d for
the 'ealth. I shall be a 'ealthy man before long, it seems to me. What
do _you_ think?'

'Have you been to see Corder again?' asked Sidney, after reflecting
anxiously.

'No, I haven't!' was the angry reply; 'an' what's more, I ain't goin'
to! He's one o' them men I can't get on with. As long as you make
yourself small before him, an' say "sir" to him with every other word,
an' keep tellin' him as he's your Providence on earth, an' as you don't
know how ever you'd get on without him--well, it's all square, an'
he'll keep you on the job. That's just what I _can't_ do--never could,
an' never shall. I should have to hear them children cryin' for food
before I could do it. So don't speak to me about Corder again. It makes
me wild!'

Sidney tapped the floor with his foot. Himself a single man, without
responsibilities, always in fairly good work, he could not invariably
sympathise with Hewett's sore and impracticable pride. His own temper
did not err in the direction of meekness, but as he looked round the
room he felt that a home such as this would drive him to any degree of
humiliation. John knew what the young man's thoughts were; he resumed
in a voice of exasperated bitterness.

'No, I haven't been to Corder--I beg his pardon; _Mister_ Corder--James
Corder, Esquire. But where do you think I went this mornin'? Mrs.
Peckover brought up a paper an' showed me an advertisement. Gorbutt in
Goswell Bead wanted a man to clean windows an' sweep up, an' so
on;--offered fifteen bob a week. Well, I went. Didn't I, mother? Didn't
I go after that job? I got there at half-past eight; an' what do you
think I found? If there was one man standin' at Gorbutt's door, _there
was five hundred_! Don't you believe me? You go an' ask them as lives
about there. If there was one, there was five hundred! Why, the p'lice
had to come an' keep the road clear. Fifteen bob What was the use o' me
standin' there, outside the crowd? What was the use, I say? Such a lot
o' poor starvin' devils you never saw brought together in all your
life. There they was, lookin' ready to fight with one another for the
fifteen bob a week. Didn't I come back and tell you about it, mother?
An' if they'd all felt like me, they'd a turned against the shop an'
smashed it up--ay, an' every other shop in the street! What use? Why,
no use; but I tell you that's how I felt. If any man had said as much
as a rough word to me, I'd a gone at him like a bulldog. I felt like a