Part 9

A family is busy. The head of it, a fine type of workman, clean and appropriately dressed as a workman should be, is occupied in making a table. His wife is busy at her loom. Two daughters are sewing together strips of strong woollen stuff which are to form by no means inelegant frocks. The stuff is dyed a pleasant blue. They are not using sewing machines, but ply the needle with patient hands; a strong thread well waxed is inevitable. Hand sewing being more durable than machine is, in the long run, more economical. Two sons are helping their father. In the corner of this bright sitting and working room, a table is laid for supper, covered by a spotless cloth. Pewter plates and jugs glisten with their bright polish. Large loaves of wholemeal look fat and desirable, while a big cheese fresh from a dairy is appetising and tempting. Hard by is a barrel of ale, real ale, made of hops and malt, wholesome and invigorating. No shams enter into its making; no poisonous chemicals destroy its purity. One or two neighbours have dropped in, and pleasant talk is in progress. When supper is finished work is suspended, some simple glees echo pleasantly from the walls, or a story is read aloud and commented upon. How thrifty it all looks, how homeful, how quietly gay is the atmosphere of this modestly provided household; what a contrast it presents to the old squalor, absence of order and often low dissipation of past times, and not so far off, which were called civilised and free, but were indeed barbarous and tyrannical.

The streets are quiet, most of the inhabitants are occupied in a manner similar in motive, if different in the matter of it. At an early hour, before midnight, the big bells of the Commune ring, when it is expected that the people will go to rest. Soon after the whole city is asleep, resting after a day of rich labour.

§ 20

It is midsummer again; my dream is again vagarious! I find my way to the Market Place. In its centre stands the Town Hall. Now that the smoke fiend is slain and outdoor life in cities is pleasant, markets, which fell into disuse owing to grasping profiteering tradesmen, who put what price they pleased upon indifferent goods, robbed honest folk right and left, did not like the restraint which markets put upon unreasonable profits. A weekly market is a wholesome and sensible institution. It fosters an influx of fresh goods, it tends to economy and providence, in that the people reckon up their weekly requirements and purchase them at a price which, if not absolutely uniform, varies little compared with the chaotic licence permitted in the less well regulated communities of the past. On every Monday the market opens early and continues through hours of daylight. Pretty well any useful article is found there, from reels of cotton, pots and pans, good woven stuffs, boots and shoes, groceries also, which under old conditions were the means of elaborate swindling, are to be bought in all their varieties. Market days bring into contact town and country folk; their existence is one of the chief causes of the departure of that expensive nuisance, the middleman. Markets discourage fluctuation in prices and encourage the sale of fresh, in place of stale goods. The weekly held market lessens weekly expenditure by something like half of what it was when tradesmen charged what they pleased for even stale goods. The middleman was a rascal, he was the “Muck Rake” in the Pilgrim’s Progress, he grabbed money earned by his betters, he was a kind of cuckoo laying eggs in other birds’ nests, he was sharp, not clever, and as unprincipled as constructively idle. As a social pest the middleman is now being dealt with by wiser economic measures. Probably the lessening in the numbers of small tradesmen has tended to speed agriculture. Unable to build up small fortunes by dishonest trade proceedings, the class which was pre-eminent in that respect is tending toward _land labour_, which, under the new conditions of life, is numerically larger than it was.

On market day all the classes meet. Owing to the high price demanded by domestic servants in the past, ladies of high rank are their own housekeepers. The most wealthy keep few servants; hence the young ladies of noble families are converted into economic housewives, and setting themselves to their task, do it well; being better educated now, whatever they set out to do they do with forethought. Thus they make good wives, daughters, and mothers, and are spending far less time than formerly upon idle amusements.

The foregoing is a sketch of what the weekly open market is doing for the community by bracing it up and giving it backbone, eradicating spineless self-indulgence and a mischievous system of profiteering.

