The Conquest of Bread

rty of the peasants, and the wealth of t

ney at the rate of ￡2,000 a year, a mere bagatelle in these days of fantastic, senseless luxury. But then he would have nothing left at the en

to live for a month, or even a fortnight. So our worthy citizen starts a factory. The banks hasten to lend him another ￡20,000,

ly needs already satisfied, who would work for our capitalist at a wage of half a crown

bread. So, before the factory is well finished, the workers hasten to offer themselves. Where a hundred are required three hundred besiege the doors

ses a lucrative trade, and has "business talents," he will soon

is money he can "marry money"; by and by he may pick and choose places for his children, and later on perhaps get something good from the Government-a contract for t

blems") the result of knavery on a large scale, assisted by the State. In Europe, nine-tenths of the fortunes

, and make them produce five shillings worth in the day, amass a fortune by these me

orethought and frugality, when we know that mere saving in itself brings i

as plenty of custom, and that by dint of strict frugality he contrives to l

pite of his passion for economy; that he does not marry or that he has no childre

se our shoemaker, as soon as he has laid by a few pence, thriftily conveys them to the savings bank and that the savings bank lends them to the capitalist who is just about to "employ labour," i.e., to

day for work that is worth five shillings, and if our shoemaker is "in luck," that is to say, if he is keen enough and mean enough, his working men and apprentices will bring him in nearly one pound a day, over and ab

ng frugal, temperate habits." At bottom it is nothi

, "buys tea in China, brings it to France, and realizes a profit of

gn trade was conducted, and so no one reached such giddy heights of fortune as in our days. Very few and very hardly earned were the gold coins which the me

eeks, in three months if it is a sailing ship, the vessels brings him his cargo. He does not even take the risks of the voyage, for his tea and his vessel are insured, and if he has expended four thousand pounds h

ages"? How? Because they are needy and starving. Go to the seaports, visit the cook-shops and taverns on the quays, and look at these men who have come to hire themselves, crowding round the dock-gates, which they besiege from early dawn, hoping to be all

in rags, living one knows not how till the father's

chist society need not fear the advent of a Rothschild who would settle in its midst. If every member of the community knows that after a few hours of productive toil he will have a right to all the pleasures that civilization procures, and to those deeper sources of enjoyment which

tion. It must apply to everything that enables any man-be he financier, mill-owner, or lan

do our utmost that none shall lack aught, that not a single man shall be forced to sell the strength of his right arm to obtain a bare subsistence for himself and his babes