mately damned—oh! utterly damned—fools. Coal owners who think only of themselves, solicitors who think backwards, politicians who think like a game of cat’s-cradle, not a gleam of generosity—not a gleam.”
“What particularly are you working for?” asked the doctor.
“I want to get the whole business of the world’s fuel discussed and reported upon as one affair—so that some day it may be handled as one affair—in the general interest.”
“The world, did you say? You meant the empire?”
“No, the world. It is all one system now. You can’t work it in bits. I want to call in foreign representatives from the beginning.”
“Advisory—consultative?”
“No. With powers. These things interlock now internationally both through labour and finance. The sooner we scrap this nonsense about an autonomous British Empire complete in itself, contra mundum, the better for us. A world control is fifty years overdue. Hence these disorders.”
“Still,—it’s rather a difficult proposition, as things are.”
“Oh, Lord! don’t I know it’s difficult!” cried Sir Richmond in the tone of one who swears. “Don’t I know that perhaps it’s impossible! But it’s the only way to do it. Therefore, I say, let’s
