Review of Reviews, 1/8/OS. 



In the Days of the Gotnet. 



the nonsensical things I produced for his astonish- 

 ment. 



I will not weary you with too detailed an account 

 of the talk of a foolish youth who was also dis- 

 tiessed and unhappy, and whose voice was balm for 

 the humiliations that smarted in his eyes. Indeed, 

 now, in many particulars, I cannot disentangle this 

 harangue of which I tell from many of the things 

 I may have said in other talks to Parload. For ex- 

 ample, I forget if it was then or before or afterward 

 that, as it were, by accident, I let out what might 

 be taken as an admission that I was addicted to 

 drugs. 



" You shouldn't do that," said Parload suddenly, 

 " It w'on't do to poison your brains with that." 



My brains, my eloquence, were to be very impor- 

 tant assets to our party in the coming revolution. 



But one thing does clearly belong to this particu- 

 lar conversation I am recalling. When I started out, 

 it was quite settled in the back of my mind that I 

 must not leave Rawdon's.' I simply wanted to abuse 

 my employer to Parload. But I talked myself quite 

 out of touch with ail the cogent reasons there were 

 for sticking to my place, and I got home that night 

 irrevocably committed to a spirited — not to say a de- 

 fiant — policy with my employer. 



" I can't stand Rawdon's much longer," I said to 

 Parload by way of a flourish. 



" There's hard times coming," said Parload. 

 " Next winter?" 



" Sooner. The Americans have been overproduc- 

 ing, and they mean to dump. The iron trade is going 

 to have convulsions." 



" I don't care. Pot-banks are steady." 



" With a corner in borax ? No. I've heard " 



" What have you heard?" 



" Office secrets. But it's no secret there's trouble 

 coming to potters. There's been borrowing and specu- 

 lation. The masters don't stick to one business as 

 they used to do. I can tell that much. Half the 

 valley may be ' playing' before two months are out." 

 Parload delivered himself of this unusually long 

 speech in his most pithy and w'eighty manner. 



"Playing" was our local euphemism for a time 

 when there was no w'ork and no money for a man, 

 a time of stagnation and dreary, hungry loafing day 

 after day. Such interludes seemed in those days a 

 necessary consequence of industrial organisation. 

 " You'd better stick to Rawdon's," said Parload. 

 " Ugh 1" said I, affecting a noble disgust. 

 " There'll be trouble," said Parload. 

 " Who cares?" said I. " Let there be trouble — the 

 more the better. This system has got to end, sooner 

 or later. These capitalists with their speculation and 

 corners and trusts make things go from bad to worse. 

 Why should I cower in Rawdon's office, like a fright- 

 ened dog, while hunger walks the streets? Hunger 

 is the master revolutionary. When he comes, we 

 ought to turn out and salute him. I'm going to do so 

 now." 



" That's all very well," began Parload. 



" I'm tired of it," I said. " I want to come to 

 grips with all these Rawdons. I think perhaps if I 

 was hungry and savage I could talk to hungry men 



" There's your mother," said Parload in his slow, 

 judicial way. 



That ivas a difficulty. 



I got over it by a rhetorical turn. "Why should 

 one sacrifice the future of the world — why should 

 one even sacrifice one's own future — because one's 

 mother is totally destitute of imagination?" 



VI. 



It was late when I parted from Parload and came 

 back to my own home. 



Our house stood in a liiglily respectable little 

 square near the Clayton parish church ; Mr. Gabbi- 

 tas, tlie curate-of-all-work, lodged on our ground 

 floor, and upstairs there was an old lady. Miss Hol- 

 royd, who painted flowers on china and maintained 

 her blind sister in an adjacent room ; my mother and 

 I lived in the basement and slept in the attic. The 

 front of the house was veiled by a Virginia creeper 

 that defied the Clayton air and clustered in untidy 

 dependent masses over the wooden porch. 



As I came up the steps, I had a glimpse of Mr. 

 Gabbitas working over his negatives by candle-light 

 in his room. It was the chief delight of his life to 

 spend his holiday abroad in the company of a queer 

 little snap-shot camera, and to return with a great 

 multitude of foggy and sinister negatives that he had 

 made in beautiful and interesting places. He would 

 spend his evenings the year through in printing from 

 them in order to inflict copies upon his undeserving 

 friends. There was a long frameful of his work 

 in the Clayton National School, for example, in- 

 scribed in old English lettering, " Italian Travel 

 Pictures by the Rev. E. B. Gabbitas." For this, it 

 seemed, he lived and travelled and had his being. 

 It was his only real joy. By his shaded light I 

 could see his sharp little nose, his little pale eyes 

 behind his glasses, his mouth pursed up with the 

 endeavour of his employment. . . . 



" Hireling liar," I muttered, for was not he also 

 part of the system, part of the scheme of robbery 

 that made wage-serfs of Parload and me? — though 

 his share in the [iroceeds were certainly small. 



" Hireling liar," said I, standing in the darkness, 

 outside even his faint glow of travelled culture. 



Mv mother let me in. 



.She looked at me, mutely, because she knew there 

 was "something wrong and that it was no use for her 

 to ask what. 



"Good-night, mummy," said I, and kissed her a 

 little roughly, and lit and took my candle and went 

 off at once up the staircase to bed — not looking back 

 at her. 



" I've kept some supper for you, dear." 



" Don't want any supper." 



