BENEATH THE THUNDER-CLOUD.

A HUSH pervades the atmosphere. The light is strange and garish. The distance between various objects contradicts our habitual impressions; things seem startlingly near, startlingly definite. Birds appear to have vanished from the earth; beasts stand as if turned to stone, or move with a scared langour. If the faintest breeze rustles the leaves, the eerie sharpness of the sound sends a chill through our blood. Every noise assumes a mysterious significance; the mere shuting of a door makes us start and shiver. Our work drags heavily along; our hands seem made of lead, our brains of wool. Like a pall the inky cloud with its yellowish glare hangs overhead and stifles all our energy, until the tension becomes unbearable and our jaded nerves quiver in anticipation of the crash which we almost long for in our dread.
Yet, perhaps, that crash may after all be indefinitely delayed. The threatening cloud, may be, vanishes silently into space. The atmosphere clears. Common sights and common sounds once more become common-place. The sun shines out, and life resumes its ordinary aspect. Nothing but the masses of cloud towering above the sky line and our own lurking sense of oppression remain to warn us that the storm has but temporarily dispersed, and that to-morrow may see it burst over our heads.
Just such weather has been frequent lately not only in the physical, but in the social world of Europe. A heavy thunder cloud of war and revolution hangs overhead. The moral atmosphere is charged with the consciousness that Germany, France and Russia are trembling upon the verge of a great war, a disturbance which promises to be as the breaking up of the well springs of existing conditions in the civilized world.
The great centralised States are tottering and crumbling; held together solely by armed force. It is hardly possible that a European war should not end in the dismemberment of at least some of them. Not probably in the separation of nations held together by race sympathy, but in the destruction of the centralised administration of artificially constructed empires, such as Russia and Austria, and in the immense development of local self-administration and voluntary federation throughout the whole continent. It is hardly possible that such a war will not afford opportunities, which will be seized by the workers to take hold of the means of production and deprive the property owners of their monopoly. The consciousness of these mightier issues at stake conflicts with the greed of the traders for scarcity and war prices or for commercial supremacy, and the ambition and land hunger of the rulers. The immediate result hangs quivering in the balance, at the mercy of social forces beyond all human control.
Meanwhile the overcharged condition of the atmosphere seems to have momentarily checked the conscious activity of society. The public hide the prevailing sense of uneasiness beneath fictious enthusiasms and hollow clamour. The canting festivities of the Jubilee being ended, we English are amusing ourselves by holding up hands of pious amazement at the unmanly vice of our idle classes, the petty barbarities of the police, and the incapacity and worse of ministers and officials; whilst our neighbours across the channel throw up caps for the untried heroism of Boulanger and celebrate with much waving of flags the days when they were energetically revolutionary. And all Europe watches with languid eyes the fruitless struggles of Egypt and Bulgaria in the hands of the wire pullers; the Great Powers contenting themselves with just putting out a foot and tripping up any sort of attempt at escape -which looks as if it might possibly be successful. Little States only exist as pawns for the play of their big neighbours.
Sharp and clear, amidst these dreary trivialities and futilities, rings the cry of the evicted Irish peasants, still heroically persevering in their defence of house and land and social justice amongst men. The Emerald Isle is just now the gem of Europe. The one bright spot where the hope of the wronged still takes the shape of resolute action. Elsewhere the prevailing dulness and sense of oppression seem to bang heavy as lead over the workers, dismally toiling in dust and heat. It is a time, not of rest and refreshment, but of inaction and strained expectancy.
Where will the return of energy find us? To what deeds shall we

be hurried when it awakes? Those are questions which lie to some extent within our power to determine. This pause allows us breathing time to think and prepare, to study the lessons of the past that we may make ready for the chances of the future. Let us look to it that those chances do not present themselves in vain.

