At a corner where the trams and buses stopped she lingered for a while, watching the fierce struggle; the weak and aged being pushed back time after time, hardly seeming to even resent it, regarding it as in the natural order of things. It was so absurd, apart from the injustice, the brutality of it! The poor, fighting among themselves! She felt as once when watching a crowd of birds to whom she had thrown a handful of crumbs in winter time. As if they had not enemies enough: cats, weasels, rats, hawks, owls, the hunger and the cold. And added to all, they must needs make the struggle yet harder for one another: pecking at each other’s eyes, joining with one another to attack the fallen. These tired men, these weary women, pale-faced lads and girls, why did they not organize among themselves some system that would do away with this daily warfare of each against all. If only they could be got to grasp the fact that they were one family, bound together by suffering. Then, and not till then, would they be able to make their power felt? That would have to come first: the Esprit de Corps of the Poor. “You must come and see them,” the Human Document insisted. “Such dear, magnetic creatures. I superintend their entire education myself. We have a cottage in Surrey. It’s rather a tight fit. You see, there are seven of us now. But the three girls can easily turn in together for a night, Abner will be delighted.”!

“It’s a new world we shall be called upon to build,” he said. “We must pay more heed to the foundation this time.” “It doesn’t seem to answer,” grumbled Madge. “One is always told it is the artist—the brain worker, the very men who have these fine instincts, who are the most sexual.”

“That’s a bad sign,” said the girl. “Means he’s feeling better.” She seated herself on the sofa and fingered the shawl. “Did you give it her?” she asked. A passing cab had drawn up close to them. The chauffeur was lighting his pipe. “Didn’t you love him?” asked the girl, staring. “Wouldn’t you have helped him?”