington went to the Yard to get the long ladder - the 65 - so called because it had sixty-five rungs. It was really what is known as a builder’s scaffold ladder, and it had been strengthened by several iron bolts or rods which passed through just under some of the rungs. One side of the ladder had an iron band or ribbon twisted and nailed round it spirally. It was not at all suitable for painters’ work, being altogether too heavy and cumbrous. However, as none of the others were long enough to reach the high gable at the Refuge, they managed, with a struggle, to get it down from the hooks and put it on one of the handcarts and soon passed through the streets of mean and dingy houses in the vicinity of the yard, and began the ascent of the long hill.
 There had been a lot of rain during the night, and the sky was still overcast with dark grey clouds. The cart went heavily over the muddy road; Sawkins was at the helm, holding the end of the ladder and steering; the others walked a little further ahead, at the sides of the cart.
 It was such hard work that by the time they were half-way up the hill they were so exhausted and out of breath that they had to stop for a rest.
 ‘This is a bit of all right, ain’t it?’ remarked Harlow as he took off his cap and wiped the sweat from his forehead with his handkerchief.
 While they rested they kept a good look out for Rushton or Hunter, who were likely to pass by at any moment.
 At first, no one made any reply to Harlow’s observation, for they were all out of breath and Philpot’s lean fingers trembled violently as he wiped the perspiration from his face.
 ‘Yes, mate,’ he said despondently, after a while. ‘It’s one way of gettin’ a livin’ and there’s plenty better ways.’
 In addition to the fact that his rheumatism was exceptionally bad, he felt unusually low-spirited this morning; the gloomy weather and the prospect of a long day of ladder work probably had something to do with it.
 ‘A "living" is right,’ said Barrington bitterly. He also was exhausted with the struggle up the hill and enraged by the woebegone appearance of poor old Philpot, who was panting and quivering from the exertion.
 They relapsed into silence. The unaccountable depression that possessed Philpot deprived him of all his usual jocularity and filled him with melancholy thoughts. He had travelled up and down this hill a great many times before under similar circumstances and he said to himself that if he had half a quid now for every time he had pushed a cart up this road, he wouldn’t need to do anyone out of a job all the rest of his life.
 The shop where he had been apprenticed used to be just down at the bottom; the place had been pulled down years ago, and the ground was now occupied by more pretentious buildings. Not quite so far down the road - on the other side - he could see the church where he used to attend Sunday School when he was a boy, and where he was married just thirty years ago. Presently - when they reached the top of the hill - he would be able to look across the valley and see the spire of the other church, the one in the graveyard, where all those who were dear to him had been one by one laid to rest. He felt that he would not be sorry when the time came to join them there. Possibly, in the next world - if there were such a place - they might all be together once more.
 He was suddenly aroused from these thoughts by an exclamation from Harlow.
 ‘Look out! Here comes Rushton.’
 They immediately resumed their journey. Rushton was coming up the hill in his dog-cart with Grinder sitting by his side. They passed so closely that Philpot - who was on that side of the cart - was splashed with mud from the wheels of the trap.
 ‘Them’s some of your chaps, ain’t they?’ remarked Grinder.
 ‘Yes,’ replied Rushton. ‘We’re doing a job up this way.’
 ‘I should ’ave thought it would pay you better to use a ’orse for sich work as that,’ said Grinder.
 ‘We do use the horses whenever it’s necessary for very big loads, you know,’ answered Rushton, and added with a laugh: ‘But the donkeys are quite strong enough for such a job as that.’
 The ‘donkeys’ struggled on up the hill for about another hundred yards and then they were forced to halt again.
 ‘We mustn’t stop long, you know,’ said Harlow. ‘Most likely he’s gone to the job, and he’ll wait to see how long it takes us to get there.’
 Barrington felt inclined to say that in that case Rushton would have to wait, but he remained silent, for he remembered that although he personally did not care a brass button whether he got the sack or not, the others were not so fortunately circumstanced.
 While they were resting, another two-legged donkey passed by pushing another cart - or rather, holding it back, for he was coming slowly down the hill. Another Heir of all the ages - another Imperialist - a degraded, brutalized wretch, clad in filthy, stinking rags, his toes protruding from the rotten broken boots that were tied with bits of string upon his stockingless feet. The ramshackle cart was loaded with empty bottles and putrid rags, heaped loosely in the cart and packed into a large sack. Old coats and trousers, dresses, petticoats, and under-clothing, greasy, mildewed and malodorous. As he crept along with his eyes on the ground, the man gave utterance at intervals to uncouth, inarticulate sounds.
 ‘That’s another way of gettin’ a livin’,’ said Sawkins with a laugh as the miserable creature slunk past.
 Harlow also laughed, and Barrington regarded them curiously. He thought it strange that they did not seem to realize that they might some day become like this man themselves.
 ‘I’ve often wondered what they does with all them dirty old rags,’ said Philpot.
 ‘Made into paper,’ replied Harlow, briefly.
 ‘Some of them are,’ said Barrington, ‘and some are manufactured into shoddy cloth and made into Sunday clothes for working men.
 ‘There’s all sorts of different ways of gettin’ a livin’,’ remarked Sawkins, after a pause. ‘I read in a paper the other day about a bloke wot goes about lookin’ for open trap doors and cellar flaps in front of shops. As soon as he spotted one open, he used to go and fall down in it; and then he’d be took to the ’orspital, and when he got better he used to go and threaten to bring a action against the shop-keeper and get damages, and most of ’em used to part up without goin’ in front of the judge at all. But one day a slop was a watchin’ of ’im, and seen ’im chuck ’isself down one, and when they picked ’im up they found he’d broke his leg. So they took ’im to the ’orspital and when he came out and went round to the shop and started talkin’ about bringin’ a action for damages, the slop collared ’im and they give ’im six months.’
 ‘Yes, I read about that,’ said Harlow, ‘and there was another case of a chap who was run over by a motor, and they tried to make out as ’e put ’isself in the way on purpose; but ’e got some money out of the swell it belonged to; a ’undered pound I think it was.’
 ‘I only wish as one of their motors would run inter me,’ said Philpot, making a feeble attempt at a joke. ‘I lay I’d get some a’ me own back out of ’em.’
 The others laughed, and Harlow was about to make some reply but at that moment a cyclist appeared coming down the hill from the direction of the job. It was Nimrod, so they resumed their journey once more and presently Hunter shot past on his machine without taking any notice of them...
 When they arrived they found that Rushton had not been there at all, but Nimrod had. Crass said that he had kicked up no end of a row because they had not called at the yard at six o’clock that morning for the ladder, instead of going for it after breakfast - making two journeys instead of one, and he had also been ratty because the big gable had not been started the first thing that morning.
 They carried the ladder into the garden and laid it on the ground along the side of the house where the gable was. A brick wall about eight feet high separated the grounds of ‘The Refuge’ from those of the premises next door. Between this wall and the side wall of the house was a space about six feet wide and this space formed a kind of alley or lane or passage along the side of the house. They laid the ladder on the ground along this passage, the ‘foot’ was placed about half-way through; just under the centre of the gable, and as it lay there, the other end of the ladder reached right out to the front railings.
 Next, it was necessary that two men should go up into the attic - the window of which was just under the point of the gable - and drop the end of a long rope down to the others who would tie it to the top of the ladder. Then two men would stand on the bottom rung, so as to keep the ‘foot’ down, and the three others would have to raise the ladder up, while the two men up in the attic hauled on the rope.
 They called Bundy and his mate Ned Dawson to help, and it was arranged that Harlow and Crass should stand on the foot because they were the heaviest. Philpot, Bundy, and Barrington were to ‘raise’, and Dawson and Sawkins were to go up to the attic and haul on the rope.
 ‘Where’s the rope?’ asked Crass.
 The others looked blankly at him. None of them had thought of bringing one from the yard.
 ‘Why, ain’t there one ’ere?’ asked Philpot.
 ‘One ’ere? Of course there ain’t one ’ere!’ snarled Crass. ‘Do you mean to say as you ain’t brought one, then?’
 Philpot stammered out something about having thought there was one at the house already, and the others said they had not thought about it at all.
 ‘Well, what the bloody hell are we to do now?’ cried Crass, angrily.
 ‘I’ll go to the yard and get one,’ suggested Barrington. ‘I can do it in twenty minutes there and back.’
 ‘Yes! and a bloody fine row there’d be if Hunter was to see you! ’Ere it’s nearly ten o’clock and we ain’t made a start on this gable wot we ought to ’ave started first thing this morning.’
 ‘Couldn’t we tie two or three of those short ropes together?’ suggested Philpot. ‘Those that the other two ladders was spliced with?’
 As there was sure to be a row if they delayed long enough to send to the yard, it was decided to act on Philpot’s suggestion.
 Several of the short ropes were accordingly tied together but upon examination it was found that some parts were so weak that even Crass had to admit it would be dangerous to attempt to haul the heavy ladder up with them.
 ‘Well, the only thing as I can see for it,’ he said, ‘is that the boy will ’ave to go down to the yard and get the long rope. It won’t do for anyone else to go: there’s been one row already about the waste of time because we didn’t call at the yard for the ladder at six o’clock.’
 Bert was down in the basement of the house limewashing a cellar. Crass called him up and gave him the necessary instructions, chief of which was to get back again as soon as ever he could. The boy ran off, and while they were waiting for him to come back the others went on with their several jobs. Philpot returned to the small gable he had been painting before breakfast, which he had not quite finished. As he worked a sudden and unaccountable terror took possession of him. He did not want to do that other gable; he felt too ill; and he almost resolved that he would ask Crass if he would mind letting him do something else. There were several younger men who would not object to doing it - it would be mere child’s play to them, and Barrington had already - yesterday - offered to change jobs with him.
 But then, when he thought of what the probable consequences would be, he hesitated to take that course, and tried to persuade himself that he would be able to get through with the work all right. He did not want Crass or Hunter to mark him as being too old for ladder work.
 Bert came back in about half an hour flushed and sweating with the weight of the rope and with the speed he had made. He delivered it to Crass and then returned to his cellar and went on with the limewashing, while Crass passed the word for Philpot and the others to come and raise the ladder. He handed the rope to Ned Dawson, who took it up to the attic, accompanied by Sawkins; arrived there they lowered one end out of the window down to the others.
 ‘If you ask me,’ said Ned Dawson, who was critically examining the strands of the rope as he passed it out through the open window, ’If you ask me, I don’t see as this is much better than the one we made up by tyin’ the short pieces together. Look ’ere,’ - he indicated a part of the rope that was very frayed and worn - ‘and ’ere’s another place just as bad.’
 ‘Well, for Christ’s sake don’t say nothing about it now,’ replied Sawkins. ‘There’s been enough talk and waste of time over this job already.’
 Ned made no answer and the end having by this time reached the ground, Bundy made it fast to the ladder, about six rungs from the top.
 The ladder was lying on the ground, parallel to the side of the house. The task of raising it would have been much easier if they had been able to lay it at right angles to the house wall, but this was impossible because of the premises next door and the garden wall between the two houses. On account of its having to be raised in this manner the men at the top would not be able to get a straight pull on the rope; they would have to stand back in the room without being able to see the ladder, and the rope would have to be drawn round the corner of the window, rasping against the edge of the stone sill and the brickwork.
 The end of the rope having been made fast to the top of the ladder, Crass and Harlow stood on the foot and the other three raised the top from the ground; as Barrington was the tallest, he took the middle position - underneath the ladder - grasping the rungs, Philpot being on his left and Bundy on his right, each holding one side of the ladder.
 At a signal from Crass, Dawson and Sawkins began to haul on the rope, and the top of the ladder began to use slowly into the air.
 Philpot was not of much use at this work, which made it all the harder for the other two who were lifting, besides putting an extra strain on the rope. His lack of strength, and the efforts of Barrington and Bundy to make up for him caused the ladder to sway from side to side, as it would not have done if they had all been equally capable.
 Meanwhile, upstairs, Dawson and Sawkins - although the ladder was as yet only a little more than half the way up - noticed, as they hauled and strained on the rope, that it had worn a groove for itself in the corner of the brickwork at the side of the window; and every now and then, although they pulled with all their strength, they were not able to draw in any part of the rope at all; and it seemed to them as if those others down below must have let go their hold altogether, or ceased lifting.
 That was what actually happened. The three men found the weight so overpowering, that once or twice they were compelled to relax their efforts for a few seconds, and at those times the rope had to carry the whole weight of the ladder; and the part of the rope that had to bear the greatest strain was the part that chanced to be at the angle of the brickwork at the side of the window. And presently it happened that one of the frayed and worn places that Dawson had remarked about was just at the angle during one of those momentary pauses. On one end there hung the ponderous ladder, straining the frayed rope against the corner of the brickwork and the sharp edge of the stone sill, at the other end were Dawson and Sawkins pulling with all their strength, and in that instant the rope snapped like a piece of thread. One end remained in the hands of Sawkins and Dawson, who reeled backwards into the room, and the other end flew up into the air, writhing like the lash of a gigantic whip. For a moment the heavy ladder swayed from side to side: Barrington, standing underneath, with his hands raised above his head grasping one of the rungs, struggled desperately to hold it up. At his right stood Bundy, also with arms upraised holding the side; and on the left, between the ladder and the wall, was Philpot.
 For a brief space they strove fiercely to support the overpowering weight, but Philpot had no strength, and the ladder, swaying over to the left, crashed down, crushing him upon the ground and against the wall of the house. He fell face downwards, with the ladder across his shoulders; the side that had the iron bands twisted round it fell across the back of his neck, forcing his face against the bricks at the base of the wall. He uttered no cry and was quite still, with blood streaming from the cuts on his face and trickling from his ears.
 Barrington was also hurled to the ground with his head and arms under the ladder; his head and face were cut and bleeding and he was unconscious; none of the others was hurt, for they had all had time to jump clear when the ladder fell. Their shouts soon brought all the other men running to the spot, and the ladder was quickly lifted off the two motionless figures. At first it seemed that Philpot was dead, but Easton rushed off for a neighbouring doctor, who came in a few minutes.
 He knelt down and carefully examined the crushed and motionless form of Philpot, while the other men stood by in terrified silence.
 Barrington, who fortunately was but momentarily stunned was sitting against the wall and had suffered nothing more serious than minor cuts and bruises.
 The doctor’s examination of Philpot was a very brief one, and when he rose from his knees, even before he spoke they knew from his manner that their worst fears were realized.
 Philpot was dead.
 
 Chapter 47
 The Ghouls
  Barrington did not do any more work that day, but before going home he went to the doctor’s house and the latter dressed the cuts on his head and arms. Philpot’s body was taken away on the ambulance to the mortuary.
 Hunter arrived at the house shortly afterwards and at once began to shout and bully because the painting of the gable was not yet commenced. When he heard of the accident he blamed them for using the rope, and said they should have asked for a new one. Before he went away he had a long, private conversation with Crass, who told him that Philpot had no relatives and that his life was insured for ten pounds in a society of which Crass was also a member. He knew that Philpot had arranged that in the event of his death the money was to be paid to the old woman with whom he lodged, who was a very close friend. The result of this confidential talk was that Crass and Hunter came to the conclusion that it was probable that she would be very glad to be relieved of the trouble of attending to the business of the funeral, and that Crass, as a close friend of the dead man, and a fellow member of the society, was the most suitable person to take charge of the business for her. He was already slightly acquainted with the old lady, so he would go to see her at once and get her authority to act on her behalf. Of course, they would not be able to do much until after the inquest, but they could get the coffin made - as Hunter knew the mortuary keeper there would be no difficulty about getting in for a minute to measure the corpse.
 This matter having been arranged, Hunter departed to order a new rope, and shortly afterwards Crass - having made sure that everyone would have plenty to do while he was gone - quietly slipped away to go to see Philpot’s landlady. He went off so secretly that the men did not know that he had been away at all until they saw him come back just before twelve o’clock.
 The new rope was brought to the house about one o’clock and this time the ladder was raised without any mishap. Harlow was put on to paint the gable, and he felt so nervous that he was allowed to have Sawkins to stand by and hold the ladder all the time. Everyone felt nervous that afternoon, and they all went about their work in an unusually careful manner.
 When Bert had finished limewashing the cellar, Crass set him to work outside, painting the gate of the side entrance. While the boy was thus occupied he was accosted by a solemn-looking man who asked him about the accident. The solemn stranger was very sympathetic and inquired what was the name of the man who had been killed, and whether he was married. Bert informed him that Philpot was a widower, and that he had no children.
 ‘Ah, well, that’s so much the better, isn’t it?’ said the stranger shaking his head mournfully. ‘It’s a dreadful thing, you know, when there’s children left unprovided for. You don’t happen to know where he lived, do you?’
 ‘Yes,’ said Bert, mentioning the address and beginning to wonder what the solemn man wanted to know for, and why he appeared to be so sorry for Philpot since it was quite evident that he had never known him.
 ‘Thanks very much,’ said the man, pulling out his pocket-book and making a note of it. ‘Thanks very much indeed. Good afternoon,’ and he hurried off.
 ‘Good afternoon, sir,’ said Bert and he turned to resume his work. Crass came along the garden just as the mysterious stranger was disappearing round the corner.
 ‘What did HE want?’ said Crass, who had seen the man talking to Bert.
 ‘I don’t know exactly; he was asking about the accident, and whether Joe left any children, and where he lived. He must be a very decent sort of chap, I should think. He seems quite sorry about it.’
 ‘Oh, he does, does he?’ said Crass, with a peculiar expression. ‘Don’t you know who he is?’
 ‘No,’ replied the boy; ‘but I thought p’raps he was a reporter of some paper.
 ‘’E ain’t no reporter: that’s old Snatchum the undertaker. ’E’s smellin’ round after a job; but ’e’s out of it this time, smart as ’e thinks ’e is.’
 Barrington came back the next morning to work, and at breakfast-time there was a lot of talk about the accident. They said that it was all very well for Hunter to talk like that about the rope, but he had known for a long time that it was nearly worn out. Newman said that only about three weeks previously when they were raising a ladder at another job he had shown the rope to him, and Misery had replied that there was nothing wrong with it. Several others besides Newman claimed to have mentioned the matter to Hunter, and each of them said he had received the same sort of reply. But when Barrington suggested that they should attend the inquest and give evidence to that effect, they all became suddenly silent and in a conversation Barrington afterwards had with Newman the latter pointed out that if he were to do so, it would do no good to Philpot. It would not bring him back but it would be sure to do himself a lot of harm. He would never get another job at Rushton’s and probably many of the other employers would ‘mark him’ as well.
 ‘So if YOU say anything about it,’ concluded Newman, ‘don’t bring my name into it.’
 Barrington was constrained to admit that all things considered it was right for Newman to mind his own business. He felt that it would not be fair to urge him or anyone else to do or say anything that would injure themselves.
 Misery came to the house about eleven o’clock and informed several of the hands that as work was very slack they would get their back day at pay time. He said that the firm had tendered for one or two jobs, so they could call round about Wednesday and perhaps he might then be able to give some of them another start, Barrington was not one of those who were ‘stood off’, although he had expected to be on account of the speech he had made at the Beano, and everyone said that he would have got the push sure enough if it had not been for the accident.
 Before he went away, Nimrod instructed Owen and Crass to go to the yard at once: they would there find Payne the carpenter, who was making Philpot’s coffin, which would be ready for Crass to varnish by the time they got there.
 Misery told Owen that he had left the coffin plate and the instructions with Payne and added that he was not to take too much time over the writing, because it was a very cheap job.
 When they arrived at the yard, Payne was just finishing the coffin, which was of elm. All that remained to be done to it was the pitching of the joints inside and Payne was in the act of lifting the pot of boiling pitch off the fire to do this.
 As it was such a cheap job, there was no time to polish it properly, so Crass proceeded to give it a couple of coats of spirit varnish, and while he was doing this Owen wrote the plate, which was made of very thin zinc lacquered over to make it look like brass:
  JOSEPH PHILPOT Died September 1st 19— Aged 56 years.
