The two murderers made off down Eaton Terrace , Chester Terrace , South Eaton Place , where Cecilia was then .sx living , and so into Ebury Street where they were captured , .sx after having wounded two policemen .sx They were chased by .sx a number of people and unarmed constables , but kept them .sx off by firing their revolvers .sx Both paid with their lives for a .sx cruel action which could in no way further the Irish cause .sx I was obliged to continue my journey , but it was a .sx white-faced , shaken woman who arrived at her destination .sx Looking back on the post-War years I think that they might well come to be known as the Age of Discontent .sx This discontent boiled up in the Great Strike of 1926 , when we saw in the streets convoys of food supplies under the protection of armed soldiers and armoured cars ; when Hyde Park became a food depot from which the public was excluded ; when newspapers shrank to one-page leaflets and those of us who had wireless sets invited others who had not to gather and listen to the news .sx Then we , like most other people , used our car to take workers to and from their work , and the few omnibuses which ran had boarded-up windows and engines protected by an entanglement of barbed wire .sx Young men from the universities drove these omnibuses or took the place of drivers and stokers on the trains , and women turned to as they had done in the War and made themselves useful wherever they could .sx It says much for the common sense and good feeling of the nation that the strike which began on May 4th and ended on Wednesday , May 12th , was , for the most part , a good-humoured and disciplined strike .sx On one of the strike days I went in the late afternoon to play Bridge at a certain club .sx I happened to know that an elderly woman who was then on duty in the cloak room lived at Camberwell .sx " How did you get here ?sx " I asked .sx " I had to walk ma'am .sx Perhaps I'll be lucky in getting a lift home .sx " I asked her if she would care to come and stay with us while the trouble lasted .sx One of the club members overheard this conversation .sx " Oh , I suppose you are one of those Reds yourself , " she said in scathing tones .sx " The working classes want a lesson .sx Those damned strikers ought to be shot .sx " The cloak-room attendant watched her as she walked indignantly away and then she looked at me .sx " Those are the people who make revolutions , " she said .sx In November , 1928 , our younger daughter married Mr. ( Patrick ) D. Pole Welman .sx As he was in the West Indies and could not obtain leave , Sir Frederick and Lady James were kind enough to take Denise out to Grenada with them to stay at Government House , and from there she was married .sx How kind it was of them to do that , and how grateful to them we were and are .sx By then I had ceased to write novels and was occupying myself with historical books .sx The first of these was suggested by the conversation of a very old lady .sx What a mine of memories she possessed .sx I christened this unborn book " A Hundred Wonderful Years , " and began reading up the period .sx The success of this venture encouraged me to write another book of similar character .sx I had for one reason and another needed information about life during the War years and found that by 1929 memories were becoming vague , and that much of the material I required was not to be found in libraries or in the War Museum .sx So , while my own memory was to be depended upon , I wrote " How We Lived Then , " which it pleases me to find is approved by school children , who thrill to learn of all their parents and grandparents did and endured .sx If it incites in even a few of them a loathing of war , I have done something worth doing .sx About this time my husband became very ill , an illness which lasted for nearly two years , and as , by then , it was impossible for him to resume his former work , so just as he had used a shoe horn when a spoon was not available , he adopted another profession .sx The social histories which appear under my name are really written in partnership with him , though he will not allow his name to appear upon them .sx When he was well enough to live in London again , we moved to yet another house , this time of a still more labour-saving kind .sx Settled in our new home we then set to work on another book , " The Stream of Time , " which necessitated a considerable amount of grubbing in libraries .sx This book , as an old village friend used to say , has been " blessed to us " by the number of appreciative letters received from people all over the English-speaking world .sx I now undertook to write " The Home Life of the People " section for " Early Victorian England , " shortly to be published by the Clarendon Press , and edited by Mr. G. M. Young , one of the most inspiring editors for whom it has been my pleasant lot to work .sx It is by no means easy to reconstruct in detail the domestic life of the poor during this period .sx Those friends to all students , Mr. and Mrs. Hammond , know more about the subject than any other historians , but even when we had combed their books and all the well-known libraries , we needed still more information .sx Then it was that I asked the help of the editors of The Sunday Times and The Observer , who kindly published letters appealing to individuals who might be interested , and so obtained a number of personal recollections , and of little books and pamphlets written for the use of the poor , which contained invaluable information .sx I then undertook an article entitled " Pageant of Women , " for the 160th birthday of the Morning Post .sx This had to be done in a hurry , and necessitated an extensive course of reading and an intensive style of writing to compress the necessary information into 3,000 words .sx I propose to use this article as the foundation