The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists Part 68

Another specious fraud was the 'Distress Committee'. This body--or corpse, for there was not much vitality in it--was supposed to exist for the purpose of providing employment for 'deserving cases'. One might be excused for thinking that any man--no matter what his past may have been--who is willing to work for his living is a 'deserving case': but this was evidently not the opinion of the persons who devised the regulations for the working of this committee. Every applicant for work was immediately given a long job, and presented with a double sheet of foolscap paper to do it with. Now, if the object of the committee had been to furnish the applicant with material for the manufacture of an appropriate headdress for himself, no one could reasonably have found fault with them: but the foolscap was not to be utilized in that way; it was called a 'Record Paper', three pages of it were covered with insulting, inquisitive, irrelevant questions concerning the private affairs and past life of the 'case' who wished to be permitted to work for his living, and all these had to be answered to the satisfaction of Messrs D'Encloseland, Bosher, Sweater, Rushton, Didlum, Grinder and the other members of the committee, before the case stood any chance of getting employment.

However, notwithstanding the offensive nature of the questions on the application form, during the five months that this precious committee was in session, no fewer than 1,237 broken-spirited and humble 'lion's whelps' filled up the forms and answered the questions as meekly as if they had been sheep. The funds of the committee consisted of 500, obtained from the Imperial Exchequer, and about 250 in charitable donations. This money was used to pay wages for certain work--some of which would have had to be done even if the committee had never existed--and if each of the 1,237 applicants had had an equal share of the work, the wages they would have received would have amounted to about twelve s.h.i.+llings each. This was what the 'practical' persons, the 'business-men', called 'dealing with the problem of unemployment'.

Imagine having to keep your family for five months with twelve s.h.i.+llings!

And, if you like, imagine that the Government grant had been four times as much as it was, and that the charity had amounted to four times as much as it did, and then fancy having to keep your family for five months with two pounds eight s.h.i.+llings!

It is true that some of the members of the committee would have been very glad if they had been able to put the means of earning a living within the reach of every man who was willing to work; but they simply did not know what to do, or how to do it. They were not ignorant of the reality of the evil they were supposed to be 'dealing with'--appalling evidences of it faced them on every side, and as, after all, these committee men were human beings and not devils, they would have been glad to mitigate it if they could have done so without hurting themselves: but the truth was that they did not know what to do!

These are the 'practical' men; the monopolists of intelligence, the wise individuals who control the affairs of the world: it is in accordance with the ideas of such men as these that the conditions of human life are regulated.

This is the position:

It is admitted that never before in the history of mankind was it possible to produce the necessaries of life in such abundance as at present.

The management of the affairs of the world--the business of arranging the conditions under which we live--is at present in the hands of Practical, Level-headed, Sensible Business-men.

The result of their management is, that the majority of the people find it a hard struggle to live. Large numbers exist in perpetual poverty: a great many more periodically starve: many actually die of want: hundreds destroy themselves rather than continue to live and suffer.

When the Practical, Level-headed, Sensible Business-men are asked why they do not remedy this state of things, they reply that they do not know what to do! or, that it is impossible to remedy it!

And yet it is admitted that it is now possible to produce the necessaries of life, in greater abundance than ever before!

With lavish kindness, the Supreme Being had provided all things necessary for the existence and happiness of his creatures. To suggest that it is not so is a blasphemous lie: it is to suggest that the Supreme Being is not good or even just. On every side there is an overflowing superfluity of the materials requisite for the production of all the necessaries of life: from these materials everything we need may be produced in abundance--by Work. Here was an army of people lacking the things that may be made by work, standing idle. Willing to work; clamouring to be allowed to work, and the Practical, Level-headed, Sensible Business-men did not know what to do!

Of course, the real reason for the difficulty is that the raw materials that were created for the use and benefit of all have been stolen by a small number, who refuse to allow them to be used for the purposes for which they were intended. This numerically insignificant minority refused to allow the majority to work and produce the things they need; and what work they do graciously permit to be done is not done with the object of producing the necessaries of life for those who work, but for the purpose of creating profit for their masters.

