He had long since joined a Trade Union, and for two years past had paid a subscription of a shilling a week towards its funds.

He longed to be doing some battle against his superiors, and to be putting himself in opposition to his employers;--not that he objected personally to Messrs.

Foolscap, Margin, and Vellum, who always made much of him as a useful man;--but because some such antagonism would be manly, and the fighting of some battle would be the right thing to do.

"If Labour don't mean to go to the wall himself," Bunce would say to his wife, "Labour must look alive, and put somebody else there." Mrs.Bunce was a comfortable motherly woman, who loved her husband but hated politics.

As he had an aversion to his superiors in the world because they were superiors, so had she a liking for them for the same reason.