Men had more to think of now. There was no time to congratulate the man who had been so splendidly right.
Consols were at 65!
Bread was rising each week. War was imminent. On all sides great mercantile houses were crashing. Each fall meant a thousand minor catastrophes all over the country.
The antichristians had no time to jeer at the Faithful; they must work and strain to save their own fortunes from the wreck.
The mob, who were swiftly bereft of the luxuries which kept them in good-humour, were turning on the antichristian party now. In their blind, selfish unreason they cried them down, saying that they were responsible for the misery and terror that lay over the world.
With an absolute lack of logic, the churches were crowded again. The most irreligious cried for the good old times. Those who had most coarsely exulted over the broken Cross now bewailed it as the most awful of calamities.
Christianity was daily being terribly avenged through the pockets and stomachs of the crowd!
It was bizarre beyond thinking, sordid in its immensity, vulgar in its mighty soulless greed, but TRUE, REAL, a FEARFUL FACT.
A stupendous confusion.
Two great currents had met in a maelstrom. The din of the disturbance beat upon the world's ear with sickening clamour.