The Project Gutenberg eBook ofA CommentaryThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: A CommentaryAuthor: John GalsworthyRelease date: June 5, 2022 [eBook #68242]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024Language: EnglishOriginal publication: United States: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1920Credits: Emmanuel Ackerman, Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A COMMENTARY ***
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
Title: A CommentaryAuthor: John GalsworthyRelease date: June 5, 2022 [eBook #68242]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024Language: EnglishOriginal publication: United States: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1920Credits: Emmanuel Ackerman, Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
Title: A Commentary
Author: John Galsworthy
Author: John Galsworthy
Release date: June 5, 2022 [eBook #68242]Most recently updated: October 18, 2024
Language: English
Original publication: United States: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1920
Credits: Emmanuel Ackerman, Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A COMMENTARY ***
A COMMENTARY
THE WORKS OFJOHN GALSWORTHYNOVELSVILLA RUBEIN: AND OTHER STORIESTHE ISLAND PHARISEESTHE MAN OF PROPERTYTHE COUNTRY HOUSEFRATERNITYTHE PATRICIANTHE DARK FLOWERTHE FREELANDSBEYONDFIVE TALESSAINT’S PROGRESSIN CHANCERYTO LETTHE BURNING SPEARTHE WHITE MONKEYTHE SILVER SPOONSWAN SONGTHE FORSYTE SAGAA MODERN COMEDYSHORT STORIES AND STUDIESA COMMENTARYA MOTLEYTHE INN OF TRANQUILLITYTHE LITTLE MANA SHEAFANOTHER SHEAFTATTERDEMALIONCAPTURESCASTLES IN SPAIN AND OTHER SCREEDSTWO FORSYTE INTERLUDESCARAVANVERSES NEW AND OLDMEMORIES (Illustrated)AWAKENING (Illustrated)ADDRESSES IN AMERICAPLAYSFirst Series:The Silver BoxJoyStrifeSecond Series:The Eldest SonThe Little DreamJusticeThird Series:The FugitiveThe PigeonThe MobFourth Series:A Bit o’ LoveFoundationsThe Skin GameFifth Series:A Family ManLoyaltiesWindowsSixth Series:The ForestOld EnglishThe ShowEscapeThe above Plays issued separatelySix Short Plays:The First and the LastThe Little ManHall-MarkedDefeatThe SunPunch and GoPLAYS BY JOHN GALSWORTHY—1 VOL.THE GROVE EDITIONThe Novels, Stories, and Studies of John Galsworthy in small volumes
THE WORKS OFJOHN GALSWORTHY
NOVELS
VILLA RUBEIN: AND OTHER STORIESTHE ISLAND PHARISEESTHE MAN OF PROPERTYTHE COUNTRY HOUSEFRATERNITYTHE PATRICIANTHE DARK FLOWERTHE FREELANDSBEYONDFIVE TALESSAINT’S PROGRESSIN CHANCERYTO LETTHE BURNING SPEARTHE WHITE MONKEYTHE SILVER SPOONSWAN SONG
THE FORSYTE SAGAA MODERN COMEDY
SHORT STORIES AND STUDIES
A COMMENTARYA MOTLEYTHE INN OF TRANQUILLITYTHE LITTLE MANA SHEAFANOTHER SHEAFTATTERDEMALIONCAPTURESCASTLES IN SPAIN AND OTHER SCREEDSTWO FORSYTE INTERLUDES
CARAVAN
VERSES NEW AND OLD
MEMORIES (Illustrated)AWAKENING (Illustrated)ADDRESSES IN AMERICA
PLAYS
The above Plays issued separately
PLAYS BY JOHN GALSWORTHY—1 VOL.
THE GROVE EDITION
The Novels, Stories, and Studies of John Galsworthy in small volumes
BYJOHN GALSWORTHYNEW YORKCHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONSPrinted in the United States of America“JUSTICE” APPEARED IN THEAlbany Review(LONDON);“POWER” IN THENew Age;ALL THE OTHER SKETCHESIN THIS VOLUME HAVE APPEARED INThe Nation(LONDON). THE AUTHOR THANKS THE EDITORSOF THESE REVIEWS
Theold man whose call in life was to warn the public against the dangers of the steam-roller held a small red flag in his remaining hand, for he had lost one arm. His brown face, through whose leathery skin white bristles showed, had a certain dignity; so had his square upstanding figure. And his light grey eyes, with tiny pupils, gazed with a queer intentness, as if he saw beyond you. His clothes were old, respectable, and stained with grease; his smile shrewd and rather sweet, and his voice—of one who loved to talk, but whose profession kept him silent—was deliberate and sonorous, with a whistling lisp in it, because he had not many teeth.
