But for a great deal of the political
machinery, which at present mismanages for them, I see nothing else than
the scrap heap.
JACK LONDON.
PIEDMONT, CALIFORNIA.
CHAPTER I--THE DESCENT
"But you can't do it, you know," friends said, to whom I applied for
assistance in the matter of sinking myself down into the East End of
London. "You had better see the police for a guide," they added, on
second thought, painfully endeavouring to adjust themselves to the
psychological processes of a madman who had come to them with better
credentials than brains.
"But I don't want to see the police," I protested. "What I wish to do is
to go down into the East End and see things for myself. I wish to know
how those people are living there, and why they are living there, and
what they are living for. In short, I am going to live there myself."
"You don't want to _live_ down there!" everybody said, with
disapprobation writ large upon their faces. "Why, it is said there are
places where a man's life isn't worth tu'pence."
"The very places I wish to see," I broke in.
"But you can't, you know," was the unfailing rejoinder.
"Which is not what I came to see you about," I answered brusquely,
somewhat nettled by their incomprehension.
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