will help? Plenty of people wish well to any good
cause; but very few care to exert themselves to help it, and still
fewer will risk anything in its support. 'Some one ought to do it, but
why should I?' is the ever re-echoed phrase of weak-kneed amiability.
'Some one ought to do it, so why _not_ I?' is the cry of some earnest
servant of man, eagerly forward springing to face some perilous duty.
Between those two sentences lie whole centuries of moral evolution."

I was promptly threatened with an action for libel, but nothing came
of it; it was easier to strike at the girls, and a few days later
Fleet Street was enlivened by the irruption of a crowd of match-girls,
demanding Annie Besant. I couldn't speechify to match-girls in Fleet
Street, so asked that a deputation should come and explain what they
wanted. Up came three women and told their story: they had been asked
to sign a paper certifying that they were well treated and contented,
and that my statements were untrue; they refused. "You had spoke up
for us," explained one, "and we weren't going back on you." A girl,
pitched on as their leader, was threatened with dismissal; she stood
firm; next day she was discharged for some trifle, and they all threw
down their work, some 1,400 of them, and then a crowd of them started
off to me to ask what to do next. If we ever worked in our lives,
Herbert Burrows and I worked for the next fortnight. And a pretty
hubbub we created; we asked for money, and it came pouring in; we
registered the girls to receive strike pay, wrote articles, roused the
clubs, held public meetings, got Mr. Bradlaugh to ask questions in
Parliament, stirred up constituencies in which shareholders were
members, till the whole country rang with the struggle. Mr. Frederick
Charrington lent us a hall for registration, Mr. Sidney Webb and
others moved the National Liberal Club to action; we led a procession
of the girls to the House of Commons, and interviewed, with a
deputation of them, Members of Parliament who cross-questioned them.
The girls behaved splendidly, stuck together, kept brave and bright
all through. Mr. Hobart of the Social Democratic Federation, Messrs.
Shaw, Bland, and Oliver, and Headlam of the Fabian Society, Miss
Clementina Black, and many another helped in the heavy work. The
London Trades Council finally consented to act as arbitrators and a
satisfactory settlement was arrived at; the girls went in to work,
fines and deductions were a