Felix Holt, the Radical

  CHAPTER XXX.

  His nature is too noble for the world: He would not flatter Neptune for his trident, Or Jove for his power to thunder. His heart's his mouth; What his breast forges, that his tongue must vent; And, being angry, doth forget that ever He heard the name of death.--_Coriolanus._

  Christian and Johnson did meet, however, by means that were quiteincalculable. The incident which brought them into communication was dueto Felix Holt, who of all men in the world had the least affinity eitherfor the industrious or the idle parasite.

  Mr. Lyon had urged Felix to go to Duffield on the fifteenth of Decemberto witness the nomination of the candidates for North Loamshire. Theminister wished to hear what took place; and the pleasure of gratifyinghim helped to outweigh some opposing reasons.

  "I shall get into a rage at something or other," Felix had said. "I'vetold you one of my weak points. Where I have any particular business, Imust incur the risks my nature brings. But I've no particular businessat Duffield. However, I'll make a holiday and go. By dint of seeingfolly, I shall get lessons in patience."

  The weak point to which Felix referred was his liability to be carriedcompletely out of his own mastery by indignant anger. His strong health,his renunciation of selfish claims, his habitual preoccupation withlarge thoughts and with purposes independent of everyday casualties,secured him a fine and even temper, free from moodiness or irritability.He was full of long-suffering toward his unwise mother, who "pressed himdaily with her words and urged him, so that his soul was vexed;" he hadchosen to fill his days in a way that required the utmost exertion ofpatience, that required those little rill-like outflowings of goodnesswhich in minds of great energy must be fed from deep sources of thoughtand passionate devotedness. In this way his energies served to make himgentle; and now, in this twenty-sixth year of his life, they had ceasedto make him angry, except in the presence of something that roused hisdeep indignation. When once exasperated, the passionateness of hisnature threw off the yoke of a long-trained consciousness in whichthought and emotion had been more and more completely mingled, andconcentrated itself in a rage as ungovernable as that of boyhood. He wasthoroughly aware of the liability, and knew that in such circumstanceshe could not answer for himself. Sensitive people with feeble frameshave often the same sort of fury within them; but they are themselvesshattered, and shatter nothing. Felix had a terrible arm: he knew thathe was dangerous; and he avoided the conditions that might cause himexasperation as he would have avoided intoxicating drinks if he had beenin danger of intemperance.

  The nomination-day was a great epoch of successful trickery, or, tospeak in a more parliamentary manner, of war-stratagem, on the part ofskilful agents. And Mr. Johnson had his share of inward chuckling andself-approval, as one who might justly expect increasing renown, and besome day in as general request as the great Putty himself. To have thepleasure and the praise of electioneering ingenuity, and also to getpaid for it, without too much anxiety whether the ingenuity will achieveits ultimate end, perhaps gives to some select persons a sort ofsatisfaction in their superiority to their more agitated fellow-men thatis worthy to be classed with those generous enjoyments of having thetruth chiefly to yourself, and of seeing others in danger of drowningwhile you are high and dry, which seem to have been regarded as unmixedprivileges by Lucretius and Lord Bacon.

  One of Mr. Johnson's great successes was this. Spratt, the hated managerof the Sproxton Colliery, in careless confidence that the colliers andother laborers under him would follow his orders, had provided carts tocarry some loads of voteless enthusiasm to Duffield on behalf ofGarstin; enthusiasm which, being already paid for by the recognizedbenefit of Garstin's existence as a capitalist with a share in theSproxton mines, was not to cost much in the form of treating. Acapitalist was held worthy of pious honor as the cause why workingmenexisted. But Mr. Spratt did not sufficiently consider that a cause whichwas to be proved by argument or testimony is not an object of passionatedevotion to colliers: a visible cause of beer acts on them much morestrongly. And even if there had been any love of the far-off Garstin,hatred of the too immediate Spratt would have been the stronger motive.Hence Johnson's calculations, made long ago with Chubb, the remarkablepublican, had been well founded, and there had been diligent care tosupply treating at Duffield in the name of Transome. After the electionwas over it was not improbable that there would be much friendly jokingbetween Putty and Johnson as to the success of this trick againstPutty's employer, and Johnson would be conscious of rising in theopinion of his celebrated senior.

