were addressed direct to 'the great heart of the people', and the

heart of the people must certainly be sounder than its head, for his

lucubrations were received with favour. That entitled 'How to Live

Cheerfully on Forty Pounds a Year', created a sensation among the

unemployed. 'Education: Its Aims, Objects, Purposes, and Desirability',

gained him the respect of the shallow-minded. As for his celebrated

essay on 'Life Insurance Regarded in its Relation to the Masses', read

before the Working Men's Mutual Improvement Society, Isle of Dogs, it

was received with a 'literal ovation' by an unintelligent audience of

both sexes, and so marked was the effect that he was next year elected

honorary president of the institution, an office of less than

no emolument--since the holder was expected to come down with a

donation--but one which highly satisfied his self-esteem.

While Joseph was thus building himself up a reputation among the more

cultivated portion of the ignorant, his domestic life was suddenly

overwhelmed by orphans. The death of his younger brother Jacob saddled

him with the charge of two boys, Morris and John; and in the course of

the same year his family was still further swelled by the addition of a

little girl, the daughter of John Henry Hazeltine, Esq., a gentleman

of small property and fewer friends. He had met Joseph only once, at a

lecture-hall in Holloway; but from that formative experience he returned

home to make a new will, and consign his daughter and her fortune to the

lecturer. Joseph had a kindly disposition; and yet it was not without

reluctance that he accepted this new responsibility, advertised for a

The Wrong Box