He came up to Edward and said: "I would advise you not to mix yourself up in this, Mr. Perry. I mean business, and if you are here when my men come back, it will be my duty to arrest you first of all." Edward hesitated a moment, and then turned abruptly on his heel and walked off. I followed him, and he said as we went down the drive: "I shan't shirk being arrested when the time comes, but it will be for something more serious than refusing to move on when I am told to." As we left the garden I turned back and saw Mr. Bolster showering from an upper window articles of feminine apparel, which, floating amply down the breeze, roused the crowd to renewed merriment. FOOTNOTES: [32] It would not have been etiquette for them to show any interest whatever in the doings of their masters and mistresses, or to unbend in any way while on duty. The second coachman whom we had just heard about was behaving unprofessionally in talking to his own friends from the box, although his fellow-servants would not blame him for inconveniencing his master and mistress by so doing. CHAPTER XXIII As we walked away, Edward said contemptuously: "Isn't that just like the race of servants all over? To come back for their _things_! Despicable race of parasitical humbugs! If I were ever so poor I should be ashamed of going out to service. I would sooner be the man who can hardly rise from his chair through over-feeding, than the man who busies himself in seeing that he consumes more than his share. The one is at any rate trying to do his duty, with all the forces of poverty and oppression ranged against him; the other merely wants to live in rich surroundings without undergoing any of the disadvantages." "I have rather suspected that," I said. "Still, they do live simply, as far as I have observed. They are not like Lord Charles Delagrange, and that sort of person, who likes luxury for its own sake." "I am not at all sure that some of them don't," said Edward. "But, at any rate, they all enjoy the contrast between their state and that of their masters and mistresses. You have no idea what servants are, Howard, by only knowing them at Magnolia Hall. Would you like to come with me to a few houses where, I think, I may get recruits for this movement? You will see then what the servants of the rich are really like." It was still early in the morning, and I did not want to call on Mr. Hobson until later, so I accepted Edward's invitation. "But I hope you are not going to run yourself up against the law," I said. "Your father won't like that, nor any of your family." "My dear Howard," said Edward obstinately, "I am a reformer. Now the opportunity has come I must not be found wanting."