. He went
on. He had just about time to reach the shop before the whistle blew.
As he neared the shop he became one of a stream of toilers pressing
towards the same goal. Most of them were younger than he, and it was
safe to assume none were going to work with the same enthusiasm.
There were many weary, rebellious faces. They had not yet come to
Henry's pass. Toil had not yet gotten the better of their freedom of
spirit. They considered that they could think and live to better
purpose without it. Henry had become its slave. He was his true self
only when under the conditions of his slavery. He had toiled a few
years longer than he should have done, to attain the ability to keep
his head above the waters of life without toil. The mechanical motion
of his hands at their task of years was absolutely necessary to him.
He had become, in fact, as a machine, which rusts and is good for
nothing if left long inactive. Henry was at once pitiable and
terrible when he came in sight of the many-windowed building which
was his goal. The whistles blew, and he heard as an old war-horse
hears the summons to battle. But in his case the battle was all for
naught and there was no victory to be won. But the man was happier
than he had been for months. His happiness was a pity and a shame to
him, but it was happiness, and sweet in his soul. It was the only
happiness which he had not become too callous to feel. If only he
could have lived in the beautiful old home, and spent the rest of his
life in prideful wrestling with the soil for goodly crops, in tasting
the peace of life which is the right of those who have worked long!

But it all seemed too late. When a man has become welded to toil he
can never separate himself from it without distress and loss of his
own substance of individuality. What Henry had told Sidney Meeks was
entirely true: good-fortune had come too late for him to reap the
physical and spiritual benefit from it which is its usual dividend.
He was no longer his own man, but the man of his life-experience.

When he stood once more in his old place, cutting the leather which
smelled to him sweeter than roses, he was assailed by many a gibe,
good-natured in a way, but still critical.

"What are you to work again for, Henry?" "You've got money enough to
live on." "What in thunder are you working for?"

One thing was said many times which hit him hard. "You are taking the
bread out of the mouth of some other man who needs wo