“What’s your opinion?” he said one summer morning. “I’ll tell youmyexperience: a lot o’ them that’s workin’ on road jobs like this are fellers that theVestries takes on, makin’ o’ work for them—the lowest o’ the low. You can’t do nothing with them; here to-day and gone to-morrow. Lost dogs I call ’em. Most of them goes on the drink the moment they gets a chance, and the language that they’ll use—oh dear! But you can’t blame them’s far as I can see—they’re born tired. They ain’t up to what’s wanted of ’em nowadays. You might just as well put their ’eads under this steam-roller and ’ave done with it.”
Then lowering his voice as though imparting information of a certain value: “And that’s just what I think’s ’appened to them already; that great thing”—he pointed to the roller—“that great thing goes on, and on, and on—it’s gone over them! Life nowadays has got no more feelin’ for a man than for a beetle. See the way the poor live—like pigs, crowded all together; to any one who knows, it’s awful! An’ morals—something dreadful! How can you have morals when you’ve got to live like that—let alone humanity? You can’t, it standsto reason. Talk about democracy—government by the people? There’s no sense in it; the people’s kept like pigs; all they’ve got’s like pig-wash thrown ’em. They know there’s no hope for them. Why, when all’s done, a working-man can’t save enough to keep ’imself in his old age. Look at me! I’ve lost my arm, all my savin’s was spent when I was gettin’ well; I’ve got this job now, an’ very glad to get it—but the time ’ll come when I’ll be too old to stand about all weathers; what ’ll happen? I’ll either ’ave to starve or go into the ’Ouse—well, that’s a miserable ending for a man. But then you say, what can you do? That’s just it—whatcanyou do? Where’s the money to come from? People say Parliament ought to find it, but I’ve not much ’opes of them; they’re very slow. All my life I’ve noticed that. Very slow! Them fellers in Parliament, they’ve got their positions and one thing and another to consider, the same as any other people; they’re bound to be cautious, they don’t want to take no risks, it stands to reason.Well, that’s all against reforms, I think. All they do, why it’s no more than following after this ’ere roller, treadin’ in the stones.”
He paused, looking dubiously at the roller, now close at hand. “See what a lot o’ things the money’s wanted for. It’s not only old-age pensions, there’s illness! When I lost my arm, and lay there in the ’orspital, it worried me to think what I should do when I got out—put me in such a stew; well, there’s thousands like that—people with consumption, people with bad blood—’undreds an’ thousands, that’s got nothin’ to fall back on; they’re in fear all their time.”
He came closer, and his voice seemed to whistle more than ever. “It’s a dreadful thing, is fear. I thought that I’d come out a log, an’ just ’ave to rot away. I’ve got no family—but them fellers in consumption with families an’ all, it’s an awful thing for them. Here’s a carriage—I mustn’t get to talking!”
He moved forward to the barrier, and stood there holding up his flag. A barouche and pair came sweeping up; the sun shone on its panels, on the horses’ coats, the buttons of the coachman, and the egrets in two ladies’ hats. It swerved at sight of the red flag, and swung round the corner to the left.
The old man stood looking after it, and the silence was broken only by the crunching of the roller. Rousing himself from reverie, he said: “Fashion! D’you know, I can’t tell what them sort of people think of all day long. It puzzles me. Sometimes I fancy they don’t think at all. Thinking’s all done for them!” And again he seemed to lapse into his reverie. “If you told them that they’d stare at you. Why, they fancy they’re doin’ an awful lot, what with their bazaars an’ one thing an’ another. Them sort of people, they don’t mean any ’arm, but they ’aven’t got the mind. You can’t expect it of them, livin’ their lives; you want a lot o’ mind to think of other people.”
Suddenly his eyes brightened. “Why, take them street-walkers you see aboutat night; now what d’you think ladies in their carriages thinks of them—dirt! But them women ’alf the time’s no worse than what the ladies are. They took their bit o’ sport, as you may call it—same as lots o’ ladies take it. That’s where money comes in—they ’adn’t the money to keep off the streets. But what are you to do? You can’t have the creatures about.” A frown came on his brow, as though this question had long been troubling him. “The rich,” he went on, “are able for to educate their daughters, and look after them; I don’t blame them—it’s human nature to do the best you can for your own family; but you’ve got to think of others that haven’t got your money—you’ve got to be human about it. The mischief is, when a man’s got money, it’s like a wall between ’im an’ ’is fellows. That’s what I’ve found. What’s your opinion? Look here! My father was a farm labourer, at eight shillin’s a week, an’ brought up six of us. And ’owever ’e managed it I don’t know; but I don’t think things are any better thanthey were then—I don’t—I think they’re worse. This progress, or what do they call it, is destroyin’ of us. You can’t keep it back, no more than you could keep back that there roller if you pushed against it; all you can do’s to keep ahead of it, I suppose. But talk about people’s increasin’ in the milk of human kindness—I don’t see it, nor intelligence. Look at the way they spend their ’olidays—it gives you stomach-ache to see them. All a lot o’ rowdy fellers, never still a minute, that’s lost all religion—a lot o’ town-bred monkeys. This ’ere modern life, it’s hollowed of ’em out, that’s what it’s done, in my opinion. People’s got so restless; they keep on tryin’ first one thing and then another; anything so long as they can be doing something on their own. That’s a fact. It’s like a man workin’ on a job like this road-mendin’; he just sees the stones he’s puttin’ down himself, and he don’t see nothing else. That’s what everybody’s doin’. But I don’t see how you can prevent it; it looks as if ’twas in the blood. They talk aboutthis Socialism; well, but I’m not very sweet on it—it’s mostly all a-lookin’ after your neighbour, ’s far’s I can see.”
