he
hands that he'll split the difference and reduce the wages five
instead of ten per cent."

Chapter LIX

When Robert Lloyd entered the factory that morning he experienced
one of those revulsions which come to man in common with all
creation. As the wind can swerve from south to east, and its
swerving be a part of the universal scheme of things, so the
inconsistency of a human soul can be an integral part of its
consistency. Robert, entering Lloyd's, flushed with triumph over his
workmen, filled also with rage whenever he thought of poor Risley,
became suddenly, to all appearances, another man. However, he was
the same man, only he had come under some hidden law of growth. All
at once, as he stood there amidst those whirring and clamping
machines, and surveyed those bowed and patient backs and swaying
arms of labor, standing aside to allow a man bending before a heavy
rack of boots to push it to another department, he realized that his
triumph was gone.

Not a man or woman in the factory looked at him. All continued
working with a sort of patient fierceness, as if storming a
citadel--as, indeed, they were in one sense--and waging incessant
and in the end hopeless warfare against the destructive forces of
life. Robert stood in the midst of them, these fellow-beings who had
bowed to his will, and saw, as if by some divine revelation, in his
foes his brothers and sisters. He saw Ellen's fair head before her
machine, and she seemed the key-note of a heart-breaking yet
ineffable harmony of creation which he heard for the first time. He
was a man whom triumph did not exalt as much as it humiliated. Who
was he to make these men and women do his bidding? They were working
as hard as they had worked for full pay. Without doubt he would not
gain as much comparatively, but he was going to lose nothing
actually, and he would not work as these men worked. He saw himself
as he never could have seen himself had the strike continued; and
yet, after all, he was not a woman, to be carried away by a sudden
wave of generous sentiment and enthusiasm, for his business
instincts were too strong, inherited and developed by the force of
example. He could not forget that this had been his uncle's factory.

He shut his mouth hard, and stood looking at the scene of toil, then
he resolved what to do.

He spoke to Flynn, who could not believe his ears, and asked him
over.

"I beg your pardon, sir," he said.

"Go and speak to the