The Town Hall is the most ample building outside the factories. It is the centre of INTELLECTUAL as well as COMMERCIAL life. While it belongs to the people it represents also a kind of University. No pedantic teaching goes on there, but lectures upon all branches of knowledge are delivered by chosen experts, to which the public are admitted free. These lectures are delivered voluntarily by good and cultivated citizens, whose pride it is to give their knowledge _without fees_. Chiefly these are delivered in the winter months, because most of the people’s spare time in summer is spent, not within, but outdoors. Socrates found wisdom in the Agora, and wise men of to-day search in the market for the same. Hence there is constant touch of intellectual as well as commercial interests between class and class. This is leading to a surprising unity of conception and practice. Within the walls of the Town Hall is the large concert room, where the best music is given, and as far as possible by local talent, which does not mean only of the cities, but coming out of the population of the county _inclusive_. This concentration gives a chance to local success which importation in the days of centralisation never achieved, when native talent was overlooked.

§ 21

There is also a picture gallery conducted under an analogous scheme. Italy has owed (in the past) everything great in its Art to Decentralisation. The variety, hence the interest, of the great schools of painting in Italy is due to the independent expression of emotion as the property of the race. In Italy, the art of Venice, of Rome, Florence, and Siena, to mention only many of the great schools of painting that flourished there, identified itself with the idiosyncracy of each community. Why should not the same apply to England? The man of Devonshire is as different in mental construction to the man of Yorkshire as the Florentine is from the Roman. Why then should not each express himself in the vernacular of his locality? Time will show that there is far more artistic talent in England than has been supposed. Give it a chance of having its say, and an admirable result is certain. Let us become something higher in the intellectual scale than a race of shopkeepers!

Town Councils, being here composed of a much more cultivated class than before, Commerce and Art are no longer antagonistic. On the contrary, they appear to be becoming indispensable to each other. The tradesmen no longer having matters all their own way, and being checked by the stronger minds encircling them, are taking their place, not as tyrannical class rulers, but as useful items in communal interests and progress. In my dream, I noticed that the walls of the public rooms in the Town Hall are not bare, or that the only so-called decoration on them has been restricted to whole-length portraits of weird Mayors, with an occasional bad picture of the reigning monarch. There is in progress a scheme of History pictures. The subjects for them are chosen by a committee of painters and literary men. So far as this scheme has developed, I saw the products of it; varied in merit they are, which goes without saying, but a certain sincerity of aim and approach seemed to distinguish them from the tiresome and commonplace; anyway, they express a good intention. There certainly is an absence of “academic prescription”; they are hopeful efforts. A variety is maintained, the reverse of monotonous, showing individuality of approach, which may in time lead to greater things.

A really intellectual life seems to be growing here, but not of hot-house breed only accessible to a few, but one which is slowly permeating the people, which I hold to be due to the commingling of all the classes produced by an increased desire to do more than fill pockets (too often by ill-gotten gold), but by a growing elevation of the plane of thought brought about by unity of purpose and rejection of class prejudice. Given that home life is ambitious of industry, municipal life is certain to follow suit. A great change must come from the bottom. It is no use to clear the surface of a pond of slime unless the base of it is clean and fresh. It is no use to cut the heads from weeds if the roots are left in the ground, or to achieve good fruit from a tree whose roots are unpruned. And surely the root of a great nation is represented by the industrious attitude taken by the people at large. That is the essential to a Democracy that is workable. A Democracy which is only one in name is an anomaly, and is quite certain to be ephemeral.

§ 22

In my dream I had heard talk that once, not far from the river, was a Benedictine Monastery, and attached to it an Abbey. Save for a few remains of its cloisters, its kitchen, and a portion of its great dining hall, the monastery is gone. But the Abbey remains, as we have seen. Although vulgarised to a certain extent by barbarians of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, it retains much of the simplicity and grandeur of the work of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Its nave now belongs to the people. It is there that the Hebrews and Moslems conduct their religious services. The chancel, its sanctuary and aisles are retained for Christian worship. In the nave, old mystery plays are reverently acted, and such noble old dramas as “Every Man” are produced. At Christmas, the incidents in the birth of Jesus Christ are acted, and many a primitive song of the shepherds is heard. These presentations keep that beautiful story vivid by bringing before the eyes of the people the mysterious events of 2,000 years ago. They form a tangible and visible link between those old days and these more complicated and less simple times.

A form of monasticism disconnected from hard and fast dogma is growing. Not ascetic, it is educational; in which it resembles the earlier forms of the old Benedictine orders. But as yet my spirit has only heard of this; presently it will be given access to its principles and working.

§ 23

It has been previously intimated that the Drama takes a prominent place in the intellectual and emotional substance of the people’s training, plus its delights. An open air theatre was proposed, but the conclusion arrived at was that the climate (although much bettered by the death of the smoke fiend) is too unstable to ensure success.

