door to them all my days. Take them one way and another, they're a
decent sort, good and bad like the rest of us. But there's a wheen
daft folk that would set them up as models--close to truth and
reality, says you. It's sheer ignorance, for you're about as well
acquaint with the working-man as with King Solomon. You say I make
up fine stories about tinklers and sailor-men because I know nothing
about them. That's maybe true. But you're at the same job yourself.
You ideelise the working man, you and your kind, because
you're ignorant. You say that he's seeking for truth, when he's only
looking for a drink and a rise in wages. You tell me he's near
reality, but I tell you that his notion of reality is often just a
short working day and looking on at a footba'-match on Saturday....
And when you run down what you call the middle-classes that do
three-quarters of the world's work and keep the machine going and the
working-man in a job, then I tell you you're talking havers. Havers!"

Mr. McCunn, having delivered his defence of the bourgeoisie, rose
abruptly and went to bed. He felt jarred and irritated.
His innocent little private domain had been badly trampled by this
stray bull of a poet. But as he lay in bed, before blowing out
his candle, he had recourse to Walton, and found a passage on which,
as on a pillow, he went peacefully to sleep:


"As I left this place, and entered into the next field, a second
pleasure entertained me; 'twas a handsome milkmaid, that had not yet
attained so much age and wisdom as to load her mind with any fears
of many things that will never be, as too many men too often do;
but she cast away all care, and sang like a nightingale; her voice
was good, and the ditty fitted for it; it was the smooth song that