Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell (read novel full TXT) 📖

>square work for their living: and in return for their labour they

receive money: some more, some less than others.’

 

`You don’t think they’d be sich bloody fools as to work for nothing,

do you?’ said Newman.

 

`I suppose you think they ought all to get the same wages!’ cried

Harlow. `Do you think it’s right that a scavenger should get as much

as a painter?’

 

`I’m not speaking about that at all,’ replied Owen. `I’m trying to

show you what I think is one of the causes of poverty.’

 

`Shut up, can’t you, Harlow,’ remonstrated Philpot, who began to feel

interested. `We can’t all talk at once.’

 

`I know we can’t,’ replied Harlow in an aggrieved tone: `but ‘e takes

sich a ‘ell of a time to say wot ‘e’s got to say. Nobody else can’t

get a word in edgeways.’

 

`In order that these people may live,’ continued Owen, pointing to the

large black square, `it is first necessary that they shall have a

PLACE to live in -‘

 

`Well! I should never a thought it!’ exclaimed the man on the pail,

pretending to be much impressed. The others laughed, and two or three

of them went out of the room, contemptuously remarking to each other

in an audible undertone as they went:

 

`Bloody rot!’

 

`Wonder wot the bloody ‘ell ‘e thinks ‘e is? A sort of schoolmaster?’

 

Owen’s nervousness increased as he continued:

 

`Now, they can’t live in the air or in the sea. These people are land

animals, therefore they must live on the land.’

 

`Wot do yer mean by animals?’ demanded Slyme.

 

`A human bean ain’t a animal!’ said Crass indignantly.

 

`Yes, we are!’ cried Harlow. `Go into any chemist’s shop you like and

ask the bloke, and ‘e’ll tell you -‘

 

`Oh, blow that!’ interrupted Philpot. `Let’s ‘ear wot Owen’s sayin’.’

 

`They must live on the land: and that’s the beginning of the trouble;

because - under the present system - the majority of the people have

really no right to be in the country at all! Under the present system

the country belongs to a few - those who are here represented by this

small black square. If it would pay them to do so, and if they felt

so disposed, these few people have a perfect right - under the present

system - to order everyone else to clear out!

 

`But they don’t do that, they allow the majority to remain in the land

on one condition - that is, they must pay rent to the few for the

privilege of being permitted to live in the land of their birth. The

amount of rent demanded by those who own this country is so large

that, in order to pay it, the greater number of the majority have

often to deprive themselves and their children, not only of the

comforts, but even the necessaries of life. In the case of the

working classes the rent absorbs at the lowest possible estimate,

about one-third of their total earnings, for it must be remembered

that the rent is an expense that goes on all the time, whether they

are employed or not. If they get into arrears when out of work, they

have to pay double when they get employment again.

 

`The majority work hard and live in poverty in order that the minority

may live in luxury without working at all, and as the majority are

mostly fools, they not only agree to pass their lives in incessant

slavery and want, in order to pay this rent to those who own the

country, but they say it is quite right that they should have to do

so, and are very grateful to the little minority for allowing them to

remain in the country at all.’

 

Owen paused, and immediately there arose a great clamour from his

listeners.

 

`So it IS right, ain’t it?’ shouted Crass. `If you ‘ad a ‘ouse and

let it to someone, you’d want your rent, wouldn’t yer?’

 

`I suppose,’ said Slyme with resentment, for he had some shares in a

local building society, `after a man’s been careful, and scraping and

saving and going without things he ought to ‘ave ‘ad all ‘is life, and

managed to buy a few ‘ouses to support ‘im in ‘is old age - they ought

all to be took away from ‘im? Some people,’ he added, `ain’t got

common honesty.’

 

Nearly everyone had something to say in reprobation of the views

suggested by Owen. Harlow, in a brief but powerful speech, bristling

with numerous sanguinary references to the bottomless pit, protested

against any interference with the sacred rights of property. Easton

listened with a puzzled expression, and Philpot’s goggle eyes rolled

horribly as he glared silently at the circle and the two squares.

 

`By far the greatest part of the land,’ said Owen when the row had

ceased, `is held by people who have absolutely no moral right to it.

Possession of much of it was obtained by means of murder and theft

perpetrated by the ancestors of the present holders. In other cases,

when some king or prince wanted to get rid of a mistress of whom he

had grown weary, he presented a tract of our country to some

`nobleman’ on condition that he would marry the female. Vast estates

were also bestowed upon the remote ancestors of the present holders in

return for real or alleged services. Listen to this,’ he continued as

he took a small newspaper cutting from his pocketbook.

 

Crass looked at the piece of paper dolefully. It reminded him of the

one he had in his own pocket, which he was beginning to fear that he

would not have an opportunity of producing today after all.

 

`Ballcartridge Rent Dat.

