MR.    SMEETH   IS   REASSURED	89'
approach of one of these outrages, all clocks ought to
be put back three hours, so that everybody might stay
in bed until their fury is spent. There is no end to their
malice. They sweep, lash, and machine-gun the streets-
with rain; they send up fountains of mud from every
passing wheel; they contrive that fires shall not burn
nor water boil, that tea shall be lukewarm, bacon fat con-
gealed, and warranted fresh eggs change in their very
cups to mere eggs and dubious; they make the husband1
turn on the wife, the father on the child, and thus help-
to ruin all family life; and they lavishly sow all the
ills that townsmen know, colds, indigestion, rheumatism,,
influenza, bronchitis, pneumonia, and are indeed the in-
dustrious hirelings of death.
"Got your umbrella?" said Mrs. Smeeth. She had
been out of bed for an hour, but somehow looked as if
her real self was still there, as if this was a mysteriously
wrapped wraith ot herself she had projected downstairs,
"Goo'-bye, then. You'll have to run for it, Dad/'
Dad did not run for it, but he managed to trot down
Chaucer Road and then along the neighbouring street,
but after that he had a pain over his heart and was re-
duced to a sort of quick shamble. Before he reached
the High Street and his tram, the bottoms of his trousers
were unpleasantly heavy, his boots (one of Mrs, Smeeth's
bargains and made of cardboard) gave out a squelching
sound, and the newspaper he carried was being rapidly
reconverted into its original pulp. The tram, its-
windows steaming and streaming, was more crowded
than usual, of course, and carried its maximum cargo^
of wet clothes, the wearers of which were simply so many
irritable ghosts. After enormous difficulty, Mr. Smeeth
succeeded in filling and lighting his morning pipe of