'No, I haven't been to Corder--I beg his pardon; _Mister_
Corder--James Corder, Esquire. But where do you think I went this
mornin'? Mrs. Peckover brought up a paper an' showed me an
advertisement. Gorbutt in Goswell Bead wanted a man to clean windows
an' sweep up, an' so on;--offered fifteen bob a week. Well, I
went. Didn't I, mother? Didn't I go after that job? I got there at
half-past eight; an' what do you think I found? If there was one man
standin' at Gorbutt's door, _there was five hundred_! Don't you
believe me? You go an' ask them as lives about there. If there was
one, there was five hundred! Why, the p'lice had to come an' keep
the road clear. Fifteen bob What was the use o' me standin' there,
outside the crowd? What was the use, I say? Such a lot o' poor
starvin' devils you never saw brought together in all your life.
There they was, lookin' ready to fight with one another for the
fifteen bob a week. Didn't I come back and tell you about it,
mother? An' if they'd all felt like me, they'd a turned against the
shop an' smashed it up--ay, an' every other shop in the street!
What use? Why, no use; but I tell you that's how I felt. If any man
had said as much as a rough word to me, I'd a gone at him like a
bulldog. I felt like a beast. I wanted to fight, I tell you--to
fight till the life was kicked an' throttled out of me!'

'John, don't, don't go on in that way,' cried his wife, sobbing
miserably. 'Don't let him go on like that, Sidney.'

Hewett jumped up and walked about.

'What's the time?' he asked the next moment. And when Sidney told
him that it was half-past nine, he exclaimed, 'Then why hasn't Clara