He paused, staring hard, as though trying to see further. “Well,” he went on suddenly; “that won’t work! Look at the police—never met such meddlesome creatures; very nice men in themselves, I dare say, but just because they’ve got a little power—! And they’re as thick as thieves together. Take these fellers that they send to prison; they talk about reformin’ of them, but when they get them there it’s all like that roller, crushin’ the life out—awful, I call it. Them fellers come out dead, with their minds squashed out o’ them; an’ all done with the best intentions, so they tell me. I tell you what I think, there’s only one man in a ’undred fit to ’ave power over other men put in his ’ands. Look at the workhouses—why ain’t they popular? It’s all because you’ve got to live by rule. I don’t find no fault with rules so long as you don’t order people about; what you want to do’s to get people to keep rules of theirown accord—that’s what I think. But people don’t look at it that way, ’s far ’s I can see. What’s your opinion? Mind ye,” he went on suddenly, “I’m not saying as there isn’t lots o’ things Government might do, that you’d call Socialism, I dare say. See the women in them slums—poor things, they can’t hardly drag themselves along, and yet they breed like rabbits. I don’t blame them, they don’t know no better. But look ’ere!” and thrusting the handle of the flag into his pocket, he took a button of his listener’s coat between his finger and his thumb; “I’d pass a law, I would, to stop ’em. That’s going too far, you say! Well, but what’s to be done? There’s no other way, in my opinion. Then, of course, if you stop ’em, you won’t ’ave none o’ this cheap low-class labour. That won’t please people. It’s a difficult matter!”
He sank his voice to a sort of whistling whisper. “’Alf the children in them slums is brought about under the influence of drink. What d’ you make of that? And that’s only the beginning—they feedthem poor little things on all sorts o’ mucky stuff—an’ lots o’ them ’alf fed at that. Pretty state o’ things for a country like this—it’d disgrace the savages, I think. I’d ’ave every child full-fed by law. I’d make it a crime, I would, to ’ave half-starved children about the streets or schools, or anywhere. I’d begin at the beginning. But then you say that’s pauperising of the parents. That’s what they said when they began this ’ere free education—nobody ain’t been pauperised by that. A country that can’t keep its children fed ain’t fit to ’ave them, that’s what I think; ’t isn’t fair to them little things. But then you say that’d cost a mint o’ money—millions! Of course it would! Well, look at the ’ouses in this road, look at them big flats—’undreds an’ thousands of streets an’ ’ouses like that all over England. They say that sixpence on the rates would feed the children, but they won’t put it on—of course they won’t, it’s too much off their comfort. People don’t like parting; that’s a fact, as you know yourself.But what’s the good of raisin’ millions of these ’ere dry-rotted people—they’re so expensive, you can’t do nothing with them——” He broke off to intercept a cart. “But I dare say,” he said, returning, “they’d call that Socialism. What’s your opinion? Shall I tell you what I think about it? These Socialists are like men that keep a shop, an’ some one walks in an’ says: ‘How much for the coat there?’ he says. ‘Ten bob!’ they say. ‘I’ll give you five,’ he says. ‘No, we wants ten,’ they say. ‘No,’ ’e says, ‘five!’ And both of them knows all the time they’re goin’ to do a deal at seven an’ six!”
He sank his voice, as though imparting a State secret: “It wouldn’t never do for them to say seven an’ six straight off; then ’e’d only give ’em six an’ three. See? If you want to get a proper price you’ve got to keep hollerin’ for more—that’s human nature.”
Then, waving his flag towards the block of flats, he said: “Look at all this class of comfortable people. They don’t see things the same as I do, an’ I don’t know why they should. They’re comfortable themselves. It stands to reason they’re not goin’ to think about such things. They’ve been brought up to believe the world was made for them. They never see no other people but their own sort; same as workin’ people never see no other but workin’ people. That’s what makes the classes, in my opinion. All these fellers here,” and he waved his hand towards the figures working at the road, “talk very big about betterin’ their position, but as soon as it comes to standin’ by each other it’s every man for himself. It’s only what you can expect—if you don’t look out for yourself, nobody else will, that’s as sure as eggs. They say, in England all men’s equal under the law; well, but then you’ve only got to look around—that isn’t true, how can it be? You’ve got to pay for law same as you’ve got to pay for everything. That’s where it is! They talk about Justice in the country, the same for rich and poor; that’s all very fine, but there’s a ’undredways where a man that’s poor has to suffer for it, because he can’t pull the lawyers’ tails and make ’em jump.”