 The inquest was held on the following Monday morning, and as both Rushton and Hunter thought it possible that Barrington might attempt to impute some blame to them, they had worked the oracle and had contrived to have several friends of their own put on the jury. There was, however, no need for their alarm, because Barrington could not say that he had himself noticed, or called Hunter’s attention to the state of the rope; and he did not wish to mention the names of the others without their permission. The evidence of Crass and the other men who were called was to the effect that it was a pure accident. None of them had noticed that the rope was unsound. Hunter also swore that he did not know of it - none of the men had ever called his attention to it; if they had done so he would have procured a new one immediately.
 Philpot’s landlady and Mr Rushton were also called as witnesses, and the end was that the jury returned a verdict of accidental death, and added that they did not think any blame attached to anyone.
 The coroner discharged the jury, and as they and the witnesses passed out of the room, Hunter followed Rushton outside, with the hope of being honoured by a little conversation with him on the satisfactory issue of the case; but Rushton went off without taking any notice of him, so Hunter returned to the room where the court had been held to get the coroner’s certificate authorizing the interment of the body. This document is usually handed to the friends of the deceased or to the undertaker acting for them. When Hunter got back to the room he found that during his absence the coroner had given it to Philpot’s landlady, who had taken it with her. He accordingly hastened outside again to ask her for it, but the woman was nowhere to be seen.
 Crass and the other men were also gone; they had hurried off to return to work, and after a moment’s hesitation Hunter decided that it did not matter much about the certificate. Crass had arranged the business with the landlady and he could get the paper from her later on. Having come to this conclusion, he dismissed the subject from his mind: he had several prices to work out that afternoon - estimates from some jobs the firm was going to tender for.
 That evening, after having been home to tea, Crass and Sawkins met by appointment at the carpenter’s shop to take the coffin to the mortuary, where Misery had arranged to meet them at half past eight o’clock. Hunter’s plan was to have the funeral take place from the mortuary, which was only about a quarter of an hour’s walk from the yard; so tonight they were just going to lift in the body and get the lid screwed down.
 It was blowing hard and raining heavily when Crass and Sawkins set out, carrying the coffin - covered with a black cloth - on their shoulders. They also took a small pair of tressels for the coffin to stand on. Crass carried one of these slung over his arm and Sawkins the other.
 On their way they had to pass the ‘Cricketers’ and the place looked so inviting that they decided to stop and have a drink - just to keep the damp out, and as they could not very well take the coffin inside with them, they stood it up against the brick wall a little way from the side of the door: as Crass remarked with a laugh, there was not much danger of anyone pinching it. The Old Dear served them and just as they finished drinking the two half-pints there was a loud crash outside and Crass and Sawkins rushed out and found that the coffin had blown down and was lying bottom upwards across the pavement, while the black cloth that had been wrapped round it was out in the middle of the muddy road. Having recovered this, they shook as much of the dirt off as they could, and having wrapped it round the coffin again they resumed their journey to the mortuary, where they found Hunter waiting for them, engaged in earnest conversation with the keeper. The electric light was switched on, and as Crass and Sawkins came in they saw that the marble slab was empty.
 The corpse was gone.
 ‘Snatchum came this afternoon with a hand-truck and a corfin,’ explained the keeper. ‘I was out at the time, and the missis thought it was all right so she let him have the key.’
 Hunter and Crass looked blankly at each other.
 ‘Well, this takes the biskit!’ said the latter as soon as he could speak.
 ‘I thought you said you had settled everything all right with the old woman?’ said Hunter.
 ‘So I did,’ replied Crass. ‘I seen ’er on Friday, and I told ’er to leave it all to me to attend to, and she said she would. I told ’er that Philpot said to me that if ever anything ’appened to ’im I was to take charge of everything for ’er, because I was ’is best friend. And I told ’er we’d do it as cheap as possible.’
 ‘Well, it seems to me as you’ve bungled it somehow,’ said Nimrod, gloomily. ‘I ought to have gone and seen ’er myself, I was afraid you’d make a mess of it,’ he added in a wailing tone. ‘It’s always the same; everything that I don’t attend to myself goes wrong.’
 An uncomfortable silence fell. Crass thought that the principal piece of bungling in this affair was Hunter’s failure to secure possession of the Coroner’s certificate after the inquest, but he was afraid to say so.
 Outside, the rain was still falling and drove in through the partly open door, causing the atmosphere of the mortuary to be even more than usually cold and damp. The empty coffin had been reared against one of the walls and the marble slab was still stained with blood, for the keeper had not had time to clean it since the body had been removed.
 ‘I can see ’ow it’s been worked,’ said Crass at last. ‘There’s one of the members of the club who works for Snatchum, and ’e’s took it on ’isself to give the order for the funeral; but ’e’s got no right to do it.’
 ‘Right or no right, ’e’s done it,’ replied Misery, ‘so you’d better take the box back to the shop.’
 Crass and Sawkins accordingly returned to the workshop, where they were presently joined by Nimrod.
 ‘I’ve been thinking this business over as I came along,’ he said, ‘and I don’t see being beat like this by Snatchum; so you two can just put the tressels and the box on a hand cart and we’ll take it over to Philpot’s house.’
 Nimrod walked on the pavement while the other two pushed the cart, and it was about half past nine, when they arrived at the street in Windley where Philpot used to live. They halted in a dark part of the street a few yards away from the house and on the opposite side.
 ‘I think the best thing we can do,’ said Misery, ‘is for me and Sawkins to wait ’ere while you go to the ’ouse and see ’ow the land lies. You’ve done all the business with ’er so far. It’s no use takin’ the box unless we know the corpse is there; for all we know, Snatchum may ’ave taken it ’ome with ’im.’
 ‘Yes; I think that’ll be the best way,’ agreed Crass, after a moment’s thought.
 Nimrod and Sawkins accordingly took shelter in the doorway of an empty house, leaving the handcart at the kerb, while Crass went across the street and knocked at Philpot’s door. They saw it opened by an elderly woman holding a lighted candle in her hand; then Crass went inside and the door was shut. In about a quarter of an hour he reappeared and, leaving the door partly open behind him, he came out and crossed over to where the others were waiting. As he drew near they could see that he carried a piece of paper in his hand.
 ‘It’s all right,’ he said in a hoarse whisper as he came up. I’ve got the stifficut.’
 Misery took the paper eagerly and scanned it by the light of a match that Crass struck. It was the certificate right enough, and with a sigh of relief Hunter put it into his note-book and stowed it safely away in the inner pocket of his coat, while Crass explained the result of his errand.
 It appeared that the other member of the Society, accompanied by Snatchum, had called upon the old woman and had bluffed her into giving them the order for the funeral. It was they who had put her up to getting the certificate from the Coroner - they had been careful to keep away from the inquest themselves so as not to arouse Hunter’s or Crass’s suspicions.
 ‘When they brought the body ’ome this afternoon,’ Crass went on, ‘Snatchum tried to get the stifficut orf ’er, but she’d been thinkin’ things over and she was a bit frightened ’cos she knowed she’d made arrangements with me, and she thought she’d better see me first; so she told ’im she’d give it to ’im on Thursday; that’s the day as ’e was goin’ to ’ave the funeral.’
 ‘He’ll find he’s a day too late,’ said Misery, with a ghastly grin. ‘We’ll get the job done on Wednesday.’
 ‘She didn’t want to give it to me, at first,’ Crass concluded, ‘but I told ’er we’d see ’er right if old Snatchum tried to make ’er pay for the other coffin.’
 ‘I don’t think he’s likely to make much fuss about it,’ said Hunter. ‘He won’t want everybody to know he was so anxious for the job.’
 Crass and Sawkins pushed the handcart over to the other side of the road and then, lifting the coffin off, they carried it into the house, Nimrod going first.
 The old woman was waiting for them with the candle at the end of the passage.
 ‘I shall be very glad when it’s all over,’ she said, as she led the way up the narrow stairs, closely followed by Hunter, who carried the tressels, Crass and Sawkins, bringing up the rear with the coffin. ‘I shall be very glad when it’s all over, for I’m sick and tired of answerin’ the door to undertakers. If there’s been one ’ere since Friday there’s been a dozen, all after the job, not to mention all the cards what’s been put under the door, besides the one’s what I’ve had give to me by different people. I had a pair of boots bein’ mended and the man took the trouble to bring ’em ’ome when they was finished - a thing ’e’s never done before - just for an excuse to give me an undertaker’s card.
 ‘Then the milkman brought one, and so did the baker, and the greengrocer give me another when I went in there on Saturday to buy some vegetables for Sunday dinner.’
 Arrived at the top landing the old woman opened a door and entered a small and wretchedly furnished room.
 Across the lower sash of the window hung a tattered piece of lace curtain. The low ceiling was cracked and discoloured.
 There was a rickety little wooden washstand, and along one side of the room a narrow bed covered with a ragged grey quilt, on which lay a bundle containing the clothes that the dead man was wearing at the time of the accident.
 There was a little table in front of the window, with a small looking-glass upon it, and a cane-seated chair was placed by the bedside and the floor was covered with a faded piece of drab-coloured carpet of no perceptible pattern, worn into holes in several places.
 In the middle of this dreary room, upon a pair of tressels, was the coffin containing Philpot’s body. Seen by the dim and flickering light of the candle, the aspect of this coffin, covered over with a white sheet, was terrible in its silent, pathetic solitude.
 Hunter placed the pair of tressels he had been carrying against the wall, and the other two put the empty coffin on the floor by the side of the bed. The old woman stood the candlestick on the mantelpiece, and withdrew, remarking that they would not need her assistance. The three men then removed their overcoats and laid them on the end of the bed, and from the pocket of his Crass took out two large screwdrivers, one of which he handed to Hunter. Sawkins held the candle while they unscrewed and took off the lid of the coffin they had brought with them: it was not quite empty, for they had brought a bag of tools inside it.
 ‘I think we shall be able to work better if we takes the other one orf the trussels and puts it on the floor,’ remarked Crass.
 ‘Yes, I think so, too,’ replied Hunter.
 Crass took off the sheet and threw it on the bed, revealing the other coffin, which was very similar in appearance to the one they had brought with them, being of elms with the usual imitation brass furniture. Hunter took hold of the head and Crass the foot and they lifted it off the tressels on to the floor.
 ‘’E’s not very ’eavy; that’s one good thing,’ observed Hunter.
 ‘’E always was a very thin chap,’ replied Crass.
 The screws that held down the lid had been covered over with large-headed brass nails which had to be wrenched off before they could get at the screws, of which there were eight altogether. It was evident from the appearance of the beads of these screws that they were old ones that had been used for some purpose before: they were rusty and of different sizes, some being rather larger or smaller, than they should have been. They were screwed in so firmly that by the time they had drawn half of them out the two men were streaming with perspiration. After a while Hunter took the candle from Sawkins and the latter had a try at the screws.
 ‘Anyone would think the dam’ things had been there for a ’undred years,’ remarked Hunter, savagely, as he wiped the sweat from his face and neck with his handkerchief.
 Kneeling on the lid of the coffin and panting and grunting with the exertion, the other two continued to struggle with their task. Suddenly Crass uttered an obscene curse; he had broken off one side of the head of the screw he was trying to turn and almost at the same instant a similar misfortune happened to Sawkins.
 After this, Hunter again took a screwdriver himself, and when they got all the screws out with the exception of the two broken ones, Crass took a hammer and chisel out of the bag and proceeded to cut off what was left of the tops of the two that remained. But even after this was done the two screws still held the lid on the coffin, and so they had to hammer the end of the blade of the chisel underneath and lever the lid up so that they could get hold of it with their fingers. It split up one side as they tore it off, exposing the dead man to view.
 Although the marks of the cuts and bruises were still visible on Philpot’s face, they were softened down by the pallor of death, and a placid, peaceful expression pervaded his features. His hands were crossed upon his breast, and as he lay there in the snow-white grave clothes, almost covered in by the white lace frill that bordered the sides of the coffin, he looked like one in a profound and tranquil sleep.
 They laid the broken lid on the bed, and placed the two coffins side by side on the floor as close together as possible. Sawkins stood at one side holding the candle in his left hand and ready to render with his right any assistance that might unexpectedly prove to be necessary. Crass, standing at the foot, took hold of the body by the ankles, while Hunter at the other end seized it by the shoulders with his huge, clawlike hands, which resembled the talons of some obscene bird of prey, and they dragged it out and placed it in the other coffin.
 Whilst Hunter - hovering ghoulishly over the corpse - arranged the grave clothes and the frilling, Crass laid the broken cover on the top of the other coffin and pushed it under the bed out of the way. Then he selected the necessary screws and nails from the bag. and Hunter having by this time finished, they proceeded to screw down the lid. Then they lifted the coffin on to the tressels, covering it over with the sheet, and the appearance it then presented was so exactly similar to what they had seen when they first entered the room, that it caused the same thought to occur to all of them: Suppose Snatchum took it into his head to come there and take the body out again? If he were to do so and take it up to the cemetery they might be compelled to give up the certificate to him and then all their trouble would be lost.
 After a brief consultation, they resolved that it would be safer to take the corpse on the handcart to the yard and keep it in the carpenter’s shop until the funeral, which could take place from there. Crass and Sawkins accordingly lifted the coffin off the tressels, and - while Hunter held the light - proceeded to carry it downstairs, a task of considerable difficulty owing to the narrowness of the staircase and the landing. However, they got it down at last and, having put it on the handcart, covered it over with the black wrapper. It was still raining and the lamp in the cart was nearly out, so Sawkins trimmed the wick and relit it before they started.
 Hunter wished them ‘Good-night’ at the corner of the street, because it was not necessary for him to accompany them to the yard - they would be able to manage all that remained to be done by themselves. He said he would make the arrangements for the funeral as soon as he possibly could the next morning, and he would come to the job and let them know, as soon as he knew himself, at what time they would have to be in attendance to act as bearers. He had gone a little distance on his way when he stopped and turned back to them.
 ‘It’s not necessary for either of you to make a song about this business, you know,’ he said.
 The two men said that they quite understood that: he could depend on their keeping their mouths shut.
 When Hunter had gone, Crass drew out his watch. It was a quarter to eleven. A little way down the road the lights of a public house were gleaming through the mist.
 ‘We shall be just in time to get a drink before closing time if we buck up,’ he said. And with this object they hurried on as fast as they could.
 When they reached the tavern they left the cart standing by the kerb, and went inside, where Crass ordered two pints of four-ale, which he permitted Sawkins to pay for.
 ‘How are we going on about this job?’ inquired the latter after they had each taken a long drink, for they were thirsty after their exertions. ‘I reckon we ought to ’ave more than a bob for it, don’t you? It’s not like a ordinary "lift in".’
 ‘Of course it ain’t,’ replied Crass. ‘We ought to ’ave about, say’ - reflecting - ‘say arf a dollar each at the very least.’
 ‘Little enough too,’ said Sawkins. ‘I was going to say arf a crown, myself.’
 Crass agreed that even half a crown would not be too much.
 ‘’Ow are we going’ on about chargin’ it on our time sheets?’ asked Sawkins, after a pause. ‘If we just put a "lift in", they might only pay us a bob as usual.’
 As a rule when they had taken a coffin home, they wrote on their time sheets, ‘One lift in’, for which they were usually paid one shilling, unless it happened to be a very high-class funeral, when they sometimes got one and sixpence. They were never paid by the hour for these jobs.
 Crass smoked reflectively.
 ‘I think the best way will be to put it like this,’ he said at length. ‘"Philpot’s funeral. One lift out and one lift in. Also takin’ corpse to carpenter’s shop." ’Ow would that do?’
 Sawkins said that would be a very good way to put it, and they finished their beer just as the landlord intimated that it was closing time. The cart was standing where they left it, the black cloth saturated with the rain, which dripped mournfully from its sable folds.
 When they reached the plot of waste ground over which they had to pass in order to reach the gates of the yard, they had to proceed very cautiously, for it was very dark, and the lantern did not give much light. A number of carts and lorries were standing there, and the path wound through pools of water and heaps of refuse. After much difficulty and jolting, they reached the gate, which Crass unlocked with the key he had obtained from the office earlier in the evening. They soon opened the door of the carpenter’s shop and, after lighting the gas, they arranged the tressels and then brought in the coffin and placed it upon them. Then they locked the door and placed the key in its usual hiding-place, but the key of the outer gate they took with them and dropped into the letter-box at the office, which they had to pass on their way home.
 As they turned away from the door, they were suddenly confronted by a policeman who flashed his lantern in their faces and demanded to know why they had tried the lock...
 The next morning was a very busy one for Hunter, who had to see several new jobs commenced. They were all small affairs. Most of them would only take two or three days from start to finish.
 Attending to this work occupied most of his morning, but all the same he managed to do the necessary business connected with the funeral, which he arranged to take place at two o’clock on Wednesday afternoon from the mortuary, where the coffin had been removed during the day, Hunter deciding that it would not look well to have the funeral start from the workshop.
 Although Hunter had kept it as quiet as possible, there was a small crowd, including several old workmates of Philpot’s who happened to be out of work, waiting outside the mortuary to see the funeral start, and amongst them were Bill Bates and the Semi-drunk, who were both sober. Barrington and Owen were also there, having left work for the day in order to go to the funeral. They were there too in a sense as the representatives of the other workmen, for Barrington carried a large wreath which had been subscribed for voluntarily by Rushton’s men. They could not all afford to lose the time to attend the funeral, although most of them would have liked to pay that tribute of regard to their old mate, so they had done this as the next best thing. Attached to the wreath was a strip of white satin ribbon, upon which Owen had painted a suitable inscription.
 Promptly at two o’clock the hearse and the mourning coach drove up with Hunter and the four bearers - Crass, Slyme, Payne and Sawkins, all dressed in black with frock coats and silk hats. Although they were nominally attired in the same way, there was a remarkable dissimilarity in their appearance. Crass’s coat was of smooth, intensely black cloth, having been recently dyed, and his hat was rather low in the crown, being of that shape that curved outwards towards the top. Hunter’s coat was a kind of serge with a rather rusty cast of colour and his hat was very tall and straight, slightly narrower at the crown than at the brim. As for the others, each of them had a hat of a different fashion and date, and their ‘black’ clothes ranged from rusty brown to dark blue.
 These differences were due to the fact that most of the garments had been purchased at different times from different second-hand clothes shops, and never being used except on such occasions as the present, they lasted for an indefinite time.
 When the coffin was brought out and placed in the hearse, Hunter laid upon it the wreath that Barrington gave him, together with the another he had brought himself, which had a similar ribbon with the words: ‘From Rushton & Co. With deep sympathy.’
 Seeing that Barrington and Owen were the only occupants of the carriage, Bill Bates and the Semi-drunk came up to the door and asked if there was any objection to their coming and as neither Owen nor Barrington objected, they did not think it necessary to ask anyone else’s permission, so they got in.
 Meanwhile, Hunter had taken his position a few yards in front of the hearse and the bearers each his proper position, two on each side. As the procession turned into the main road, they saw Snatchum standing at the corner looking very gloomy. Hunter kept his eyes fixed straight ahead and affected not to see him, but Crass could not resist the temptation to indulge in a jeering smile, which so enraged Snatchum that he shouted out:
 ‘It don’t matter! I shan’t lose much! I can use it for someone else!’
 The distance to the cemetery was about three miles, so as soon as they got out of the busy streets of the town, Hunter called a halt, and got up on the hearse beside the driver, Crass sat on the other side, and two of the other bearers stood in the space behind the driver’s seat, the fourth getting up beside the driver of the coach; and then they proceeded at a rapid pace.
 As they drew near to the cemetery they slowed down, and finally stopped when about fifty yards from the gate. Then Hunter and the bearers resumed their former position, mid they passed through the open gate and up to the door of the church, where they were received by the clerk - a man in a rusty black cassock, who stood by while they carried the coffin in and placed it on a kind of elevated table which revolved on a pivot. They brought it in footfirst, and as soon as they had placed it upon the table, the clerk swung it round so as to bring the foot of the coffin towards the door ready to be carried out again.
 There was a special pew set apart for the undertakers, and in this Hunter and the bearers took their seats to await the arrival of the clergyman. Barrington and the three others sat on the opposite side. There was no altar or pulpit in this church, but a kind of reading desk stood on a slightly raised platform at the other end of the aisle.
