than these: of a Heavenly Mother,
a Suffering Man; a hint that solid animal health was not the only
conceivable ideal. It was a tiny detail; he blamed himself for
noticing it. He reminded himself that here, at any rate, was real
liberty as he had conceived it.

He began to scrutinize the faces of the passers-by, sheltering
himself behind his elbow that he might not be noticed--appearing
as if he were waiting for some one. Women passed by, strong-faced
and business-like; men came up and passed, talking in twos or
threes. He even watched for some while a couple of children who
sat gravely together on a doorstep. (That reminded him of the
meeting of to-morrow, when certain educational matters had to be
finally decided; he remembered the proposed _curriculum_,
sketched out in some papers that he had to study this evening--an
exceedingly sound and useful _curriculum_, calculated to make the
pupils satisfactorily informed persons.)

Again and again he told himself that it was fancy that made him
see in the faces of these people--people, it must be remembered,
who were not commonplace, but rather enthusiasts for their cause,
since they preferred exile to a life under the Christian
system--that made him see a kind of blankness and heaviness
corresponding to that which the aspect of their street presented.
Many of the faces were intellectual, especially of the men--there
was no doubt of that; and all were wholesome-looking and healthy,
just as this little square was sensibly built and planned, and
the houses soundly constructed.

Yet, as he looked at them _en masse_, and compared them with his
general memories of the type of face that he saw in London
streets, there was certainly a difference. He could conceive
these people making speeches, recording votes, discussing
matters of public interest with great gravity and consideration;
he could conceive them distributing alms to the needy after
careful and scientific enquiry, administering justice; he could
imagine them even, with an effort, inflamed with political
passion, denouncing, appealing. . . . But it appeared to him (to
his imagination rather, as he angrily told himself) that he
could not believe them capable of any absolutely reckless crime
or reckless act of virtue. They could calculate, they could
plan, they had almost mechanically perfect ideas of justice;
they could even love and hate after their kind. But it was
inconceivable that their passion, either for good