The chief theatre of the city is large, capable of holding a thousand people. It is not conducted on private enterprise, but by a council of the best local minds, which, while occupied in supplying the best, are wise enough not to dismiss pleasurable and light comedies so long as they are “clean.” Declamation, the first essential of the actor’s craft, is taught in every school. Dancing, which we have seen to be part of a liberal education, provides an elasticity of deportment and freedom of manner but not undisciplined, which goes far towards the creation of a good player. The plays of Shakespeare are prominent, but to their list are added many of the fine Elizabethan plays, Marlow’s and others. Modern drama, so long as it is wholesome, is readily admitted, while the old and so entirely English Pantomime and Extravaganza of other days have been revived, and very jolly they are and entirely in place at certain merrymaking seasons of the year. There is no priggishness in the management, only care is taken that no play is produced which is undesirable for the young to witness.

§ 24

Within the walls of the Town Hall is the School of Music, where instrumental and vocal music are taught, and where the elements of opera training can be learnt. The Town Hall is at once the seat of government, not only commercial but artistic. A great proportion of work done in it is voluntary, being conducted by men and women who have time and energy to spare, and is leading more and more to what has been called, the upper class taking part in general progress. Time gone by, and not so long, that class was idle as regards local affairs. Thus they got into the hands of ill-equipped tradesmen, who were out for their own advantages, and misconducted local affairs to a deplorable extent. I reiterate, that, being held in check, the more or less ignorant and selfish class no longer rides roughshod, but is held in a leash by better equipped citizens; and so there is hope for them to mend their manners, and in time to become useful members of Home Rule.

The theatre is not open all the year round, but only at times of festival, hence the pleasure and instruction it provides is always fresh.

§ 25

In my dream I became aware that the cinema, which had become an abuse and a positive mischief, is under strict regulations. It catered to the lowest taste and became a very dangerous implement. Now, being under strict control of the same committee which manages the Communal theatre, it has become free of vice, and is not only a pleasant but instructive institution, and a picture palace is by no means an undignified place in which to pass an hour. There is plenty of fun there, but clean fun, and plenty of exciting situations are presented, but, while humour and wit are present, whatever might tend to decadence is absent. Individualists, who regard with suspicion any form of legislation which in pompous terms they call “interference with the liberty of the subject,” will be up in arms at the restrictions applied by a wise Government, forgetting, or perhaps never having read, in Plato’s “Republic” that the wise philosopher would protect the community from degradation created by exploiters out for themselves at the expense of a moral tone essential to stability and real progress. These will call the care of the people, implied by restrictions, “grandfatherly government,” forgetting that an ignorant crowd has to be guided to abstention from any poison in their midst, which may in time kill the soul of a nation.

§ 26

It is the aim of the Commune to ally, as far as possible, agricultural and industrial pursuits. With a view to that, every house has a garden which the householder is expected to cultivate. Waste land is nowhere permitted within the city or its environs. I find as my spirit travels hither and thither that the “entirely leisured gentleman” hardly exists. If a man of means is not using his leisure, and, in some instances, all his time, for the public good, he is using it to be his own servant. I saw a man, called rich, putting in a pane of glass, adroitly manipulating the putty with the skill of an expert. Another I observed sawing up blocks of wood, another cutting down trees in his garden, another pruning fruit and rose trees, and in the country, not far distant from the city, another cultivated scholar ploughing a furrow on his estate. The great war taught these admirable habits, which profiteers now regret, because “the gentleman” prefers to mend his own belongings to paying a king’s ransom to a fellow who did it ill in obedience to his iniquitous leaders. Shortly, he prefers to do honest work for himself than to pay for dishonest.

