'It's part o' wot I mean w'en I s'y old England's on the down gryde.' 'W'ich is the one in black--this end?' his companion asked, indicating a refined-looking woman of forty or so. 'Is that Miss----?' 'Miss,' chipped in a young man of respectable appearance just behind. '_Miss?_ Why, that's the mother o' the Gracchi,' and there was a little ripple of laughter. 'Hasn't she got any of her jewels along with her to-day?' said another voice. 'What do they mean?' demanded Mrs. Fox-Moore. Vida shook her head. She herself was looking about for some one to ask. 'Isn't it queer that you and I have lived all this time in the world and have never yet been in a mixed crowd before in all our lives?--never _as a part of it_.' 'I think myself it's less strange we haven't done it before than that we're doing it now. There's the woman selling things. Let us ask her----' They had noticed before a faded-looking personage who had been going about on the fringe of the crowd with a file of propagandist literature on her arm. Vida beckoned to her. She made her way with some difficulty through the chaffing, jostling horde, saying steadily and with a kind of cheerful doggedness-- 'Leaflets! Citizenship of Women, by Lothian Scott! Labour Record! Prison Experiences of Miss----' 'How much?' asked Miss Levering. 'What you like,' she answered. Miss Levering took her change out in information. 'Can you tell me who the speakers are?' 'Oh, yes.' The haggard face brightened before the task. 'That one is the famous Miss Claxton.' 'With her face screwed up?' 'That's because the sun is in her eyes.' 'She isn't so bad-looking,' admitted Mrs. Fox-Moore. 'No; but just wait till she speaks!' The faded countenance of the woman with the heavy pile of printed propaganda on her arm was so lit with enthusiasm, that it, too, was almost good-looking, in the same way as the younger, more regular face up there, frowning at the people, or the sun, or the memory of wrongs. 'Is Miss Claxton some relation of yours?' asked Mrs. Fox-Moore. 'No, oh, no, I don't even know her. She hasn't been out of prison long. The man in grey--he's Mr. Henry.' 'Out of prison! And Henry's the chairman, I suppose.' 'No; the chairman is the lady in black.' The pamphlet-seller turned away to make change for a new customer. 'Do you mean the mother of the Gracchi?' said Vida, at a venture, and saw how if she herself hadn't understood the joke the lady with the literature did. She laughed good-humouredly. 'Yes; that's Mrs. Chisholm.' 'What!' said a decent-looking but dismal sort of shopman just behind, 'is that the mother of those dreadful young women?' Neither of the two ladies were sufficiently posted in the nefarious goings on of the 'dreadful' progeny quite to appreciate the bystander's surprise, but they gazed with renewed interest at the delicate face. 'What can the man mean! She doesn't _look_----' Mrs. Fox-Moore hesitated.