ire were
passing through the room. They all looked happy and prosperous: he
thought the girls' light dresses were gayer and smarter than those
usually seen among a crowd of English passengers; but there was another
side to the picture.

Rows of artistic seats ran here and there, and each was occupied by
jaded immigrants, worn out by their journey in the sweltering Colonist
cars. Piles of dilapidated baggage surrounded them, and among it
exhausted children lay asleep. Drowsy, dusty women, with careworn
faces, were huddled beside them; men bearing the stamp of ill-paid toil
sat in dejected apathy; and all about each group the floor, which was
wet with drippings from the roof, was strewn with banana skins, crumbs,
and scraps of food. There had been heavy rains, and the atmosphere was
hot and humid. It was, however, the silence of these newcomers that
struck George most. There was no grumbling among them--they scarcely
seemed vigorous enough for that--but as he passed one row he heard a
woman's low sobbing and the wail of a fretful child.

After a while the girl he had met on the train appeared and intimated
by a smile that he might join her. They found an unoccupied seat, and
a smartly-attired young man who was approaching it stopped when he saw
them.

"Well," he said coolly, "I guess I won't intrude."

George felt seriously annoyed with him, but he was reassured when his
companion laughed with candid amusement. Though there was no doubt of
her prettiness, he had already noticed that she did not impress one
most forcibly with the fact that she was an attractive young woman. It
seemed to sink into the background when one spoke to her.

"It was rather tedious waiting in the hotel," she explained. "There
was nobody I could talk to; my father is busy with a grain broker."

"Then he is a farmer?"

"Yes," said the girl, "he has a farm."

"And you live out in the West with him?"

"Of course," she said, smiling. "Still, I have been in Montreal, and
England." Then she turned and glanced at the jaded immigrants. "One
feels sorry for them; they have so much to bear."

George felt that she wished to change the subject, and he followed her
lead.

"I feel inclined to wonder where they all go to and how you employ
them. Your people still seem anxious to bring them in."

"Yes," she replied thoughtfully, "It's rather a difficult question. Of
course, we pay high wages--people who say they must dispense with hel