unwillingness to exchange the one for an ermine robe or the other for a
crown. As a matter of fact, he invariably purchased the largest and
roughest blouse to be found, and his cap was unnecessarily soaked with
suet. He was a knight of industry of the very worst description--a
braggart, a talker, a windbag. He preached, or rather he shrieked, the
doctrine of equality, but the equality he sought was that which would
place him on a par with his superiors, while in no way benefiting those
beneath him.

At one time, when he had first come into contact with the dark-eyed man
who now sat at the table watching him curiously, there had been a
struggle for mastery.

"I am," he had said with considerable heat, "as good as you. That is all
I wish to demonstrate."

"No," replied the other with that calm and assured air of superiority
which the people once tried in vain to stamp out with the guillotine.
"No, it is not. You want to demonstrate that you are superior, and you
cannot do it. You say that you have as much right to walk on the
pavement as I. I admit it. In your heart you want to prove that you have
_more_, and you cannot do it. I could wear your blouse with
comfort, but you could not put on my hat or my gloves without making
yourself ridiculous. But--that is not the question. Let us get to
business."

And in time the butcher succumbed, as he was bound to do, to the man
whom he shrewdly suspected of being an aristocrat.

He who entered the room immediately afterwards was of a very different