Looking back upon their past life of plenty, and their present empty homes and famished faces, little wonder that this misguided body of men grew to find that something of the old Satan was in them yet. A great deal of it, too. Perhaps remorse held its full share with them. They had intended that it should be so entirely for the better when they threw up work; and it had turned out so surprisingly for the worse. They had meant to return to work on their own terms; earning more and toiling less: they had been led to believe that this result lay in their own hands, and was as safe and certain as that the sun shone overhead at noonday. Instead of that--here they were, in as deplorable a condition as human beings could well be; Time had been, not very long ago either, that the false step might have been redeemed; Richard North had offered them work again on the old terms. Ay, and he had once conceded a portion of their demands--as they remembered well. But that time and that offer had gone by for ever. Fresh men (few though they were) had taken their places, and they themselves were starving and helpless. The feeling against these new men was bitter enough; it was far more bitter against the small number of old workmen who had gone back again. We are told that the heart of man is desperately wicked: our own experience shows us that it is desperately selfish. They saw the employed men doing the work which once was theirs; they saw them wearing good coats, eating good food. They themselves had neither one nor the other; and work they had rejected. It would not have seemed quite so hard had the work altogether left the place: but to see these others doing it and living in comfort was more than mortal temper could brook.