Throughout the community, rich or poor delegate no manual labour which can be done at home. Every girl of every class is a good needlewoman and dressmaker. Every boy is trained to be a skilful carpenter and is not ashamed of sewing on his buttons or darning his socks. Industrious habits, habits of making use of odd moments in practical home work, enter into every sphere. The great war taught the wiser how much outdoor assistance could be dispensed with. The colossal rise in wage obliged even the well-to-do to learn to turn their hands to the simplest duties connected with _home_. In time this beneficial result will become automatic, and a far simpler as well as more dignified life is certain to result from it. Of scholars, artists, writers and musicians there is a goodly number, which is increasing, owing to less hurry and more concentration, the result of better physical conditions. Men of the highest attainments, who are following the professions, inspired by peace and moderate expenditure of money, keep their minds fresh by light labour on the land, which they prefer to SPORT; indeed, SPORT, once made a business, is rather despised. It is thought to be enervating, and an idle, unproductive way of “getting through time.” Mental vitality is increased by labour which became necessary to men of small means through the rise of wages and reckless increase of rates and taxes. It now seems to permeate the richest as well as the poorest classes, so men are becoming more dignified and self-helpful.

§ 27

Theoretical politics and party conventions are ruled out by strenuous practical occupations. Instead of being the last subject for action, _useful citizenship is the first_. Politics used to be abstractions put into phrases by _doctrinaires_. The text completed, its result was pigeon-holed, under the fallacy that the object was attained when, indeed, it had only been talked about. People are now united, hence can govern themselves. There is no need for sermons upon thrift and economy; they are practised. Politicians have been taught that their words formed easy back-doors for the exit of action. The people are interested now from top to bottom in deeds. Theories which do not lead to action represent waste of energy; energy displayed in every section of the community is in demand.

Some return to more primitive social conditions is evidently an invigorating process. An easy way of getting through life by facilities which militated against effort was unstiffening the back of the English character. Instead of saying to himself, “How much can I do myself?” the majority was saying, “How much can I delegate?” “We were on the look-out for a very beneficent fairy who would perform miracles, and so, instead of effort, we were trusting to ease. Now, we are sweeping our own floors instead of wasting our little savings upon paying for the doing of it. We were thinking that sweeping our houses clean was a tax upon time, an exhausting expenditure of physical energy. Experience is telling us the opposite.” “Mental energies are revived, even stimulated, by automatic industry which is a rest to them. While a man is sweeping his house or garden, he can think, and think well. He can organise his work.” These words I heard from the mouth of a scholar. I heard the same thought expressed by a skilled craftsman, differently, but analogous. “The lack of domestic servants is proving a blessing to us all,” I heard a woman say. “We did not know, under the old self-indulgent system, how long a day was, and what a lot of time we wasted. We had forgotten we had hands, strong muscles and vigorous aptitudes. We paid a high price for the neglect to which we had submitted our physical energies. We suffered from ‘boredom’ and other evils consequent upon indolence. Now, we do not ask ourselves how we shall dispose of the day. That question is answered before it is asked. We have our duties to perform to the Commune, as members of it, to our homes as sacred trusts as our palaces of pleasure as well as duty. We know what are our responsibilities. We accept and use them, in the city and home.” As my spirit grew in experience and closer observation, I noticed that in matters of dress or costume there was little difference between the classes. Constant changes of fashion created to supply the tradesmen when novelties were so constantly demanded from them, are out of date. The garments of the rich may be more elaborately adorned, be more sumptuous, more composed of silk than wool, but in their simple cut they are not differentiated from those of the poorer classes.

“We do not make them all at home,” I heard an elegantly attired lady of high rank say. “That would be unfair; because we can afford to give employment, expensive though it is. At the same time, quite half is made at home. Even in houses of the rich the peaceful sound of the loom prevails. Our daughters are all taught to use it, for who knows when they may be compelled to do so. It is wise to instruct the young in occupation which they may be called upon to use in darker times. Besides,” the lady added, “girls need quiescent employment to establish character. It is not that the arts are ceasing to flourish or the elegancies of mental cultivation are curtailed; it is only,” as the lady went on to say, “now that we are more busy we have more time. A girl can study a language while she works her loom, or another can read to her.” This led me to wonder if peripatetic teaching was usual? It is, for, in schools young people are encouraged while learning by heart, reciting or reading aloud, to personate, by action the drama or tale they are telling. This habit, no doubt, has arisen from the high position the drama and all that belongs to histrionic training takes in the new life. Artists and such who are called by their genius to create are not a set apart, nor are they regarded any longer as harmless lunatics. Being, by the nature of their calling constructors, they are expected to help in the affairs of the Commune, not only as specialities but as intelligences well adapted to other forms of construction than those demanded from their own work. The mind of an artist of any kind, in letters, graphic or plastic arts, or music, is a well tuned instrument. It must be so, or success is out of the question.

§ 28