And with these words he tried to raise both arms, but he had only one. “You haven’t told me what you think?” he said: “I’ll tell you my opinion,” and his voice dropped to an emphatic whisper: “There’s things that want improvin’, and there’s things that stand in the way of things improvin’. But I’ve noticed one thing; it don’t matter how low people get, they’re always proud of something, even if it’s only of their troubles. There must be some good in human nature, or we’d never keep ahead of that great thing at all;” he stretched his arm out to the roller, approaching with its slow crunching sound like the sound of Life crunching the bones of men; “we’d let it go right over us.” And nodding his grey head twice, he stood holding up his red flag as still as stone, with his eyes fixed intently on a coming milk-cart.
Itwas the first October frost. Outside a half-built house, before a board on which was written, “Jolly Bros., Builders,” I saw a man, whose eyes seemed saying: “In the winter building will stop; if I am homeless and workless now, what shall I be in two months’ time?” Turning to me he said: “Can you give me a job, sir? I don’t mind what I do.”
His face was in mourning for a shave, his clothes were very ragged, and he was so thin that there seemed hardly any man behind those ragged clothes. He smelt, not indeed of whiskey, but as though bereaved of it; and his blue and watery eyes were like those of a lost dog.
We looked at each other, and this conversation passed between our eyes:
“What are you? Where did you worklast? How did you get into this condition? Are you married? How many children? Why don’t you apply to the proper authorities? I have money, and you have none; it is my right to ask these questions.”
“I am a lost dog.”
“But I have no work for you; if you are really hungry I can give you sixpence; I can also refer you to a Society who will examine your affairs, but if they find you a man for whom life has been too much, they will tell me so, and warn me not to help you. Is that what you want?”
“I am a lost dog.”
“I dare say; but what can I do? I can’t make work! I know nothing about you, I daren’t recommend you to my friends. No man gets into the condition you are in without the aid of his own folly. You say you fell ill; yes, but you all say that. Why couldn’t you look ahead and save some money? You see now that you ought to have? And yet you come to me! I have a great many calls—societies, old people, and the sick;the rates are very high—you know that—partly on your account!”
“I am a lost dog.”
“Ah! but I am told daily by the just, the orderly, the practical, who have never been lost or hungry, that I must not give to casuals. You know yourself it would be pure sentiment; you know yourself it would be mere luxury. I wonder you can ask me!”
“I am a lost dog.”
“You have said that before. It’s not as if I didn’t know you! I have seen and talked with you—with dozens of you. I have found you asleep on the Thames Embankment. I have given you sixpence when you were shambling empty away after running a mile behind a cab. One night, don’t you remember, in the Cromwell Road—well, not you, but your twin brother—we talked together in the rain, and the wind blew your story against the shuttered windows of the tall, closed houses. Once you were with me quite six weeks, cutting up a dead tree in my garden. Day after day you sat there,working very slowly to keep the tree from coming to an end, and showing me in gratitude each morning your waistbelt filling out. With the saw in your hand and your weak smile you would look at me, and your eyes would say, ‘You don’t know what a rest it is for me to come here and cut up wood all day.’ At all events, youmustremember how you kept yourself from whiskey until I went away, and how you excused yourself when I returned and found you speaking thickly in the morning: ‘I can’thelprememberin’ things!’ It was not you, you say? No; it was your double.”
“I am a lost dog.”
“Yes, yes, yes! You are one of those men that our customs breed. You had no business to be born—or at any rate you should have seen to it that you were born in the upper classes. What right had you to imagine you could ever tackle the working-man’s existence—up to the mark all day and every day? You, a man with a soft spot? You knew, or your parents ought to have known, thatyou couldn’t stand more than a certain pressure from life. You are diseased, if not physically, then in your disposition. Am I to excuse you because of that? Most probably I should be the same if life pressed hard enough. Am I to excuse myself because of that? Never—until it happens! Being what you are you chose deliberately—or was it chosen for you—to run the risks of being born; and now you complain of the consequences, and come to me for help? To me—who may myself at some time be in need, if not of physical, of moral bread? Is it right, or reasonable?”
“I am a lost dog.”
“You are getting on my nerves! Your chin is weak—I can see that through your beard; your eyes are wistful, not like the professional beggar’s pebbly eyes; you have a shuffling walk, due perhaps a little to the nature of your boots; yes, there are all the marks of amiability about you. Can you look me in the face and say it would be the slightest use to put you on your legs and thrust you again, equipped,into the ranks of battle? Can you now? Ah! if you could only get some food in you, and some clothes on you, and some work to do! But don’t you know that, three weeks hence, that work would be lost, those clothes in pawn, and you be on the drink? Why should I waste my charity onyou—‘the deserving’ are so many! There’s ‘something against you’ too? Oh! nothing much—you’re not the sort that makes a criminal; if you were you would not be in such a state. You would be glad enough to do your fellows a good turn if ever you could do a good turn to yourself; and you are not ungrateful, you would attach yourself to any one who showed you kindness. But you are hopeless, hopeless, hopeless—aren’t you now?”