  For the show of hands and the cheering, the hustling and the pelting,the roaring and the hissing, the hard hits with small missiles and thesoft hits with small jokes, were strong enough on the side of Transometo balance the similar "demonstrations" for Garstin, even with theDebarry interest in his favor. And the inconvenient presence of Sprattwas easily got rid of by a dexterously-managed accident, which sent himbruised and limping from the scene of action. Mr. Chubb had never beforefelt so thoroughly that the occasion was up to a level with his talents,while the clear daylight in which his virtue would appear when at theelection he voted, as his duty to himself bound him, for Garstin only,gave him thorough repose of conscience.

  Felix Holt was the only person looking on at the senseless exhibitionsof this nomination-day, who knew from the beginning the history of thetrick with the Sproxton men. He had been aware all along that thetreating at Chubb's had been continued, and that so far HaroldTransome's promise had produced no good fruits; and what he wasobserving to-day, as he watched the uproarious crowd, convinced him thatthe whole scheme would be carried out just as if he had never spokenabout it. He could be fair enough to Transome to allow that he mighthave wished, and yet have been unable, with his notions of success, tokeep his promise; and his bitterness toward the candidate only took theform of contemptuous pity; for Felix was not sparing in his contempt formen who put their inward honor in pawn by seeking the prizes of theworld. His scorn fell too readily on the fortunate. But when he sawJohnson passing to and fro, and speaking to Jermyn on the hustings, hefelt himself getting angry, and jumped off the wheel of the stationarycart on which he was mounted, that he might no longer be in sight ofthis man, whose vitiating cant had made his blood hot and his fingerstingle on the first day of encountering him at Sproxton. It was a littletoo exasperating to look at this pink-faced rotund specimen ofprosperity, to witness the power for evil that lay in his vulgar cant,backed by another man's money, and to know that such stupid iniquityflourished the flags of Reform, and Liberalism, and justice to theneedy. While the roaring and the scuffling were still going on, Felix,with his thick stick in his hand, made his way through the crowd, andwalked on through the Duffield streets, till he came out on a grassysuburb, where the houses surrounded a small common. Here he walkedabout in the breezy air, and ate his bread and apples, telling himselfthat this angry haste of his about evils that could only be remediedslowly, could be nothing else than obstructive, and might some day--hesaw it so clearly that the thought seemed like a presentiment--beobstructive of his own work.

  "Not to waste energy, to apply force where it would tell, to do smallwork close at hand, not waiting for speculative chances of heroism, butpreparing for them"--these were the rules he had been constantly urgingon himself. But what could be a greater waste than to beat a scoundrelwho had law and opodeldoc at command? After this meditation, Felix feltcool and wise enough to return into the town, not, however, intending todeny himself the satisfaction of a few pungent words wherever there wasplace for them. Blows are sarcasms turned stupid: wit is a form of forcethat leaves the limbs at rest.

  Anything that could be called a crowd was no longer to be seen. The showof hands having been pronounced to be in favor of Debarry and Transome,and a poll having been demanded for Garstin, the business of the daymight be considered at an end. But in the street where the hustings wereerected, and where the great hotels stood, there were many groups, aswell as strollers and steady walkers
to and fro. Men in superiorgreatcoats and well-brushed hats were awaiting with more or lessimpatience an important dinner, either at the Crown, which was Debarry'shouse, or at the Three Cranes, which was Garstin's, or at the Fox andHounds, which was Transome's. Knots of sober retailers, who had alreadydined, were to be seen at some shop-doors; men in very shabby coats andmiscellaneous head-coverings, inhabitants of Duffield and not countyvoters, were lounging about in dull silence, or listening, some to agrimy man in a flannel shirt, hatless and with turbid red hair, who wasinsisting on political points with much more ease than had seemed tobelong to the gentlemen speakers on the hustings, and others to a Scotchvendor of articles useful to sell, whose unfamiliar accent seemed tohave a guarantee of truth in it wanting as an association with everydayEnglish. Some rough-looking pipe-smokers, or distinguishedcigar-smokers, chose to walk up and down in isolation and silence. Butthe majority of those who had shown a burning interest in the nominationhad disappeared, and cockades no longer studded a close-pressed crowd,like, and also very unlike, meadow-flowers among the grass. The streetpavement was strangely painted with fragments of perishable missilesground flat under heavy feet: but the workers were resting from theirtoil, and the buzz and tread and the fitfully discernible voices seemedlike stillness to Felix after the roar with which the wide space hadbeen filled when he left it.

