Maximilian shuddered.
At this moment another man coming along towards the tavern caught sight of the speaker, and gave him a nod.
“Here, Müller,” cried the potter, “come here! Here’s a Socialist!”
Müller replied with an oath.
“No Socialists for me; give me beer,” he said, and swung through the tavern door.
“He’s about right,” said the potter, with a laugh. And with a nod to Johann he went back after his comrade.
“I see your difficulty is not only with the wealthy classes,” commented the King, moodily, as they moved on.
“True. But it is the rule of the wealthy which has produced such men as these. What can we say to a state of society which condemns a whole class to die off at the age of fifty, most of them earlier still?”
“It is horrible. Could not their work be done by machinery?”
“Probably it could. But the first introduction of machinery would mean that hundreds, or thousands, of men would be thrown into the streets to starve. So that the change would only mean for them that they were to die at once, instead of in ten or twenty years.”