“I am a lost dog.”
“You know our methods with lost dogs? Have you never heard of the lethal chamber? A real tramp, living from hand to mouth in sun and rain and dirt and rags, enjoys his life. Butyoudon’t enjoy the state you’re in. You’reafraid of the days when you’ve nothing to eat, afraid of the nights when you’ve nowhere to sleep, afraid of crime, afraid even of this begging; twice since we’ve been standing here I’ve seen you looking round. If you knew you’d be afraid like this, what made you first desert ‘the narrow path’? Something came over you? How could you let it come like that? It still comes over you? You were tired, you wanted something new—something a little new. We all want that something, friend, and get it if we can; but we can’t recognise thatyoursort of human creature is entitled, for you see what’s come of it?”
“I am a lost dog.”
“You say that as if you thought there was one law for the rich and another for the poor. You are making a mistake. If I am had up for begging as well as you, we shall both of us go to prison. The fact that I have no need to steal or beg, can pay for getting drunk and taking holidays, is hardly to the point—you must see that! Do not be led away by sentimental talk; if we appear before a judge, we both must suffer punishment. I am not so likely to appear as you perhaps, but that’s an accident. No, please don’t say that dreadful thing again! I wish to help you. There is Canada, but they don’t want you. I would send you anywhere to stop your eyes from haunting me, but they don’t want you. Where do they want you? Tell me, and you shall go.”
“I am a lost dog.”
“You remind me of that white shadow with little liver spots that my spaniel dog and I picked up one night when we were going home.
“‘Master,’ he said, ‘there’s such an amusing cur out there in the middle of the road.’
“‘Behave yourself! Don’t pick up with anything you come across like this!’
“‘Master, I know it is a thin and dirty cur, but the creature follows me.’
“‘Keep to heel! The poor dog will get lost if you entice him far from home.’
“‘Oh, master! that’s just what’s so amusing. He hasn’t any.’
“And like a little ghost the white dog crept along behind. We looked to read his collar; it was gone. We took him home—and how he ate, and how he drank! But my spaniel said to me:
“‘Master, what is the use of bringing in a dog like this? Can’t you see what he is like? He has eaten all my meat, drunk my bowl dry, and he is now sleeping in my bed.’
“I said to him: ‘My dear, you ought to like to give this up to this poor dog.’
“And he said to me: ‘Master, Idon’t! He is no good, this dog; I am cleaner and fatter than he. And don’t you know there’s a place on the other side of the water for all this class of dog? When are we going to take him there?’
“And I said to him: ‘My dear, don’t ask me;I don’t know.’
“And you are like that dog, standing there with those eyes of yours and that weak chin and those weak knees, before this half-built house with the wintercoming on. And I am like my spaniel, who knows there is a proper place for all your kind of creature. Man! what shall I do with you?”
“I am a lost dog.”
“Well, she’s my wife, ain’t she?” He put his hands on the handles of his barrow as though to take it away from one who could not see his point of view, wheeled it two yards, and stopped.
“It’s no matter what I done to her. Look ’ere!” He turned his fish-white face, and his dead eyes came suddenly to life, with a murky, yellow glare, as though letting escape the fumes within his soul. “I ought to ha’ put her to bed with a shovel long ago; and I will, too, first chance I get.”
“You are talking like a madman.”
“Look ’ere, ’as a man a right to his own wife an’ children?” His thick loose lower lip trembled. “You tell me that!”
“It depends on how he behaves himself.If you knock her about, you can’t expect her to stay with you.”
“I never done no more to her than what she deserved. I never gave her the ’alf o’ what she ought to ’ave.”
“I’ve seen her several times with your marks on her face.”
“Yes, an’ I’ll mark ’er again, I will.”
“So you have just said.”
“Because a man ’its ’is wife when he’s got a drop o’ liquor in ’im, that don’t give ’er the right to go off like this and take a man’s children from ’im, do it?”
“I think it does.”
“When I find her——”
“I hope you will not find her.”
He thrust his head forward, and the yellow in the whites of his eyes deepened and spread till his whole face seemed suffused with it.
“Look ’ere, man an’ wife is man an’ wife, and don’t you or any one come between ’em, or it’ll be the worse for you.”
“I have told you my opinion.”
“You think I don’t know the law; thelaw says his children belongs to a man, not to a woman.”
“We needn’t go into that.”
“Needn’t we? You think, becos I’m not a torf, I got no rights. I know what the law says. A man owns ’is wife, an’ ’e owns ’is children.”
“Do you deny that you drink?”
“You’d drink if you ’ad my life; d’you think I like this goin’ about all day with a barrer?”
“Do you deny that you’ve often struck your wife?”
“What’s it to you or any one else, what I do to ’er in private? Why don’t you come down to my place an’ order me about?”
“But I suppose you know your wife can get a separation order if she goes down to the Court?”
