Mr. Palk crept to his theme with great strategy. He spoke of the price of commodities in general and the difficulties that confronted even a bachelor with a good home and satisfactory work. "The thought of a new black coat do make you tremble nowadays," he said. "Then put the thought away from you, Thomas," advised Mr. Stockman. "I'm often wishful for little comforts myself, as is natural at my time of life; but I say to myself, 'The times are hard and these ban't days to set an example of selfishness.' The times are lean, Thomas, and we've got to practise the vartue of going without--high and low alike." "Everybody knows one thing: that everybody else did ought to be working harder," said Susan. "You hear it all round. Where I go, up or down, I always seem to find men loafing about saying the people did ought to be working harder." "True for you, Soosie-Toosie. I've marked the like. 'Tis all very well for Thomas here to say the prices be cruel; but the question is, 'Why are they?' And I'll tell you for why. Labour says Capital ought to give more; and Capital says Labour ought to work harder; and so they both stand chattering at each other like magpies and saying the country's going to the devil. Whereas, if they'd take a lesson from us of the land and put their backs into it with good will, the sun would soon come from behind the cloud. If each man would mind his own business and not waste his time judging his neighbour and envying him, we'd get a move on. You don't find the professional people grizzling and whining for more money--doctors and lawyers and such like. Nor farmers neither." "No," said Thomas, "because their job pays and they fetch in the cash and have enough to put by. I'd be so cheerful as them if I could make so much. I'd work like hell pulling mangel if I could get half as much by it as a dentist do pulling teeth. And the great puzzle to me is why for should pulling teeth be worth a fortune and pulling mangel deny me a new Sunday coat?" "Never heard you to say such a foolish thing afore, Thomas," answered Joe. "My dear man, you voice the whole silly staple of Labour when you say that. And I always thought you was above the masses in your ideas, as we all are to Buckland--or most of us. A thing is only worth what it will fetch, Thomas, and the root of our trouble at this minute is because Labour is forcing Capital to pay it more than it did ought to fetch." "Labour's worth what it can get," ventured Susan, and her father rebuked her. "A very wicked thought and I'm sorry you can sink to it," he said. "It's that opinion and a weak Government that's ruining the kingdom. Look at it, Thomas. Here's a man has three pounds a week for doing what an everyday boy of fifteen could do as well. That's false economy to begin with, because that man can't honestly earn three golden pounds in a week. He haven't got the parts to do it. And if millions of men are getting more than they can earn, what's happening?"