s uncle's house that Sidney came to know
John Hewett; the circumstances which fostered their friendship were
such as threw strong light on the characters of both. Sidney had taken
a room in Islington, and two rooms on the floor beneath him were
tenanted by a man who was a widower and had two children. In those
days, our young friend found much satisfaction in spending his Sunday
evenings on Clerkenwell Green, where fervent, if ungrammatical, oratory
was to be heard, and participation in debate was open to all whom the
spirit moved. One whom the spirit did very frequently move was Sidney's
fellow-lodger; he had no gift of expression whatever, but his brief,
stammering protests against this or that social wrong had such an
honest, indeed such a pathetic sound, that Sidney took an opportunity
of walking home with him and converting neighbourship into friendly
acquaintance. John Hewett gave the young man an account of his life. He
had begun as a lath-render; later he had got into cabinet-making,
started a business on his own account, and failed. A brother of his,
who was a builder's foreman, then found employment for him in general
carpentry on some new houses; but John quarrelled with his brother, and
after many difficulties fell to the making of packing-cases; that was
his work at present, and with much discontent he pursued it. John was
curiously frank in owning all the faults in himself which had helped to
make his career so unsatisfactory. He confessed that he had an
uncertain temper, that he soon became impatient with work 'which led to
nothing,' that he was tempted out of his prudence by anything which
seemed to offer 'a better start.' With all these admissions, he
maintained that he did well to be angry. It was wrong that life should
be so hard; so much should not be required of a man. In body he was not
strong; the weariness of interminable days over-tried him and excited
his mind to vain discontent. His wife was the only one who could ever
keep him cheerful under his lot, and his wedded life had lasted but six
years; now there was his lad Bob and his little girl Clara to think of,
and it only made him more miserable to look forward and see them going
through hardships like his own. Things were wrong somehow, and it
seemed to him that 'if only we could have universal suffrage--'

Sidney was only eighteen, and strong in juvenile Radicalism, but he had
a fund of common sense, and such a conclusion as this of poor John