denunciation would
begin to mount again towards a fresh climax of loud-voiced attack, only
to sink again to the same lamb-like refrain. Mrs. Boyce's thin lip
twitched, and Marcella bore the good gentleman a grudge for providing
her mother with so much unnecessary amusement.

As for Wharton, at the opening of his speech he spoke both awkwardly and
flatly; and Marcella had a momentary shock. He was, as he said, tired,
and his wits were not at command. He began with the general political
programme of the party to which--on its extreme left wing--he proclaimed
himself to belong. This programme was, of course, by now a newspaper
commonplace of the stalest sort. He himself recited it without
enthusiasm, and it was received without a spark, so far as appeared, of
interest or agreement. The minister gave an "hear, hear," of a loud
official sort; the men made no sign.

"They might be a set of Dutch cheeses!" thought Marcella, indignantly,
after a while. "But, after all, why should they care for all this? I
shall have to get up in a minute and stop those children romping."

But through all this, as it were, Wharton was only waiting for his
second wind. There came a moment when, dropping his quasi-official and
high political tone, he said suddenly with another voice and emphasis:

"Well now, my men, I'll be bound you're thinking, 'That's all pretty
enough!--we haven't got anything against it--we dare say it's all right;
but we don't care a brass ha'porth about any of it! If that's all you'd
got to say to us, you might have let us bide at home. We don't have none
too much time to rest our bones a bit by the fire, and talk to the
missus and the kids. Why didn't you let us alone, instead of bringing us
out in the cold?'

"Well, but it _isn't_ all I've got to say--and you know it--because
I've spoken to you before. What I've been talking about is all true, and
all important, and you'll see it some day when you're fit. But what can
men in your position know about it, or care about it? What do any of you
want, but _bread_--"

--He thundered on the desk--

"--a bit of decent _comfort_--a bit of _freedom_--freedom from tyrants
who call themselves your betters!--a bit of rest in your old age, a home
that's something better than a dog-hole, a wage that's something better
than starvation, an honest share in the wealth you are making every day
and every hour for other people to gorge and plunder!"

He stopped a moment to see how _th