which entailed long and cruel interruptions of labour, though these
were, it is true, utilized by the manufacturers as a means of breaking
the power of the workmen, by facing them with the prospect of a
lock-out. A more obvious peril resulted from the physiological state of
almost the entire population. "The health of the poor is what it must
be," said the experts in hygiene, "but that of the rich leaves much to
be desired." It was not difficult to find the causes of this. The supply
of oxygen necessary for life was insufficient in the city, and men
breathed in an artificial air. The food trusts, by means of the most
daring chemical syntheses, produced artificial wines, meat, milk, fruit,
and vegetables, and the diet thus imposed gave rise to stomach and brain
troubles. The multi-millionaires were bald at the age of eighteen; some
showed from time to time a dangerous weakness of mind. Over-strung and
enfeebled, they gave enormous sums to ignorant charlatans; and it was a
common thing for some bath-attendant or other trumpery who turned healer
or prophet, to make a rapid fortune by the practice of medicine or
theology. The number of lunatics increased continually; suicides
multiplied in the world of wealth, and many of them were accompanied
by atrocious and extraordinary circumstances, which bore witness to an
unheard o perversion of intelligence and sensibility.

Another fatal symptom created a strong impression upon average minds.
Terrible accidents, henceforth periodical and regular, entered
into people's calculations, and kept mounting higher and higher in
statistical tables. Every day, machines burst into fragments, houses
fell down, trains laden with merchandise fell on to the streets,
demolishing entire buildings and crushing hundreds of passers-by.
Through the ground, honey-combed with tunnels, two or three storeys of
work-shops would often crash, engulfing all those who worked in them.