roduction. If we are not at all events
partly independent, how is it possible to urge on others the
principles of small ownership.

In saying this he spoke from experience, for he had found that before
he began his experiment his friends were exasperated by references to
the principles of Distributism, while the sight of the building in
progress began to convert them.

I have found many letters striking the note of gratitude to Gilbert
for his goodness and the inspiration he has given. One of these,
written by a sailor from H.M.S. _Hood_, is pure Distributism: "Your
articles are so interesting tho' so hard to understand. . . . Why not
come down a bit and educate the working class who are always in
trouble because they don't know what they want. You see, sir, your
use of words and phrases are so complicated, personally that's why
I'm so fascinated when I read them, but really us average Council
School educated people can't learn from you as we should . . . but
what I do understand helps me to live. . . ."

The sailor goes on to tell the story of his life: a workhouse child,
a farm boy: a seaman on a submarine who spent his "danger money" on a
bit of land in Cornwall, married now and with two boys. "What a thrill
of pleasure we have when we gaze over our land. . . . To be reared in
a workhouse and then to leave a freehold home and land to one's
children may not seem much to most people but still out of that my
sons can build again. . . . I feel you understand this letter, what
is in my heart, and I want to thank you very much for what you have
done for me."

Towards the end of September 1932 the League held a meeting to which
Gilbert came "as peacemaker." In the course of his speech he remarked
that he had often said harsh things of America in the days of her
prosperity but that in these days of adversity we might learn much
from that country. He instanced the saying he had heard from a
business man on his recent visit, "There's nothing for it but to go
back to the farm," and noted the fact that America still had this
large element of family farms as a basis for recovery. The suggestion
that Distributists wanted to turn everybody into peasants had been
another point answered in _The Outline_--"What we offer is
proportion. We wish to correct the proportions of the modern state."*
A considerable return to the family farm would greatly improve this
proportion.

[* _Outline of Sanity_, p. 56.]

But if he had sp