own lives, that though they were not aware of the fact, the truth
was that they believed in them with about the same degree of realisation
with which they believed in what they heard in the pulpit of the glories
of the New Jerusalem. No human being exists without an ambition, and the
ambition of Janway's Millers of the high-class was to possess a neat
frame-house with clean Nottingham lace curtains at the windows, fresh
oilcloth on the floor of the front hall, furniture covered with green or
red reps in the parlour, a tapestry Brussels carpet, and a few
lithographs upon the walls. It was also the desire of the owners of such
possessions that everyone should know that they attended one of the
churches, that their house-cleaning was done regularly, that no member of
the family frequented bar-rooms, and that they were respectable people.
It was an ambition which was according to their lights, and could be
despised by no honest human being, however dull it might appear to him.
It resulted oftener than not in the making of excellent narrow lives
which brought harm to no one. The lives which went wrong on the
street-corners and in the bar-rooms often did harm. They produced
discomfort, unhappiness, and disorder; but as it is also quite certain
that no human being produces these things without working out his own
punishment for himself while he lives on earth, the ends of justice were
doubtless attained.

If a female creature at the Mills broke the great social law, there was
no leaning towards the weakness of pity for her, Janway's was not
sufficiently developed, mentally, to deal with gradations or analysis of
causes and impelling powers. The girl who brought forth a child without
the pale of orthodox marriage was an outcast and a disgraced creature,
and nobody flinched from pronouncing her both.

"It's disgustin', that's what I call it," it was the custom for
respectable wives and mothers to say. "It's disgustin'! A nice thing
she's done for herself. I h'ain't no patience with girls like her, with
no fear o' God or religion in them an' no modesty and decency. She
deserves whatever comes to her!"

Usually every tragedy befell her which could befall a woman. If her child
lived, it lived the life of wretchedness and was an outcast also. The
outcome of its existence was determined by the order of woman its mother
chanced to be. If the maternal instinct was warm and strong within her
and she loved it, there were a few chances