and went to the front at once, one of the recognised forces in the House.  The action of Mr. Speaker Peel promptly put an end to an attempted obstruction.  Sir Michael Hicks Beach, Mr. Cecil Raikes, and Sir John Hennaway had written to the Speaker asking his interference, but the Speaker declared that he had no authority, no right to stand between a duly elected member and the duty of taking the oath prescribed by statute.  Thus ended the constitutional struggle of six years, that left the victor well-nigh bankrupt in health and in purse, and sent him to a comparatively early grave.  He lived long enough to justify his election, to prove his value to the House and to his country, but he did not live long enough to render to England all the services which his long training, his wide knowledge, his courage, and his honesty so eminently fitted him to yield.

[Illustration:  NORWICH BRANCH OF THE SOCIALIST LEAGUE.]

Our Corner now served as a valuable aid in Socialist propaganda, and its monthly “Socialist Notes” became a record of Socialist progress in all lands.  We were busy during the spring in organising a conference for the discussion of “The Present Commercial System, and the Better Utilisation of National Wealth for the Benefit of the Community,” and this was successfully held at South Place Institute on June 9th, 10th, 11th, the three days being given respectively, to the “Utilisation of Land,” the “Utilisation of Capital,” and the “Democratic Policy.”  On the 9th Mr. Bradlaugh spoke on the utilisation of waste lands, arguing that in a thickly populated country no one had the right to keep cultivable land uncultivated, and that where land was so kept there should be compulsory expropriation, the state taking the land and letting it out to cultivating tenants.  Among the other speakers were Edward Carpenter, William Morris, Sidney Webb, John Robertson, William Saunders, W. Donnisthorpe, Edward Aveling, Charlotte Wilson, Mrs. Fenwick Miller, Hubert Bland, Dr. Pankhurst, and myself—­men and women of many views, met to compare methods, and so help on the cause of social regeneration.

Bitter attacks were made on me for my Socialist advocacy by some of the Radicals in the Freethought party, and looking back I find myself condemned as a “Saint Athanasius in petticoats,” and as possessing a “mind like a milk-jug.”  This same courteous critic remarked, “I have heard Mrs. Besant described as being, like most women, at the mercy of her last male acquaintance for her views on economics.”  I was foolish enough to break a lance in self-defence with this assailant, not having then learned that self-defence was a waste of time that might be better employed in doing work for others.  I certainly should not now take the trouble to write such a paragraph as the following:  “The moment a man uses a woman’s sex to discredit her arguments, the thoughtful reader knows that he is unable to answer the arguments themselves.  But really these silly sneers at woman’s ability