The unpleasant social features of Honey Fair thus obtruded themselves on William Halliburton's notice; it was impossible that any one passing much through Honey Fair should not be struck with them. Could nothing be done to rescue the people from this degraded condition?--and a degraded one it was, compared with what it might have been. Young and inexperienced as he was, it was a question that sometimes arose to William's mind. Dirty homes, scolding mothers, ragged and pining children, rough and swearing husbands! Waste, discomfort, evil. The women laid the blame on the men: reproached them with wasting their evenings and their money at the public-house. The men retorted upon the women, and said they had not a home "fit for a pig to come into." Meanwhile the money, whether earned by husband or wife, _went_. It went somehow, bringing apparently nothing to show for it, and the least possible return of good. Thus they struggled and squabbled on, their lives little better than one continued scene of scramble, discomfort, and toil. At a year's end they were not in the least bettered, not in the least raised, socially, morally, or physically, from their condition at the year's commencement. Nothing had been achieved; except that they were one year nearer to the great barrier which separates time from eternity. Ask them what they were toiling and struggling for. They did not know. What was their end, their aim? They had none. If they could only rub on, and keep body and soul together (as poor Caroline Mason was trying to do in her garret), it appeared to be all they cared for. They did not endeavour to lift up their hopes or their aspirations above that; they were willing so to go on until death should come. What a life! what an end! A feeling would now and then come over William that he might in some way help them to attempt better things. To do so was a duty which seemed to be lying across his path, that he might take it up and make it his. How to set about it, he knew no more than the Man in the Moon. Now and then disheartening moments would come upon him. To attempt to sweep away the evils of Honey Fair appeared a far more formidable task than to cleanse the Augean Stables could ever have appeared to Hercules. He knew that any endeavour, whether on his part or on that of others, who might be far more experienced and capable than he, would be utterly fruitless unless the incentive to exertion, to strive to do better, should be first born within themselves. Ah, my friends! the aid of others may be looked upon as a great thing; but without self-struggle and self-help little good will be effected.