On his face a grin stole up.
“Separation order! Do ’er a lot o’ good, that would! D’you think that’d keep my ’ands off ’er afterwards? She knows what I’d do to ’er if she went against me.”
“Whatwouldyou do?”
“She wouldn’t want to arsk for any more separation orders.”
“You would be locked up if you molested her afterwards.”
“Should I?Shewouldn’t be there to speak against me.”
“I understand.”
“She knows what I’d do to ’er.”
“You’ve scared her so that she daren’t go to the Court—she daren’t stay with you; what can she do but leave you?”
“I don’t want’er, let ’er go; I want the children.”
“Do you really mean that you don’t want her?”
“I never ’ad a woman keepme.”
“You know that her earnings have kept you all.”
“I tell you I never ’ad a woman keep me.”
“Can you support the children?”
“If I could get a proper job——”
“But can you get a proper job?”
“Well, ’oo’s fault is that; it’s not my fault, is it?”
“You’ve had plenty of chances.”
“’Oo cares if I ’ave! I’ve always been a good father to my children. I’ve worked for ’em, an’ begged for ’em, an’ stole for ’em; I’m well known to be a good father all about where I live.”
“But that won’t keep them off the parish, will it?”
“You let the parish alone! If I ’aven’t got money, I’ve got honour; that’s better than all the money. I don’t want no money to tell me what’s right and what isn’t.”
“Come, come!”
“The children’s mine—every one o’ them. Takin’ children away from their father! that’s a fine thing to be backin’ up like this!”
His eyes moved from side to side, like the eyes of an animal in pain, and his voice was hoarse as though a lump had risen in his throat.
“Look ’ere! I’m fonder of them children than what people might think. I’ll never sleep again till I know where they are.”
“How can I tell you where they are without telling you where their mother is?”
“They’re mine—the law gives ’em to me. ’Oo are you to go against the law?”
“We went over that just now.”
“When she married me she took me for better or worse, didn’t she? Man an’ wife should settle their own affairs. They don’t want no one else to interfere with them!”
“You want her back so that you can do what you like to her. Do you expect other people to help you to that?”
“Look ’ere! D’you think it’s pleasant for me when I go into the pub to ’ave ’em talk aboutmy wifegoin’ off on ’er own? D’you think I ’aven’t got enough to bear without that?”
“You ought to have thought of that before you drove her to it.”
“’Oo says I drove ’er? Noos-bearin’, talkin’ about ’er, like what they are? She’s lost ’er honour; d’you think that’s pleasant forme?”
“No.”
“Well, then!” He came from between the handles of his barrow and stood on the edge of the pavement, and the movement of his shoulders was like the movement of a bull that is about to charge. “Look ’ere! She’s mine to do what I like with. I never injured any one that didn’t injure me; but any one that injures me’ll ’ave a funny piece o’ cake to cut, what ’e’ll never be able to swaller.”
“Who is injuring you?”
“An’ don’t you think I’m afraid o’ the police. Not all the police in the world won’t stopme!”
“Well?”
“You only listens to one side; if I was to tell you all I’d got against ’er——”
“You beat her—and you ask me to help you find her?”
“I’m arskin’ you the whereabouts o’ my children.”
“It’s the same thing. Can’t you see that no decent man would tell you?”
He plucked at his throat and stood silent, with a groping movement like aman suddenly realising that the darkness before him is not going to lift.
“It’s all like a Secret Society to me! If I can’t get ’em back, I can’t bear meself.”
“How can it be otherwise?”
“You’re all on ’er side. She’s a disgrace, that’s whatsheis, takin’ ’em away from their ’ome, takin’ ’em away from their father.”
“She brought them into the world.”
“When I find ’er, I’ll make’ersorry she was ever brought into the world ’erself. I’ll let ’er know ’oo’s ’er master! She sha’n’t forget a second time! She’s mine, and the children’s mine!”
“Well, I can’t help you.”
“I stands on the law. The law gives ’em to me, and I’ll keep ’em. She knows better than to go to the Court against me—it means ’er last sleep.”
“Good-morning!”
He plucked at his neck again and ground the sole of his boot on the pavement, and the movement of his eyes was pitiful to see.
“I’m ’alf out o’ meself, that’s what I am; I’ll never sleep until I find ’em. Look ’ere!Tellme where they are, sir?”
“I am sorry, I cannot.”
In the unmoving fish-white face his dead eyes, straining in their sockets, began to glow again with that queer yellow glare, as though alive with the spirit that dwells where light has never come; the spirit that possesses those dim multitudes who know no influence but that of force, no reason, and no gentleness, since these have never come their way; who know only that they must keep that little which they have, since that which they have not is so great and so desirable; the dim multitudes who, since the world began, have lived from hand to mouth, like dogs crouched over their stale bones, snarling at such as would take those poor bones from them.
“I’m ’er ’usband, an’ I mean to ’ave ’er, alive or dead.”