  The group round the speaker in the flannel shirt stood at the corner ofa side-street, and the speaker himself was elevated by the head andshoulders above his hearers, not because he was tall, but because hestood on a projecting stone. At the opposite corner of the turning wasthe great inn of the Fox and Hounds, and this was the ultra-Liberalquarter of the High street. Felix was at once attracted by this group;he liked the look of the speaker, whose bare arms were powerfullymuscular, though he had the pallid complexion of a man who lives chieflyamidst the heat of furnaces. He was leaning against the dark stonebuilding behind him with folded arms, the grimy paleness of his shirtand skin standing out in high relief against the dark stone buildingbehind him. He lifted up one forefinger, and marked his emphasis with itas he spoke. His voice was high and not strong, but Felix recognized thefluency and the method of an habitual preacher or lecturer.

  "It's the fallacy of all monopolists," he was saying. "We know whatmonopolists are: men who want to keep a trade all to themselves, underthe pretence that they'll furnish the public with a better article. Weknow what that comes to: in some countries a poor man can't afford tobuy a spoonful of salt, and yet there's salt enough in the world topickle every living thing in it. That's the sort of benefit monopolistsdo to mankind. And these are the men who tell us we're to let politicsalone; they'll govern us better without our knowing anything about it.We must mind our business; we are ignorant; we've no time to study greatquestions. But I tell them this: the greatest question in the world is,how to give every man a man's share in what goes on in life----"

  "Hear, hear!" said Felix in his sonorous voice, which seemed to give anew impressiveness to what the speaker had said. Every one looked athim: the well-washed face and its educated expression along with a dressmore careless than that of most well-to-do workmen on a holiday, madehis appearance strangely arresting.

  "Not a pig's share," the speaker went on, "not a horse's, not the shareof a machine fed with oil only to make it work and nothing else. Itisn't a man's share just to mind your pin-making, or your glass-blowing,and higgle about your own wages, and bring up your family to be ignorantsons of ignorant fathers, and no better prospect; that's a slave'sshare; we want a freeman's share, and that is to think and speak and actabout what concerns us all, and see whether these fine gentlemen whoundertake to govern us are doing the best they can for us. They've gotthe knowledge, say they. Very well, we've got the wants. There's many aone would be idle if hunger didn't pinch him; but the stomach sets us towork. There's a fable told where the nobles are the belly and the peoplethe members. But I make another sort of fable. I say, we are the bellythat feels the pinches, and we'll set these aristocrats, these greatpeople who call themselves our brains, to work at some way of satisfyingus a bit better. The aristocrats are pretty sure to try and govern fortheir own benefit; but how are we to be sure they'll try and govern forours? They must be looked after, I think, like other workmen. We musthave what we call inspectors, to see whether the work's well done forus. We want to send our inspectors to Parliament. Well, they say--you'vegot the Reform Bill; what more can you want? Send your inspectors. But Isay, the Reform Bill is a trick--it's nothing but swearing-in specialconstables to keep the aristocrats safe in their monopoly; it's bribingsome of the people with votes to make them hold their tongues aboutgiving votes to the rest. I say, if a man doesn't beg or steal, butworks for his bread, the poorer and the more miserable he is, the morehe'd need have a vote to send an inspector to Parliament--else the manwho is worst off is likely to be forgotten; and I say, he's the man whoought to be first remembered. Else what does their religion mean? Why dothey build churches and endow them that their sons may get paid well forpreaching a Saviour, and making themselves as little like Him as can be?If I want to believe in Jesus Christ, I must shut my eyes for fear Ishould see a parson. And what's a bishop? A bishop's a person dressedup, who sits in the House of Lords to help and throw out Reform Bills.And because it's hard to get anything in the shape of a man to dresshimself up like that, and do such work, they have to give him a palacefor it, and plenty of thousands a-year. And then they cry out--'TheChurch is in danger,'--'the poor man's Church.' And why is it the poorman's Church? Because he can have a seat for nothing. I think it _is_for nothing; for it would be hard to tell what he gets by it. If thepoor man had a vote in the matter, I think he'd choose a different sortof Church to what that is. But do you think the aristocrats will everalter it, if the belly doesn't pinch them? Not they. It's part of theirmonopoly. They'll supply us with our religion like everything else, andget a profit on it. They'll give us plenty of heaven. We may have land_there_. That's the sort of religion they like--a religion that gives usworkingmen heaven, and nothing else. But we'll offer to change withthem. We'll give them back some of their heaven, and take it out insomething for us and our children in this world. They don't seem to careso much about heaven themselves till they feel the gout very bad; butyou won't get them to give up anything else, if you don't pinch 'em forit. And to pinch them enough, we must get the suffrage, we must getvotes, that we may send the men to Parliament who will do our work forus; and we must have Parliament dissolved every year, that we may changeour man if he doesn't do what we want him to do; and we must have thecountry divided so that the little kings of the counties can't do asthey like, but must be shaken up in one bag with us. I say, if weworkingmen are ever to get a man's share, we must have universalsuffrage, and annual Parliaments, and the vote by ballot, and electoraldistricts."

