TOO DEARLY BOUGHT
OR
THE TOWN STRIKE.
[CHAPTER I.]
FLAGS AND BANNERS.
THE procession was coming down Pleasant Lane!
A great number of noisy little boys came trooping on ahead, with shrill cries, to announce this important fact. Hardly one among them understood exactly what the procession was about; but flags and banners are the delight of a boy's heart. Not seldom this particular form of affection for coloured bunting lasts on into manhood.
The wives and mothers, who turned out of their doorways to enjoy the sight, were, however, more learned than their little boys as to the cause of the stir. And everybody was aware that Peter Pope was to be at its head.
Peter Pope, a smooth-tongued and comfortably-dressed individual, had been very busy lately in the town. Most of his business had been in the way of talk; but what of that? There was a committee, of course, behind him, which did a good deal of work while Pope did the talk. He had been sent down, as a delegate from London, for the express purpose of teaching the inhabitants of the town; and teaching commonly means a certain amount of talk. Peter Pope had come to teach the men of the town to appreciate their degraded and enslaved condition. With this object in view he had talked vigorously for many weeks; and the men were becoming fast convinced of the truth of his words. They had not dreamt before what a melancholy thing it was to be a British working-man; but now their eyes were opened.
If you want to convince the British Public about anything,—especially that part of the British Public which reads very few books, and knows very little of history, and never goes out of England, just remember this! There is not the least need that you should be clever or learned yourself, or even powerful in speech. You only have to go on saying the same thing over and over and over again, with dogged pertinacity; and in time you are sure to be believed. The British Public is wonderfully easy of belief, and will swallow anything,—if only you give it time! Peter Pope had done this. He had talked on, with a resolute and dogged pertinacity; he had given his hearers plenty of time; and now he was rewarded by seeing the biggest boluses he could offer, meekly gulped down.