Mr. Cowes had introduced the subject which a considerable number of those present were bent on publicly discussing.  Who it was that had first spread the story of Mutimer’s matrimonial concerns probably no one could have determined.  It was not Daniel Dabbs, though Daniel, partly from genuine indignation, partly in consequence of slowly growing personal feeling against the Mutimers, had certainly supplied Richard’s enemies with corroborative details.  Under ordinary circumstances Mutimer’s change of fortune would have seemed to his old mates a sufficient explanation of his behaviour to Emma Vine; they certainly would not have gone out of their way to condemn him.  But Richard was by this time vastly unpopular with most of those who had once glorified him.  Envy had had time to grow, and was assisted by Richard’s avoidance of personal contact with his Hoxton friends.  When they spoke of him now it was with sneers and sarcasms.  Some one had confidently asserted that the so-called Socialistic enterprise at Wanley was a mere pretence, that Mutimer was making money just like any other capitalist, and the leaguers of Hoxton firmly believed this.  They encouraged one another to positive hatred of the working man who had suddenly become wealthy; his name stank in their nostrils.  This, in a great measure, explained Comrade Roodhouse’s success; personal feeling is almost always the spring of public action among the uneducated.  In the excitement of the schism a few of the more energetic spirits had determined to drag Richard’s domestic concerns into publicity.  They suddenly became aware that private morality was at the root of the general good; they urged each other to righteous indignation in a matter for which they did not really care two straws.  Thus Mr. Cowes’s question was received with vociferous approval.  Those present who did not understand the allusion were quickly enlightened by their neighbours.  A crowd of Englishmen working itself into a moral rage is as glorious a spectacle as the world can show.  Not one of these men but heartily believed himself justified in reviling the traitor to his class, the betrayer of confiding innocence.  Remember, too, how it facilitates speech to have a concrete topic on which to enlarge; in this matter a West End drawing-room and the Hoxton coffee-shop are akin.  Regularity of procedure was at an end; question grew to debate, and debate was riot.  Mr. Cullen succeeded Mr. Cowes and roared himself hoarse, defying the feeble protests of the chairman.  He abandoned mere allusion, and rejoiced the meeting by declaring names.  His example was followed by those who succeeded him.

Little did Emma think, as she sat working, Sunday though it was, in her poor room, that her sorrows were being blared forth to a gross assembly in venomous accusation against the man who had wronged her.  We can imagine that the knowledge would not greatly have soothed her.

Comrade Roodhouse at length obtained a hearing.  It was his policy to deprecate these extreme personalities, and in doing so he heaped on the enemy greater condemnation.  There was not a little art in the heresiarch’s modes of speech; the less obtuse appreciated him and bade him live for ever.  The secretary of the branch busily took notes.