  "No!--something else before all that," said Felix, again startling theaudience into looking at him. But the speaker glanced coldly at him andwent on.

  "That's what Sir Francis Burdett went in for fifteen years ago; and it'sthe right thing for us, if it was Tomfool who went in for it. You mustlay hold of such handles as you can. I don't believe much in Liberalaristocrats; but if there's any fine carved gold-headed stick of anaristocrat will make a broomstick of himself, I'll lose no time but I'llsweep with him. And that's what I think about Transome. And if any ofyou have acquaintance among county voters, give 'em a hint that you wish'em to vote for Transome."

  At the last word, the speaker stepped down from his slight eminence, andwalked away rapidly, like a man whose leisure was exhausted, and whomust go about his business. But he had left an appetite in his audiencefor further oratory, and one of them seemed to express a generalsentiment as he hurried immediately to Felix, and said, "Come, sir, whatdo you say?"

  Felix did at once what he would very likely have done without beingasked--he stepped on the stone, and took off his cap by an instinctiveprompting that always led him to speak uncovered. The effect of hisfigure in relief agains
t the stone background was unlike that of theprevious speaker. He was considerably taller, his head and neck weremore massive, and the expression of his mouth and eyes was somethingvery different from the mere acuteness and rather hard-lipped antagonismof the trades-union man. Felix Holt's face had the look of habitualmeditative abstraction from objects of mere personal vanity or desire,which is the peculiar stamp of culture, and makes a very roughly-cutface worthy to be called "the human face divine." Even lions and dogsknow a distinction between men's glances; and doubtless those Duffieldmen, in the expectation with which they looked up at Felix, wereunconsciously influenced by the grandeur of his full yet firm mouth, andthe calm clearness of his gray eyes, which were somehow unlike what theywere accustomed to see along with an old brown velveteen coat, and anabsence of chin-propping. When he began to speak, the contrast of voicewas still stronger than that of appearance. The man in the flannel shirthad not been heard--had probably not cared to be heard--beyond theimmediate group of listeners. But Felix at once drew the attention ofpersons comparatively at a distance.

  "In my opinion," he said, almost the moment after he was addressed,"that was a true word spoken by your friend when he said the greatquestion was how to give every man a man's share in life. But I think heexpects voting to do more toward it than I do. I want the workingmen tohave power. I'm a workingman myself, and I don't want to be anythingelse. But there are two sorts of power. There's a power to domischief--to undo what has been done with great expense and labor, towaste and destroy, to be cruel to the weak, to lie and quarrel, and totalk poisonous nonsense. That's the sort of power that ignorant numbershave. It never made a joint stool or planted a potato. Do you think it'slikely to do much toward governing a great country, and making wiselaws, and giving shelter, food, and clothes to millions of men? Ignorantpower comes in the end to the same thing as wicked power; it makesmisery. It's another sort of power that I want us workingmen to have,and I can see plainly enough that our all having votes will do littletoward it at present. I hope we, or the children that come after us,will get plenty of political power some time. I tell everybody plainly,I hope there will be great changes, and that some time, whether we liveto see it or not, men will have come to be ashamed of things they'reproud of now. But I should like to convince you that votes would nevergive you political power worth having while things are as they are now,and that if you go the right way to work you may get power soonerwithout votes. Perhaps all you who hear me are sober men, who try tolearn as much of the nature of things as you can, and to be as littlelike fools as possible. A fool or idiot is one who expects things tohappen that never can happen; he pours milk into a can without a bottom,and expects the milk to stay there. The more of such vain expectations aman has, the more he is a fool or idiot. And if any working man expectsa vote to do for him what it never can do, he's foolish to that amount,if no more. I think that's clear enough, eh?"