And I saw that this was not a man who spoke, but the very self of the brute beast that lurks beneath the surface ofour State; the very self of the chained monster whom Nature tortures with the instinct for possession, and man with whips drives from attainment. And behind his figure in the broad flowery road I seemed to see the countless masses of his fellows filing out of their dark streets, out of their alleys and foul lodgings, in a never-ending river of half-human flesh, with their faces set one way. They covered the whole road, and every inlet was alive with them; and all the air was full of the dull surging of thousands more. Of every age, in every sort of rags; on all their faces the look that said: “All my life I have been given that which will keep me alive, that, and no more. What I have got I have got; no one shall wrench it from my teeth! I live as the dogs; as the dogs shall my actions be! I am the brute beast; have I the time, the chance, the money to learn gentleness and decency? Let me be! Touch not my gnawed bones!”
They stood there—a great dark sea stretching out to the farther limits of thesight; no sound came from their lips, but all their eyes glowed with that yellow glare, and I saw that if I took my glance off them they would spring at me.
“You defy me, Guv’nor?”
“I am obliged to.”
“One day I’ll meet yer, then, for all your money, and I’ll let yer know!”
He took up the handles of his barrow, and slowly, with a sullen lurch, wheeled it away, looking neither to his right nor left. And behind him, down the road with its gardens and tall houses, moved the millions of his fellows; and, as they passed in silence, each seemed to say:
“One day I’ll meet you, and—I’ll let you know!”
The road lay empty again beneath the sun; nursemaids wheeled their perambulators, the lilac-trees dropped blossom, the policemen at the corners wrote idly in their little books.
There was no sign of what had passed.
Hecame running out of the darkness, and spoke at once: “Go an’ see my poor mother, gentleman; go and see my poor father an’ mother!”
It was a snowy midnight; by the light of the street lamp he who made this strange request looked ragged and distraught.
“They lives in Gold Street, 22; go an’ see ’em, gentleman. Mrs. James White—my poor mother starvin’.”
In England no one starves.
“Go an’ see ’em, gentleman; it’s the book o’ truth I’m tellin’ you. They’re old; they got no food, they got nothin’.”
“Very well, I will.”
He thrust out his face to see whether he might trust his ears, then without warning turned and ran on down theroad. His shape vanished into darkness, whence it came....
Gold Street with its small grey houses whose doors are always open, and its garbage-littered gutters, where children are at play.
“Mr. and Mrs. James White?”
“First floor back. Mr. White—wanted!”
My dog sniffed at the passage wall, that smelled unlike the walls belonging to him, and presently an old man came. He looked at us distrustfully, and we looked back distrustfully at him.
“Mr. James White?”
“Yes.”
“Last night some one calling himself your son asked me to come up and see you.”
“Come up, sir.”
The room was unpapered, and not more than ten feet square; it contained a double bed, over whose dirty mattress was stretched a black-brown rag; a fireplace and no fire; a saucepan, but nothing in it; two cups, a tin or two, no carpet, a knifeand spoon, a basin, some photographs, and rags of clothing; all blackish and discoloured.
On a wooden chair before the hearth was sitting an old woman whose brown-skinned face was crowsfooted all over. Her hair was white, and she had little bright grey eyes and a wart on one nostril. A dirty shawl was pinned across her chest; this, with an old skirt and vest, seemed all her clothing. The third finger of her left hand was encircled by a broad gold ring. There were two chairs, and the old man placed the other one for me, having rubbed it with his sleeve. My dog lay with his chin pressed to the ground, for the sights and scents of poverty displeased him.
“I’m afraid you’re down on your luck.”
“Yes, sir, we are down.”
Seated on the border of the bed, he was seen to be a man with features coloured greyish-dun by lack of food; his weak hair and fringe of beard were touched with grey; a dumb, long-sufferingman from whom discouragement and want had planed away expression.
“How have you got into this state?”
“The winter an’ my not gettin’ work.”
A whisper came from the old lady by the hearth:
“Father can work, sir; oh! ’e can work!”
“Yes, I can work; I’m good for a day’s work at any time.”
“I’m afraid you don’t look it!”
His hand was shaking violently, and he tried to stop its movement.
“It’s a bit chilly; I feels well enough in meself.”
More confidential came the old lady’s whisper:
“Father’s very good ’ealth, sir; oh! ’e can work. It’s not ’avin’ any breakfast that makes ’im go like that this weather.”
“But how old are you?”
“Father’s seventy-one, sir, and I’m the same. Born within two months of each other—wasn’t we, Father?”
“Forgive my saying so, Mr. White, but, with all this competition, is there muchchance of your getting work at that age? Whatareyou?”
“Painter I am, sir; take any work—I’m not particular. Mr. Williams gives me a bit when times are good, but the winter——”
“Father can work, sir; oh! ’e can work!”
“Thirty-three years I worked for one firm—thirty-three years.”
“What firm was that?”
“Thirty-three years—till they gave up business——”
“But what firm——”
“Answer the gentleman’s question. Father’s very slow, sir.”
