“Then Anarchists aren’t wicked men?”

“The Anarchist ideal is the highest and noblest of all human ideals.  I cannot conceive of a good man who does not recognise that when he once understands it.  The Anarchical Communists simply seek that men should live in peace and concord, of their own better nature, without being forced, doing harm to none, and being harmed by none.  Of course the blind revolt against oppressive and unjust laws and tyrannical governments has become associated with Anarchy, but those who abuse it simply don’t know what they do.  Anarchical Communism, that is men working as mates and sharing with one another of their own free will, is the highest conceivable form of Socialism in industry.”

“Are you an Anarchist?”

“No.  I recognise their ideal, understand that it is the only natural condition for a community of general intelligence and fair moral health, and look to the time when it will be instituted.  I freely admit it is the only form of Socialism possible among true Socialists.  But the world is full of mentally and morally and socially diseased people who, I believe, must go through the school of State Socialism before, as a great mass, they are true Socialists and fit for voluntary Socialism.  Unionism is the drill for Socialism and Socialism is the drill for Anarchy and Anarchy is that free ground whereon true Socialists and true Individualists meet as friends and mates, all enmity between them absorbed by the development of an all-dominant Humanity.”

“Mates!  Do you know that’s a word I like?” said Ned.  “It makes you feel good, just the sound of it.  I know a fellow, a shearer, who was witness for a man in a law case once, and the lawyer asked him if he wasn’t mates with the chap he was giving evidence for.

“‘No,’ says Bill, ‘we ain’t mates.’

“‘But you’ve worked together?’ says the lawyer.  ‘Oh, yes!’ says Bill.

“‘And travelled together?’

“‘Oh, yes!’

“‘And camped together?’

“‘Oh, yes!’

“‘Then if you’re not mates what is mates?’ says the lawyer in a bit of a tear.

“‘Well, mister,’ says Bill, ’mates is them wot’s got one pus.  If I go to a shed with Jack an’ we’re mates an’ I earn forty quid and Jack gets sick an’ only earns ten or five or mebbe nothin’ at all we puts the whole lot in one pus, or if it’s t’other way about an’ Jack earns the forty it don’t matter.  There’s one pus no matter how much each of us earns an’ it b’longs just the same to both of us alike.  If Jack’s got the pus and I want half-a-crown, I says to Jack, says I, “Jack, gimme the pus.”  An’ if Jack wants ten quid or twenty or the whole lot he just says to me, “Bill,” says he “gimme the pus.”  I don’t ask wot he’s goin’ to take and I don’t care.  He can take it all if he wants it, ’cos it stands to reason, don’t it, mister?’ says Bill to the lawyer, ’that a man wouldn’t be so dirt mean as to play a low-down trick on his own mate.  So you see, mister, him an’ me warn’t mates ‘cos we had two pusses an’ mates is them wot’s got one pus.’”