At Ailesbury, a town of which one of you is lord, destitution is

chronic. At Penkridge, in Coventry, where you have just endowed a

cathedral and enriched a bishop, there are no beds in the cabins, and

they dig holes in the earth in which to put the little children to lie,

so that instead of beginning life in the cradle, they begin it in the

grave. I have seen these things! My lords, do you know who pays the

taxes you vote? The dying! Alas! you deceive yourselves. You are going

the wrong road. You augment the poverty of the poor to increase the

riches of the rich. You should do the reverse. What! take from the

worker to give to the idle, take from the tattered to give to the

well-clad; take from the beggar to give to the prince! Oh yes! I have

old republican blood in my veins. I have a horror of these things. How I

execrate kings! And how shameless are the women! I have been told a sad

story. How I hate Charles II.! A woman whom my father loved gave herself

to that king whilst my father was dying in exile. The prostitute!

Charles II., James II.! After a scamp, a scoundrel. What is there in a

king? A man, feeble and contemptible, subject to wants and infirmities.

Of what good is a king? You cultivate that parasite royalty; you make a

serpent of that worm, a dragon of that insect. O pity the poor! You

increase the weight of the taxes for the profit of the throne. Look to

the laws which you decree. Take heed of the suffering swarms which you

crush. Cast your eyes down. Look at what is at your feet. O ye great,

there are the little. Have pity! yes, have pity on yourselves; for the

people is in its agony, and when the lower part of the trunk dies, the

higher parts die too. Death spares no limb. When night comes no one can

keep his corner of daylight. Are you selfish? then save others. The

destruction of the vessel cannot be a matter of indifference to any

854

The Man Who Laughs