"I suppose I OUGHT to take that as an answer," said Denson, getting
his shoulder-blades well down to the seat of his chair; "but I
don't. I don't, you know. It's rather a shame to cross-examine you
after this fine address of yours"--Chris Robinson on the hearthrug
made acquiescent and inviting noises--"but the real question
remains how exactly are you going to end all these wrongs? There
are the administrative questions. If you abolish the private owner,
I admit you abolish a very complex and clumsy way of getting
businesses run, land controlled and things in general administered,
but you don't get rid of the need of administration, you know."

"Democracy," said Chris Robinson.

"Organised somehow," said Denson. "And it's just the How perplexes
me. I can quite easily imagine a socialist state administered in a
sort of scrambling tumult that would be worse than anything we have
got now.

"Nothing could be worse than things are now," said Chris Robinson.
"I have seen little children--"

"I submit life on an ill-provisioned raft, for example, could easily
be worse--or life in a beleagured town."

Murmurs.

They wrangled for some time, and it had the effect upon me of coming
out from the glow of a good matinee performance into the cold
daylight of late afternoon. Chris Robinson did not shine in
conflict with Denson; he was an orator and not a dialectician, and