 

`The hundredth anniversary of the Battle of Ballcartridge occurred

yesterday and in accordance with custom the Duke of Ballcartridge

handed to the authorities the little flag which he annually presents

to the State in virtue of his tenure of the vast tract of this country

which was presented to one of his ancestors - the first Duke - in

addition to his salary, for his services at the battle of

Ballcartridge.

 

`The flag - which is the only rent the Duke has to pay for the great

estate which brings him in several hundreds of thousands of pounds per

annum - is a small tricoloured one with a staff surmounted by an

eagle.

 

`The Duke of Blankmind also presents the State with a little coloured

silk flag every year in return for being allowed to retain possession

of that part of England which was presented - in addition to his

salary - to one of His Grace’s very remote ancestors, for his services

at the battle of Commissariat - in the Netherlands.

 

`The Duke of Southward is another instance,’ continued Owen. `He

“owns” miles of the country we speak of as “ours”. Much of his part

consists of confiscated monastery lands which were stolen from the

owners by King Henry VIII and presented to the ancestors of the

present Duke.

 

`Whether it was right or wrong that these parts of our country should

ever have been given to those people - the question whether those

ancestor persons were really deserving cases or not - is a thing we

need not trouble ourselves about now. But the present holders are

certainly not deserving people. They do not even take the trouble to

pretend they are. They have done nothing and they do nothing to

justify their possession of these “estates” as they call them. And in

my opinion no man who is in his right mind can really think it’s just

that these people should be allowed to prey upon their fellow men as

they are doing now. Or that it is right that their children should be

allowed to continue to prey upon our children for ever! The thousands

of people on those estates work and live in poverty in order that

these three men and their families may enjoy leisure and luxury. Just

think of the absurdity of it!’ continued Owen, pointing to the

drawings. `All those people allowing themselves to be overworked and

bullied and starved and robbed by this little crowd here!’

 

Observing signs of a renewal of the storm of protests, Owen hurriedly

concluded:

 

`Whether it’s right or wrong, you can’t deny that the fact that this

small minority possesses nearly all the land of the country is one of

the principal causes of the poverty of the majority.’

 

`Well, that seems true enough,’ said Easton, slowly. `The rent’s the

biggest item a workin’ man’s got to pay. When you’re out of work and

you can’t afford other things, you goes without ‘em, but the rent ‘as

to be paid whether you’re workin’ or not.’

 

`Yes, that’s enough,’ said Harlow impatiently; `but you gets value for

yer money: you can’t expect to get a ‘ouse for nothing.’

 

`Suppose we admits as it’s wrong, just for the sake of argyment,’ said

Crass in a jeering tone. `Wot then? Wot about it? ‘Ow’s it agoin’

to be altered.’

 

`Yes!’ cried Harlow triumphantly. `That’s the bloody question! ‘Ow’s

it goin’ to be altered? It can’t be done!’

 

There was a general murmur of satisfaction. Nearly everyone seemed

very pleased to think that the existing state of things could not

possibly be altered.

 

`Whether it can be altered or not, whether it’s right or wrong,

landlordism is one of the causes of poverty,’ Owen repeated. `Poverty

is not caused by men and women getting married; it’s not caused by

machinery; it’s not caused by “over-production”; it’s not caused by

drink or laziness; and it’s not caused by “over-population”. It’s

caused by Private Monopoly. That is the present system. They have

monopolized everything that it is possible to monopolize; they have

got the whole earth, the minerals in the earth and the streams that

water the earth. The only reason they have not monopolized the

daylight and the air is that it is not possible to do it. If it were

possible to construct huge gasometers and to draw together and

compress within them the whole of the atmosphere, it would have been

done long ago, and we should have been compelled to work for them in

order to get money to buy air to breathe. And if that seemingly

impossible thing were accomplished tomorrow, you would see thousands

of people dying for want of air - or of the money to buy it - even as

now thousands are dying for want of the other necessities of life.

You would see people going about gasping for breath, and telling each

other that the likes of them could not expect to have air to breathe

unless the had the money to pay for it. Most of you here, for

instance, would think and say so. Even as you think at present that

it’s right for so few people to own the Earth, the Minerals and the

Water, which are all just as necessary as is the air. In exactly the

same spirit as you now say: “It’s Their Land,” “It’s Their Water,”

“It’s Their Coal,” “It’s Their Iron,” so you would say “It’s Their

Air,” “These are their gasometers, and what right have the likes of us

to expect them to allow us to breathe for nothing?” And even while he

is doing this the air monopolist will be preaching sermons on the

Brotherhood of Man; he will be dispensing advice on “Christian Duty”

in the Sunday magazines; he will give utterance to numerous more or

less moral maxims for the guidance of the young. And meantime, all

around, people will be dying for want of some of the air