It has been good for me to be here, Bertie. It has
brought me in close contact with the working classes, and
made me realise what fine people they are. Because one
drunkard goes home howling on a Saturday night, we are
too apt to overlook the ninety-nine decent folk by their
own firesides. I shall not make that mistake any more.
The kindliness of the poor to the poor makes a man
sick of himself. And their sweet patience! Depend upon
it, if ever there is a popular rising, the wrongs which
lead to it must be monstrous and indefensible. I think
the excesses of the French Revolution are dreadful enough
in themselves, but much more so as an index to the slow
centuries of misery against which they were a mad
protest. And then the wisdom of the poor! It is amusing
to read the glib newspaper man writing about the
ignorance of the masses. They don't know the date of
Magna Charta, or whom John of Gaunt married; but put a
practical up-to-date problem before them, and see how
unerringly they take the right side. Didn't they put the
Reform Bill through in the teeth of the opposition of the
majority of the so-called educated classes? Didn't they
back the North against the South when nearly all our
leaders went wrong? When universal arbitration and the
suppression of the liquor traffic comes, is it not sure
to be from the pressure of these humble folks? They look
at life with clearer and more unselfish eyes.
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