Wealth, real wealth, has hardly as yet much reason to complain of any encroachment of the labour movement on its rights. When did it command such means and appliances of pleasure, such satisfaction for every appetite and every fancy, as it commands now? When did it rear such enchanted palaces of luxury as it is rearing in England at the present day? Well do I remember one of those palaces, the most conspicuous object for miles round. Its lord was, I daresay, consuming the income of some six hundred of the poor labouring families round him. The thought that you are spending on yourself annually the income of six hundred labouring families seems to me about as much as a man with a heart and a brain can bear. Whatever the rich man desires, the finest house, the biggest diamond, the reigning beauty for his wife, social homage, public honours, political power, is ready at his command. Does he fancy a seat in the British House of Commons, the best club in London, as it has been truly called? All other claims, those of the public service included, at once give way. I remember a question arising about a nomination for a certain constituency (a working man's constituency, by the way), which was cut short by the announcement that the seat was wanted by a local millionaire. When the name of the millionaire was mentioned, surprise was expressed. Has he, it was asked, any political knowledge or capacity, any interest in public affairs, any ambition? The answer was "None." "Then why does he want the seat?" "He does not want it." "Then why does he take it?" "Because his wife does." Cleopatra, as the story goes, displayed her mad prodigality by melting a pearl in a cup, out of which she drank to Antony. But this modern money-queen could throw into her cup of pleasure, to give it a keener zest, a share in the government of the greatest empire in the world. If the movement, by transferring something from the side of profits to that of wages, checks in any measure the growth of these colossal fortunes, it will benefit society and diminish no man's happiness. I say it without the slightest feeling of asceticism, and in the conviction that wealth well made and well spent is as pure as the rill that runs from the mountain side.