genuine Anarchists who belonged to it, but I wish here to convey some
faint idea of the strange medley of outside cranks and _declasses_
whose resort it in time became. There appeared to be a magnetic attraction
about the place to tramps, _desoeuvres_ cranks, argumentative people
with time on their hands, and even downright lunatics. Foreigners of all
tongues assembled in the office--Russians, Italians, French, Spaniards,
Dutch, Swedes, and before very long they practically swamped the English
element. The Anarchist and revolutionary party has always been more
serious on the Continent than in England, and what genuine Anarchists
there are here are mostly foreigners.

Trades and industries of the most heterogeneous kinds were carried on at
the _Tocsin_ by unemployed persons who could find no other refuge for
their tools nor outlet for their energies. In one corner old M'Dermott
settled down with his lasts and leather, and there industriously hammered
away at his boots, alternating his work with occasional outbursts of
Shakespearian recitation. In winter the old fellow was positively snowed
up in the office, where he crouched shivering over the fire until the
advent of spring revived him. On the first warm sunny day he suddenly
flung down his tools, and rushing out into the courtyard amazed and
terrified Mrs. Wattles and her colleagues by shouting at the top of his
voice, "Let me shout, let me shout, Richard's himself again!" "'E gave me
such a turn, Miss, with 'is carryin's on that I got the spasims again, an'
I don't know what ever I shall do if I can't find the price of a
'alf-quartern o' gin." And I took the hint, for Mrs. Wattles's alliance
was no despicable possession among the savages of Lysander Grove.

A shed was erected in the corner of the composing-room, which served by
night as a dormitory for numbers of otherwise roofless waifs, and here
during the daytime a young Belgian and his wife set up a small factory of