 After a wait of about ten minutes, the clergyman entered and, at once proceeding to the desk, began to recite in a rapid and wholly unintelligible manner the usual office. If it had not been for the fact that each of his hearers had a copy of the words - for there was a little book in each pew - none of them would have been able to gather the sense of what the man was gabbling. Under any other circumstances, the spectacle of a human being mouthing in this absurd way would have compelled laughter, and so would the suggestion that this individual really believed that he was addressing the Supreme Being. His attitude and manner were contemptuously indifferent. While he recited, intoned, or gabbled, the words of the office, he was reading the certificate and some other paper the clerk had placed upon the desk, and when he had finished reading these, his gaze wandered abstractedly round the chapel, resting for a long time with an expression of curiosity upon Bill Bates and the Semi-drunk, who were doing their best to follow in their books the words he was repeating. He next turned his attention to his fingers, holding his hand away from him nearly at arm’s length and critically examining the nails.
 From time to time as this miserable mockery proceeded the clerk in the rusty black cassock mechanically droned out a sonorous ‘Ah-men’, and after the conclusion of the lesson the clergyman went out of the church, taking a short cut through the grave-stones and monuments, while the bearers again shouldered the coffin and followed the clerk to the grave. When they arrived within a few yards of their destination, they were rejoined by the clergyman, who was waiting for them at the corner of one of the paths. He put himself at the head of the procession with an open book in his hand, and as they walked slowly along, he resumed his reading or repetition of the words of the service.
 He had on an old black cassock and a much soiled and slightly torn surplice. The unseemly appearance of this dirty garment was heightened by the circumstance that he had not taken the trouble to adjust it properly. It hung all lop-sided, showing about six inches more of the black cassock underneath one side than the other. However, perhaps it is not right to criticize this person’s appearance so severely, because the poor fellow was paid only seven-and-six for each burial, and as this was only the fourth funeral he had officiated at that day, probably he could not afford to wear clean linen - at any rate, not for the funerals of the lower classes.
 He continued his unintelligible jargon while they were lowering the coffin into the grave, and those who happened to know the words of the office by heart were, with some difficulty, able to understand what he was saying:
 ‘Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of His great mercy to take unto Himself the soul of our Dear Brother here departed, we therefore commit his body to the ground; earth to earth; ashes to ashes, dust to dust -’
 The earth fell from the clerk’s hand and rattled on the lid of the coffin with a mournful sound, and when the clergyman had finished repeating the remainder of the service, he turned and walked away in the direction of the church. Hunter and the rest of the funeral party made their way back towards the gate of the cemetery where the hearse and the carriage were waiting.
 On their way they saw another funeral procession coming towards them. It was a very plain-looking closed hearse with only one horse. There was no undertaker in front and no bearers walked by the sides.
 It was a pauper’s funeral.
 Three men, evidently dressed in their Sunday clothes, followed behind the hearse. As they reached the church door, four old men who were dressed in ordinary everyday clothes, came forward and opening the hearse took out the coffin and carried it into the church, followed by the other three, who were evidently relatives of the deceased. The four old men were paupers - inmates of the workhouse, who were paid sixpence each for acting as bearers.
 They were just taking out the coffin from the hearse as Hunter’s party was passing, and most of the latter paused for a moment and watched them carry it into the church. The roughly made coffin was of white deal, not painted or covered in any way, and devoid of any fittings or ornament with the exception of a square piece of zinc on the lid. None of Rushton’s party was near enough to recognize any of the mourners or to read what was written on the zinc, but if they had been they would have seen, roughly painted in black letters
  J.L.Aged 67
 and some of them would have recognized the three mourners who were Jack Linden’s sons.
 As for the bearers, they were all retired working men who had come into their ‘titles’. One of them was old Latham, the venetian blind maker.
 
 Chapter 48
 The Wise men of the East
  At the end of the following week there was a terrible slaughter at Rushton’s. Barrington and all the casual hands were sacked, including Newman, Easton and Harlow, and there was so little work that it looked as if everyone else would have to stand off also. The summer was practically over, so those who were stood off had but a poor chance of getting a start anywhere else, because most other firms were discharging hands as well.
 There was only one other shop in the town that was doing anything at all to speak of, and that was the firm of Dauber and Botchit. This firm had come very much to the front during the summer, and had captured several big jobs that Rushton & Co. had expected to get, besides taking away several of the latter’s old customers.
 This firm took work at almost half the price that Rushton’s could do it for, and they had a foreman whose little finger was thicker than Nimrod’s thigh . Some of the men who had worked for both firms during the summer, said that after working for Dauber and Botchit, working for Rushton seemed like having a holiday.
 ‘There’s one bloke there,’ said Newman, in conversation with Harlow and Easton. ‘There’s one bloke there wot puts up twenty-five rolls o’ paper in a day an’ trims and pastes for ’imself; and as for the painters, nearly everyone of ’em gets over as much work as us three put together, and if you’re working there you’ve got to do the same or get the sack.’
 However much truth or falsehood or exaggeration there may have been in the stories of the sweating and driving that prevailed at Dauber and Botchit’s, it was an indisputable fact that the other builders found it very difficult to compete with them, and between the lot of them what work there was to do was all finished or messed up in about a quarter of the time that it would have taken to do it properly.
 By the end of September there were great numbers of men out of employment, and the practical persons who controlled the town were already preparing to enact the usual farce of ‘Dealing’ with the distress that was certain to ensue. The Rev. Mr Bosher talked of reopening the Labour Yard; the secretary of the OBS appealed for more money and cast-off clothing and boots - the funds of the Society had been depleted by the payment of his quarter’s salary. There were rumours that the Soup Kitchen would be reopened at an early date for the sale of ‘nourishment’, and charitable persons began to talk of Rummage Sales and soup tickets.
 Now and then, whenever a ‘job’ ‘came in’, a few of Rushton’s men were able to put in a few hours’ work, but Barrington never went back. His manner of life was the subject of much speculation on the part of his former workmates, who were not a little puzzled by the fact that he was much better dressed than they had ever known him to be before, and that he was never without money. He generally had a tanner or a bob to lend, and was always ready to stand a drink, to say nothing of what it must have cost him for the quantities of Socialist pamphlets and leaflets that he gave away broadcast. He lodged over at Windley, but he used to take his meals at a little coffee tavern down town, where he used often to invite one or two of his old mates to take dinner with him. It sometimes happened that one of them would invite him home of an evening, to drink a cup of tea, or to see some curiosity that the other thought would interest him, and on these occasions - if there were any children in the house to which they were going - Barrington usually made a point of going into a shop on their way, and buying a bag of cakes or fruit for them.
 All sorts of theories were put forward to account for his apparent affluence. Some said he was a toff in disguise; others that he had rich relations who were ashamed of him because he was a Socialist, and who allowed him so much a week so long as he kept away from them and did not use his real name. Some of the Liberals said that he was in the pay of the Tories, who were seeking by underhand methods to split up the Progressive Liberal Party. Just about that time several burglaries took place in the town, the thieves getting clear away with the plunder, and this circumstance led to a dark rumour that Barrington was the culprit, and that it was these ill-gotten gains that he was spending so freely.
 About the middle of October an event happened that drew the town into a state of wild excitement, and such comparatively unimportant subjects as unemployment and starvation were almost forgotten.
 Sir Graball D’Encloseland had been promoted to yet a higher post in the service of the country that he owned such a large part of; he was not only to have a higher and more honourable position, but also - as was nothing but right - a higher salary. His pay was to be increased to seven thousand five hundred a year or one hundred and fifty pounds per week, and in consequence of this promotion it was necessary for him to resign his seat and seek re-election.
 The ragged-trousered Tory workmen as they loitered about the streets, their stomachs empty, said to each other that it was a great honour for Mugsborough that their Member should be promoted in this way. They boasted about it and assumed as much swagger in their gait as their broken boots permitted.
 They stuck election cards bearing Sir Graball’s photograph in their windows and tied bits of blue and yellow ribbon - Sir Graball’s colours - on their underfed children.
 The Liberals were furious. They said that an election had been sprung on them - they had been taken a mean advantage of - they had no candidate ready.
 They had no complaint to make about the salary, all they complained of was the short notice. It wasn’t fair because while they - the leading Liberals - had been treating the electors with the contemptuous indifference that is customary, Sir Graball D’Encloseland had been most active amongst his constituents for months past, cunningly preparing for the contest. He had really been electioneering for the past six months! Last winter he had kicked off at quite a number of football matches besides doing all sorts of things for the local teams. He had joined the Buffalos and the Druids, been elected President of the Skull and Crossbones Boys’ Society, and, although he was not himself an abstainer, he was so friendly to Temperance that he had on several occasions, taken the chair at teetotal meetings, to say nothing of the teas to the poor school children and things of that sort. In short, he had been quite an active politician, in the Tory sense of the word, for months past and the poor Liberals had not smelt a rat until the election was sprung upon them.
 A hurried meeting of the Liberal Three Hundred was held, and a deputation sent to London to find a candidate but as there was only a week before polling day they were unsuccessful in their mission. Another meeting was held, presided over by Mr Adam Sweater - Rushton and Didlum also being present.
 Profound dejection was depicted on the countenances of those assembled slave-drivers as they listened to the delegates’ report. The sombre silence that followed was broken at length by Mr Rushton, who suddenly started up and said that he began to think they had made a mistake in going outside the constituency at all to look for a man. It was strange but true that a prophet never received honour in his own land. They had been wasting the precious time running about all over the country, begging and praying for a candidate, and overlooking the fact that they had in their midst a gentleman - a fellow townsman, who, he believed, would have a better chance of success than any stranger. Surely they would all agree - if they could only prevail upon him to stand - that Adam Sweater would be an ideal Liberal Candidate!
 While Mr Rushton was speaking the drooping spirits of the Three Hundred were reviving, and at the name of Sweater they all began to clap their hands and stamp their feet. Loud shouts of enthusiastic approval burst forth, and cries of ‘Good old Sweater’ resounded through the room.
 When Sweater rose to reply, the tumult died away as suddenly as it had commenced. He thanked them for the honour they were conferring upon him. There was no time to waste in words or idle compliments; rather than allow the Enemy to have a walk-over, he would accede to their request and contest the seat.
 A roar of applause burst from the throats of the delighted Three Hundred.
 Outside the hail in which the meeting was being held a large crowd of poverty-stricken Liberal working men, many of them wearing broken boots and other men’s cast-off clothing, was waiting to hear the report of the slave-drivers’ deputation, and as soon as Sweater had consented to be nominated, Didlum rushed and opened the window overlooking the street and shouted the good news down to the crowd, which joined in the cheering. In response to their demands for a speech, Sweater brought his, obese carcass to the window and addressed a few words to them, reminding them of the shortness of the time at their disposal, and intreating them to work hard in order that the Grand old Flag might be carried to victory.
 At such times these people forgot all about unemployment and starvation, and became enthusiastic about ‘Grand old Flags’. Their devotion to this flag was so great that so long as they were able to carry it to victory, they did not mind being poverty stricken and hungry and ragged; all that mattered was to score off their hated ‘enemies’ their fellow countrymen the Tories, and carry the grand old flag to victory. The fact that they had carried the flag to victory so often in the past without obtaining any of the spoils, did not seem to damp their ardour in the least. Being philanthropists, they were content - after winning the victory - that their masters should always do the looting.
 At the conclusion of Sweater’s remarks the philanthropists gave three frantic cheers and then someone in the crowd shouted ‘What’s the colour?’ After a hasty consultation with Rushton, who being a ‘master’ decorator, was thought to be an authority on colours - green - grass green - was decided upon, and the information was shouted down to the crowd, who cheered again. Then a rush was made to Sweater’s Emporium and several yards of cheap green ribbon were bought, and divided up into little pieces, which they tied into their buttonholes, and thus appropriately decorated, formed themselves into military order, four deep, and marched through all the principal streets, up and down the Grand Parade, round and round the Fountain, and finally over the hill to Windley, singing to the tune of ‘Tramp, tramp, tramp, the Boys are marching’:
  ‘Vote, Vote, Vote for Adam Sweater! Hang old Closeland on a tree! Adam Sweater is our man, And we’ll have him if we can, Then we’ll always have the biggest loaf for tea.’
 The spectacle presented by these men - some of them with grey heads and beards - as they marked time or tramped along singing this childish twaddle, would have been amusing if it had not been disgusting.
 By way of variety they sang several other things, including:
  ‘We’ll hang ole Closeland On a sour apple tree,’
 and
  ‘Rally, Rally, men of Windley For Sweater’s sure to win.’
 As they passed the big church in Quality Street, the clock began to strike. It was one of those that strike four chimes at each quarter of the hour. It was now ten o’clock so there were sixteen musical chimes:
  Ding, dong! Ding Dong! Ding dong! Ding dong! Ding dong! Ding dong! Ding dong! Ding dong!
 They all chanted A-dam Sweat-er’ in time with the striking clock. In the same way the Tories would chant: ‘Grab - all Close - land! Grab - all Close - land! Grab - all Close - land! Grab - all Close - land!’
 The town was soon deluged with mendacious literature and smothered with huge posters:
  ‘Vote for Adam Sweater! The Working-man’s Friend!’ ‘Vote for Sweater and Temperance Reform.’‘Vote for Sweater - Free Trade and Cheap Food.’
  or
  ‘Vote for D’Encloseland: Tariff Reform and Plenty of Work!’
 This beautiful idea - ‘Plenty of Work’ - appealed strongly to the Tory workmen. They seemed to regard themselves and their children as a sort of machines or beasts of burden, created for the purpose of working for the benefit of other people. They did not think it right that they should Live, and enjoy the benefits of civilization. All they desired for themselves and their children was ‘Plenty of Work’.
 They marched about the streets singing their Marseillaise, ‘Work, Boys, Work and be contented’, to the tune of ‘Tramp, tramp, tramp the Boys are marching’, and at intervals as they tramped along, they gave three cheers for Sir Graball, Tariff Reform, and - Plenty of Work.
 Both sides imported gangs of hired orators who held forth every night at the corners of the principal streets, and on the open spaces from portable platforms, and from motor cars and lorries. The Tories said that the Liberal Party in the House of Commons was composed principally of scoundrels and fools, the Liberals said that the Tory Party were fools and scoundrels. A host of richly dressed canvassers descended upon Windley in carriages and motor cars, and begged for votes from the poverty-stricken working men who lived there.
 One evening a Liberal demonstration was held at the Cross Roads on Windley Hill. Notwithstanding the cold weather, there was a great crowd of shabbily dressed people, many of whom had not had a really good meal for months. It was a clear night. The moon was at the full, and the scene was further illuminated by the fitful glare of several torches, stuck on the end of twelve-foot poles. The platform was a large lorry, and there were several speakers, including Adam Sweater himself and a real live Liberal Peer - Lord Ammenegg. This individual had made a considerable fortune in the grocery and provision line, and had been elevated to the Peerage by the last Liberal Government on account of his services to the Party, and in consideration of other considerations.
 Both Sweater and Ammenegg were to speak at two other meetings that night and were not expected at Windley until about eight-thirty, so to keep the ball rolling till they arrived, several other gentlemen, including Rushton - who presided - and Didlum, and one of the five pounds a week orators, addressed the meeting. Mingled with the crowd were about twenty rough-looking men - strangers to the town - who wore huge green rosettes and loudly applauded the speakers. They also distributed Sweater literature and cards with lists of the different meetings that were to be held during the election. These men were bullies hired by Sweater’s agent. They came from the neighbourhood of Seven Dials in London and were paid ten shillings a day. One of their duties was to incite the crowd to bash anyone who disturbed the meetings or tried to put awkward questions to the speakers.
 The hired orator was a tall, slight man with dark hair, beard and moustache, he might have been called well-looking if it had not been for a ugly scar upon his forehead, which gave him a rather sinister appearance. He was an effective speaker; the audience punctuated his speech with cheers, and when he wound up with an earnest appeal to them - as working men - to vote for Adam Sweater, their enthusiasm knew no bounds.
 ‘I’ve seen him somewhere before,’ remarked Barrington, who was standing in the crowd with Harlow, Owen and Easton.
 ‘So have I,’ said Owen, with a puzzled expression. ‘But for the life of me, I can’t remember where.’
 Harlow and Easton also thought they had seen the man before, but their speculations were put an end to by the roar of cheering that heralded the arrival of the motor car, containing Adam Sweater and his friend, Lord Ammenegg. Unfortunately, those who had arranged the meeting had forgotten to provide a pair of steps, so Sweater found it a matter of considerable difficulty to mount the platform. However, while his friends were hoisting and pushing him up, the meeting beguiled the time by singing:
  ‘Vote, vote, vote for Adam Sweater.’
 After a terrible struggle they succeeded in getting him on to the cart, and while he was recovering his wind, Rushton made a few remarks to the crowd. Sweater then advanced to the front, but in consequence of the cheering and singing, he was unable to make himself heard for several minutes.
 When at length he was able to proceed, ho made a very clever speech - it had been specially written for him and had cost ten guineas. A large part of it consisted of warnings against the dangers of Socialism. Sweater had carefully rehearsed this speech and he delivered it very effectively. Some of those Socialists, he said, were well-meaning but mistaken people, who did not realize the harm that would result if their extraordinary ideas were ever put into practice. He lowered his voice to a blood-curdling stage whisper as he asked:
 ‘What is this Socialism that we hear so much about, but which so few understand? What is it, and what does it mean?’
 Then, raising his voice till it rang through the air and fell upon the ears of the assembled multitude like the clanging of a funeral bell, he continued:
 ‘It is madness! Chaos! Anarchy! It means Ruin! Black Ruin for the rich, and consequently, of course, Blacker Ruin still for the poor!’
 As Sweater paused, a thrill of horror ran through the meeting. Men wearing broken boots and with patches upon the seats and knees, and ragged fringes round the bottoms of the legs of their trousers, grew pale, and glanced apprehensively at each other. If ever Socialism did come to pass, they evidently thought it very probable that they would have to walk about in a sort of prehistoric highland costume, without any trousers or boots at all.
 Toil-worn women, most of them dressed in other women’s shabby cast-off clothing - weary, tired-looking mothers who fed their children for the most part on adulterated tea, tinned skimmed milk and bread and margarine, grew furious as they thought of the wicked Socialists who were trying to bring Ruin upon them.
 It never occurred to any of these poor people that they were in a condition of Ruin, Black Ruin, already. But if Sweater had suddenly found himself reduced to the same social condition as the majority of those he addressed, there is not much doubt that he would have thought that he was in a condition of Black Ruin.
 The awful silence that had fallen on the panic-stricken crowd, was presently broken by a ragged-trousered Philanthropist, who shouted out:
 ‘We knows wot they are, sir. Most of ’em is chaps wot’s got tired of workin’ for their livin’, so they wants us to keep ’em.’
 Encouraged by numerous expressions of approval from the other Philanthropists, the man continued:
 ‘But we ain’t such fools as they thinks, and so they’ll find out next Monday. Most of ’em wants ’angin’, and I wouldn’t mind lendin’ a ’and with the rope myself.’
 Applause and laughter greeted these noble sentiments, and Sweater resumed his address, when another man - evidently a Socialist - for he was accompanied by three or four others who like himself wore red ties - interrupted and said that he would like to ask him a question. No notice was taken of this request either by Mr Sweater or the chairman, but a few angry cries of ‘Order!’ came from the crowd. Sweater continued, but the man again interrupted and the cries of the crowd became more threatening. Rushton started up and said that he could not allow the speaker to be interrupted, but if the gentleman would wait till the end of the meeting, he would have an opportunity of asking his question then.
 The man said he would wait as desired; Sweater resumed his oration, and presently the interrupter and his friends found themselves surrounded by the gang of hired bullies who wore the big rosettes and who glared menacingly at them.
 Sweater concluded his speech with an appeal to the crowd to deal a ‘Slashing Bow at the Enemy’ next Monday, and then amid a storm of applause, Lord Ammenegg stepped to the front. He said that he did not intend to inflict a long speech upon them that evening, and as it was nomination day tomorrow he would not be able to have the honour of addressing them again during the election; but even if he had wished to make a long speech, it would be very difficult after the brilliant and eloquent address they had just listened to from Mr Sweater, for it seemed to him (Ammenegg) that Adam Sweater had left nothing for anyone else to say. But he would like to tell them of a Thought that had occurred to him that evening. They read in the Bible that the Wise Men came from the East. Windley, as they all knew, was the East end of the town. They were the men of the East, and he was sure that next Monday they would prove that they were the Wise Men of the East, by voting for Adam Sweater and putting him at the top of the poll with a ‘Thumping Majority’.
