Dear me, how far this kind of thing does lead one to be sure. But I have the most vivid recollection of those reflections in that strenuous time, and they gave point and edge to my remarks made on Sunday morning at Kensal Green Cemetery Gates, to the immense audiences of men waiting there for William the Fourth to open. I preached the doctrine of Christian Socialism as I saw it, as different from the naked and unabashed Socialism of the Keir Hardie type, as light is from darkness, a social law of love and duty towards my neighbour, whether he be rich or poor. And this was a great and splendid compensation, even when as often happened, I, having laid out my last few shillings on Friday for materials wherewith to make frames in the hope of getting paid for them on Saturday, found that I was left with only a few pence to procure that sacrament of the Londoner, the Sunday's dinner. However hard those times now seem to look back upon, I can very plainly see how much of pleasure and good training there was in them, compensations of which I then thought little. But I cannot help seeing also how helpful a few business-like habits would have been. I cannot say that I had a rooted objection to keeping accounts, I only know that I never did keep them except in my head. And consequently I grew to trust my memory for everything, which in business, however small, is I now know fatal. Yet I know, too, that had I been managing anybody else's business, I should have been a scrupulous book-keeper. Blamable in the last degree this constitutional aversion of mine from putting down what I had spent and how much I had earned from that spending. Also, for another confession, though I was in theory anything but an optimist, in practice I acted optimism. I never could feel sure of my monthly government pay, until I had actually cashed the cheque, yet in the face of demands which it seemed miraculous that I should ever be able to satisfy I was cheery, even confident, that, as Dickens so scornfully puts it, "things would come round." Now I must close this chapter, already overlong, but before I do so I must just say that at this time I drank nothing but water or tea, did not smoke, never paid a penny for recreation, and wore my clothes till I dared wear them no longer. And yet I was, with a steady salary of £2. 2s. a week, abjectly poor! CHAPTER VII I TAKE A SHOP