  "Hear, hear," said several voices, but they were not those of theoriginal group; they belonged to some strollers who had been attractedby Felix Holt's vibrating voice, and were Tories from the Crown. Amongthem was Christian, who was smoking a cigar with a pleasure he alwaysfelt in being among people who did not know him, and doubtless took himto be something higher than he really was. Hearers from the Fox andHounds also were slowly adding themselves to the nucleus. Felix,accessible to the pleasure of being listened to, went on with more andmore animation: "The way to get rid of folly is to get rid of vainexpectations, and of thoughts that don't agree with the nature ofthings. The men who have had true thoughts about water, and what it willdo when it is turned into steam and under all sorts of circumstances,have made themselves a great power in the world: they are turning thewheels of engines that will help to change most things. But no engineswould have done, if there had been false notions about the way waterwould act. Now, all the schemes about voting, and districts, and annualParliaments, and the rest, are engines, and the water or steam--theforce that is to work them--must come out of human nature--out of men'spassions, feelings, desires. Whether the engines will do good work orbad depends on these feelings; and if we have false expectations aboutmen's characters, we are very much like the idiot who thinks he'll carrymilk in a can without a bottom. In my opinion, the notions about whatmere voting will do are very much of that sort."

  "That's very fine," said a man in dirty fustian, with a scornful laugh."But how are we to get the power without votes?"

  "I'll tell you what's the greatest power under heaven," said Felix, "andthat is public opinion--the ruling belief in society about what is rightand what is wrong, what is honorable and what is shameful. That's thesteam that is to work the engines. How can political freedom make usbetter, any more than a religion we don't believe in, if people laughand wink when they see men abuse and defile it? And while public opinionis what it is--while men have no better beliefs about public duty--whilecorruption is not felt to be a damning disgrace--while men are notashamed in Parliament and out of it to make public questions whichconcern the welfare of millions a mere screen for their own pettyprivate ends,--I say, no fresh scheme of voting will much mend ourcondition. For, take us workingmen of all sorts. Suppose out of everyhundred who had a vote there were thirty who had some soberness, somesense to choose with, some good feeling to make them wish the rightthing for all. And suppose there were seventy out of the hundred whowere, half of them, not sober, who had no sense to choose one thing inpolitics more than another, and who had so little good feeling in themthat they wasted on their own drinking the money that should have helpedto feed and clothe their wives and children; and another half of themwho, if they didn't drink, were too ignorant or stupid to see any goodfor themselves better than pocketing a five-shilling piece when it wasoffered them. Where would be the political power of the thirty sobermen? The power would lie with the seventy drunken and stupid votes; andI'll tell you what sort of men would get the power--what sort of menwould end by returning whom they pleased to Parliament."

  Felix had seen every face around him, and had particularly noticed arecent addition to his audience; but now he looked about him, withoutappearing to fix his glance on any one. In spite of his coolingmeditations an hour ago, his pulse was getting quickened by indignation,and the desire to crush what he hated was likely to vent itself inarticulation. His tone became more biting.

  "They would be men who would undertake to do the business for acandidate, and return him: men who have no real opinions, but who pilferthe words of every opinion, and turn them into a cant which will servetheir purpose at the moment; men who look out for dirty work to maketheir fortunes by, because dirty work wants little talent and noconscience; men who know all the ins and outs of bribery, because thereis not a cranny in their own souls where a bribe can't enter. Such menas these will be the masters wherever there's a majority of voters whocare more for money, for drink, more for some mean little end which istheir own and nobody else's, than for anything that has ever been calledRight in the world. For suppose there's a poor voter named Jack, who hasseven children, and twelve or fifteen shillings a-week wages, perhapsless. Jack can't read--I don't say whose fault that is--he never had thechance to learn; he knows so little that he perhaps thinks God made thepoor-laws, and if anybody said the pattern of the work-house was laiddown in the Testament, he wouldn't be able to contradict them. What ispoor Jack likely to do when he sees a smart stranger coming to him, whohappens to be just one of these men that I say will be the masters tillpublic opinion gets too hot for them? He's a middle-sized man, we'llsay; stout, with coat upon coat of fine broadcloth, open enough to showa fine gold chain: none of your dark, scowling men, but one with aninnocent pink-and-white skin and very smooth light hair--a mostrespectable man, who calls himself a good, sound, well-known Englishname--as Green, or Baker, or Wilson, or let us say, Johnson----"

