I have had to acknowledge
a new situation--a radical if unspoken opposition between masters and
men. Since that year we have been split into opposite camps. Whatever I
might privately feel, I was one of the owners, one of the masters,
and therefore in the opposite camp. To my men I was an oppressor, a
representative of injustice and greed. Privately, I like to think that
even to this day they bear me no malice, that they have some lingering
regard for me. But the master stands before the human being, and the
condition of war overrides individuals--they hate the master, even
whilst, as a human being, he would be their friend. I recognise the
inevitable justice. It is the price one has to pay.

ANABEL. Yes, it is difficult--very.

MR. BARLOW. Perhaps I weary you?

ANABEL. Oh, no--no.

MR. BARLOW. Well--then the mines began to pay badly. The seams ran thin
and unprofitable, work was short. Either we must close down or introduce
a new system, American methods, which I dislike so extremely. Now it
really became a case of men working against machines, flesh and blood
working against iron, for a livelihood. Still, it had to be done--the
whole system revolutionised. Gerald took it in hand--and now I hardly
know my own pits, with the great electric plants and strange
machinery, and the new coal-cutters--iron men, as the colliers call
them--everything running at top speed, utterly dehumanised, inhuman.
Well, it had to be done; it was the only alternative to closing down and
throwing three thousand men out of work. And Gerald has done it. But I
can't bear to see it. The men of this generation are not like my men.
They are worn and gloomy; they have a hollow look that I can't bear
to see. They are a great grief to me. I remember men even twenty years
ago--a noisy, lively, careless set, who kept the place ringing. I feel
it is unnatural; I feel afraid of it. And I cannot help feeling guilty.

ANABEL. Yes--I understand. It terrifies me.

MR. BARLOW. Does it?--does it?--Yes.--And as my wife says, I leave it
all to Gerald--this terrible situation. But I appeal to God, if anything
in my power could have averted it, I would have averted it. I would have
made any sacrifice. For it is a great and bitter trouble to me.

ANABEL. Ah, well, in death there is no industrial situation. Something
must be different there.

MR. BARLOW. Yes--yes.

OLIVER. And you see sacrifice isn't the slightest use. If only people
would be sane and decen