tavern in Exeter Street in January, 1792. "They had finished their daily
labour and met there by appointment. After having their bread and cheese
and porter for supper, as usual, and their pipes afterwards, with some
conversation, on the hardness of the times and the dearness of all the
necessaries of life, which they in common with their fellow-citizens
felt to their sorrow, the business for which they had met was brought
forward--Parliamentary Reform."

The Corresponding Society drew the bulk of its members from tradesmen,
mechanics and shopkeepers, who contributed their penny a week, and
organised itself under Hardy's methodical guidance into numerous
branches each with twenty members. It is said to have counted in the end
some 30,000 members in London alone. It was a focus of discontent and
hope which soon attracted men of more conspicuous talents and wider
experience. Horne Tooke, man about town, ex-clergyman, and philologist,
who had been at first the friend and lieutenant and then the rival and
enemy of Wilkes, was there to bridge the years between the last great
popular agitation and the new hopes of reform. He was a man cautious and
even timid in action, but there was a vanity in him which led him to say
"hanging matters" when he had an inflammable audience in front of him
within the four walls of a room. There was Tom Paine, the man who had
first dared to propose the independence of the United States, a veteran
of revolution who had served on Washington's staff, penned those
brilliant exhortations which led the American rebels to victory, and
acted as Foreign Secretary to the insurgent Congress. On the fringes of
the little inner circle of intellectuals one catches a glimpse of
William Blake the poet, and Ritson, the first teacher and theorist of
vegetarianism. Not the least interesting member of the group was Thomas
Holcroft, the inseparable friend and ally of William Godwin. Holcroft's
vivid and masterful personality stands out indeed as the most attractive
among the abler members of the circle. The son of a boot-maker, he had
earned his bread as cobbler, ostler, village schoolmaster, strolling
player and reporter. His insatiable passion for knowledge had given him
a mastery of French and German. He went in 1783 to Paris as
correspondent of the _Morning Herald_, on the modest salary of a
guinea-and-a-half a week. It was there that he acquired his familiarity
with the writings of the French political philoso