260 The Ideal State 



if not his duty, to secure the best possible environment 

 for the children of the workers, so as to rear strong 

 virile men to man the ships and defend the shores. As 

 he cannot see it, and will not, he must be compelled, and 

 ere long, let us thank God, in his interest and in all our 

 interests, physically, intellectually, and spiritually, the 

 reforms which are necessary to this great end shall be 

 accomplished. 



Mr. Hobart gives many instances of the trials to 

 which the workers are subjected. " Who is there 

 amongst the advanced democratic writers of to-day 

 who fully appreciates the extent of suffering and even 

 agony inflicted in many working-class homes by the 

 late arrival at its destination of a workman's train ? 

 Hot, tired, exhausted, and fatigued, they arrive at 

 their workshop one minute after the gate is closed, 

 there to wait and worry for a quarter of an hour, an 

 hour, or a quarter of a day. And what does this mean ? 

 The loss of a few paltry pence ? Ah ! no. It means 

 perchance a long spell of unemployment, for some 

 employers are so precise and attach so much import- 

 ance to punctuality, that they will discharge a man 

 immediately for being late in the morning. It may 

 mean another week of shoeless feet for one of the 

 children, or the lack of some necessary comfort for 

 a delicate wife ... or a further accumulation of 

 arrears of rent, and this in its turn may mean the 

 hastening of the day of the broker's man's visit, and of 

 eviction from the place called ' home.' Those who 

 talk glibly of the thousands of pounds lost in wages 

 through a lock-out, or strike, do not know that 

 thousands of pounds of wages are lost every year 

 by the workers through late trains, tramcar delays, 

 cheap alarm clocks that will not ' alarm,' sleepless 

 nights through toothache, baby's restlessness, wife's 

 illness, and scores of other causes, and none of them 