  Felix was interrupted by an explosion of laughter from a majority of thebystanders. Some eyes had been turned on Johnson, who stood on the righthand of Felix, at the very beginning of the des
cription, and these weregradually followed by others, till at last every hearer's attention wasfixed on him, and the first burst of laughter from the two or three whoknew the attorney's name, let every one sufficiently into the secret tomake the amusement common. Johnson, who had kept his ground till hisname was mentioned, now turned away, looking unusually white after beingunusually red, and feeling by an attorney's instinct for hispocket-book, as if he felt it was a case for taking down the names ofwitnesses.

  All the well-dressed hearers turned away too, thinking they had had thecream of the speech in the joke against Johnson, which, as a thing worthtelling, helped to recall them to the scene of dinner.

  "Who is this Johnson?" said Christian to a young man who had beenstanding near him, and had been one of the first to laugh. Christian'scuriosity had naturally been awakened by what might prove a goldenopportunity.

  "Oh--a London attorney. He acts for Transome. That tremendous fellow atthe corner there is some red-hot Radical demagogue, and Johnson hasoffended him, I suppose; else he wouldn't have turned in that way on aman of their own party."

  "I had heard there was a Johnson who was an understrapper of Jermyn's,"said Christian.

  "Well, so this man may have been for what I know. But he's a London mannow--a very busy fellow--on his own legs in Bedford Row. Ha, ha! it'scapital, though, when these Liberals get a slap in the face from theworkingmen they're so very fond of."

  Another turn along the street enabled Christian to come to a resolution.Having seen Jermyn drive away an hour before, he was in no fear: hewalked at once to the Fox and Hounds and asked to speak to Mr. Johnson.A brief interview, in which Christian ascertained that he had before himthe Johnson mentioned by the bill-sticker, issued in the appointment ofa longer one at a later hour; and before they left Duffield they hadcome not exactly to a mutual understanding, but to an exchange ofinformation mutually welcome.

  Christian had been very cautious in the commencement, only intimatingthat he knew something important which some chance hints had induced himto think might be interesting to Mr. Johnson, but that this entirelydepended on how far he had a common interest with Mr. Jermyn. Johnsonreplied that he had much business in which that gentleman was notconcerned, but that to a certain extent they had a common interest.Probably then, Christian observed, the affairs of the Transome estatewere part of the business in which Mr. Jermyn and Mr. Johnson might beunderstood to represent each other, in which case he need not detain Mr.Johnson? At this hint Johnson could not conceal that he was becomingeager. He had no idea what Christian's information was, but there weremany grounds on which Johnson desired to know as much as he could aboutthe Transome affairs independently of Jermyn. By little and little anunderstanding was arrived at. Christian told of his interview with TommyTrounsem, and stated that if Johnson could show him whether theknowledge could have any legal value, he could bring evidence that alegitimate child of Bycliffe's existed: he felt certain of his fact, andof his proof. Johnson explained, that in this case the death of the oldbill-sticker would give the child the first valid claim to the Bycliffeheirship; that for his own part he should be glad to further a trueclaim, but that caution would have to be observed. How did Christianknow that Jermyn, was informed on this subject? Christian, more and moreconvinced that Johnson would be glad to counteract Jermyn at lengthbecame explicit about Esther, but still withheld his own real name, andthe nature of his relations with Bycliffe. He said he would bring therest of his information when Mr. Johnson took the case up seriously, andplace it in the hands of Bycliffe's old lawyers--of course he would dothat? Johnson replied that he would certainly do that; but that therewere legal niceties which Mr. Christian was probably not acquaintedwith; that Esther's claim had not yet accrued, and that hurry wasuseless.

  The two men parted, each in distrust of the other, but each well pleasedto have learned something. Johnson was not at all sure how he shouldact, but thought it likely that events would soon guide him. Christianwas beginning to meditate a way of securing his own ends withoutdepending in the least on Johnson's procedure. It was enough for himthat he was now assured of Esther's legal claim on the Transome estates.