"But," said Rachel, "what _is_ your ideal?"

"There you ask too much, Miss Vinrace," said Richard playfully.

She could only say that she wanted to know, and Richard was sufficiently
amused to answer.

"Well, how shall I reply? In one word--Unity. Unity of aim, of dominion,
of progress. The dispersion of the best ideas over the greatest area."

"The English?"

"I grant that the English seem, on the whole, whiter than most men,
their records cleaner. But, good Lord, don't run away with the idea that
I don't see the drawbacks--horrors--unmentionable things done in our
very midst! I'm under no illusions. Few people, I suppose, have
fewer illusions than I have. Have you ever been in a factory, Miss
Vinrace!--No, I suppose not--I may say I hope not."

As for Rachel, she had scarcely walked through a poor street, and always
under the escort of father, maid, or aunts.

"I was going to say that if you'd ever seen the kind of thing that's
going on round you, you'd understand what it is that makes me and men
like me politicians. You asked me a moment ago whether I'd done what I
set out to do. Well, when I consider my life, there is one fact I
admit that I'm proud of; owing to me some thousands of girls in
Lancashire--and many thousands to come after them--can spend an hour
every day in the open air which their mothers had to spend over their