156 LABOUR IN MADRAS depends on you and on your fortitude, patience, courage and steadfastness will depend the success that we will gain by our mutual work. I thank you once again for all that you have done for me during this last year of our mutual work and I hope I shall come back to India worthy of the confidence which you have placed in me, and will come not only with a message of hope but with surety and certainty that our cause has won a victory. The Rickshawwallahs' Union presented an address on May 6th (see appendix) to Mr. Wadia who in reply made the following speech : I do not think that it is necessary for me to reply at any length to this particular address. My opinion is that such a profession as that which rickshawwallas follow ought never to be tolerated in any civilized society. For those who sit in a rickshaw, to be driven and drawn by human beings who are their brothers, it is a matter of great shame, and the one thing in which I can help the rickshawwallas when I am in England will be to agitate so that the Government does not allow such a degrading profession to be carried on in a civilized city like the City of Madras. The Madras Tramwaymen's Union presented on May 19th an address (see appendix) to Mr. Wadia on the eve of his departure to England, and he made the following reply: MY BROTHERS.--I am very grateful to you for the address that you have presented to me, thereby giving me an opportunity of serving you during my forthcoming visit to Great Britain. Ever since we started our Madras Tramwaymen's Union we have had some very rough and difficult times. We have had two strikes
