r dinner--"laid in a good stock of ballast," as my
seafaring friend would have said; wished "Good-bye!" to everybody, and
kissed Aunt Emma; promised to take care of myself--a promise which,
please Heaven, I will faithfully keep, cost me what it may--hailed a cab
and started.

I reached Victoria some time before B. I secured two corner seats in a
smoking-carriage, and then paced up and down the platform waiting for
him.

When men have nothing else to occupy their minds, they take to thinking.
Having nothing better to do until B. arrived, I fell to musing.

What a wonderful piece of Socialism modern civilisation has become!--not
the Socialism of the so-called Socialists--a system modelled apparently
upon the methods of the convict prison--a system under which each
miserable sinner is to be compelled to labour, like a beast of burden,
for no personal benefit to himself, but only for the good of the
community--a world where there are to be no men, but only numbers--where
there is to be no ambition and no hope and no fear,--but the Socialism of
free men, working side by side in the common workshop, each one for the
wage to which his skill and energy entitle him; the Socialism of
responsible, thinking individuals, not of State-directed automata.

Here was I, in exchange for the result of some of my labour, going to be
taken by Society for a treat, to the middle of Europe and back. Railway
lines had been laid over the whole 700 or 800 miles to facilitate my
progress; bridges had been built, and tunnels made; an army of engineers,
and guards, and signal-men, and porters, and clerks were waiting to take
charge of me, and to see to my comfort and safety. All I had to do was
to tell Society (here represented by a railway booking-clerk) where I
wanted to go, and to step into a carriage; all the rest would be done for
me. Books and papers had been written and printed; so that if I wished
to beguile the journey by reading, I could do so. At various places on
the route, thoughtful Society had taken care to be ready for me with all
kinds of refreshment (her sandwiches might be a little fresher, but maybe
she thinks new bread injurious for me). When I am tired of travelling
and want to rest, I find Society waiting for me with dinner and a
comfortable bed, with hot and cold water to wash in and towels to wipe
upon. Wherever I go, whatever I need, Society, like the enslaved genii
of some Eastern tale, is ready and anxious to hel