 The Wise Men of the East greeted Ammenegg’s remarks with prolonged, imbecile cheers, and amid the tumult his Lordship and Sweater got into the motor car and cleared off without giving the man with the red tie or anyone else who desired to ask questions any opportunity of doing so. Rushton and the other leaders got into another motor car, and followed the first to take part in another meeting down-town, which was to be addressed by the great Sir Featherstone Blood.
 The crowd now resolved itself into military order, headed by the men with torches and a large white banner on which was written in huge black letters, ‘Our man is Adam Sweater’.
 They marched down the hill singing, and when they reached the Fountain on the Grand Parade they saw another crowd holding a meeting there. These were Tories and they became so infuriated at the sound of the Liberal songs and by the sight of the banner, that they abandoned their meeting and charged the processionists. A free fight ensued. Both sides fought like savages, but as the Liberals were outnumbered by about three to one, they were driven off the field with great slaughter; most of the torch poles were taken from them, and the banner was torn to ribbons. Then the Tories went back to the Fountain carrying the captured torches, and singing to the tune of ‘Has anyone seen a German Band?’
  ‘Has anyone seen a Lib’ral Flag, Lib’ral Flag, Lib’ral Flag?’
 While the Tories resumed their meeting at the Fountain, the Liberals rallied in one of the back streets. Messengers were sent in various directions for reinforcements, and about half an hour afterwards they emerged from their retreat and swooped down upon the Tory meeting. They overturned the platform, recaptured their torches, tore the enemy’s banner to tatters and drove them from their position. Then the Liberals in their turn paraded the streets singing ‘Has anyone seen a Tory Flag?’ and proceeded to the hall where Sir Featherstone was speaking, arriving as the audience left.
 The crowd that came pouring out of the hall was worked up to a frenzy of enthusiasm, for the speech they had just listened to had been a sort of manifesto to the country.
 In response to the cheering of the processionists - who, of course, had not heard the speech, but were cheering from force of habit - Sir Featherstone Blood stood up in the carriage and addressed the crowd, briefly outlining the great measures of Social Reform that his party proposed to enact to improve the condition of the working classes; and as they listened, the Wise Men grew delirious with enthusiasm. He referred to Land Taxes and Death Duties which would provide money to build battleships to protect the property of the rich, and provide Work for the poor. Another tax was to provide a nice, smooth road for the rich to ride upon in motor cars - and to provide Work for the poor. Another tax would be used for Development, which would also make Work for the poor. And so on. A great point was made of the fact that the rich were actually to be made to pay something towards the cost of their road themselves! But nothing was said about how they would get the money to do it. No reference was made to how the workers would be sweated and driven and starved to earn Dividends and Rent and Interest and Profits to put into the pockets of the rich before the latter would be able to pay for anything at all.
 These are the things, Gentlemen, that we propose to do for you, and, at the rate of progress which we propose to adopt, I say without fear or contradiction, that within the next Five Hundred years we shall so reform social conditions in this country, that the working classes will be able to enjoy some of the benefits of civilization.
 ‘The only question before you is: Are you willing to wait for Five Hundred Years?’
 ‘Yes, sir,’ shouted the Wise Men with enthusiasm at the glorious prospect.
 ‘Yes, Sir: we’ll wait a thousand years if you like, Sir!’
 ‘I’ve been waiting all my life,’ said one poor old veteran, who had assisted to ‘carry the "Old Flag" to victory’ times out of number in the past and who for his share of the spoils of those victories was now in a condition of abject, miserable poverty, with the portals of the workhouse yawning open to receive him; ‘I’ve waited all my life, hoping and trusting for better conditions so a few more years won’t make much difference to me.’
 ‘Don’t you trouble to ’urry yourself, Sir,’ shouted another Solomon in the crowd. ‘We don’t mind waiting. Take your own time, Sir. You know better than the likes of us ’ow long it ought to take.’
 In conclusion, the great man warned them against being led away by the Socialists, those foolish, unreasonable, impractical people who wanted to see an immediate improvement in their condition; and he reminded them that Rome was not built in a day.
 The Wise Men applauded lustily. It did not appear to occur to any of them that the rate at which the ancient Roman conducted their building operations had nothing whatever to do with the case.
 Sir Featherstone Blood sat down amid a wild storm of cheering, and then the procession reformed, and, reinforced by the audience from the hall, they proceeded to march about the dreary streets, singing, to the tune of the ‘Men of Harlech’:
  ‘Vote for Sweater, Vote for Sweater! Vote for Sweater, VOTE FOR SWEATER! ‘He’s the Man, who has a plan, To liberate and reinstate the workers! ‘Men of Mugs’bro’, show your mettle, Let them see that you’re in fettle! Once for all this question settle Sweater shall Prevail!’
 The carriage containing Sir Featherstone, Adam Sweater, and Rushton and Didlum was in the middle of the procession. The banner and the torches were at the head, and the grandeur of the scene was heightened by four men who walked - two on each side of the carriage, burning green fire in frying pans. As they passed by the Slave Market, a poor, shabbily dressed wretch whose boots were so worn and rotten that they were almost falling off his feet, climbed up a lamp-post, and taking off his cap waved it in the air and shrieked out: ‘Three Cheers for Sir Featherstone Blood, our future Prime Minister!’
 The Philanthropists cheered themselves hoarse and finally took the horses out of the traces and harnessed themselves to the carriage instead.
 ‘’Ow much wages will Sir Featherstone get if ’e is made Prime Minister?’ asked Harlow of another Philanthropist who was also pushing up behind the carriage.
 ‘Five thousand a year,’ replied the other, who by some strange chance happened to know. ‘That comes to a ’underd pounds a week.’
 ‘Little enough, too, for a man like ’im,’ said Harlow.
 ‘You’re right, mate,’ said the other, with deep sympathy in his voice. ‘Last time ’e ’eld office ’e was only in for five years, so ’e only made twenty-five thousand pounds out of it. Of course ’e got a pension as well - two thousand a year for life, I think it is; but after all, what’s that - for a man like ’im?’
 ‘Nothing,’ replied Harlow, in a tone of commiseration, and Newman, who was also there, helping to drag the carriage, said that it ought to be at least double that amount.
 However, they found some consolation in knowing that Sir Featherstone would not have to wait till he was seventy before he obtained his pension; he would get it directly he came out of office.
 
 The following evening Barrington, Owen and a few others of the same way of thinking, who had subscribed enough money between them to purchase a lot of Socialist leaflets, employed themselves distributing them to the crowds at the Liberal and Tory meetings, and whilst they were doing this they frequently became involved in arguments with the supporters of the capitalist system. In their attempts to persuade others to refrain from voting for either of the candidates, they were opposed even by some who professed to believe in Socialism, who said that as there was no better Socialist candidate the thing to do was to vote for the better of the two. This was the view of Harlow and Easton, whom they met. Harlow had a green ribbon in his buttonhole, but Easton wore D’Encloseland’s colours.
 One man said that if he had his way, all those who had votes should be compelled to record them - whether they liked it or not - or be disenfranchised! Barrington asked him if he believed in Tarrif Reform. The man said no.
 ‘Why not?’ demanded Barrington.
 The other replied that he opposed Tariff Reform because he believed it would ruin the country. Barrington inquired if he were a supporter of Socialism. The man said he was not, and when further questioned he said that he believed if it were ever adopted it would bring black ruin upon the country - he believed this because Mr Sweater had said so. When Barrington asked him - supposing there were only two candidates, one a Socialist and the other a Tariff Reformer - how would he like to be compelled to vote for one of them, he was at a loss for an answer.
 During the next few days the contest continued. The hired orators continued to pour forth their streams of eloquence; and tons of literature flooded the town. The walls were covered with huge posters: ‘Another Liberal Lie.’ ‘Another Tory Fraud.’
 Unconsciously each of these two parties put in some splendid work for Socialism, in so much that each of them thoroughly exposed the hypocrisy of the other. If the people had only had the sense, they might have seen that the quarrel between the Liberal and Tory leaders was merely a quarrel between thieves over the spoil; but unfortunately most of the people had not the sense to perceive this. They were blinded by bigoted devotion to their parties, and - inflamed with maniacal enthusiasm - thought of nothing but ‘carrying their flags to victory’.
 At considerable danger to themselves, Barrington, Owen and the other Socialists continued to distribute their leaflets and to heckle the Liberal and Tory speakers. They asked the Tories to explain the prevalence of unemployment and poverty in protected countries, like Germany and America, and at Sweater’s meetings they requested to be informed what was the Liberal remedy for unemployment. From both parties the Socialists obtained the same kinds of answer - threats of violence and requests ‘not to disturb the meeting’.
 These Socialists held quite a lot of informal meetings on their own. Every now and then when they were giving their leaflets away, some unwary supporter of the capitalist system would start an argument, and soon a crowd would gather round and listen.
 Sometimes the Socialists succeeded in arguing their opponents to an absolute standstill, for the Liberals and Tones found it impossible to deny that machinery is the cause of the overcrowded state of the labour market; that the overcrowded labour market is the cause of unemployment; that the fact of there being always an army of unemployed waiting to take other men’s jobs away from them destroys the independence of those who are in employment and keeps them in subjection to their masters. They found it impossible to deny that this machinery is being used, not for the benefit of all, but to make fortunes for a few. In short, they were unable to disprove that the monopoly of the land and machinery by a comparatively few persons, is the cause of the poverty of the majority. But when these arguments that they were unable to answer were put before them and when it was pointed out that the only possible remedy was the Public Ownership and Management of the Means of production, they remained angrily silent, having no alternative plan to suggest.
 At other times the meeting resolved itself into a number of quarrelsome disputes between the Liberals and Tories that formed the crowd, which split itself up into a lot of little groups and whatever the original subject might have been they soon drifted to a hundred other things, for most of the supporters of the present system seemed incapable of pursuing any one subject to its logical conclusion. A discussion would be started about something or other; presently an unimportant side issue would crop up, then the original subject would be left unfinished, and they would argue and shout about the side issue. In a little while another side issue would arise, and then the first side issue would be abandoned also unfinished, and an angry wrangle about the second issue would ensue, the original subject being altogether forgotten.
 They did not seem to really desire to discover the truth or to find out the best way to bring about an improvement in their condition, their only object seemed to be to score off their opponents.
 Usually after one of these arguments, Owen would wander off by himself, with his head throbbing and a feeling of unutterable depression and misery at his heart; weighed down by a growing conviction of the hopelessness of everything, of the folly of expecting that his fellow workmen would ever be willing to try to understand for themselves the causes that produced their sufferings. It was not that those causes were so obscure that it required exceptional intelligence to perceive them; the causes of all the misery were so apparent that a little child could easily be made to understand both the disease and the remedy; but it seemed to him that the majority of his fellow workmen had become so convinced of their own intellectual inferiority that they did not dare to rely on their own intelligence to guide them, preferring to resign the management of their affairs unreservedly into the hands of those who battened upon and robbed them. They did not know the causes of the poverty that perpetually held them and their children in its cruel grip, and - they did not want to know! And if one explained those causes to them in such language and in such a manner that they were almost compelled to understand, and afterwards pointed out to them the obvious remedy, they were neither glad nor responsive, but remained silent and were angry because they found themselves unable to answer and disprove.
 They remained silent; afraid to trust their own intelligence, and the reason of this attitude was that they had to choose between the evidence and their own intelligence, and the stories told them by their masters and exploiters. And when it came to making this choice they deemed it safer to follow their old guides, than to rely on their own judgement, because from their very infancy they had had drilled into them the doctrine of their own mental and social inferiority, and their conviction of the truth of this doctrine was voiced in the degraded expression that fell so frequently from their lips, when speaking of themselves and each other - ‘The Likes of Us!’
 They did not know the causes of their poverty, they did not want to know, they did not want to hear.
 All they desired was to be left alone so that they might continue to worship and follow those who took advantage of their simplicity, and robbed them of the fruits of their toil; their old leaders, the fools or scoundrels who fed them with words, who had led them into the desolation where they now seemed to be content to grind out treasure for their masters, and to starve when those masters did not find it profitable to employ them. It was as if a flock of foolish sheep placed themselves under the protection of a pack of ravening wolves.
 Several times the small band of Socialists narrowly escaped being mobbed, but they succeeded in disposing of most of their leaflets without any serious trouble. Towards the latter part of one evening Barrington and Owen became separated from the others, and shortly afterwards these two lost each other in the crush.
 About nine o’clock, Barrington was in a large Liberal crowd, listening to the same hired orator who had spoken a few evenings before on the hill - the man with the scar on his forehead. The crowd was applauding him loudly and Barrington again fell to wondering where he had seen this man before. As on the previous occasion, this speaker made no reference to Socialism, confining himself to other matters. Barrington examined him closely, trying to recall under what circumstances they had met previously, and presently he remembered that this was one of the Socialists who had come with the band of cyclists into the town that Sunday morning, away back at the beginning of the summer, the man who had come afterwards with the van, and who had been struck down by a stone while attempting to speak from the platform of the van, the man who had been nearly killed by the upholders of the capitalist system. It was the same man! The Socialist had been clean-shaven - this man wore beard and moustache - but Barrington was certain he was the same.
 When the man had concluded his speech he got down and stood in the shade behind the platform, while someone else addressed the meeting, and Barrington went round to where he was standing, intending to speak to him.
 All around them, pandemonium reigned supreme. They were in the vicinity of the Slave Market, near the Fountain, on the Grand Parade, where several roads met; there was a meeting going on at every corner, and a number of others in different, parts of the roadway and on the pavement of the Parade. Some of these meetings were being carried on by two or three men, who spoke in turn from small, portable platforms they carried with them, and placed wherever they thought there was a chance of getting an audience.
 Every now and then some of these poor wretches - they were all paid speakers - were surrounded and savagely mauled and beaten by a hostile crowd. If they were Tariff Reformers the Liberals mobbed them, and vice versa. Lines of rowdies swaggered to and fro, arm in arm, singing, ‘Vote, Vote, Vote, for good ole Closeland’ or ‘good ole Sweater’, according as they were green or blue and yellow. Gangs of hooligans paraded up and down, armed with sticks, singing, howling, cursing and looking for someone to hit. Others stood in groups on the pavement with their hands thrust in their pockets, or leaned against walls or the shutters of the shops with expressions of ecstatic imbecility on their faces, chanting the mournful dirge to the tune of the church chimes,
  ‘Good - ole - Sweat - er Good - ole - Sweat - er Good - ole - Sweat - er Good - ole - Sweat - er.’
 Other groups - to the same tune - sang ‘Good - ole - Close - land’; and every now and again they used to leave off singing and begin to beat each other. Fights used to take place, often between workmen, about the respective merits of Adam Sweater and Sir Graball D’Encloseland.
 The walls were covered with huge Liberal and Tory posters, which showed in every line the contempt of those who published them for the intelligence of the working men to whom they were addressed. There was one Tory poster that represented the interior of a public house; in front of the bar, with a quart pot in his hand, a clay pipe in his mouth, and a load of tools on his back, stood a degraded-looking brute who represented the Tory ideal of what an Englishman should be; the letterpress on the poster said it was a man! This is the ideal of manhood that they hold up to the majority of their fellow countrymen, but privately - amongst themselves - the Tory aristocrats regard such ‘men’ with far less respect than they do the lower animals. Horses or dogs, for instance.
 The Liberal posters were not quite so offensive. They were more cunning, more specious, more hypocritical and consequently more calculated to mislead and deceive the more intelligent of the voters.
 When Barrington got round to the back of the platform, he found the man with the scarred face standing alone and gloomily silent in the shadow. Barrington gave him one of the Socialist leaflets, which he took, and after glancing at it, put it in his coat pocket without making any remark.
 ‘I hope you’ll excuse me for asking, but were you not formerly a Socialist?’ said Barrington.
 Even in the semi-darkness Barrington saw the other man flush deeply and then become very pale, and the unsightly scar upon his forehead showed with ghastly distinctiveness.
 ‘I am still a Socialist: no man who has once been a Socialist can ever cease to be one.’
 ‘You seem to have accomplished that impossibility, to judge by the work you are at present engaged in. You must have changed your opinions since you were here last.’
 ‘No one who has been a Socialist can ever cease to be one. It is impossible for a man who has once acquired knowledge ever to relinquish it. A Socialist is one who understands the causes of the misery and degradation we see all around us; who knows the only remedy, and knows that that remedy - the state of society that will be called Socialism - must eventually be adopted; is the only alternative to the extermination of the majority of the working people; but it does not follow that everyone who has sense enough to acquire that amount of knowledge, must, in addition, be willing to sacrifice himself in order to help to bring that state of society into being. When I first acquired that knowledge,’ he continued, bitterly, ‘I was eager to tell the good news to others. I sacrificed my time, my money, and my health in order that I might teach others what I had learned myself. I did it willingly and happily, because I thought they would be glad to hear, and that they were worth the sacrifices I made for their sakes. But I know better now.’
 ‘Even if you no longer believe in working for Socialism, there’s no need to work AGAINST it. If you are not disposed to sacrifice yourself in order to do good to others, you might at least refrain from doing evil. If you don’t want to help to bring about a better state of affairs, there’s no reason why you should help to perpetuate the present system.’
 The other man laughed bitterly. ‘Oh yes, there is, and a very good reason too.’
 ‘I don’t think you could show me a reason,’ said Barrington.
 The man with the scar laughed again, the same unpleasant, mirthless laugh, and thrusting his hand into his trouser pocket drew it out again full of silver coins, amongst which one or two gold pieces glittered.
 ‘That is my reason. When I devoted my life and what abilities I possess to the service of my fellow workmen; when I sought to teach them how to break their chains; when I tried to show them how they might save their children from poverty and shameful servitude, I did not want them to give me money. I did it for love. And they paid me with hatred and injury. But since I have been helping their masters to rob them, they have treated me with respect.’
 Barrington made no reply and the other man, having returned the money to his pocket, indicated the crowd with a sweep of his hand.
 ‘Look at them!’ he continued with a contemptuous laugh. ‘Look at them! the people you are trying to make idealists of! Look at them! Some of them howling and roaring like wild beasts, or laughing like idiots, others standing with dull and stupid faces devoid of any trace of intelligence or expression, listening to the speakers whose words convey no meaning to their stultified minds, and others with their eyes gleaming with savage hatred of their fellow men, watching eagerly for an opportunity to provoke a quarrel that they may gratify their brutal natures by striking someone - their eyes are hungry for the sight of blood! Can’t you see that these people, whom you are trying to make understand your plan for the regeneration of the world, your doctrine of universal brotherhood and love are for the most part - intellectually - on level with Hottentots? The only things they feel any real interest in are beer, football, betting and - of course - one other subject. Their highest ambition is to be allowed to Work. And they desire nothing better for their children!
 ‘They have never had an independent thought in their lives. These are the people whom you hope to inspire with lofty ideals! You might just as well try to make a gold brooch out of a lump of dung! Try to reason with them, to uplift them, to teach them the way to higher things. Devote your whole life and intelligence to the work of trying to get better conditions for them, and you will find that they themselves are the enemy you will have to fight against. They’ll hate you, and, if they get the chance, they’ll tear you to pieces. But if you’re a sensible man you’ll use whatever talents and intelligence you possess for your own benefit. Don’t think about Socialism or any other "ism". Concentrate your mind on getting money - it doesn’t matter how you get it, but - get it. If you can’t get it honestly, get it dishonestly, but get it! it is the only thing that counts. Do as I do - rob them! exploit them! and then they’ll have some respect for you.’
 ‘There’s something in what you say,’ replied Barrington, after a long pause, ‘but it’s not all. Circumstances make us what we are; and anyhow, the children are worth fighting for.’
 ‘You may think so now,’ said the other, ‘but you’ll come to see it my way some day. As for the children - if their parents are satisfied to let them grow up to be half-starved drudges for other people, I don’t see why you or I need trouble about it. If you like to listen to reason,’ he continued after a pause, ‘I can put you on to something that will be worth more to you than all your Socialism.’
 ‘What do you mean?’
