in summer; where there is not room to bury the
people who live in the block within the ground on which they dwell. But
I cannot find you, in the poorest and vilest parts of this city, any
block where the percentage of liars and thieves and bribe-givers is as
large as was that among the first-class passengers of that floating
palace. Each condition of society has its own mis-doings, and I believe
varies little in the percentage of wrong-doers to the whole."

"To hear Peter talk you would think the whole of us ought to be
sentenced to life terms," laughed Watts. "I believe it's only an attempt
on his part to increase the practice of lawyers."

"Do you really think people are so bad, Peter?" asked Leonore, sadly.

"No. I have not, ten times in my life, met a man whom I should now call
bad. I have met men whom I thought so, but when I knew them better I
found the good in them more than balancing the evil. Our mistake is in
supposing that some men are 'good' and others 'bad,' and that a sharp
line can be drawn between them. The truth is, that every man has both
qualities in him and in very few does the evil overbalance the good. I
marvel at the goodness I find in humanity, when I see the temptation and
opportunity there is to do wrong."

"Some men are really depraved, though," said Mrs. D'Alloi.

"Yes," said madame. "Think of those strikers!"

Peter felt a thrill of pleasure pass through him, but he did not show
it. "Let me tell you something in connection with that. A high light in
place of a dark shadow. There was an attempt to convict some of the
strikers, but it failed, for want of positive evidence. The moral proof,
however, against a fellow named Connelly was so strong that there could
be no doubt that he was guilty. Two years later that man started out in
charge of a long express, up a seven-mile grade, where one of our
railroads crosses the Alleghanies. By the lay of the land every inch of
that seven miles of track can be seen throughout its entire length, and
when he had pulled half way up, he saw a section of a freight train
coming down the grade at a tremendous speed. A coupling had broken, and
this part of the train was without a man to put on the brakes. To go on
was death. To stand still was the same. No speed which he could give his
train by backing would enable it to escape those uncontrolled cars. He
sent his fireman back to the first car, with orders to uncouple the
engine. He whistled 'on brakes' to