“I am not sorry. I have the chance to test my theories upon my own people; could anything be better? And, besides, it is the busy people who will do this work that has to be done. I am not going to delay my part, John. You and I and many others will proclaim the fact that the Church must not be afraid to take the greatness which the Master is thrusting upon her, and that for His sake, and her own sake, and the world’s sake, she must be an united and not a split-up Church.” “But people—even good people—love to fight.” “Very well; and there is still the world, the flesh, and the devil for them to attack. That they should waste their strength in fighting one another after all these centuries of Christian teaching seems to me wonderful. But I am sure the Christian world is ready for a change. Already there are dozens, soon there will be thousands, of preachers proclaiming a truce, while the Church puts right the wrongs of the poor and degraded in England.” But Knight found that his hands were full when he went to look at the properties that had come into his possession. Among the rest was an immense number of courts and alleys near the places of business; and the heart of the young owner of them grew very sad as he examined them. They were most of them miserably old and dirty, and the women and children whom he saw lounging about the doorways looked sickly and filthy, too. He remembered what he had once read—that men and animals were greatly influenced by the character of the places in which they ate and slept; and he ceased to wonder that some of the men of whom he had heard were lazy, drunken, and blasphemous. The places were not homes—they did not deserve the name. And to think that his brother-men had to pass their hours of leisure there or in a public-house! He continued his researches, however, for some hours, after which he felt utterly miserable and ashamed that such places should form part of his inheritance. He was turning to go home when a lady accosted him. “Excuse me,” she said, “people are telling me that you are the owner of these houses. Will you be good enough to come and look at one of them?” She spoke in a low voice, which thrilled with indignation, and her eyes were blazing with a passion of anger. “I have only been the owner for a few days,” said Arthur. “I am not proud of them, I assure you, but very much ashamed of them. I will do what I can as speedily as I can; they cannot be changed by a miracle. I wish they could.” The girl did not reply; and Arthur followed her into the most wretched house that he had ever seen, and into a room where there was a hole in the roof and another in the floor, and in the corner of which lay a woman suffering horribly from rheumatic fever, while two wretched, half-clothed children sat by her side, munching a piece of bread.