her umbrella to the driver of an omnibus, endanger
the silk hat of Porkin and disturb the complacency of Snob; and I felt
glad.

It was at that moment that there popped into my head the full style and
title I had earned. "Notorious Infidel Editor of the _Clarion_!" These
be brave words, indeed. For a moment they almost flattered me into the
belief that I had become a member of the higher criminal classes: a bold
bad man, like Guy Fawkes, or Kruger, or R. B. Cuninghame Graham.

"You ought," I said to myself, "to dress the part. You ought to have an
S.D.P. sombrero, a slow wise Fabian smile, and the mysterious trousers
of a Soho conspirator."

But at the instant I caught a sight of my counterfeit presentment in a
shop window, and veiled my haughty crest. _That_ a notorious Infidel!
Behold a dumpy, comfortable British _paterfamilias_ in a light flannel
suit and a faded sun hat. No; it will not do. Not a bit like Mephisto:
much more like the Miller of the Dee.

Indeed, I am not an irreligious man, really; I am rather a religious
man; and this is not an irreligious, but rather a religious, book.

Such thoughts should make men humble. After all, may not even John Burns
be human; may not Mr. Chamberlain himself have a heart that can feel for
another?

Gentle reader, that was a wise as well as a charitable man who taught us
there is honour among thieves; although, having never been a member of
Parliament himself, he must have spoken from hearsay.

"For all that, Robert, you're a notorious Infidel." I paused--just
opposite the Tivoli--and gazed moodily up and down the Strand.

As I have remarked elsewhere, I like the Strand. It is a very human
place. But I own that the Strand lacks dignity and beauty, and that
amongst its varied odours the odour of sanctity is scarce perceptible.

There are no trees in the Strand. The thoroughfare should be wider.
The architecture is, for the most part, banal. For a chief street in a
Christian capital, the Strand is not eloquent of high national ideals.

There are derelict churches in the Strand, and dingy blatant taverns,
and strident signs and hoardings; and there are slums hard by.

There are thieves in the Strand, and prowling vagrants, and gaunt
hawkers, and touts, and gamblers, and loitering failures, with tragic
eyes and wilted garments; and prostitutes plying for hire.

And east and west, and north and south of the Strand, there is London.
Is there a man amongst all London's