mill-hands don't support high Tory doctrine. It'll be interesting to
see how they muster. If Liversedge knows how to go to work"--he
broke into laughter. "Suppose, when the time comes, I go down and
harangue the mob in his favour?"

Lilian smiled and shook her head.

"I'm afraid you would be calling them 'the mob' to their faces."

"Well, why not? I dare say I should do more that way than by talking
fudge about the glorious and enlightened people. 'Look here, you
blockheads!' I should shout, 'can't you see on which side your
interests lie? Are you going to let England be thrown into war and
taxes just to please a theatrical Jew and the howling riff-raff of
London?' I tell you what, Lily, it seems to me I could make a
rattling good speech if I gave my mind to it. Don't you think so?"

"There's nothing you couldn't do," she answered, with soft fervour,
fixing her eyes upon him.

"And yet I do nothing--isn't that what you would like to add?"

"Oh, but your book is getting on!"

"Yes, yes; so it is. A capital book it'll be, too; a breezy book--
smelling of the sea-foam! But, after all, that's only pen-work. I
have a notion that I was meant for active life, after all. If I had
remained in the Navy, I should have been high up by now. I should
have been hoping for war, I dare say. What possibilities there are
in every man!"