And then, strangest fact of all, the people who find it a hard struggle to live, or who exist in dreadful poverty and sometimes starve, instead of trying to understand the causes of their misery and to find out a remedy themselves, spend all their time applauding the Practical, Sensible, Level-headed Business-men, who bungle and mismanage their affairs, and pay them huge salaries for doing so. Sir Graball D'Encloseland, for instance, was a 'Secretary of State' and was paid 5,000 a year. When he first got the job the wages were only a beggarly 2,000, but as he found it impossible to exist on less than 100 a week he decided to raise his salary to that amount; and the foolish people who find it a hard struggle to live paid it willingly, and when they saw the beautiful motor car and the lovely clothes and jewellery he purchased for his wife with the money, and heard the Great Speech he made--telling them how the shortage of everything was caused by Over-production and Foreign Compet.i.tion, they clapped their hands and went frantic with admiration. Their only regret was that there were no horses attached to the motor car, because if there had been, they could have taken them out and harnessed themselves to it instead.

Nothing delighted the childish minds of these poor people so much as listening to or reading extracts from the speeches of such men as these; so in order to amuse them, every now and then, in the midst of all the wretchedness, some of the great statesmen made 'great speeches'

full of cunning phrases intended to hoodwink the fools who had elected them. The very same week that Sir Graball's salary was increased to 5,000 a year, all the papers were full of a very fine one that he made. They appeared with large headlines like this:

GREAT SPEECH BY SIR GRABALL D'ENCLOSELAND

Brilliant Epigram!

None should have more than they need, whilst any have less than they need!

The hypocrisy of such a saying in the mouth of a man who was drawing a salary of five thousand pounds a year did not appear to occur to anyone. On the contrary, the hired scribes of the capitalist Press wrote columns of fulsome admiration of the miserable claptrap, and the working men who had elected this man went into raptures over the 'Brilliant Epigram' as if it were good to eat. They cut it out of the papers and carried it about with them: they showed it to each other: they read it and repeated it to each other: they wondered at it and were delighted with it, grinning and gibbering at each other in the exuberance of their imbecile enthusiasm.

The Distress Committee was not the only body pretending to 'deal' with the poverty 'problem': its efforts were supplemented by all the other agencies already mentioned--the Labour Yard, the Rummage Sales, the Organized Benevolence Society, and so on, to say nothing of a most benevolent scheme originated by the management of Sweater's Emporium, who announced in a letter that was published in the local Press that they were prepared to employ fifty men for one week to carry sandwich boards at one s.h.i.+lling--and a loaf of bread--per day.

They got the men; some unskilled labourers, a few old, worn out artisans whom misery had deprived of the last vestiges of pride or shame; a number of habitual drunkards and loafers, and a non-descript lot of poor ragged old men--old soldiers and others of whom it would be impossible to say what they had once been.

The procession of sandwich men was headed by the Semi-drunk and the Besotted Wretch, and each board was covered with a printed poster: 'Great Sale of Ladies' Blouses now Proceeding at Adam Sweater's Emporium.'

Besides this artful scheme of Sweater's for getting a good advertis.e.m.e.nt on the cheap, numerous other plans for providing employment or alleviating the prevailing misery were put forward in the columns of the local papers and at the various meetings that were held.

Any foolish, idiotic, useless suggestion was certain to receive respectful attention; any crafty plan devised in his own interest or for his own profit by one or other of the crew of sweaters and landlords who controlled the town was sure to be approved of by the other inhabitants of Mugsborough, the majority of whom were persons of feeble intellect who not only allowed themselves to be robbed and exploited by a few cunning scoundrels, but venerated and applauded them for doing it.

Chapter 38

The Brigands' Cave

One evening in the drawing-room at 'The Cave' there was a meeting of a number of the 's.h.i.+ning Lights' to arrange the details of a Rummage Sale, that was to be held in aid of the unemployed. It was an informal affair, and while they were waiting for the other luminaries, the early arrivals, Messrs Rushton, Didlum and Grinder, Mr Oyley Sweater, the Borough Surveyor, Mr Wireman, the electrical engineer who had been engaged as an 'expert' to examine and report on the Electric Light Works, and two or three other gentlemen--all members of the Band--took advantage of the opportunity to discuss a number of things they were mutually interested in, which were to be dealt with at the meeting of the Town Council the next day. First, there was the affair of the untenanted Kiosk on the Grand Parade. This building belonged to the Corporation, and 'The Cosy Corner Refreshment Coy.' of which Mr Grinder was the managing director, was thinking of hiring it to open as a high-cla.s.s refreshment lounge, provided the Corporation would make certain alterations and let the place at a reasonable rent. Another item which was to be discussed at the Council meeting was Mr Sweater's generous offer to the Corporation respecting the new drain connecting 'The Cave' with the Town Main.

