ld be seen
improving his mind. Victoria, within six months, noticed three starts on
the part of one of the boys; French, book-keeping and electrical
engineering.

Many were older than these. There were little groups of young men rather
rakishly but shabbily dressed; often they wore a flower in their
buttonhole. The old men were more pathetic; their faces were
expressionless; they came to eat, not to feast.

Victoria and Betty had many conversations about the customers. Every day
Victoria felt her faculty of wonder increase; she was vaguely conscious
already that men had a tendency to revert to types, but she did not
realise the influence the conditions of their lives had upon them.

'It's curious,' she once said to Betty, as they left the depot together,
'they're so much alike.'

'I suppose they are,' said Betty. 'I wonder why?'

'I'm not sure,' said Victoria, 'but it seems to me somehow that they
must be born different but that they become alike because they do the
same kind of work.'

'It's rather awful, isn't it,' said Betty.

'Awful? Well, I suppose it is. Think of it, Betty. There's old Dry
Toast, for instance. I'm sure he's been doing whatever he does do for
thirty or forty years.'

'And'll go on doing it till he dies,' murmured Betty.

'Or goes into the workhouse,' added Victoria. A sudden and horrible
lucidity had come over her. 'Yes, Betty, that's what it means. The boys
are going to be like the old man; we see them every day becoming like
him. First they're in the twenties and are smart and read the sporting
news; then they seem to get fat and don't shave every day, because they
feel it's getting late and it doesn't matter what they look like; their
hair grows grey, they take up chess or German, or something equally
ridiculous. They don't get a chance. They're born and as soon as they
can kick they're thrust in an office to do the same thing every day.
Nobody cares; all their employers want them to do is to be punctual and
do what they're paid thirty bob a week for. Soon they don't try; they
die, and the employers fill the billet.'

'How do you know all this, Vic?' said Betty, eyeing her fearfully. 'It
seems so true.'

'Oh, I just felt it suddenly, besides . . .' Victoria hesitated.

'But is it right that they should get thirty bob a week all their lives
while their employers are getting thousands?' asked Betty, full of
excitement.

'I don't know,' said Victoria slowly. Betty's voice had broke