"They must have the money to live," said Thomas. "For the moment they must," admitted his master, "and they're getting it, but where half their time be wasted is in wrangling over keeping it. The fools won't work, because they're afraid of their lives if they do, their wages will come down; and they don't see, so kitten-blind they are, that the very best thing that could happen to them would be that their wages should come down. For what would that mean? It would mean things was returning to their true values, and that a pound was in sight of being worth twenty bob again." "That's it," answered Thomas. "If three pound be worth only thirty shilling, they must have three pound." "Listen to me, my son. Would you rather have three pound, worth thirty shilling, or two pound, worth forty? You'd rather have two worth forty; and when Labour sees that two worth forty be better than three worth thirty, then, very like, Labour will set to work to make two worth forty again. That's what their leading men know so well as me; but they're a damned sight too wicked to rub it into the rank and file, because 'twould ease Capital so well as Labour and they've no wish to do a stroke for Capital or the nation at large. They be out for themselves first and last and always. And while the people be so busy fighting for money that they ain't got time to earn it, so long the English sovereign and the world at large will have to wait to come into its own." "And meantime three pound be worth less than thirty bob; and that's what interests me most for the minute," said Mr. Palk. "Don't look at it in a small way, Thomas. Don't darken counsel by thinking of number one," urged Joe. "That's what everybody's doing, God forgive 'em. You preach work, in season and out, for at this gait the younger generation will never know what work means. They be hungering to eat without working, and that means starvation for all. Paper's only paper, Thomas, and gold's always gold, till man ceases to think in the pound sterling. So what we want is to get back on to the sure ground of solid gold and establish ourselves again as the nation with the biggest balance at the bank. But us must take these high questions in a high spirit, and not let little things, like a new black coat, blind the sight." "You speak for Capital, however," murmured Mr. Palk. "I can't withstand 'e, of course, because I haven't been aggicated; but----" "I speak for Labour quite so much as for Capital," declared Mr. Stockman. "I began life as a labouring boy and I'm a labouring man still, as you can vouch for. I'm only telling Labour, what it don't know and won't learn, that if it worked harder and jawed less, it would be putting money in its pocket. As things are it's a child yowling for the moon." "Then I suppose I be," said Thomas, "for I was going to put it to you, man to man, that it would be a Godsend to me if you could lift me five bob, or even three."