 ‘Look here: you’re a Socialist; well, I’m a Socialist too: that is, I have sense enough to believe that Socialism is practical and inevitable and right; it will come when the majority of the people are sufficiently enlightened to demand it, but that enlightenment will never be brought about by reasoning or arguing with them, for these people are simply not intellectually capable of abstract reasoning - they can’t grasp theories. You know what the late Lord Salisbury said about them when somebody proposed to give them some free libraries: He said: "They don’t want libraries: give them a circus." You see these Liberals and Tories understand the sort of people they have to deal with; they know that although their bodies are the bodies of grown men, their minds are the minds of little children. That is why it has been possible to deceive and bluff and rob them for so long. But your party persists in regarding them as rational beings, and that’s where you make a mistake - you’re simply wasting your time.
 ‘The only way in which it is possible to teach these people is by means of object lessons, and those are being placed before them in increasing numbers every day. The trustification of industry - the object lesson which demonstrates the possibility of collective ownership - will in time compel even these to understand, and by the time they have learnt that, they will also have learned by bitter experience and not from theoretical teaching, that they must either own the trusts or perish, and then, and not, till then, they will achieve Socialism. But meanwhile we have this election. Do you think it will make any real difference - for good or evil - which of these two men is elected?’
 ‘No.’
 ‘Well, you can’t keep them both out - you have no candidate of your own - why should you object to earning a few pounds by helping one of them to get in? There are plenty of voters who are doubtful whet to do; as you and I know there is every excuse for them being unable to make up their minds which of these two candidates is the worse, a word from your party would decide them. Since you have no candidate of your own you will be doing no harm to Socialism and you will be doing yourself a bit of good. If you like to come along with me now, I’ll introduce you to Sweater’s agent - no one need know anything about it.’
 He slipped his arm through Barrington’s, but the latter released himself.
 ‘Please yourself,’ said the other with an affectation of indifference. ‘You know your own business best. You may choose to be a Jesus Christ if you like, but for my part I’m finished. For the future I intend to look after myself. As for these people - they vote for what they want; they get - what they vote for; and by God, they deserve nothing better! They are being beaten with whips of their own choosing and if I had my way they should be chastised with scorpions! For them, the present system means joyless drudgery, semi-starvation, rags and premature death. They vote for it all and uphold it. Well, let them have what they vote for - let them drudge - let them starve!’
 The man with the scarred face ceased speaking, and for some moments Barrington did not reply.
 ‘I suppose there is some excuse for your feeling as you do,’ he said slowly at last, ‘but it seems to me that you do not make enough allowance for the circumstances. From their infancy most of them have been taught by priests and parents to regard themselves and their own class with contempt - a sort of lower animals - and to regard those who possess wealth with veneration, as superior beings. The idea that they are really human creatures, naturally absolutely the same as their so-called betters, naturally equal in every way, naturally different from them only in those ways in which their so-called superiors differ from each other, and inferior to them only because they have been deprived of education, culture and opportunity - you know as well as I do that they have all been taught to regard that idea as preposterous.
 ‘The self-styled "Christian" priests who say - with their tongues in their cheeks - that God is our Father and that all men are brethren, have succeeded in convincing the majority of the "brethren" that it is their duty to be content in their degradation, and to order themselves lowly and reverently towards their masters. Your resentment should be directed against the deceivers, not against the dupes.’
 The other man laughed bitterly.
 ‘Well, go and try to undeceive them,’ he said, as he returned to the platform in response to a call from his associates. ‘Go and try to teach them that the Supreme Being made the earth and all its fullness for the use and benefit of all His children. Go and try to explain to them that they are poor in body and mind and social condition, not because of any natural inferiority, but because they have been robbed of their inheritance. Go and try to show them how to secure that inheritance for themselves and their children - and see how grateful they’ll be to you.’
 For the next hour Barrington walked about the crowded streets in a dispirited fashion. His conversation with the renegade seemed to have taken all the heart out of him. He still had a number of the leaflets, but the task of distributing them had suddenly grown distasteful and after a while he discontinued it. All his enthusiasm was gone. Like one awakened from a dream he saw the people who surrounded him in a different light. For the first time he properly appreciated the offensiveness of most of those to whom he offered the handbills; some, without even troubling to ascertain what they were about, rudely refused to accept them; some took them and after glancing at the printing, crushed them in their hands and ostentatiously threw them away. Others, who recognized him as a Socialist, angrily or contemptuously declined them, often with curses or injurious words.
 His attention was presently attracted to a crowd of about thirty or forty people, congregated near a gas lamp at the roadside. The sound of many angry voices rose from the centre of this group, and as he stood on the outskirts of the crowd, Barrington, being tall, was able to look into the centre, where he saw Owen. The light of the street lamp fell full upon the latter’s pale face, as he stood silent in the midst of a ring of infuriated men, who were all howling at him at once, and whose malignant faces bore expressions of savage hatred, as they shouted out the foolish accusations and slanders they had read in the Liberal and Tory papers.
 Socialists wished to do away with religion and morality! to establish free love and atheism! All the money that the working classes had saved up in the Post Office and the Friendly Societies, was to be Robbed from them and divided up amongst a lot of drunken loafers who were too lazy to work. The King and all the Royal Family were to be Done Away with! and so on.
 Owen made no attempt to reply. and the manner of the crowd became every moment more threatening. It was evident that several of them found it difficult to refrain from attacking him. It was a splendid opportunity of doing a little fighting without running any risks. This fellow was all by himself, and did not appear to be much of a man even at that. Those in the middle were encouraged by shouts from others in the crowd, who urged them to ‘Go for him’ and at last - almost at the instant of Barrington’s arrival - one of the heroes, unable to contain himself any longer, lifted a heavy stick and struck Owen savagely across the face. The sight of the blood maddened the others, and in an instant everyone who could get within striking distance joined furiously in the onslaught, reaching eagerly over each other’s shoulders, showering blows upon him with sticks and fists, and before Barrington could reach his side, they had Owen down on the ground, and had begun to use their boots upon him.
 Barrington felt like a wild beast himself, as he fiercely fought his way through the crowd, spuming them to right and left with fists and elbows. He reached the centre in time to seize the uplifted arm of the man who had led the attack and wrenching the stick from his hand, he felled him to the ground with a single blow. The remainder shrank back, and meantime the crowd was augmented by others who came running up.
 Some of these newcomers were Liberals and some Tories, and as these did not know what the row was about they attacked each other. The Liberals went for those who wore Tory colours and vice versa, and in a few seconds there was a general free fight, though most of the original crowd ran away, and in the confusion that ended, Barrington and Owen got out of the crowd without further molestation.
 Monday was the last day of the election - polling day - and in consequence of the number of motor cars that were flying about, the streets were hardly safe for ordinary traffic. The wealthy persons who owned these carriages...
 The result of the poll was to be shown on an illuminated sign at the Town Hall, at eleven o’clock that night, and long before that hour a vast crowd gathered in the adjacent streets. About ten o’clock it began to rain, but the crowd stood its ground and increased in numbers as the time went by. At a quarter to eleven the rain increased to a terrible downpour, but the people remained waiting to know which hero had conquered. Eleven o’clock came and an intense silence fell upon the crowd, whose eyes were fixed eagerly upon the window where the sign was to be exhibited. To judge by the extraordinary interest displayed by these people, one might have thought that they expected to reap some great benefit or to sustain some great loss from the result, but of course that was not the case, for most of them knew perfectly well that the result of this election would make no more real difference to them than all the other elections that had gone before.
 They wondered what the figures would be. There were ten thousand voters on the register. At a quarter past eleven the sign was illuminated, but the figures were not yet shown. Next, the names of the two candidates were slid into sight, the figures were still missing, but D’Encloseland’s name was on top, and a hoarse roar of triumph came from the throats of his admirers. Then the two slides with the names were withdrawn, and the sign was again left blank. After a time the people began to murmur at all this delay and messing about, and presently some of them began to groan and hoot.
 After a few minutes the names were again slid into view, this time with Sweater’s name on top, and the figures appeared immediately afterwards:
  Sweater . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,221 D’Encloseland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,200
 It was several seconds before the Liberals could believe their eyes; it was too good to be true. It is impossible to say what was the reason of the wild outburst of delighted enthusiasm that followed, but whatever the reason, whatever the benefit was that they expected to reap - there was the fact. They were all cheering and dancing and shaking hands with each other, and some of them were so overcome with inexplicable joy that they were scarcely able to speak. It was altogether extraordinary and unaccountable.
 A few minutes after the declaration, Sweater appeared at the window and made a sort of a speech, but only fragments of it were audible to the cheering crowd who at intervals caught such phrases as ‘Slashing Blow’, ‘Sweep the Country’, ‘Grand Old Liberal Flag’, and so on. Next D’Encloseland appeared and he was seen to shake hands with Mr Sweater, whom he referred to as ‘My friend’.
 When the two ‘friends’ disappeared from the window, the part of the Liberal crowd that was not engaged in hand-to-hand fights with their enemies - the Tories - made a rush to the front entrance of the Town Hall, where Sweater’s carriage was waiting, and as soon as he had placed his plump rotundity inside, they took the horses out and amid frantic cheers harnessed themselves to it instead and dragged it through the mud and the pouring rain all the way to ‘The Cave’ - most of them were accustomed to acting as beasts of burden - where he again addressed a few words to them from the porch.
 Afterwards as they walked home saturated with rain and covered from head to foot with mud, they said it was a great victory for the cause of progress!
 Truly the wolves have an easy prey.
 
 Chapter 49
 The Undesired
  That evening about seven o’clock, whilst Easton was down-town seeing the last of the election, Ruth’s child was born.
 After the doctor was gone, Mary Linden stayed with her during the hours that elapsed before Easton came home, and downstairs Elsie and Charley - who were allowed to stay up late to help their mother because Mrs Easton was ill - crept about very quietly, and conversed in hushed tones as they washed up the tea things and swept the floor and tidied the kitchen.
 Easton did not return until after midnight, and all through the intervening hours, Ruth, weak and tired, but unable to sleep, was lying in bed with the child by her side. Her wide-open eyes appeared unnaturally large and brilliant, in contrast with the almost death-like paleness of her face, and there was a look of fear in them, as she waited and listened for the sound of Easton’s footsteps.
 Outside, the silence of the night was disturbed by many unusual noises: a far-off roar, as of the breaking of waves on a seashore, arose from the direction of the town, where the last scenes of the election were being enacted. Every few minutes motor cars rushed past the house at a furious rate, and the air was full of the sounds of distant shouts and singing.
 Ruth listened and started nervously at every passing footstep. Those who can imagine the kind of expression there would be upon the face of a hunted thief, who, finding himself encompassed and brought to bay by his pursuers, looks wildly around in a vain search for some way of escape, may be able to form some conception of the terror-stricken way in which she listened to every sound that penetrated into the stillness of the dimly lighted room. And ever and again, when her wandering glance reverted to the frail atom of humanity nestling by her side, her brows contracted and her eyes filled with bitter tears, as she weakly reached out her trembling hand to adjust its coverings, faintly murmuring, with quivering lips and a bursting heart, some words of endearment and pity. And then - alarmed by the footsteps of some chance passerby, or by the closing of the door of a neighbouring house, and fearing that it was the sound she had been waiting for and dreading through all those weary hours, she would turn in terror to Mary Linden, sitting in the chair at the bedside, sewing by the light of the shaded lamp, and take hold of her arm as if seeking protection from some impending danger.
 It was after twelve o’clock when Easton came home. Ruth recognized his footsteps before he reached the house, and her heart seemed to stop beating when she heard the clang of the gate, as it closed after he had passed through.
 It had been Mary’s intention to withdraw before he came into the room, but the sick woman clung to her in such evident fear, and entreated her so earnestly not to go away, that she remained.
 It was with a feeling of keen disappointment that Easton noticed how Ruth shrank away from him, for he had expected and hoped, that after this, they would be good friends once more; but he tried to think that it was because she was ill, and when she would not let him touch the child lest he should awaken it, he agreed without question.
 The next day, and for the greater part of the time during the next fortnight, Ruth was in a raging fever. There were intervals when although weak and exhausted, she was in her right mind, but most of the time she was quite unconscious of her surroundings and often delirious. Mrs Owen came every day to help to look after her, because Mary just then had a lot of needlework to do, and consequently could only give part of her time to Ruth, who, in her delirium, lived and told over and over again all the sorrow and suffering of the last few months. And so the two friends, watching by her bedside, learned her dreadful secret.
 Sometimes - in her delirium - she seemed possessed of an intense and terrible loathing for the poor little creature she had brought into the world, and was with difficulty prevented from doing it violence. Once she seized it cruelly and threw it fiercely from her to the foot of the bed, as if it had been some poisonous or loathsome thing. And so it often became necessary to take the child away out of the room, so that she could not see or hear it, but when her senses came back to her, her first thought was for the child, and there must have been in her mind some faint recollection of what she had said and done in her madness, for when she saw that the baby was not in its accustomed place her distress and alarm were painful to see, as she entreated them with tears to give it back to her. And then she would kiss and fondle it with all manner of endearing words, and cry bitterly.
 Easton did not see or hear most of this; he only knew that she was very ill; for he went out every day on the almost hopeless quest for work. Rushton’s had next to nothing to do, and most of the other shops were in a similar plight. Dauber and Botchit had one or two jobs going on, and Easton tried several times to get a start for them, but was always told they were full up. The sweating methods of this firm continued to form a favourite topic of conversation with the unemployed workmen, who railed at and cursed them horribly. It had leaked out that they were paying only sixpence an hour to most of the skilled workmen in their employment, and even then the conditions under which they worked were, if possible, worse than those obtaining at most other firms. The men were treated like so many convicts, and every job was a hell where driving and bullying reigned supreme, and obscene curses and blasphemy polluted the air from morning till night. The resentment of those who were out of work was directed, not only against the heads of the firm, but also against the miserable, half-starved drudges in their employment. These poor wretches were denounced as ‘scabs’ and ‘wastrels’ by the unemployed workmen but all the same, whenever Dauber and Botchit wanted some extra hands they never had any difficulty in obtaining them, and it often happened that those who had been loudest and bitterest in their denunciations were amongst the first to rush off eagerly to apply there for a job whenever there was a chance of getting one.
 Frequently the light was seen burning late at night in Rushton’s office, where Nimrod and his master were figuring out prices and writing out estimates, cutting down the amounts to the lowest possible point in the hope of underbidding their rivals. Now and then they were successful but whether they secured the work or not, Nimrod always appeared equally miserable. If they got the ‘job’ it often showed such a small margin of profit that Rushton used to grumble at him and suggest mismanagement. If their estimates were too high and they lost the work, he used to demand of Nimrod why it was possible for Dauber and Botchit to do work so much more cheaply.
 As the unemployed workmen stood in groups at the corners or walked aimlessly about the streets, they often saw Hunter pass by on his bicycle, looking worried and harassed. He was such a picture of misery, that it began to be rumoured amongst the men, that he had never been the same since the time he had that fall off the bike; and some of them declared, that they wouldn’t mind betting that ole Misery would finish up by going off his bloody rocker.
 At intervals - whenever a job came in - Owen, Crass, Slyme, Sawkins and one or two others, continued to be employed at Rushton’s, but they seldom managed to make more than two or three days a week, even when there was anything to do.
 
 Chapter 50
 Sundered
  During the next few weeks Ruth continued very ill. Although the delirium had left her and did not return, her manner was still very strange, and it was remarkable that she slept but little and at long intervals. Mrs Owen came to look after her every day, not going back to her own home till the evening. Frankie used to call for her as he came out of school and then they used to go home together, taking little Freddie Easton with them also, for his own mother was not able to look after him and Mary Linden had so much other work to do.
 On Wednesday evening, when the child was about five weeks old, as Mrs Owen was wishing her good night, Ruth took hold of her hand and after saying how grateful she was for all that she had done, she asked whether - supposing anything happened to herself - Nora would promise to take charge of Freddie for Easton. Owen’s wife gave the required promise, at the same time affecting to regard the supposition as altogether unlikely, and assuring her that she would soon be better, but she secretly wondered why Ruth had not mentioned the other child as well.
 Nora went away about five o’clock, leaving Ruth’s bedroom door open so that Mrs Linden could hear her call if she needed anything. About a quarter of an hour after Nora and the two children had gone, Mary Linden went upstairs to see Ruth, who appeared to have fallen fast asleep; so she returned to her needlework downstairs. The weather had been very cloudy all day, there had been rain at intervals and it was a dark evening, so dark that she had to light the lamp to see her work. Charley sat on the hearthrug in front of the fire repairing one of the wheels of a wooden cart that he had made with the assistance of another boy, and Elsie busied herself preparing the tea.
 Easton was not yet home; Rushton & Co. had a few jobs to do and he had been at work since the previous Thursday. The place where he was working was some considerable distance away, so it was nearly half past six when he came home. They heard him at the gate and at her mother’s direction Elsie went quickly to the front door, which was ajar, to ask him to walk as quietly as possible so as not to wake Ruth.
 Mary had prepared the table for his tea in the kitchen, where there was a bright fire with the kettle singing on the hob. He lit the lamp and after removing his hat and overcoat, put the kettle on the fire and while he was waiting for it to boil he went softly upstairs. There was no lamp burning in the bedroom and the place would have been in utter darkness but for the red glow of the fire, which did not dispel the prevailing obscurity sufficiently to enable him to discern the different objects in the room distinctly. The intense silence that reigned struck him with a sudden terror. He crossed swiftly over to the bed and a moment’s examination sufficed to tell him that it was empty. He called her name, but there was no answer, and a hurried search only made it certain that she was nowhere in the house.
 Mrs Linden now remembered what Owen’s wife had told her of the strange request that Ruth had made, and as she recounted it to Easton, his fears became intensified a thousandfold. He was unable to form any opinion of the reason of her going or of where she had gone, as he rushed out to seek for her. Almost unconsciously he directed his steps to Owen’s house, and afterwards the two men went to every place where they thought it possible she might have gone, but without finding any trace of her.
 Her father lived a short distance outside the town, and this was one of the first places they went to, although Easton did not think it likely she would go there, for she had not been on friendly terms with her stepmother, and as he had anticipated, it was a fruitless journey.
 They sought for her in every conceivable place, returning often to Easton’s house to see if she had come home, but they found no trace of her, nor met anyone who had seen her, which was, perhaps, because the dreary, rain-washed streets were deserted by all except those whose business compelled them to be out.
 About eleven o’clock Nora was standing at the front door waiting for Owen and Easton, when she thought she could discern a woman’s figure in the shadow of the piers of the gate opposite. It was an unoccupied house with a garden in front, and the outlines of the bushes it contained were so vague in the darkness that it was impossible to be certain; but the longer she looked the more convinced she became that there was someone there. At last she summoned sufficient courage to cross over the road, and as she nervously drew near the gate it became evident that she had not been mistaken. There was a woman standing there - a woman with a child in her arms, leaning against one of the pillars and holding the iron bars of the gate with her left hand. It was Ruth. Nora recognized her even in the semi-darkness. Her attitude was one of extreme exhaustion, and as Nora touched her, she perceived that she was wet through and trembling; but although she was almost fainting with fatigue she would not consent to go indoors until repeatedly assured that Easton was not there, and that Nora would not let him see her if he came. And when at length she yielded and went into the house she would not sit down or take off her hat or jacket until - crouching on the floor beside Nora’s chair with her face hidden in the latter’s lap - she had sobbed out her pitiful confession, the same things that she had unwittingly told to the same hearer so often before during the illness, the only fact that was new was the account of her wanderings that night.
 She cried so bitterly and looked so forlorn and heartbroken and ashamed as she faltered out her woeful story; so consumed with self-condemnation, making no excuse for herself except to repeat over and over again that she had never meant to do wrong, that Nora could not refrain from weeping also as she listened.
 It appeared that, unable to bear the reproach that Easton’s presence seemed to imply, or to endure the burden of her secret any longer, and always haunted by the thought of the lake in the park, Ruth had formed the dreadful resolution of taking her own life and the child’s. When she arrived at the park gates they were closed and locked for the night but she remembered that there was another means of entering - the place at the far end of the valley where the park was not fenced in, so she had gone there - nearly three miles - only to find that railings had recently been erected and therefore it was no longer possible to get into the park by that way. And then, when she found it impossible to put her resolve into practice, she had realized for the first time the folly and wickedness of the act she had meant to commit. But although she had abandoned her first intention, she said she could never go home again; she would take a room somewhere and get some work to do, or perhaps she might be able to get a situation where they would allow her to have the child with her, or failing that she would work and pay someone to look after it; but she could never go home any more. If she only had somewhere to stay for a few days until she could get something to do, she was sure she would be able to earn her living, but she could not go back home; she felt that she would rather walk about the streets all night than go there again.
