“Heaven knows I’m not condoning his conduct, Levi.  He has behaved as badly as a young man could, and not a word of extenuation will you hear from me.  I’m not speaking of him as a part of the social order; I’m speaking of him as master of the Mill.  As master here he may be a successful man and you’ll do well to bear in mind that he must be judged by results.  Morally, he’s a failure, and you are right to condemn him; but don’t let that make you an enemy to him as owner of the works.  Be just, and don’t be prejudiced against him in one capacity because he’s failed in another.”

“A bad man is a bad man,” answered Baggs stoutly, “and a blackguard’s a blackguard.  And if you are equal to doing one dirty trick, your fellow man has a right to distrust you all through.  You’ve got to look at a question through your own spectacles, and I won’t hear no nonsense about the welfare of the Mill, because the welfare of the Mill means to me—­Levi Baggs—­my welfare—­and, no doubt, it means to that godless rip, his welfare.  You mark me—­a man that can ruin one girl won’t be very tender about fifty girls and women.  And if you think Raymond Ironsyde will take any steps to better the workers at the expense of the master, you’re wrong, and don’t know nothing about human nature.”

John Best looked at Mr. Churchouse doubtfully.

“There’s sense in that, I’m fearing,” he said.

“When you say ‘human nature,’ Levi, you sum the whole situation,” answered Ernest mildly.  “Because human nature is like the sea—­you never know when you put a net into it what you’ll drag up to the light of day.  Human nature is never exhausted, and it abounds in contradictions.  You cannot make hard and fast laws for it, and you cannot, if you are philosophically inclined, presume to argue about it as though it were a consistent and unchanging factor.  History is full of examples of men defeating their own characters, of falling away from their own ideals, yet struggling back to them.  Careers have dawned in beauty and promise and set in blood and failure; and, again, you find people who make a bad start, yet manage to retrieve the situation.  In a word, you cannot argue from the past to the future, where human nature is concerned.  It is a series of surprises, some gratifying and some very much the reverse.  There’s always room for hope with the worst and fear with the best of us.”

“It’s easy for you to talk,” growled Mr. Baggs.  “But talk don’t take the place of facts.  I say a blackguard’s always a blackguard and defy any man to disprove it.”

“If you want facts, you can have them,” replied Ernest.  “My researches into history have made me sanguine in this respect.  Many have been vicious in youth and proved stout enemies to vice at a later time.  Themistocles did much evil.  His father disowned him—­and he drove his mother to take her own life for grief at his sins.  Yet, presently, the ugly bud put forth a noble flower.