great loss. He had lost money, but he had never lost confidence in his business ability.
"I have gained experience," he said. "I shall know better next time."
His wife had died early and his daughter had spent her girlhood with a relative abroad. She had developed into beauty so faultless that it had been said that its order belonged rather to the world of pedestals and catalogues than to ordinary young womanhood.
But the truth was that she was not an ordinary young woman at all.
"I suppose," she said at dinner on the evening of her visit to the Briarley cottage,—"I suppose these workpeople are very radical in their views."
"Why?" asked her father.
"I went into a cottage this afternoon and found a young workman there in his working clothes, and instead of leaving the room he remained in it as if that was the most natural thing to do. It struck me that he must belong to the class of people we read of."
"I don't know much of the political state of affairs now," said Mr. Ffrench. "Some of these fellows are always bad enough, and this Haworth rose from the ranks. He was a foundry lad himself."
"I met Mr. Haworth, too," said Miss Ffrench. "He stopped in the street to stand looking after the carriage. He is a very big person."
"He is a very successful fellow," with something like a sigh. "A man who has made of himself what he has through sheer power of will and business capacity is a genius."
"What has he made of himself?" inquired Miss Ffrench.