 It was arranged that Ruth should have the small apartment which had been Frankie’s playroom, the necessary furniture being obtained from a second-hand shop close by. Easton did not learn the real reason of her flight until three days afterwards. At first he attributed it to a recurrence of the mental disorder that she had suffered from after the birth of the child, and he had been glad to leave her at Owen’s place in Nora’s care, but on the evening of the third day when he returned home from work, he found a letter in Ruth’s handwriting which told him all there was to tell.
 When he recovered from the stupefaction into which he was thrown by the perusal of this letter, his first thought was to seek out Slyme, but he found upon inquiring that the latter had left the town the previous morning. Slyme’s landlady said he had told her that he had been offered several months’ work in London, which he had accepted. The truth was that Slyme had heard of Ruth’s flight - nearly everyone knew about it as a result of the inquiries that had been made for her - and, guessing the cause, he had prudently cleared out.
 Easton made no attempt to see Ruth, but he went to Owen’s and took Freddie away, saying he would pay Mrs Linden to look after the child whilst he was at work. His manner was that of a deeply injured man - the possibility that he was in any way to blame for what had happened did not seem to occur to his mind at all.
 As for Ruth she made no resistance to his taking the child away from her, although she cried about it in secret. She got some work a few days afterwards - helping the servants at one of the large boarding- houses on the Grand Parade.
 Nora looked after the baby for her while she was at work, an arrangement that pleased Frankie vastly; he said it was almost as good as having a baby of their very own.
 For the first few weeks after Ruth went away Easton tried to persuade himself that he did not very much regret what had happened. Mrs Linden looked after Freddie, and Easton tried to believe that he would really be better off now that he had only himself and the child to provide for.
 At first, whenever he happened to meet Owen, they used to speak of Ruth, or to be more correct, Easton used to speak of her; but one day when the two men were working together Owen had expressed himself rather offensively. He seemed to think that Easton was more to blame than she was; and afterwards they avoided the subject, although Easton found it difficult to avoid the thoughts the other man’s words suggested.
 Now and then he heard of Ruth and learnt that she was still working at the same place; and once he met her suddenly and unexpectedly in the street. They passed each other hurriedly and he did not see the scarlet flush that for an instant dyed her face, nor the deathly pallor that succeeded it.
 He never went to Owen’s place or sent any communication to Ruth, nor did she ever send him any; but although Easton did not know it she frequently saw Freddie, for when Elsie Linden took the child out she often called to see Mrs Owen.
 As time went on and the resentment he had felt towards her lost its first bitterness, Easton began to think there was perhaps some little justification for what Owen had said, and gradually there grew within him an immense desire for reconciliation - to start afresh and to forget all that had happened; but the more he thought of this the more hopeless and impossible of realization it seemed.
 Although perhaps he was not conscious of it, this desire arose solely from selfish motives. The money he earned seemed to melt away almost as soon as he received it; to his surprise he found that he was not nearly so well off in regard to personal comfort as he had been formerly, and the house seemed to grow more dreary and desolate as the wintry days dragged slowly by. Sometimes - when he had the money - he sought forgetfulness in the society of Crass and the other frequenters of the Cricketers, but somehow or other he could not take the same pleasure in the conversation of these people as formerly, when he had found it - as he now sometimes wondered to remember - so entertaining as to almost make him forget Ruth’s existence.
 One evening about three weeks before Christmas, as he and Owen were walking homewards together from work, Easton reverted for the first time to their former conversation. He spoke with a superior air: his manner and tone indicating that he thought he was behaving with great generosity. He would be willing to forgive her and have her back, he said, if she would come: but he would never be able to tolerate the child. Of course it might be sent to an orphanage or some similar institution, but he was afraid Ruth would never consent to that, and he knew that her stepmother would not take it.
 ‘If you can persuade her to return to you, we’ll take the child,’ said Owen.
 ‘Do you think your wife would be willing?’
 ‘She has already suggested doing so.’
 ‘To Ruth?’
 ‘No: to me. We thought it a possible way for you, and my wife would like to have the child.’
 ‘But would you be able to afford it?’ said Easton.
 ‘We should manage all right.’
 ‘Of course,’ said Easton, ‘if Slyme comes back he might agree to pay something for its keep.’
 Owen flushed.
 ‘I wouldn’t take his money.’
 After a long pause Easton continued: ‘Would you mind asking Mrs Owen to suggest it to Ruth?’
 ‘If you like I’ll get her to suggest it - as a message from you.’
 ‘What I meant,’ said Easton hesitatingly, ‘was that your wife might just suggest it - casual like - and advise her that it would be the best way, and then you could let me know what Ruth said.’
 ‘No,’ replied Owen, unable any longer to control his resentment of the other’s manner, ‘as things stand now, if it were not for the other child, I should advise her to have nothing further to do with you. You seem to think that you are acting a very generous part in being "willing" to have her back, but she’s better off now than she was with you. I see no reason - except for the other child - why she should go back to you. As far as I understand it, you had a good wife and you ill-treated her.’
 ‘I never ill-treated her! I never raised my hand to her - at least only once, and then I didn’t hurt her. Does she say I ill-treated her.’
 ‘Oh no: from what my wife tells me she only blames herself, but I’m drawing my own conclusions. You may not have struck her, but you did worse - you treated her with indifference and exposed her to temptation. What has happened is the natural result of your neglect and want of care for her. The responsibility for what has happened is mainly yours, but apparently you wish to pose now as being very generous and to "forgive her" - you’re "willing" to take her back; but it seems to me that it would be more fitting that you should ask her to forgive you.’
 Easton made no answer and after a long silence the other continued:
 ‘I would not advise her to go back to you on such terms as you seem to think right, because if you became reconciled on such terms I don’t think either of you could be happy. Your only chance of happiness is to realize that you have both done wrong; that each of you has something to forgive; to forgive and never speak of it again.’
 Easton made no reply and a few minutes afterwards, their ways diverging, they wished each other ‘Good night’.
 They were working for Rushton - painting the outside of a new conservatory at Mr Sweater’s house, ‘The Cave’. This job was finished the next day and at four o’clock the boy brought the handcart, which they loaded with their ladders and other materials. They took these back to the yard and then, as it was Friday night, they went up to the front shop and handed in their time sheets. Afterwards, as they were about to separate, Easton again referred to the subject of their conversation of the previous evening. He had been very reserved and silent all day, scarcely uttering a word except when the work they had been engaged in made it necessary to do so, and there was now a sort of catch in his voice as he spoke.
 ‘I’ve been thinking over what you said last night; it’s quite true. I’ve been a great deal to blame. I wrote to Ruth last night and admitted it to her. I’ll take it as a favour if you and your wife will say what you can to help me get her back.’
 Owen stretched out his hand and as the other took it, said: ‘You may rely on us both to do our best.’
 
 Chapter 51
 The Widow’s Son
  The next morning when they went to the yard at half past eight o’clock Hunter told them that there was nothing to do, but that they had better come on Monday in case some work came in. They accordingly went on the Monday, and Tuesday and Wednesday, but as nothing ‘came in’ of course they did not do any work. On Thursday morning the weather was dark and bitterly cold. The sky presented an unbroken expanse of dull grey and a keen north wind swept through the cheerless streets. Owen - who had caught cold whilst painting the outside of the conservatory at Sweater’s house the previous week - did not get to the yard until ten o’clock. He felt so ill that he would not have gone at all if they had not needed the money he would be able to earn if there was anything to do. Strange though it may appear to the advocates of thrift, although he had been so fortunate as to be in employment when so many others were idle, they had not saved any money. On the contrary, during all the summer they had not been able to afford to have proper food or clothing. Every week most of the money went to pay arrears of rent or some other debts, so that even whilst he was at work they had often to go without some of the necessaries of life. They had broken boots, shabby, insufficient clothing, and barely enough to eat.
 The weather had become so bitterly cold that, fearing he would be laid up if he went without it any longer, he took his overcoat out of pawn, and that week they had to almost starve. Not that it was much better other weeks, for lately he had only been making six and a half hours a day - from eight-thirty in the morning till four o’clock in the evening, and on Saturday only four and a half hours - from half past eight till one. This made his wages - at sevenpence an hour - twenty-one shillings and sevenpence a week - that is, when there was work to do every day, which was not always. Sometimes they had to stand idle three days out of six. The wages of those who got sixpence halfpenny came out at one pound and twopence - when they worked every day - and as for those who - like Sawkins - received only fivepence, their week’s wages amounted to fifteen and sixpence.
 When they were only employed for two or three days or perhaps only a few hours, their ‘Saturday night’ sometimes amounted to half a sovereign, seven and sixpence, five shillings or even less. Then most of them said that it was better than nothing at all.
 Many of them were married men, so, in order to make existence possible, their wives went out charing or worked in laundries. They had children whom they had to bring up for the most part on ‘skim’ milk, bread, margarine, and adulterated tea. Many of these children - little mites of eight or nine years - went to work for two or three hours in the morning before going to school; the same in the evening after school, and all day on Saturday, carrying butchers’ trays loaded with meat, baskets of groceries and vegetables, cans of paraffin oil, selling or delivering newspapers, and carrying milk. As soon as they were old enough they got Half Time certificates and directly they were fourteen they left school altogether and went to work all the day. When they were old enough some of them tried to join the Army or Navy, but were found physically unfit.
 It is not much to be wondered at that when they became a little older they were so degenerate intellectually that they imagined that the surest way to obtain better conditions would be to elect gangs of Liberal and Tory land-grabbers, sweaters, swindlers and lawyers to rule over them.
 When Owen arrived at the yard he found Bert White cleaning out the dirty pots in the paint-shop. The noise he made with the scraping knife prevented him from hearing Owen’s approach and the latter stood watching him for some minutes without speaking. The stone floor of the paint shop was damp and shiny and the whole place was chilly as a tomb. The boy was trembling with cold and he looked pitifully undersized and frail as he bent over his work with an old apron girt about him. Because it was so cold he was wearing his jacket with the ends of the sleeves turned back to keep them clean, or to prevent them getting any dirtier, for they were already in the same condition as the rest of his attire, which was thickly encrusted with dried paint of many colours, and his hands and fingernails were grimed with it.
 As he watched the poor boy bending over his task, Owen thought of Frankie, and with a feeling akin to terror wondered whether he would ever be in a similar plight.
 When he saw Owen, the boy left off working and wished him good morning, remarking that it was very cold.
 ‘Why don’t you light a fire? There’s lots of wood lying about the yard.’
 ‘No,’ said Bert shaking his head. ‘That would never do! Misery wouldn’t ’arf ramp if ’e caught me at it. I used to ’ave a fire ’ere last winter till Rushton found out, and ’e kicked up an orful row and told me to move meself and get some work done and then I wouldn’t feel the cold.’
 ‘Oh, he said that, did he?’ said Owen, his pale face becoming suddenly suffused with blood. ‘We’ll see about that.’
 He went out into the yard and crossing over to where - under a shed - there was a great heap of waste wood, stuff that had been taken out of places where Rushton & Co. had made alterations, he gathered an armful of it and was returning to the paintshop when Sawkins accosted him.
 ‘You mustn’t go burnin’ any of that, you know! That’s all got to be saved and took up to the bloke’s house. Misery spoke about it only this mornin’.’
 Owen did not answer him. He carried the wood into the shop and after throwing it into the fireplace he poured some old paint over it, and, applying a match, produced a roaring fire. Then he brought in several more armfuls of wood and piled them in a corner of the shop. Bert took no part in these proceedings, and at first rather disapproved of them because he was afraid there would be trouble when Misery came, but when the fire was an accomplished fact he warmed his hands and shifted his work to the other side of the bench so as to get the benefit of the heat.
 Owen waited for about half an hour to see if Hunter would return, but as that disciple did not appear, he decided not to wait any longer. Before leaving he gave Bert some instructions:
 ‘Keep up the fire with all the old paint that you can scrape off those things and any other old paint or rubbish that’s here, and whenever it grows dull put more wood on. There’s a lot of old stuff here that’s of no use except to be thrown away or burnt. Burn it all. If Hunter says anything, tell him that I lit the fire, and that I told you to keep it burning. If you want more wood, go out and take it.’
 ‘All right,’ replied Bert.
 On his way out Owen spoke to Sawkins. His manner was so menacing, his face so pale, and there was such a strange glare in his eyes, that the latter thought of the talk there had been about Owen being mad, and felt half afraid of him.
 ‘I am going to the office to see Rushton; if Hunter comes here, you say I told you to tell him that if I find the boy in that shop again without a fire, I’ll report it to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. And as for you, if the boy comes out here to get more wood, don’t you attempt to interfere with him.’
 ‘I don’t want to interfere with the bloody kid,’ grunted Sawkins. ‘It seems to me as if he’s gorn orf ’is bloody crumpet,’ he added as he watched Owen walking rapidly down the street. ‘I can’t understand why people can’t mind their own bloody business: anyone would think the boy belonged to ’IM.’
 That was just how the matter presented itself to Owen. The idea that it was his own child who was to be treated in this way possessed and infuriated him as he strode savagely along. In the vicinity of the Slave Market on the Grand Parade he passed - without seeing them - several groups of unemployed artisans whom he knew. Some of them were offended and remarked that he was getting stuck up, but others, observing how strange he looked, repeated the old prophecy that one of these days Owen would go out of his mind.
 As he drew near to his destination large flakes of snow began to fall. He walked so rapidly and was in such a fury that by the time he reached the shop he was scarcely able to speak.
 ‘Is - Hunter - or Rushton here?’ he demanded of the shopman.
 ‘Hunter isn’t, but the guv’nor is. What was it you wanted?’
 ‘He’ll soon - know - that,’ panted Owen as he strode up to the office door, and without troubling to knock, flung it violently open and entered.
 The atmosphere of this place was very different from that of the damp cellar where Bert was working. A grate fitted with asbestos blocks and lit with gas communicated a genial warmth to the air.
 Rushton was standing leaning over Miss Wade’s chair with his left arm round her neck. Owen recollected afterwards that her dress was disarranged. She retired hastily to the far end of the room as Rushton jumped away from her, and stared in amazement and confusion at the intruder - he was too astonished and embarrassed to speak. Owen stood panting and quivering in the middle of the office and pointed a trembling finger at his employer:
 ‘I’ve come - here - to tell - you - that - if I find young - Bert White - working - down in that shop - without a fire - I’ll have you prosecuted. The place is not good enough for a stable - if you owned a valuable dog - you wouldn’t keep it there - I give you fair warning - I know - enough - about you - to put you - where you deserve to be - if you don’t treat him better I’ll have you punished I’ll show you up.’
 Rushton continued to stare at him in mingled confusion, fear and perplexity; he did not yet comprehend exactly what it was all about; he was guiltily conscious of so many things which he might reasonably fear to be shown up or prosecuted for if they were known, and the fact of being caught under such circumstances with Miss Wade helped to reduce him to a condition approaching terror.
 ‘If the boy has been there without a fire, I ’aven’t known anything about it,’ he stammered at last. ‘Mr ’Unter has charge of all those matters.’
 ‘You - yourself - forbade him - to make a fire last winter - and anyhow - you know about it now. You obtained money from his mother under the pretence - that you were going - to teach him a trade - but for the last twelve months - you have been using him - as if he were - a beast of burden. I advise you to see to it - or I shall - find - means - to make you - wish you had done so.’
 With this Owen turned and went out, leaving the door open, and Rushton in a state of mind compounded of fear, amazement and anger.
 As he walked homewards through the snow-storm, Owen began to realize that the consequence of what he had done would be that Rushton would not give him any more work, and as he reflected on all that this would mean to those at home, for a moment he doubted whether he had done right. But when he told Nora what had happened she said there were plenty of other firms in the town who would employ him - when they had the work. He had done without Rushton before and could do so again; for her part - whatever the consequences might be - she was glad that he had acted as he did.
 ‘We’ll get through somehow, I suppose,’ said Owen, wearily. ‘There’s not much chance of getting a job anywhere else just now, but I shall try to get some work on my own account. I shall do some samples of show-cards the same as I did last winter and try to get orders from some of the shops - they usually want something extra at this time, but I’m afraid it is rather too late: most of them already have all they want.’
 ‘I shouldn’t go out again today if I were you,’ said Nora, noticing how ill he looked. ‘You should stay at home and read, or write up those minutes.’
 The minutes referred to were those of the last meeting of the local branch of the Painters’ Society, of which Owen was the secretary, and as the snow continued to fall, he occupied himself after dinner in the manner his wife suggested, until four o’clock, when Frankie returned from school bringing with him a large snowball, and crying out as a piece of good news that the snow was still falling heavily, and that he believed it was freezing!
 They went to bed very early that night, for it was necessary to economize the coal, and not only that, but - because the rooms were so near the roof - it was not possible to keep the place warm no matter how much coal was used. The fire seemed, if anything, to make the place colder, for it caused the outer air to pour in through the joints of the ill-fitting doors and windows.
 Owen lay awake for the greater part of the night. The terror of the future made rest or sleep impossible. He got up very early the next morning - long before it was light - and after lighting the fire, set about preparing the samples he had mentioned to Nora, but found that it would not be possible to do much in this direction without buying more cardboard, for most of what he had was not in good condition.
 They had bread and butter and tea for breakfast. Frankie had his in bed and it was decided to keep him away from school until after dinner because the weather was so very cold and his only pair of boots were so saturated with moisture from having been out in the snow the previous day.
 ‘I shall make a few inquiries to see if there’s any other work to be had before I buy the cardboard,’ said Owen, ‘although I’m afraid it’s not much use.’
 Just as he was preparing to go out, the front door bell rang, and as he was going down to answer it he saw Bert White coming upstairs. The boy was carrying a flat, brown-paper parcel under his arm.
 ‘A corfin plate,’ he explained as he arrived at the door. ‘Wanted at once - Misery ses you can do it at ’ome, an’ I’ve got to wait for it.’
 Owen and his wife looked at each other with intense relief. So he was not to be dismissed after all. It was almost too good to be true.
 ‘There’s a piece of paper inside the parcel with the name of the party what’s dead,’ continued Bert, ‘and here’s a little bottle of Brunswick black for you to do the inscription with.’
 ‘Did he send any other message?’
 ‘Yes: he told me to tell you there’s a job to be started Monday morning - a couple of rooms to be done out somewhere. Got to be finished by Thursday; and there’s another job ’e wants you to do this afternoon - after dinner - so you’ve got to come to the yard at one o’clock. ’E told me to tell you ’e meant to leave a message for you yesterday morning, but ’e forgot.’
 ‘What did he say to you about the fire - anything?’
 ‘Yes: they both of ’em came about an hour after you went away - Misery and the Bloke too - but they didn’t kick up a row. I wasn’t arf frightened, I can tell you, when I saw ’em both coming, but they was quite nice. The Bloke ses to me, "Ah, that’s right, my boy," ’e ses. "Keep up a good fire. I’m going to send you some coke," ’e ses. And then they ’ad a look round and ’e told Sawkins to put some new panes of glass where the winder was broken, and - you know that great big packing-case what was under the truck shed?’
 ‘Yes.’
 ‘Well, ’e told Sawkins to saw it up and cover over the stone floor of the paint-shop with it. It ain’t ’arf all right there now. I’ve cleared out all the muck from under the benches and we’ve got two sacks of coke sent from the gas-works, and the Bloke told me when that’s all used up I’ve got to get a order orf Miss Wade for another lot.’
 At one o’clock Owen was at the yard, where he saw Misery, who instructed him to go to the front shop and paint some numbers on the racks where the wallpapers were stored. Whilst he was doing this work Rushton came in and greeted him in a very friendly way.
 ‘I’m very glad you let me know about the boy working in that paint-shop,’ he observed after a few preliminary remarks. ‘I can assure you as I don’t want the lad to be uncomfortable, but you know I can’t attend to everything myself. I’m much obliged to you for telling me about it; I think you did quite right; I should have done the same myself.’