of a book to be called by the same title .sx If I had not the nine lives of the proverbial cat I should not be proposing to write any more books , for while correcting proofs of " The Stream of Time , " I fell ill with Angina , and sat propped up in a bed strewn with slip-proof , while I refreshed my failing energies with inhalations of nitrate of amyl .sx Well , probably it was better for me to think about proof sheets than about Angina .sx CHAPTER XIX .sx SO far in this book I have begun at the beginning and worked on to the end .sx Now I shall begin at the end and look back to the beginning , for the changes which have taken place in the sixty years of which I write are extra-ordinarily interesting and worthy to be further stressed .sx The inventions which have made the greatest changes in the lives of people of my generation are those which have been the means of weaving the world together .sx To-day every civilised country knows in the course of a few hours what is happening in any other civilised country , and nationalism has had , perforce , to give way to internationalism .sx Another change which has come about in my lifetime is the decline of the aristocracy of birth and of wealth , and the rise of the aristocracy of brains and personality .sx There is now no place to which a working man of small means cannot attain .sx We have already had a Labour Government .sx Our present Prime Minister , Mr. Ramsay Macdonald , was educated at a Board School and was a pupil teacher before he became a journalist , and Mr. J. H. Thomas was an engine driver .sx Russia is in the hands of the people ; Mussolini , who is the son of a blacksmith , is in power in Italy and at the moment Hitler , an ex-house decorator , controls the fortunes of Germany .sx Of all the Kings and Princes who attended or sent representatives to the Coronation of King George V , how many remain in the position which they then held ?sx In this country , one now finds the great houses of the aristocracy used as schools , as institutions ; the gardens have become market gardens ; the shootings are let to syndicates .sx Heavy taxation , the rise in wages , and now the economic depression , make it impossible for more than a few very rich persons to live in anything approaching the manner in which they lived when I was a child and young married woman .sx But those are not the only reasons of the changes which have come about .sx The spread of education is another cause .sx Two years before this book begins , in 1870 , it became compulsory that every child should receive some education , though he might be partially excused attendance at school at 11 years of age .sx Mr. Clynes , the third Food Controller , worked as a half-timer in an Oldham Mill and at twelve years old was doing a man's work in the same mills the fees for his night school he saved out of his earnings .sx To-day the leaving age is fourteen and free places and scholarships provide that ladder from the gutter to the University which Professor Huxley desired .sx As the masses became better instructed the newspapers catered for them , and with this newspaper knowledge , added to what they saw for themselves and as transport became easier , they saw more and more their influence was extended .sx Until the post-War blight of a vast unemployment fell upon us , the position of the working classes had been steadily improving .sx They were not only better educated but better fed and better clothed , although by no means always better housed , than they had been during my youth .sx Sickness Insurance , Unemployment Benefit , Old Age Pensions and Widows' Pensions have made a vast difference to their lives , as has also the coming of the bicycle , the motor omnibus , and the cheap excursion train , as well as such amenities as public libraries , public baths , an increased number of playing-fields , the cinema and the wireless .sx Yet although for the last sixty-three years it has been almost impossible for a child to escape from attending school until he is fourteen , I do not think that the improvement in the mental standard of the people has kept pace with that of the standard of material prosperity .sx Study the crowds which pour out of London public-houses at closing time .sx One finds roughness , vulgarity of speech , silly shrieking laughter .sx Study the mental fare offered by the majority of the cinemas .sx Does one gain the impression that the cinema trade is catering for persons of much intelligence ?sx It is sad , too , that during the War and to a great extent .sx to-day , there is a low standard of honesty amongst boys and .sx girls .sx They will " nick " any article that takes their fancy .sx These children probably are hypnotised by a word ; " nicking " sounds so far less serious than thieving , though it .sx means precisely the same thing .sx In some large establishments , with the working of which I was familiar , it was the .sx custom to dismiss a thief , but to take no proceedings against .sx him .sx Whether this is any kindness to the transgressor I doubt .sx Two experiences of my own show how little nine years .sx of education may do to effect refinement of conduct .sx When .sx moving into our present house I employed a charwoman whose miserable appearance excited pity .sx I saw to it that she had milk to drink and tried to persuade her to have her teeth put in proper order .sx One afternoon her sixteen-year-old daughter appeared " to help mother , " in reality to see what our house was like .sx She was dressed in a smart coat with a fur collar , a modish little hat , silk stockings , patent leather shoes , carried a chic handbag and umbrella , and was liberally powdered and lipsticked .sx Her clothes might have been worn by any young girl , but her face was not only common but vulgar , and further disfigured .sx by two large strips of sticking plaster .sx