"Well, Alton! where was the treason and murder? Your nose must have been a sharp one, to smell out any there. Did you hear anything that astonished your weak mind so very exceedingly, after all?" "The only thing that did astonish me was to hear men of my own class--and lower still, perhaps some of them--speak with such fluency and eloquence. Such a fund of information--such excellent English--where did they get it all?" "From the God who knows nothing about ranks. They're the unknown great--the unaccredited heroes, as Master Thomas Carlyle would say--whom the flunkeys aloft have not acknowledged yet--though they'll be forced to, some day, with a vengeance. Are you convinced, once for all?" "I really do not understand political questions, Crossthwaite." "Does it want so very much wisdom to understand the rights and the wrongs of all that? Are the people represented? Are you represented? Do you feel like a man that's got any one to fight your battle in parliament, my young friend, eh?" "I'm sure I don't know--" "Why, what in the name of common sense--what interest or feeling of yours or mine, or any man's you ever spoke to, except the shopkeeper, do Alderman A---- or Lord C---- D---- represent? They represent property--and we have none. They represent rank--we have none. Vested interests--we have none. Large capitals--those are just what crush us. Irresponsibility of employers, slavery of the employed, competition among masters, competition among workmen, that is the system they represent--they preach it, they glory in it.--Why, it is the very ogre that is eating us all up. They are chosen by the few, they represent the few, and they make laws for the many--and yet you don't know whether or not the people are represented!" We were passing by the door of the Victoria Theatre; it was just half-price time--and the beggary and rascality of London were pouring in to their low amusement, from the neighbouring gin palaces and thieves' cellars. A herd of ragged boys, vomiting forth slang, filth, and blasphemy, pushed past us, compelling us to take good care of our pockets. "Look there! look at the amusements, the training, the civilization, which the government permits to the children of the people! These licensed pits of darkness, traps of temptation, profligacy, and ruin, triumphantly yawning night after night--and then tell me that the people who see their children thus kidnapped into hell are represented by a government who licenses such things!" "Would a change in the franchise cure that?"