 Owen did not know what to reply, but Rushton walked off without waiting...
 
 Chapter 52
 ’It’s a Far, Far Better Thing that I do, than I have Ever Done’
  Although Owen, Easton and Crass and a few others were so lucky as to have had a little work to do during the last few months, the majority of their fellow workmen had been altogether out of employment most of the time, and meanwhile the practical business-men, and the pretended disciples of Christ - the liars and hypocrites who professed to believe that all men are brothers and God their Father - had continued to enact the usual farce that they called ‘Dealing’ with the misery that surrounded them on every side. They continued to organize ‘Rummage’ and ‘Jumble’ sales and bazaars, and to distribute their rotten cast-off clothes and boots and their broken victuals and soup to such of the Brethren as were sufficiently degraded to beg for them. The beautiful Distress Committee was also in full operation; over a thousand Brethren had registered themselves on its books. Of this number - after careful investigation - the committee had found that no fewer than six hundred and seventy-two were deserving of being allowed to work for their living. The Committee would probably have given these six hundred and seventy-two the necessary permission, but it was somewhat handicapped by the fact that the funds at its disposal were only sufficient to enable that number of Brethren to be employed for about three days. However, by adopting a policy of temporizing, delay, and general artful dodging, the Committee managed to create the impression that they were Dealing with the Problem.
 If it had not been for a cunning device invented by Brother Rushton, a much larger number of the Brethren would have succeeded in registering themselves as unemployed on the books of the Committee. In previous years it had been the practice to issue an application form called a ‘Record Paper’ to any Brother who asked for one, and the Brother returned it after filling it in himself. At a secret meeting of the Committee Rushton proposed - amid laughter and applause, it was such a good joke - a new and better way, calculated to keep down the number of applicants. The result of this innovation was that no more forms were issued, but the applicants for work were admitted into the office one at a time, and were there examined by a junior clerk, somewhat after the manner of a French Juge d’Instruction interrogating a criminal, the clerk filling in the form according to the replies of the culprit.
 ‘What’s your name?’
 ‘Where do you live?’
 ‘How long have you been living there?’
 ‘Where did you live before you went there?’
 ‘How long were you living at that place?’
 ‘Why did you move?’
 ‘Did you owe any rent when you left?’
 ‘What was your previous address?’
 ‘How old are you? When was your last birthday?’
 ‘What is your Trade, Calling, Employment, or Occupation?’
 ‘Are you Married or single or a Widower or what?’
 ‘How many children have you? How many boys? How many girls? Do they go to work? What do they earn?’
  ‘What kind of a house do you live in? How many rooms are there?’
 ‘How much rent do you owe?’
 ‘Who was your last employer? What was the foreman’s name? How long did you work there? What kind of work did you do? Why did you leave?’
 ‘What have you been doing for the last five years? What kind of work, how many hours a day? What wages did you get?’
 ‘Give the full names and addresses of all the different employers you have worked for during the last five years, and the reasons why you left them?’
 ‘Give the names of all the foremen you have worked under during the last five years?’
 ‘Does your wife earn anything? How much?’
 ‘Do you get any money from any Club or Society, or from any Charity, or from any other source?’
 ‘Have you ever received Poor Relief?’
 ‘Have you ever worked for a Distress Committee before?’
 ‘Have you ever done any other kinds of work than those you have mentioned? Do you think you would be fit for any other kind’
 ‘Have you any references?’ and so on and so forth.
 When the criminal had answered all the questions, and when his answers had all been duly written down, he was informed that a member of the Committee, or an Authorized Officer, or some Other Person, would in due course visit his home and make inquiries about him, after which the Authorized Officer or Other Person would make a report to the Committee, who would consider it at their next meeting.
 As the interrogation of each criminal occupied about half an hour, to say nothing of the time he was kept waiting, it will be seen that as a means of keeping down the number of registered unemployed the idea worked splendidly.
 When Rushton introduced this new rule it was carried unanimously, Dr Weakling being the only dissentient, but of course he - as Brother Grinder remarked - was always opposed to any sensible proposal. There was one consolation, however, Grinder added, they was not likely to be pestered with ’im much longer; the first of November was coming and if he - Grinder - knowed anything of working men they was sure to give Weakling the dirty kick out directly they got the chance.
 A few days afterwards the result of the municipal election justified Brother Grinder’s prognostications, for the working men voters of Dr Weakling’s ward did give him the dirty kick out: but Rushton, Didlum, Grinder and several other members of the band were triumphantly returned with increased majorities.
 Mr Dauber, of Dauber and Botchit, had already been elected a Guardian of the Poor.
 During all this time Hunter, who looked more worried and miserable as the dreary weeks went by, was occupied every day in supervising what work was being done and in running about seeking for more. Nearly every night he remained at the office until a late hour, poring over specifications and making out estimates. The police had become so accustomed to seeing the light in the office that as a rule they took no notice of it, but one Thursday night - exactly one week after the scene between Owen and Rushton about the boy - the constable on the beat observed the light there much later than usual. At first he paid no particular attention to the fact, but when night merged into morning and the light still remained, his curiosity was aroused.
 He knocked at the door, but no one came in answer, and no sound disturbed the deathlike stillness that reigned within. The door was locked, but he was not able to tell whether it had been closed from the inside or outside, because it had a spring latch. The office window was low down, but it was not possible to see in because the back of the glass had been painted.
 The constable thought that the most probable explanation of the mystery was that whoever had been there earlier in the evening had forgotten to turn out the light when they went away; it was not likely that thieves or anyone who had no business to be there would advertise their presence by lighting the gas.
 He made a note of the incident in his pocket-book and was about to resume his beat when he was joined by his inspector. The latter agreed that the conclusion arrived at by the constable was probably the right one and they were about to pass on when the inspector noticed a small speck of light shining through the lower part of the painted window, where a small piece of the paint had either been scratched or had shelled off the glass. He knelt down and found that it was possible to get a view of the interior of the office, and as he peered through he gave a low exclamation. When he made way for his subordinate to look in his turn, the constable was with some difficulty able to distinguish the figure of a man lying prone upon the floor.
 It was an easy task for the burly policeman to force open the office door: a single push of his shoulder wrenched it from its fastenings and as it flew back the socket of the lock fell with a splash into a great pool of blood that had accumulated against the threshold, flowing from the place where Hunter was lying on his back, his arms extended and his head nearly severed from his body. On the floor, close to his right hand, was an open razor. An overturned chair lay on the floor by the side of the table where he usually worked, the table itself being littered with papers and drenched with blood.
 Within the next few days Crass resumed the role he had played when Hunter was ill during the summer, taking charge of the work and generally doing his best to fill the dead man’s place, although - as he confided to certain of his cronies in the bar of the Cricketers - he had no intention of allowing Rushton to do the same as Hunter had done. One of his first jobs - on the morning after the discovery of the body - was to go with Mr Rushton to look over a house where some work was to be done for which an estimate had to be given. It was this estimate that Hunter had been trying to make out the previous evening in the office, for they found that the papers on his table were covered with figures and writing relating to this work. These papers justified the subsequent verdict of the Coroner’s jury that Hunter committed suicide in a fit of temporary insanity, for they were covered with a lot of meaningless scribbling, the words wrongly spelt and having no intelligible connection with each other. There was one sum that he had evidently tried repeatedly to do correctly, but which came wrong in a different way every time. The fact that he had the razor in his possession seemed to point to his having premeditated the act, but this was accounted for at the inquest by the evidence of the last person who saw him alive, a hairdresser, who stated that Hunter had left the razor with him to be sharpened a few days previously and that he had called for it on the evening of the tragedy. He had ground this razor for Mr Hunter several times before.
 Crass took charge of all the arrangements for the funeral. He bought a new second-hand pair of black trousers at a cast-off clothing shop in honour of the occasion, and discarded his own low-crowned silk hat - which was getting rather shabby - in favour of Hunter’s tall one, which he found in the office and annexed without hesitation or scruple. It was rather large for him, but he put some folded strips of paper inside the leather lining. Crass was a proud man as he walked in Hunter’s place at the head of the procession, trying to look solemn, but with a half-smile on his fat, pasty face, destitute of colour except one spot on his chin near his underlip, where there was a small patch of inflammation about the size of a threepenny piece. This spot had been there for a very long time. At first - as well as he could remember - it was only a small pimple, but it had grown larger, with something the appearance of scurvy. Crass attributed its continuation to the cold having ‘got into it last winter’. It was rather strange, too, because he generally took care of himself when it was cold: he always wore the warm wrap that had formerly belonged to the old lady who died of cancer. However, Crass did not worry much about this little sore place; he just put a little zinc ointment on it occasionally and had no doubt that it would get well in time.
 
 Chapter 53
 Barrington Finds a Situation
  The revulsion of feeling that Barrington experienced during the progress of the election was intensified by the final result. The blind, stupid, enthusiastic admiration displayed by the philanthropists for those who exploited and robbed them; their extraordinary apathy with regard to their own interests; the patient, broken-spirited way in which they endured their sufferings, tamely submitting to live in poverty in the midst of the wealth they had helped to create; their callous indifference to the fate of their children, and the savage hatred they exhibited towards anyone who dared to suggest the possibility of better things, forced upon him the thought that the hopes he cherished were impossible of realization. The words of the renegade Socialist recurred constantly to his mind:
 ‘You can be a Jesus Christ if you like, but for my part I’m finished. For the future I intend to look after myself. As for these people, they vote for what they want, they get what they vote for, and, by God! they deserve nothing better! They are being beaten with whips of their own choosing, and if I had my way they should be chastised with scorpions. For them, the present system means joyless drudgery, semi-starvation, rags and premature death; and they vote for it and uphold it. Let them have what they vote for! Let them drudge and let them starve!’
 These words kept ringing in his ears as he walked through the crowded streets early one fine evening a few days before Christmas. The shops were all brilliantly lighted for the display of their Christmas stores, and the pavements and even the carriageways were thronged with sightseers.
 Barrington was specially interested in the groups of shabbily dressed men and women and children who gathered in the roadway in front of the poulterers’ and butchers’ shops, gazing at the meat and the serried rows of turkeys and geese decorated with coloured ribbons and rosettes. He knew that to come here and look at these things was the only share many of these poor people would have of them, and he marvelled greatly at their wonderful patience and abject resignation.
 But what struck him most of all was the appearance of many of the women, evidently working men’s wives. Their faded, ill-fitting garments and the tired, sad expressions on their pale and careworn faces. Some of them were alone; others were accompanied by little children who trotted along trustfully clinging to their mothers’ hands. The sight of these poor little ones, their utter helplessness and dependence, their patched unsightly clothing and broken boots, and the wistful looks on their pitiful faces as they gazed into the windows of the toy-shops, sent a pang of actual physical pain to his heart and filled his eyes with tears. He knew that these children - naked of joy and all that makes life dear - were being tortured by the sight of the things that were placed so cruelly before their eyes, but which they were not permitted to touch or to share; and, like Joseph of old, his heart yearned over to his younger brethren.
 He felt like a criminal because he was warmly clad and well fed in the midst of all this want and unhappiness, and he flushed with shame because he had momentarily faltered in his devotion to the noblest cause that any man could be privileged to fight for - the uplifting of the disconsolate and the oppressed.
 He presently came to a large toy shop outside which several children were standing admiring the contents of the window. He recognized some of these children and paused to watch them and to listen to their talk. They did not notice him standing behind them as they ranged to and fro before the window, and as he looked at them, he was reminded of the way in which captive animals walk up and down behind the bars of their cages. These children wandered repeatedly, backwards and forwards from one end of the window to the other, with their little hands pressed against the impenetrable plate glass, choosing and pointing out to each other the particular toys that took their fancies.
 ‘That’s mine!’ cried Charley Linden, enthusiastically indicating a large strongly built waggon. ‘If I had that I’d give Freddie rides in it and bring home lots of firewood, and we could play at fire engines as well.’
 ‘I’d rather have this railway,’ said Frankie Owen. ‘There’s a real tunnel and real coal in the tenders; then there’s the station and the signals and a place to turn the engine round, and a red lantern to light when there’s danger on the line.’
 ‘Mine’s this doll - not the biggest one, the one in pink with clothes that you can take off,’ said Elsie; ‘and this tea set; and this needlecase for Mother.’
 Little Freddie had let go his hold of Elsie, to whom he usually clung tightly and was clapping his hands and chuckling with delight and desire. ‘Gee-gee?’ he cried eagerly. ‘Gee-gee. Pwetty Gee-gee! Fweddy want gee-gee!’
 ‘But it’s no use lookin’ at them any longer,’ continued Elsie, with a sigh, as she took hold of Freddie’s hand to lead him away. ‘It’s no use lookin’ at ’em any longer; the likes of us can’t expect to have such good things as them.’
 This remark served to recall Frankie and Charley to the stern realities of life, and turning reluctantly away from the window they prepared to follow Elsie, but Freddie had not yet learnt the lesson - he had not lived long enough to understand that the good things of the world were not for the likes of him; so when Elsie attempted to draw him away he pursed up his underlip and began to cry, repeating that he wanted a gee-gee. The other children dustered round trying to coax and comfort him by telling him that no one was allowed to have anything out of the windows yet - until Christmas - and that Santa Claus would be sure to bring him a gee-gee then; but these arguments failed to make any impression on Freddie, who tearfully insisted upon being supplied at once.
 Whilst they were thus occupied they caught sight of Barrington, whom they hailed with evident pleasure born of the recollection of certain gifts of pennies and cakes they had at different times received from him.
 ‘Hello, Mr Barrington,’ said the two boys in a breath.
 ‘Hello,’ replied Barrington, as he patted the baby’s cheek. ‘What’s the matter here? What’s Freddie crying for?’
 ‘He wants that there ’orse, mister, the one with the real ’air on,’ said Charley, smiling indulgently like a grown-up person who realized the absurdity of the demand.
 ‘Fweddie want gee-gee,’ repeated the child, taking hold of Barrington’s hand and returning to the window. ‘Nice gee-gee.’
 ‘Tell him that Santa Claus’ll bring it to him on Christmas,’ whispered Elsie. ‘P’raps he’ll believe you and that’ll satisfy him, and he’s sure to forget all about it in a little while.’
 ‘Are you still out of work, Mr Barrington?’ inquired Frankie.
 ‘No,’ replied Barrington slowly. ‘I’ve got something to do at last.’
 ‘Well, that’s a good job, ain’t it?’ remarked Charley.
 ‘Yes,’ said Barrington. ‘And whom do you think I’m working for?’
 ‘Who?’
 ‘Santa Claus.’
 ‘Santa Claus!’ echoed the children, opening their eyes to the fullest extent.
 ‘Yes,’ continued Barrington, solemnly. ‘You know, he is a very old man now, so old that he can’t do all his work himself. Last year he was so tired that he wasn’t able to get round to all the children he wanted to give things to, and consequently a great many of them never got anything at all. So this year he’s given me a job to help him. He’s given me some money and a list of children’s names, and against their names are written the toys they are to have. My work is to buy the things and give them to the boys and girls whose names are on the list.’
 The children listened to this narrative with bated breath. Incredible as the story seemed, Barrington’s manner was so earnest as to almost compel belief.
 ‘Really and truly, or are you only having a game?’ said Frankie at length, speaking almost in a whisper. Elsie and Charley maintained an awestruck silence, while Freddie beat upon the glass with the palms of his hands.
 ‘Really and truly,’ replied Barrington unblushingly as he took out his pocket-book and turned over the leaves. ‘I’ve got the list here; perhaps your names are down for something.’
 The three children turned pale and their hearts beat violently as they listened wide-eyed for what was to follow.
 ‘Let me see,’ continued Barrington, scanning the pages of the book, ‘Why, yes, here they are! Elsie Linden, one doll with clothes that can be taken off, one tea-set, one needlecase. Freddie Easton, one horse with real hair. Charley Linden, one four-wheeled waggon full of groceries. Frankie Owen, one railway with tunnel, station, train with real coal for engine, signals, red lamp and place to turn the engines round.’
 Barrington closed the book: ‘So you may as well have your things now,’ he continued, speaking in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘We’ll buy them here; it will save me a lot of work. I shall not have the trouble of taking them round to where you live. It’s lucky I happened to meet you, isn’t it?’
 The children were breathless with emotion, but they just managed to gasp out that it was - very lucky.
 As they followed him into the shop, Freddie was the only one of the four whose condition was anything like normal. All the others were in a half-dazed state. Frankie was afraid that he was not really awake at all. It couldn’t be true; it must be a dream.
 In addition to the hair, the horse was furnished with four wheels. They did not have it made into a parcel, but tied some string to it and handed it over to its new owner. The elder children were scarcely conscious of what took place inside the shop; they knew that Barrington was talking to the shopman, but they did not hear what was said - the sound seemed far away and unreal.
 The shopman made the doll, the tea-set and the needlecase into one parcel and gave it to Elsie. The railway, in a stout cardboard box, was also wrapped up in brown paper, and Frankie’s heart nearly burst when the man put the package into his arms.
 When they came out of the toy shop they said ‘Good night’ to Frankie, who went off carrying his parcel very carefully and feeling as if he were walking on air. The others went into a provision merchant’s near by, where the groceries were purchased and packed into the waggon.
 Then Barrington, upon referring to the list to make quite certain that he had not forgotten anything, found that Santa Claus had put down a pair of boots each for Elsie and Charley, and when they went to buy these, it was seen that their stockings were all ragged and full of holes, so they went to a draper’s and bought some stocking also. Barrington said that although they were not on the list, he was sure Santa Claus would not object - he had probably meant them to have them, but had forgotten to put them down.
 
 Chapter 54
 The End
  The following evening Barrington called at Owen’s place. He said he was going home for the holidays and had come to say goodbye for a time.
 Owen had not been doing very well during these last few months, although he was one of the few lucky ones who had had some small share of work. Most of the money he earned went for rent, to pay which they often had to go short of food. Lately his chest had become so bad that the slightest exertion brought on fits of coughing and breathlessness, which made it almost impossible to work even when he had the opportunity; often it was only by an almost superhuman effort of will that he was able to continue working at all. He contrived to keep up appearances to a certain extent before Rushton, who, although he knew that Owen was not so strong as the other men, was inclined to overlook it so long as he was able to do his share of work, for Owen was a very useful hand when things were busy. But lately some of the men with whom he worked began to manifest dissatisfaction at having him for a mate. When two men are working together, the master expects to see two men’s work done, and if one of the two is not able to do his share it makes it all the harder for the other.
 He never had the money to go to a doctor to get advice, but earlier in the winter he had obtained from Rushton a ticket for the local hospital. Every Saturday throughout the year when the men were paid they were expected to put a penny or twopence in the hospital box. Contributions were obtained in this way from every firm and workshop in the town. The masters periodically handed these boxes over to the hospital authorities and received in return some tickets which they gave to anyone who needed and asked for them. The employer had to fill in the ticket or application form with the name and address of the applicant, and to certify that in his opinion the individual was a deserving case, ‘suitable to receive this charity’. In common with the majority of workmen, Owen had a sort of horror of going for advice to this hospital, but he was so ill that he stifled his pride and went. It happened that it turned out to be more expensive than going to a private doctor, for he had to be at the hospital at a certain hour on a particular morning. To do this he had to stay away from work. The medicine they prescribed and which he had to buy did him no good, for the truth was that it was not medicine that he - like thousands of others - needed, but proper conditions of life and proper food; things that had been for years past as much out of his reach as if he had been dying alone in the middle of a desert.
 Occasionally Nora contrived - by going without some other necessary - to buy him a bottle of one of the many much-advertised medicines; but although some of these things were good she was not able to buy enough for him to derive any benefit from them.
 Although he was often seized with a kind of terror of the future - of being unable to work - he fought against these feelings and tried to believe that when the weather became warmer he would be all right once more.
 When Barrington came in Owen was sitting in a deck-chair by the fire in the sitting-room. He had been to work that day with Harlow, washing off the ceilings and stripping the old paper from the walls of two rooms in Rushton’s home, and he looked very haggard and exhausted.
