No one replied, but angry eyes were turned on the speaker. He somewhat nervously placed his young friend in a bad light, with a table between him and his hearers.
Then Andrew began.
"The Society for Doing Without," he read, "has been tried and found wanting. It has now been in existence for some years, and its members have worked zealously, though unostentatiously.
"I am far from saying a word against them. They are patriots as true as ever petitioned against the Channel Tunnel."
"No compliments," whispered the president, warningly. Andrew hastily turned a page, and continued:
"But what have they done? Removed an individual here and there. That is the extent of it.
"You have been pursuing a half-hearted policy. You might go on for centuries at this rate before you made any perceptible difference in the streets.
"Have you ever seen a farmer thinning turnips? Gentlemen, there is an example for you. My proposal is that everybody should have to die on reaching the age of forty-five years.
"It has been the wish of this society to avoid the prejudices engendered of party strife. But though you are a social rather than a political organisation, you cannot escape politics. You do not call yourselves Radicals, but you work for Radicalism. What is Radicalism? It is a desire to get a chance. This is an aspiration inherent in the human breast. It is felt most keenly by the poor.
"Make the poor rich, and the hovels, the misery, the immorality, and the crime of the East End disappear. It is infamous, say the Socialists, that this is not done at once. Yes, but how is it to be done? Not, as they hold, by making the classes and the masses change places. Not on the lines on which the society has hitherto worked. There is only one way, and I make it my text to-night. Fortunately, it presents no considerable difficulties.