And yet the quality of the life is good. All human potentialities are in
it. Given proper conditions, it could live through the centuries, and
great men, heroes and masters, spring from it and make the world better
by having lived.

I talked with a woman who was representative of that type which has been
jerked out of its little out-of-the-way streets and has started on the
fatal fall to the bottom. Her husband was a fitter and a member of the
Engineers' Union. That he was a poor engineer was evidenced by his
inability to get regular employment. He did not have the energy and
enterprise necessary to obtain or hold a steady position.

The pair had two daughters, and the four of them lived in a couple of
holes, called "rooms" by courtesy, for which they paid seven shillings
per week. They possessed no stove, managing their cooking on a single
gas-ring in the fireplace. Not being persons of property, they were
unable to obtain an unlimited supply of gas; but a clever machine had
been installed for their benefit. By dropping a penny in the slot, the
gas was forthcoming, and when a penny's worth had forthcome the supply
was automatically shut off. "A penny gawn in no time," she explained,
"an' the cookin' not arf done!"

Incipient starvation had been their portion for years. Month in and
month out, they had arisen from the table able and willing to eat more.
And when once on the downward slope, chronic innutrition is an important
factor in sapping vitality and hastening the descent.

Yet this woman was a hard worker. From 4.30 in the morning till the last
light at night, she said, she had toiled at making cloth dress-skirts,
lined up and with two flounces, for seven shillings a dozen. Cloth dress-