 ‘I have never told you before,’ said Barrington, after they had been talking for a while, ‘but I suppose you have guessed that I did not work for Rushton because I needed to do so in order to live. I just wanted to see things for myself; to see life as it is lived by the majority. My father is a wealthy man. He doesn’t approve of my opinions, but at same time he does not interfere with me for holding them, and I have a fairly liberal allowance which I spent in my own way. I’m going to pass Christmas with my own people, but in the spring I intend to fit out a Socialist Van, and then I shall come back here. We’ll have some of the best speakers in the movement; we’ll hold meetings every night; we’ll drench the town with literature, and we’ll start a branch of the party.’
 Owen’s eye kindled and his pale face flushed.
 ‘I shall be able to do something to advertise the meetings,’ he said. For instance, I could paint some posters and placards.’
 ‘And I can help to give away handbills,’ chimed in Frankie, looking up from the floor, where he was seated working the railway. ‘I know a lot of boys who’ll come along with me to put ’em under the doors as well.’
 They were in the sitting-room and the door was shut. Mrs Owen was in the next room with Ruth . While the two men were talking the front-door bell was heard to ring and Frankie ran out to see who it was, closing the door after him. Barrington and Owen continued their conversation, and from time to time they could hear a low murmur of voices from the adjoining room. After a little while they heard some one go out by the front door, and almost immediately afterward Frankie - wild with excitement, burst into the room, crying out:
 ‘Dad and Mr Barrington! Three cheers!’ And he began capering gleefully about the room, evidently transported with joy.
 ‘What are the cheers to be for?’ inquired Barrington, rather mystified by this extraordinary conduct.
 ‘Mr Easton came with Freddie to see Mrs Easton, and she’s gone home again with them,’ replied Freddie, ‘and - she’s given the baby to us for a Christmas box!’
 Barrington was already familiar with the fact of Easton’s separation from his wife, and Owen now told him the Story of their reconciliation.
 Barrington took his leave shortly afterwards. His train left at eight; it was already nearly half past seven, and he said he had a letter to write. Nora brought the baby in to show him before he went, and then she helped Frankie to put on his overcoat, for Barrington had requested that the boy might be permitted to go a little way with him.
 There was a stationer’s shop at the end of the street. He went in here and bought a sheet of notepaper and an envelope, and, having borrowed the pen and ink, wrote a letter which he enclosed in the envelope with the two other pieces that he took out of his pocketbook. Having addressed the letter he came out of the shop; Frankie was waiting for him outside. He gave the letter to the boy.
 ‘I want you to take this straight home and give it to your dad. I don’t want you to stop to play or even to speak to anyone till you get home.’
 ‘All right,’ replied Frankie. ‘I won’t stop running all the way.’
 Barrington hesitated and looked at his watch. ‘I think I have time to go back with you as far as your front door,’ he said, ‘then I shall be quite sure you haven’t lost it.’
 They accordingly retraced their steps and in a few minutes reached the entrance to the house. Barrington opened the door and stood for a moment in the hall watching Frankie ascend the stairs.
 ‘Will your train cross over the bridge?’ inquired the boy, pausing and looking over the banisters.
 ‘Yes. Why?’
 ‘Because we can see the bridge from our front-room window, and if you were to wave your handkerchief as your train goes over the bridge, we could wave back.’
 ‘All right. I’ll do so. Goodbye.’
 ‘Goodbye.’
 Barrington waited till he heard Frankie open and close the door of Owen’s fiat, and then he hurried away. When he gained the main road he heard the sound of singing and saw a crowd at the corner of one of the side-streets. As he drew near he perceived that it was a religious meeting.
 There was a lighted lamp on a standard in the centre of the crowd and on the glass of this lamp was painted: ‘Be not deceived: God is not mocked.’
 Mr Rushton was preaching in the centre of the ring. He said that they had come hout there that evening to tell the Glad Tidings of Great Joy to hall those dear people that he saw standing around. The members of the Shining Light Chapel - to which he himself belonged - was the organizers of that meeting but it was not a sectarian meeting, for he was ’appy to say that several members of other denominations was there co-operating with them in the good work. As he continued his address, Rushton repeatedly referred to the individuals who composed the crowd as his ‘Brothers and Sisters’ and, strange to say, nobody laughed.
 Barrington looked round upon the ‘Brothers’: Mr Sweater, resplendent in a new silk hat of the latest fashion, and a fur-trimmed overcoat. The Rev. Mr Bosher, Vicar of the Church of the Whited Sepulchre, Mr Grinder - one of the churchwardens at the same place of alleged worship - both dressed in broadcloth and fine linen and glossy silk hats, while their general appearance testified to the fact that they had fared sumptuously for many days. Mr Didlum, Mrs Starvem, Mr Dauber, Mr Botchit, Mr Smeeriton, and Mr Leavit.
 And in the midst was the Rev. John Starr, doing the work for which he was paid.
 As he stood there in the forefront of this company, there was nothing in his refined and comely exterior to indicate that his real function was to pander to and flatter them; to invest with an air of respectability and rectitude the abominably selfish lives of the gang of swindlers, slave-drivers and petty tyrants who formed the majority of the congregation of the Shining Light Chapel.
 He was doing the work for which he was paid. By the mere fact of his presence there, condoning and justifying the crimes of these typical representatives of that despicable class whose greed and inhumanity have made the earth into a hell.
 There was also a number of ‘respectable’, well-dressed people who looked as if they could do with a good meal, and a couple of shabbily dressed, poverty-stricken-looking individuals who seemed rather out of place in the glittering throng.
 The remainder of the Brothers consisted of half-starved, pale-faced working men and women, most of them dressed in other people’s cast-off clothing, and with broken, patched-up, leaky boots on their feet.
 Rushton having concluded his address, Didlum stepped forward to give out the words of the hymn the former had quoted at the conclusion of his remarks:
  ‘Oh, come and jine this ’oly band, And hon to glory go.’
 Strange and incredible as it may appear to the reader, although none of them ever did any of the things Jesus said, the people who were conducting this meeting had the effrontery to claim to be followers of Christ - Christians!
 Jesus said: ‘Lay not up for yourselves treasure upon earth’, ‘Love not the world nor the things of the world’, ‘Woe unto you that are rich - it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.’ Yet all these self-styled ‘Followers’ of Christ made the accumulation of money the principal business of their lives.
 Jesus said: ‘Be ye not called masters; for they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves will not touch them with one of their fingers. For one is your master, even Christ, and ye are all brethren.’ But nearly all these alleged followers of the humble Workman of Nazareth claimed to be other people’s masters or mistresses. And as for being all brethren, whilst most of these were arrayed in broadcloth and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day, they knew that all around them thousands of those they hypocritically called their ‘brethren’, men, women and little children, were slowly perishing of hunger and cold; and we have already seen how much brotherhood existed between Sweater and Rushton and the miserable, half-starved wretches in their employment.
 Whenever they were asked why they did not practise the things Jesus preached, they replied that it is impossible to do so! They did not seem to realize that when they said this they were saying, in effect, that Jesus taught an impracticable religion; and they appeared to forget that Jesus said, ‘Wherefore call ye me Lord, Lord, when ye do not the things I say?.. .’ ‘Whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them not, shall be likened to a foolish man who built his house upon the sand.’
 But although none of these self-styled ‘Followers’ of Christ, ever did the things that Jesus said, they talked a great deal about them, and sang hymns, and for a pretence made long prayers, and came out here to exhort those who were still in darkness to forsake their evil ways. And they procured this lantern and wrote a text upon it: ‘Be not deceived, God is not mocked.’
 They stigmatized as ‘infidels’ all those who differed from them, forgetting that the only real infidels are those who are systematically false and unfaithful to the Master they pretend to love and serve.
 Grinder, having a slight cold, had not spoken this evening, but several other infidels, including Sweater, Didlum, Bosher, and Starr, had addressed the meeting, making a special appeal to the working people, of whom the majority of the crowd was composed, to give up all the vain pleasures of the world in which they at present indulged, and, as Rushton had eloquently put it at the close of his remarks:
  ‘Come and jine this ’Oly band and hon to glory go!’
 As Didlum finished reading out the words, the lady at the harmonium struck up the tune of the hymns, and the disciples all joined in the singing:
  ‘Oh, come and join this ’oly band and hon to glory go.’
 During the singing certain of the disciples went about amongst the crowd distributing tracts. Presently one of them offered one to Barrington and as the latter looked at the man he saw that it was Slyme, who also recognized him at the same instant and greeted him by name. Barrington made no reply except to decline the tract:
 ‘I don’t want that - from you,’ he said contemptuously.
 Slyme turned red. ‘Oh, I know what you’re thinking of,’ he said after a pause and speaking in an injured tone; ‘but you shouldn’t judge anyone too hard. It wasn’t only my fault, and you don’t know ’ow much I’ve suffered for it. If it ’adn’t been for the Lord, I believe I should ’ave drownded myself.’
 Barrington made no answer and Slyme slunk off, and when the hymn was finished Brother Sweater stood forth and gave all those present a hearty invitation to attend the services to be held during the ensuing week at the Chapel of the Shining Light. He invited them there specially, of course, because it was the place with which he was himself connected, but he entreated and begged of them even if they would not come there to go Somewhere; there were plenty of other places of worship in the town; in fact, there was one at the corner of nearly every street. Those who did not fancy the services at the Shining Light could go to the Church of the Whited Sepulchre, but he really did hope that all those dear people whom he saw standing round would go Somewhere.
 A short prayer from Bosher closed the meeting, and now the reason for the presence of the two poverty-stricken-looking shabbily dressed disciples was made manifest, for while the better dressed and therefore more respectable Brothers were shaking hands with and grinning at each other or hovering round the two clergymen and Mr Sweater, these two poor wretches carried away the harmonium and the lantern, together with the hymn books and what remained of the tracts. As Barrington hurried off to catch the train one of the ‘Followers’ gave him a card which he read by the light of a street lamp -
  Come and join the Brotherhood at the Shining Light Chapel PSA Every Sunday at 3 o’clock. Let Brotherly Love Continue. ‘Oh come and join this Holy Band and on to Glory go.’
 Barrington thought he would, rather go to hell - if there were such a place - with some decent people, than share ‘glory’ with a crew like this.
 
 Nora sat sewing by the fireside in the front room, with the baby asleep in her lap. Owen was reclining in the deck-chair opposite. They had both been rather silent and thoughtful since Barrington’s departure. It was mainly by their efforts that the reconciliation between Easton and Ruth had been effected and they had been so desirous of accomplishing that result that they had not given much thought to their own position.
 ‘I feel that I could not bear to part with her for anything now,’ said Nora at last breaking the long silence, ‘and Frankie is so fond of her too. But all the same I can’t feel happy about it when I think how ill you are.’
 ‘Oh, I shall be all right when the weather gets a little warmer,’ said Owen, affecting a cheerfulness he did not feel. ‘We have always pulled through somehow or other; the poor little thing is not going to make much difference, and she’ll be as well off with us as she would have been if Ruth had not gone back.’
 As he spoke he leaned over and touched the hand of the sleeping child and the little fingers closed round one of his with a clutch that sent a thrill all through him. As he looked at this little helpless, dependent creature, he realized with a kind of thankfulness that he would never have the heart to carry out the dreadful project he had sometimes entertained in hours of despondency.
 ‘We’ve always got through somehow or other,’ he repeated, ‘and we’ll do so still.’
 Presently they heard Frankie’s footsteps ascending the stairs and a moment afterwards the boy entered the room.
 ‘We have to look out of the window and wave to Mr Barrington when his train goes over the bridge,’ he cried breathlessly. ‘And he’s sent this letter. Open the window, quick, Dad, or it may be too late.’
 ‘There’s plenty of time yet,’ replied Owen, smiling at the boy’s impetuosity. ‘Nearly twenty minutes. We don’t want the window open all that time. It’s only a quarter to eight by our clock now, and that’s five minutes fast.’
 However, so as to make quite certain that the train should not run past unnoticed, Frankie pulled up the blind and, rubbing the steam off the glass, took up his station at the window to watch for its coming, while Owen opened the letter:
 ‘Dear Owen,
 ‘Enclosed you will find two bank-notes, one for ten pounds and the other for five. The first I beg you will accept from me for yourself in the same spirit that I offer it, and as I would accept it from you if our positions were reversed. If I were in need, I know that you would willingly share with me whatever you had and I could not hurt you by refusing. The other note I want you to change tomorrow morning. Give three pounds of it to Mrs Linden and the remainder to Bert White’s mother.
 ‘Wishing you all a happy Xmas and hoping to find you well and eager for the fray when I come back in the spring,
  ‘Yours for the cause,
 ‘George Barrington.’
 Owen read it over two or three times before he could properly understand it and then, without a word of comment - for he could not have spoken at that moment to save his life - he passed it to Nora, who felt, as she read it in her turn, as if a great burden had been lifted from her heart. All the undefined terror of the future faded away as she thought of all this small piece of paper made possible.
 Meanwhile, Frankie, at the window, was straining his eyes in the direction of the station.
 ‘Don’t you think we’d better have the window open now, Dad?’ he said at last as the clock struck eight. ‘The steam keeps coming on the glass as fast as I wipe it off and I can’t see out properly. I’m sure it’s nearly time now; p’raps our clock isn’t as fast as you think it is.’
 ‘All right, we’ll have it open now, so as to be on the safe side,’ said Owen as he stood up and raised the sash, and Nora, having wrapped the child up in a shawl, joined them at the window.
 ‘It can’t be much longer now, you know,’ said Frankie. ‘The line’s clear. They turned the red light off the signal just before you opened the window.’
 In a very few minutes they heard the whistle of the locomotive as it drew out of the station, then, an instant before the engine itself came into sight round the bend, the brightly polished rails were illuminated, shining like burnished gold in the glare of its headlight; a few seconds afterwards the train emerged into view, gathering speed as it came along the short stretch of straight way, and a moment later it thundered across the bridge. It was too far away to recognize his face, but they saw someone looking out of a carriage window waving a handkerchief, and they knew it was Barrington as they waved theirs in return. Soon there remained nothing visible of the train except the lights at the rear of the guard’s van, and presently even those vanished into the surrounding darkness.
 The lofty window at which they were standing overlooked several of the adjacent streets and a great part of the town. On the other side of the road were several empty houses, bristling with different house agents’ advertisement boards and bills. About twenty yards away, the shop formerly tenanted by Mr Smallman, the grocer, who had become bankrupt two or three months previously, was also plastered with similar decorations. A little further on, at the opposite corner, were the premises of the Monopole Provision Stores, where brilliant lights were just being extinguished, for they, like most of the other shops, were closing their premises for the night, and the streets took on a more cheerless air as one after another their lights disappeared.
 It had been a fine day, and during the earlier part of the evening the moon, nearly at the full, had been shining in a clear and starry sky; but a strong north-east wind had sprung up within the last hour; the weather had become bitterly cold and the stars were rapidly being concealed from view by the dense banks of clouds that were slowly accumulating overhead.
 As they remained at the window looking out over this scene for a few minutes after the train had passed out of sight, it seemed to Owen that the gathering darkness was as a curtain that concealed from view the Infamy existing beyond. In every country, myriads of armed men waiting for their masters to give them the signal to fall upon and rend each other like wild beasts. All around was a state of dreadful anarchy; abundant riches, luxury, vice, hypocrisy, poverty, starvation, and crime. Men literally fighting with each other for the privilege of working for their bread, and little children crying with hunger and cold and slowly perishing of want.
 The gloomy shadows enshrouding the streets, concealing for the time their grey and mournful air of poverty and hidden suffering, and the black masses of cloud gathering so menacingly in the tempestuous sky, seemed typical of the Nemesis which was overtaking the Capitalist System. That atrocious system which, having attained to the fullest measure of detestable injustice and cruelty, was now fast crumbling into ruin, inevitably doomed to be overwhelmed because it was all so wicked and abominable, inevitably doomed to sink under the blight and curse of senseless and unprofitable selfishness out of existence for ever, its memory universally execrated and abhorred.
 But from these ruins was surely growing the glorious fabric of the Co-operative Commonwealth. Mankind, awaking from the long night of bondage and mourning and arising from the dust wherein they had lain prone so long, were at last looking upward to the light that was riving asunder and dissolving the dark clouds which had so long concealed from them the face of heaven. The light that will shine upon the world wide Fatherland and illumine the gilded domes and glittering pinnacles of the beautiful cities of the future, where men shall dwell together in true brotherhood and goodwill and joy. The Golden Light that will be diffused throughout all the happy world from the rays of the risen sun of Socialism.
 
 Appendix
 Mugsborough
  Mugsborough was a town of about eighty thousand inhabitants, about two hundred miles from London. It was built in a verdant valley. Looking west, north or east from the vicinity of the fountain on the Grand Parade in the centre of the town, one saw a succession of pine-clad hills. To the south, as far as the eye could see, stretched a vast, cultivated plain that extended to the south coast, one hundred miles away. The climate was supposed to be cool in summer and mild in winter.
 The town proper nestled in the valley: to the west, the most beautiful and sheltered part was the suburb of Irene: here were the homes of the wealthy residents and prosperous tradespeople, and numerous boarding-houses for the accommodation of well-to-do visitors. East, the town extended up the slope to the top of the hill and down the other side to the suburb of Windley, where the majority of the working classes lived.
 Years ago, when the facilities for foreign travel were fewer and more costly, Mugsborough was a favourite resort of the upper classes, but of late years most of these patriots have adopted the practice of going on the Continent to spend the money they obtain from the working people of England. However, Mugsborough still retained some semblance of prosperity. Summer or winter the place was usually fairly full of what were called good-class visitors, either holidaymakers or invalids. The Grand Parade was generally crowded with well-dressed people and carriages. The shops appeared to be well-patronized and at the time of our story an air of prosperity pervaded the town. But this fair outward appearance was deceitful. The town was really a vast whited sepulchre; for notwithstanding the natural advantages of the place the majority of the inhabitants existed in a state of perpetual poverty which in many cases bordered on destitution. One of the reasons for this was that a great part of the incomes of the tradespeople and boarding-house-keepers and about a third of the wages of the working classes were paid away as rent and rates.
 For years the Corporation had been borrowing money for necessary public works and improvements, and as the indebtedness of the town increased the rates rose in proportion, because the only works and services undertaken by the Council were such as did not yield revenue. Every public service capable of returning direct profit was in the hands of private companies, and the shares of the private companies were in the hands of the members of the Corporation, and the members of the Corporation were in the hands of the four most able and intellectual of their number, Councillors Sweater, Rushton, Didlum and Grinder, each of whom was a director of one or more of the numerous companies which battened on the town.
 The Tramway Company, the Water Works Company, the Public Baths Company, the Winter Gardens Company, the Grand Hotel Company and numerous others. There was, however, one Company in which Sweater, Rushton, Didlum and Grinder had no shares, and that was the Gas Company, the oldest and most flourishing of them all. This institution had grown with the place; most of the original promoters were dead, and the greater number of the present shareholders were non-residents; although they lived on the town, they did not live in it.
 The profits made by this Company were so great that, being prevented by law from paying a larger dividend than ten percent, they frequently found it a difficult matter to decide what to do with the money. They paid the Directors and principal officials - themselves shareholders, of course - enormous salaries. They built and furnished costly and luxurious offices and gave the rest to the shareholders in the form of Bonuses.
 There was one way in which the Company might have used some of the profits: it might have granted shorter hours and higher wages to the workmen whose health was destroyed and whose lives were shortened by the terrible labour of the retort-houses and the limesheds; but of course none of the directors or shareholders ever thought of doing that. It was not the business of the Company to concern itself about them.
 Years ago, when it might have been done for a comparatively small amount, some hare-brained Socialists suggested that the town should buy the Gas Works, but the project was wrecked by the inhabitants, upon whom the mere mention of the word Socialist had the same effect that the sight of a red rag is popularly supposed to have on a bull.
 Of course, even now it was still possible to buy out the Company, but it was supposed that it would cost so much that it was generally considered to be impracticable.
 Although they declined to buy the Gas works, the people of Mugsborough had to buy the gas. The amount paid by the municipality to the Company for the public lighting of the town loomed large in the accounts of the Council. They managed to get some of their own back by imposing a duty of two shillings a ton upon coals imported into the Borough, but although it cost the Gas Works a lot of money for coal dues the Company in its turn got its own back by increasing the price of gas they sold to the inhabitants of the town ...