HONY. [With a great sigh-slowly.] We have been made the subject
of an attack. [Looking round at WILDER and SCANTLEBURY with ironical
contempt.] I take it on my shoulders. I am seventy-six years old. I
have been Chairman of this Company since its inception two-and-thirty
years ago. I have seen it pass through good and evil report. My
connection with it began in the year that this young man was born.

[EDGAR bows his head. ANTHONY, gripping his chair, goes on.]

I have had do to with "men" for fifty years; I've always stood up to
them; I have never been beaten yet. I have fought the men of this
Company four times, and four times I have beaten them. It has been
said that I am not the man I was. [He looks at Wilder.] However
that may be, I am man enough to stand to my guns.

[His voice grows stronger. The double-doors are opened. ENID
slips in, followed by UNDERWOOD, who restrains her.]

The men have been treated justly, they have had fair wages, we have
always been ready to listen to complaints. It has been said that
times have changed; if they have, I have not changed with them.
Neither will I. It has been said that masters and men are equal!
Cant! There can only be one master in a house! Where two men meet
the better man will rule. It has been said that Capital and Labour
have the same interests. Cant! Their interests are as wide asunder
as the poles. It has been said that the Board is only part of a
machine. Cant! We are the machine; its brains and sinews; it is for
us to lead and to determine what is to be done, and to do it without
fear or favour. Fear of the men! Fear of the shareholders! Fear of
our own shadows! Before I am like that, I hope to die.

[He pauses, and meeting his son's eyes, goes on.]

There is only one way of treating "men"--with the iron hand. This
half and half business, the half and half manners of this generation,
has brought all this upon us. Sentiment and softness, and what this
young man, no doubt, would call his social policy. You can't eat
cake and have it! This middle-class sentiment, or socialism, or
whatever it may be, is rotten. Masters are masters, men are men!
Yield one demand, and they will make it six. They are [he smiles
grimly] like Oliver Twist, asking for more. If I were in their
place I should be the same. But I am not in their place. Mark my
words: one fine morning, when you have given way here, and given way
there-