n the East End, where she did such
splendid social work. Her constant cry of "Save the children!" referred
to the cruel neglect of children's eyesight involved in allowing them
to play with crudely painted toys. She quoted unanswerable statistics
to prove that children allowed to look at violet and vermilion often
suffered from failing eyesight in their extreme old age; and it
was owing to her ceaseless crusade that the pestilence of the
Monkey-on-the-Stick was almost swept from Hoxton. The devoted worker
would tramp the streets untiringly, taking away the toys from all the
poor children, who were often moved to tears by her kindness. Her
good work was interrupted, partly by a new interest in the creed
of Zoroaster, and partly by a savage blow from an umbrella. It was
inflicted by a dissolute Irish apple-woman, who, on returning from some
orgy to her ill-kept apartment, found Lady Hypatia in the bedroom taking
down an oleograph, which, to say the least of it, could not really
elevate the mind. At this the ignorant and partly intoxicated Celt dealt
the social reformer a severe blow, adding to it an absurd accusation of
theft. The lady's exquisitely balanced mind received a shock, and it was
during a short mental illness that she married Dr. Hagg.

Of Dr. Hagg himself I hope there is no need to speak. Any one even
slightly acquainted with those daring experiments in Neo-Individualist
Eugenics, which are now the one absorbing interest of the English
democracy, must know his name and often commend it to the personal
protection of an impersonal power. Early in life he brought to bear that
ruthless insight into the history of religions which he had gained in
boyhood as an electrical engineer. Later he became one of our greatest
geologists; and achieved that bold and bright outlook upon the future of
Socialism which only geology can give. At first there seemed something
like a rift, a faint, but perceptible, fissure, between his views and
those of his aristocratic wife. For she was in favour (to use her own
powerful epigram) of protecting the poor against themselves; while he
declared pitilessly, in a new and striking metaphor, that the weakest
must go to the wall. Eventually, however, the married pair perceived
an essential union in the unmistakably modern character of both their
views, and in this enlightening and intelligible formula their souls
found peace. The result is that this union of the two highest types of
our civi