The gallery they stood upon ran along the upper edge of a huge screen that cut the dancing hall on one side from a sort of outer hall that showed through broad arches the incessant onward rush of the city ways.  In this outer hall was a great crowd of less brilliantly dressed people, as numerous almost as those who danced within, the great majority wearing the blue uniform of the Labour Department that was now so familiar to Graham.  Too poor to pass the turnstiles to the festival, they were yet unable to keep away from the sound of its seductions.  Some of them even had cleared spaces, and were dancing also, fluttering their rags in the air.  Some shouted as they danced, jests and odd allusions Graham did not understand.  Once someone began whistling the refrain of the revolutionary song, but it seemed as though that beginning was promptly suppressed.  The corner was dark and Graham could not see.  He turned to the hall again.  Above the caryatids were marble busts of men whom that age esteemed great moral emancipators and pioneers; for the most part their names were strange to Graham, though he recognised Grant Allen, Le Gallienne, Nietzsche, Shelley and Goodwin.  Great black festoons and eloquent sentiments reinforced the huge inscription that partially defaced the upper end of the dancing place, and asserted that “The Festival of the Awakening” was in progress.

“Myriads are taking holiday or staying from work because of that, quite apart from the labourers who refuse to go back,” said Asano.  “These people are always ready for holidays.”

Graham walked to the parapet and stood leaning over, looking down at the dancers.  Save for two or three remote whispering couples, who had stolen apart, he and his guide had the gallery to themselves.  A warm breath of scent and vitality came up to him.  Both men and women below were lightly clad, bare-armed, open-necked, as the universal warmth of the city permitted.  The hair of the men was often a mass of effeminate curls, their chins were always shaven, and many of them had flushed or coloured cheeks.  Many of the women were very pretty, and all were dressed with elaborate coquetry.  As they swept by beneath, he saw ecstatic faces with eyes half closed in pleasure.

“What sort of people are these?” he asked abruptly.

“Workers—­prosperous workers.  What you would have called the middle class.  Independent tradesmen with little separate businesses have vanished long ago, but there are store servers, managers, engineers of a hundred sorts.  To-night is a holiday of course, and every dancing place in the city will be crowded, and every place of worship.”

“But—­the women?”

“The same.  There’s a thousand forms of work for women now.  But you had the beginning of the independent working-woman in your days.  Most women are independent now.  Most of these are married more or less—­there are a number of methods of contract—­and that gives them more money, and enables them to enjoy themselves.”