But this autumn had brought him a gleam of hope; and the stirring events of the time helped to strengthen that hope. All things were changing. The great towns had been roused into political activity by the Reform Bill, and railways were fast revolutionising the habits of the people the land through, as well as opening up new fields of labour. At last, then, and even in sleepy, wealth worshipping, hide-bound England, democracy might be considered born. Thomas was sanguine that in the coming struggles the people would win, and, like all sanguine believers in the future good, his belief expected instant fulfilment. The apostles themselves lived in the belief that the end of the world was at hand. Might not the way-worn and heart-weary agricultural labourer therefore hope? Thomas Wanless, at least, did so. The world was changing for others; for him and his also better times might be at hand. Hitherto, alas, the changes had been mostly to his hurt. Railway-making itself had done his class harm rather than good, for the new iron roads linked the country more and more closely to the great centres of industry. Prices of all kinds of agricultural produce went higher and higher, but without bringing a corresponding increase in the labourer's pay. The landowner grabbed all he could of the augmented gains, and what he left the farmer took. For the hind was there not still the workhouse? Yet the demand for labour was increasing fast, and not all the hungry kerns of Ireland seemed able to meet that demand. For once Thomas and his wife had enjoyed a good year. Was not Leamington Priors growing a big town moreover, and going to have a college of its own to outshine Rugby itself? Surely Ashbrook would benefit from the nearness of so much wealth as this implied. The grounds for this hope were many and obvious. Thomas might yet rent his own little farm, and be independent. His ambition ran no higher, yet the indulgence of it proved him to be a short-sighted fool. At this time Thomas was an odd or day labourer, taking contract jobs on his own account when he could get them, and working for a daily wage when these failed. This winter found him at work grubbing up old hedges, and helping to lay out anew some land on a farm of Lord Duckford's beyond Radbury. He had to walk about four miles each way daily to and from his work, but as the days were short he lost no time, and the company of a fellow villager engaged with him at the same job made the trudge lighter. And the hopes that lay around his heart helped him more than aught else, as they always help us poor will-o'-the-wisp-led mortals in this dark world.