The report of Mr Wireman, the electrical expert, was also to be dealt with, and afterwards a resolution in favour of the purchase of the Mugsborough Electric light and Installation Co. Ltd by the town, was to be proposed.

In addition to these matters, several other items, including a proposal by Mr Didlum for an important reform in the matter of conducting the meetings of the Council, formed subjects for animated conversation between the brigands and their host.

During this discussion other luminaries arrived, including several ladies and the Rev. Mr Bosher, of the Church of the Whited Sepulchre.

The drawing-room of 'The Cave' was now elaborately furnished. A large mirror in a richly gilt frame reached from the carved marble mantelpiece to the cornice. A magnificent clock in an alabaster case stood in the centre of the mantelpiece and was flanked by two exquisitely painted and gilded vases of Dresden ware. The windows were draped with costly hangings, the floor was covered with a luxurious carpet and expensive rugs. Sumptuously upholstered couches and easy chairs added to the comfort of the apartment, which was warmed by the immense fire of coal and oak logs that blazed and crackled in the grate.

The conversation now became general and at times highly philosophical in character, although Mr Bosher did not take much part, being too busily engaged gobbling up the biscuits and tea, and only occasionally spluttering out a reply when a remark or question was directly addressed to him.

This was Mr Grinder's first visit at the house, and he expressed his admiration of the manner in which the ceiling and the walls were decorated, remarking that he had always liked this 'ere j.a.panese style.

Mr Bosher, with his mouth full of biscuit, mumbled that it was sweetly pretty--charming--beautifully done--must have cost a lot of money.

'Hardly wot you'd call j.a.panese, though, is it?' observed Didlum, looking round with the air of a connoisseur. 'I should be inclined to say it was rather more of the--er--Chinese or Egyptian.'

'Moorish,' explained Mr Sweater with a smile. 'I got the idear at the Paris Exhibition. It's simler to the decorations in the "Halambara", the palace of the Sultan of Morocco. That clock there is in the same style.'

The case of the clock referred to--which stood on a table in a corner of the room--was of fretwork, in the form of an Indian Mosque, with a pointed dome and pinnacles. This was the case that Mary Linden had sold to Didlum; the latter had had it stained a dark colour and polished and further improved it by subst.i.tuting a clock of more suitable design than the one it originally held. Mr Sweater had noticed it in Didlum's window and, seeing that the design was similar in character to the painted decorations on the ceiling and walls of his drawing-room, had purchased it.

'I went to the Paris Exhibition meself,' said Grinder, when everyone had admired the exquisite workmans.h.i.+p of the clock-case. 'I remember 'avin' a look at the moon through that big telescope. I was never so surprised in me life: you can see it quite plain, and it's round!'

'Round?' said Didlum with a puzzled look. 'Round? Of course it's round! You didn't used to think it was square, did yer?'

'No, of course not, but I always used to think it was flat--like a plate, but it's round like a football.'

'Certainly: the moon is a very simler body to the earth,' explained Didlum, describing an aerial circle with a wave of his hand. They moves through the air together, but the earth is always nearest to the sun and consequently once a fortnight the shadder of the earth falls on the moon and darkens it so that it's invisible to the naked eye. The new moon is caused by the moon movin' a little bit out of the earth's shadder, and it keeps on comin' more and more until we gets the full moon; and then it goes back again into the shadder; and so it keeps on.'

For about a minute everyone looked very solemn, and the profound silence was disturbed only the the crunching of the biscuits between the jaws of Mr Bosher, and by certain gurglings in the interior of that gentleman.

'Science is a wonderful thing,' said Mr Sweater at length, wagging his head gravely, 'wonderful!'

'Yes: but a lot of it is mere theory, you know,' observed Rushton.

'Take this idear that the world is round, for instance; I fail to see it! And then they say as Hawstralia is on the other side of the globe, underneath our feet. In my opinion it's ridiculous, because if it was true, wot's to prevent the people droppin' orf?'

'Yes: well, of course it's very strange,' admitted Sweater. 'I've often thought of that myself. If it was true, we ought to be able to walk on the ceiling of this room, for instance; but of course we know that's impossible, and I really don't see that the other is any more reasonable.'

'I've often noticed flies walkin' on the ceilin',' remarked Didlum, who felt called upon to defend the globular theory.

'Yes; but they're different,' replied Rushton. 'Flies is provided by nature with a gluey substance which oozes out of their feet for the purpose of enabling them to walk upside down.'