y week he threw into the
lap of Mrs. Ginx the eighteen or twenty shillings which his strength and
temperance enabled him continuously to earn, less sixpence reserved
for the public-house, whither he retreated on Sundays after the family
dinner. A dozen children overrunning the space in his rooms was then
a strain beyond the endurance of Ginx. Nor had he the heart to try the
common plan, and turn his children out of doors on the chance of their
being picked up in a raid of Sunday School teachers. So he turned out
himself to talk with the humbler spirits of the "Dragon," or listen
sleepily while alehouse demagogues prescribed remedies for State abuses.

Our friend was nearly as guiltless of knowledge as if Eve had never
rifled the tree whereon it grew. Vacant of policies were his thoughts;
innocent he of ideas of state-craft. He knew there was a Queen; he had
seen her. Lords and Commons were to him vague deities possessing strange
powers. Indeed, he had been present when some of his better-informed
companions had recognized with cheers certain gentlemen,--of whom Ginx's
estimate was expressed by a reference to his test of superiority to
himself in that which he felt to be greatest within him--"I could lick
'em with my little finger"--as the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the
Prime Minister. Little recked he of their uses or abuses. The functions
of Government were to him Asian mysteries. He only felt that it ought to
have a strong arm, like the brawny member wherewith he preserved order
in his domestic kingdom, and therefore generally associated Government
with the Police. In his view these were to clear away evil-doers and
leave every one else alone. The higher objects of Government were, if
at all, outlined in the shadowiest form in his imagination. Government
imposed taxes--that he was obliged to know. Government maintained the
parks; for that he thanked it. Government made laws, but what they were,
or with what aim or effects made, he knew not, save only that by them
something was done to raise or depress the prices of bread, tea, sugar,
and other necessaries. Why they should do so he never conceived--I am
not sure that he cared. Legislation sometimes pinched him, but darkness
so hid from him the persons and objects of the legislators that he could
not criticise the theories which those powerful beings were subjecting
to experiment at his cost. I must, at any risk, say something about this
in a separate chapter.