Sometimes the grossness and impurity, the ignorance and downright wickedness of the underworld appal and frighten me.
But over this I must draw a veil, for I dare not give particulars; I think, and think, and ask myself again and again what is to be the end of it all! Are we to have two distinct races! those below and those above?
Is Wells' prophecy to come true; will the one race become uncanny, loathsome abortions with clammy touch and eyes that cannot face the light?
Will the other become pretty human butterflies?
I hope not, nay, I am sure that Wells is wrong! For there is too much real goodness in the upper world and too much heroism and endurance in the underworld to permit such an evolution to come about.
But it is high time that such a possibility was seriously considered.
It is high time, too, that the lives and necessities, the wrongs and the rights of even the gross poor in the underworld were considered.
For the whole social and industrial system is against them.

Though many of them are parasites, preying upon society or upon each other, yet even they become themselves the prey of other parasites, who drain their blood night and day.
So I ask in all seriousness, is it not high time that the exploitation of the poor, because they are poor, should cease.

See how it operates: a decent married woman loses her husband; his death leaves her dependent upon her own labour.

She has children who hitherto have been provided with home life, food and clothing; in fact the family had lived a little above the poverty line, though not far removed from it.
She had lived in the upper world, but because her husband dies, she is precipitated into the lower world, to seek a new home and some occupation whereby she and her children may live.
Because she is a widow, and poor and helpless, she becomes the prey of the sweater.

Henceforth she must work interminable hours for a starvation wage.