ndent on the pleasure of the workers. The 'Resolution,' as it was
called, which was widely published in the newspapers of the day, was in
fact a declaration of war, and was so accepted by the master class. They
began henceforward to prepare for a firm stand against the 'brutal and
ferocious communism of the day,' as they phrased it. And as they were in
many ways still very powerful, or seemed so to be; they still hoped by
means of brute force to regain some of what they had lost, and perhaps in
the end the whole of it. It was said amongst them on all hands that it
had been a great mistake of the various governments not to have resisted
sooner; and the liberals and radicals (the name as perhaps you may know
of the more democratically inclined part of the ruling classes) were much
blamed for having led the world to this pass by their mis-timed pedantry
and foolish sentimentality: and one Gladstone, or Gledstein (probably,
judging by this name, of Scandinavian descent), a notable politician of
the nineteenth century, was especially singled out for reprobation in
this respect. I need scarcely point out to you the absurdity of all
this. But terrible tragedy lay hidden behind this grinning through a
horse-collar of the reactionary party. 'The insatiable greed of the
lower classes must be repressed'--'The people must be taught a
lesson'--these were the sacramental phrases current amongst the
reactionists, and ominous enough they were."

The old man stopped to look keenly at my attentive and wondering face;
and then said:

"I know, dear guest, that I have been using words and phrases which few
people amongst us could understand without long and laborious
explanation; and not even then perhaps. But since you have not yet gone
to sleep, and since I am speaking to you as to a being from another
planet, I may venture to ask you if you have followed me thus far?"

"O yes," said I, "I quite understand: pray go on; a great deal of what
you have been saying was common place with us--when--when--"

"Yes," said he gravely, "when you were dwelling in the other planet.
Well, now for the crash aforesaid.

"On some comparatively trifling occasion a great meeting was summoned by
the workmen leaders to meet in Trafalgar Square (about the right to meet
in which place there had for years and years been bickering). The civic
bourgeois guard (called the police) attacked the said meeting with
bludgeons, according to their custom; many