“Scotter’s, of John Street, that was—thirty-three years. Now they’ve given up.”
“How long since they gave up?”
“Three years.”
“And how have you managed since?”
“Just managed along—get some jobs in the summer—just managed along.”
“You mustn’t mind Father, sir. Why don’t you tell the gentleman? Justmanaged along, as you see, sir—everything’s gone now.”
She passed her hand over her mouth, and the sound of her whisper was more intimate than ever:
“Dreadful things we’ve suffered in this room, sir; dreadful! I don’t like to speak of ’em, if you’ll believe me.”
And, with that almost soundless whisper, that stealthy movement of her hand before her mouth, all those things she spoke of seemed to be happening in their deadly privacy to those two old people behind their close-shut door.
There was a silence; my dog spoke with his eyes: “Master, we have been here long enough; I smell no food; there is no fire!”
“You must feel the cold dreadfully this weather?”
“We stays in bed as long as we can, sir—to keep warm, you know—to keep warm.”
The old man nodded from the black ruin of a bed.
“But I see you have no blankets.”
“All gone, sir—all gone.”
“Had you no savings out of that thirty-three years?”
“Family, sir—family; four sons an’ two daughters; never more than thirty shillin’s a week. He always gave me his wages—Father always gave me his wages.”
“I never was one to drink.”
“Sober man, Father; an’ now he’s old. But ’e can work, sir; ’e can work.”
“But can’t your sons help you?”
“One’s dead, sir; died of fever. And one”—her withered finger touched her forehead—“not quite—you know, not quite——”
“The one I saw last night, I suppose?”
“Not quite—not since he was in the Army. A bit—” Again she touched her forehead.
“And the other two?”
“Good sons, sir; but large families, you know. Not able——”
“And the daughters?”
“One’s dead, sir; the other’s married—away.”
“Haven’t you any one to fall back on?”
The old man interrupted heavily:
“No, sir; we haven’t.”
“Father doesn’t put things right, sir—let me speak to the gentleman! Tell you the truth, never ’ad the habit, sir; not accustomed to ask for things; never done it—couldn’t!”
The old man spoke again:
“The Society looked into our case; ’ere’s their letter. Owin’ to my not ’avin’ any savin’s, we weren’t thought fit for bein’ ’elped, so they says ’ere. All my savin’s is gone this year or more; what could I save, with six children?”
“Father couldn’t save; ’e did ’is duty by them—’e couldn’t save. We’ve not been in the ’abit of askin’ people, sir; wouldn’t do such a thing—couldn’t!”
“Well! You see they’ve made a start with old-age pensions?”
The old man slowly answered:
“I ’eard something—I don’t trouble about politics.”
“Father never was one for the public-’ouse, sir; never.”
“But you used to have a vote, of course?”
A smile came on his lips, and faded; and in that smile, not even ironical, he passed judgment on the centuries that had left him where he was.
“I never bothered about them. I let that alone!”
And again he smiled. “I’ll be dead long before they reachme, I know that.”
“The winter’s only half over. What are you going to do?”
“Well, sir, I don’t knowwhatwe’re goin’ to do.”
“Don’t you think that, all things considered, you’d be better off in the—in the Infirmary?”
Silence.
“You know they—they’re quite comfortable, and——”
Silence.
“It’s not as if there were any—any disgrace, or——”
Silence.
“Well?”
He rose and crossed over to the hearth,and my dog, disturbed, sniffed at his trousers. “You are worn out,” he seemed to say; “go where you ought to go, then my master will not have to visit you, and waste the time he owes to me.” And he, too, rose and came and put his snout on my knee; “When I am old, master, you will still take care of me—that is understood between us. But this man has no one to take care of him. Let us go!”
The old man spoke at last:
“No, sir. I don’t want to go there; I can work. I don’t want to go there.”
Beyond him the whisper rose:
“Father can work, sir; ’e can work. So long as we get a crust of bread, we’d rather stay ’ere.”
“I’ve gotthis, but I can’t bring meself to use it. I can work; I’ve always worked.” He took out a piece of paper. It was an order admitting James White, aged 71, and Eliza White his wife, aged 71, into the local Workhouse; if used for purposes of begging to be destroyed.
“Father can work, sir; ’e can work. We seen dreadful times in this room,believe, me, sir, before we came to getting that. We don’t want to go. I tell Father I’d rather die out ’ere.”
“But you’d be so much more comfortable, Mrs. White; you must know that.”
“Yes, sir; but there it is—I don’t want to, and Father don’t want to.”
“I can work; I can go about with a barrer, or anything.”
“But can youlive?”
“Well, sir, so long as we’re alive. After that, I can’t tell—they’ll get us then, I suppose.”
And the whisper came:
“We can’t ’elp it after that. As you see, sir—there’s nothin’ left, there’s nothin’ left.”
She raised her hand and pointed to the bed; and the sun, that had been hidden all the morning, broke through and glittered on her wedding ring.