Ian Hay

Name: A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII
Author: Ian Hay

A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

Summary

“A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII”, published in 1911, is a work by Ian Hay. It explores elements such as Killick, crowd and Belton Hall.

Quotes from A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (Ian Hay)

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ In fifteen the crowd had pledged itself to do something really big; and in half an hour most of the windows of the pit offices had been broken as a guarantee of good faith.
Having whetted its appetite on this hors d'œuvre, the mob listened readily to Mr Winch's suggestion of a brisk walk to Belton Hall and a personal interview with its proprietor. The notion ran through the excited mass of humanity like fire through dry grass; and presently, as if from one spontaneous impulse, the advance on Belton Hall began. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ That fine unreasoning human instinct which under a certain degree of pressure bids logic and argument go hang, and impels us to go forth and break some one else's windows, held the reins that evening. As the night-shift assembled at the pit-head, what time the day-shift was being disgorged, a cageful at a time, from the depths below, a great and magnificent project suddenly hatched itself in the fertile brain of Mr Tom Winch, who had been haunting the neighbourhood on business connected with the propaganda of his own particular revolutionary organisation for the past six weeks. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ One man with his wits about him has two great advantages over a crowd. In the first place, he knows exactly what he is going to do, and, in the second, he knows exactly what the crowd is going to do. The crowd knows neither. It is impossible to foretell how a single individual will behave upon emergency: the human temperament varies too widely. But there is nothing in the world so normal or conventional as a crowd. Mankind in the lump is a mere puppet in the hands of the law of averages. Given, as noted above, a resolute leader, the conditions are changed. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ A confused medley of men and women—not to mention the inevitable small boy element—was pouring up the road from Belton Pit in the direction of the Hall, which lay beyond the brow of the hill in a green hollow as yet unsullied by winding-wheels and waste-heaps. People who have made up their minds to do evil are usually in a hurry to get it over. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ He wanted the crowd to feel ridiculous. That object achieved, he proposed to turn his visitors to the right-about and send them home. He had been through this experience before, and felt comparatively sure of his ground.
Provided, that is, that one thing did not occur. There were women present.
Now women are exempt from the law of averages; the sex snaps its fingers at computations based upon laboriously compiled statistics. If the women—or more likely a woman—gave the men a lead, anything might happen. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ In our present frame of mind nothing else will satisfy us. Now here is a fair offer. Send up any two men you like out of that multitude down there, and I will take them on, both together or one after the other, as you please. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ It is always gratifying to be invited to participate in a sporting event, but there is a difference between a seat on the platform and a stance in the arena. Getting hurt gratuitously is slipping into the Index Expurgatorius of modern field sports. ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ For the moment Sir John Carr stood for all the injustice and cruelty that strength has ever inflicted upon weakness. Every word told. The mob was aflame at last. They hung upon Killick's fiery sentences, surging ever more closely round the steps. The next wave, Juggernaut saw, would bring them in a flood upon the terrace ”

[↩︎]

Source: Wikisource

Ian Hay, A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (1911)

“ Go home, and think things over. Consult the older men: I see none of them here. If you are of the same mind to-morrow, I promise to—"
"Call yourselves men? Cowards! cowards! cowards! One of us is worth the lot of you!"
A woman, with a shawl over her head and a child in her arms, had mounted half-way up the steps, and was addressing the mob below. Sir John recognised her as Mrs Brash, a quiet little person as a rule. ”

Ian Hay

Summary

Quotes from A Safety Match — CHAPTER XVIII (Ian Hay)

Common terms

Similar works

Get perspective with Kwize: daily news enlightened by great literature