"Well, you may be right," said George, drily. "But I confess--if I may be quite frank--that I don't altogether trust you to judge. I want at least, before I strike the balance between my Dalhousie and your tailoress, to hear what those people have to say who have not crippled their minds--by pity!" "Pity!" she said, her lip trembling in spite of herself. "Pity!--you count pity a disease?" "As you--and others--practise it," he replied coolly, turning round upon her. "It is no good; the world can't be run by pity. At least, living always seems to me a great brutal, rushing, rough-and-tumble business, which has to be carried on whether we like it or no. To be too careful, too gingerly over the separate life, brings it all to a standstill. Meddle too much, and the Demiurge who set the machine going turns sulky and stops working. Then the nation goes to pieces--till some strong ruffian without a scruple puts it together again." "What do you mean by the Demiurge?" He laughed. "Why do you make me explain my flights? Well, I suppose, the natural daimonic power in things, which keeps them going and set them off; which is not us, or like us, and cares nothing for us." His light voice developed a sudden energy during his little speech. "Ah!" said Marcella, wistfully. "Yes, if one thought that, I could understand. But, even so, if the power behind things cares nothing for us, I should only regard it as challenging us to care more for each other. Do you mind my asking you a few plain questions? Do you know anything personally of the London poor? I mean, have you any real friends among them, whose lives you know?" "Well, I sit with Fontenoy while he receives deputations from all those tailoresses and shirtmakers and fur-sewers that _you_ want to put in order. The harassed widow streams through his room perpetually--wailing to be let alone!" Marcella made a sound of amused scorn. "Oh! you think that nothing," said George, indignant. "I vow I could draw every type of widow that London contains--I know them intimately." She shook her head. "I give up London. Then, in the North, aren't you a coal-owner? Do you know your miners?" "Yes, and I detest them!" said George, shortly; "pig-headed brutes! They will be on strike next month, and I shall be defrauded of my lawful income till their lordships choose to go back. Pity _me_, if you please--not them!" "So I do," she said with spirit--"if you hate the men by whom you live!" There was silence. Then suddenly George said, in another tone: "But sometimes, I don't deny, the beggars wring it out of one--your pity. I saw a mother last week--Suppose we stroll on a little. I want to see how the river gets out of the wood."