WHATEVER turn, pacific or warlike, events may take when the time has come for a thorough modification of present conditions, those who will take an active part in the movement will find two different courses open to them; and upon their choice will depend the success or the failure of the attempt.
Deeply imbued with the teachings of Political Economy, which has devoted its chief attention to the best means of increasing the intensity of the present capitalist production; accustomed to reason under the open or unspoken presumption that the economical life of a Society cannot but be organised on some kind of wage-system, –most social reformers have built up their schemes of reform on the supposition that our endeavours must be merely directed towards some improvement of the present system of wage-payment, and it is usually supposed that this improvement would result from the State, or the Municipality, taking industry under their management, and eliminating the present owners of land and capital.
In the opinion of these persons the Social Revolution, after having proclaimed the rights of the nation to its soil, mines, machinery, and means of communication, and after having expropriated the present owners of these necessities of production, ought to organise industry so as to guarantee to the worker " the full value of his labour," and thus to prevent anybody from pocketing for himself the surplus-value. added by the labourer to the cotton and wool which he transforms into stuffs, to the coal which he brings to the surface of the earth, or to the metals he transforms into tools or machines. But, as far as we understand the social reformers belonging to this school, they consider it quite possible provisionally to maintain existing industry as it is, both as to the kinds of produce it brings to market, and the territorial distribution of the various workshops and manufactures. As to how the very first needs of the producer–those of food, of shelter, of clothing, and so on-should be satisfied, we must recognise that these grave questions are rather driven into the back-ground in the schemes of all social reformers of the Collectivist and previous schools.
Well, it seems to us Communist-Anarchists, that if the Social Revolution should really follow this course, it would be doomed beforehand to be defeated, and to be crushed in the blood of the workingclasses.
We have already said that the, abolition of private ownership of land, mines, machinery, and productive capital altogether, surely will be the distinctive feature of any movement worthy of the name of Socialist; and we have said, moreover, that no Parliament, no Government can do this. The expropriation can be carried out only by local initiative, by local action, by being not only written on paper, but accomplished de facto.
But suppose it is done; that is, suppose the nation has loudly proclaimed that the soil, the houses thereupon and the mines beneath, the factories and railways, are the property of the nation, and suppose that even the idea is so ripe that no serious objections are raised against it –what next?
It is not enough to proclaim, "These factories are ours," and to put on them the inscription, "National Property." They will become ours when we really bring them into action, when we use them and set their machinery at work. But how will that be done?
We are answered, "The State will do that, and it will pay wages, either in money or in 'labour notes.' But it seems to us that those who answer the question in this way, are merely paying a tribute to the false and portentious pseudo-science which middle-class people have elaborated under the name of Political Economy. Their point of view is altogether wrong; because, instead of basing our reasonings on the present production we ought to base them on consumption. Production is, for us, the mere servant of consumption; it must mould itself on the wants of the consumer, not dictate to him conditions.
Suppose we have entered a revolutionary period, with or without civil war–it does not matter,–a period when old institutions are falling into ruins and new ones are growing in their place. The movement

may be limited to one State, or spread over the world,–it will have nevertheless the same consequence: an immediate slackening of individual enterprise all over Europe. Capital will conceal itself, and hundreds of capitalists will prefer to abandon their undertakings and go to watering-places rather than to risk their unfixed capital in industrial production. And we know how a restriction of production in any one branch of industry affects many others, and these in their turn spread wider and wider the area of depression.
Already, at this moment, millions of those who have created all riches suffer from want of what must be considered as necessaries for the life of a civilised man. Already hundreds of thousands are in want of even food and shelter. Let the slightest commotion be felt in the industrial world, and it will take the shape of a general stoppage of work. Let the first attempt at expropriation be made, and the capitalist production of our days will at once come to a stop, and millions and millions of "unemployed" will join the ranks of those who are already unemployed now.
More than that. Our production cannot continue to go on as it does. The very first advance towards a Socialist society will imply a thorough reorganisation of industry as to what we have to produce. Socialism implies, not only a reorganisation as to the division of profits: its economical meaning is much deeper. It implies also a transformation of industry so that it may be adapted to the needs of the consumer, not to those of the profit-maker. Many a branch of our present industry must disappear, or limit its production; many a new one must develope. We are now producing to a great extent for export. But the export trade will be the first to be reduced as soon as attempts at Social Revolution are made anywhere in Europe. The British weaver, for instance, does not stand in direct exchange with the Hindoo - there is between them a series of middle-men both in this country and in India, and in a time of industrial disturbance such middle-men would cease their orders. The industry of this country being calculated for an immense export trade, must undergo a deep modification to adlust it to the needs of the inhabitants of these isles.
All that can be, and will be reorganised in time-not by the State, of course (why, then, not say by Providence?), but by the workers themselves. But, in the meantime, the worker, who has not even so much wealth as will enable him to live for a fortnight, cannot wait for the gradual reorganisation of industry. Having no employment, he would meanwhile lose even those wages which formerly permitted him to keep body and soul together.
The great problem of how to supply the wants of the millions will thus start up at once in all its immensity. And the necessity of finding an immediate solution for it is the reason why we consider that a step in the direction of communism will be imposed on the revolted society–not in the future, but as soon as it applies its crowbar to the first stones of the capitalist edifice.
It is because none of the three revolutions through which France has passed during the last hundred years grasped this necessity that each of them was crushed in the blood of its best defenders. By forgetting that the workmen who can earn no wages during a revolutionary period, cannot continue to be defenders of the revolution, the leaders of those enterprises reduced the working classes to the most terrible raisery, and finally compelled them to accept any dictator, any Emperor who guaranteed them work and wages, whatever were the conditions of work and however low the rate of wages.
Therefore we differ from all other Socialist schools in the manner in which we look at the next social movements. We hold that the satisfaction of the wants of all must be the first consideration of the revolutionists; that in the very first twenty-four hours after a Socialist movement has broken out in a city, there must not be one single family in want of food; not one single man or woman reduced to sleep under a bridge or in the meadows. Our first object must be to care for providing this food and this shelter for those who are most in need of them, for those precisely who have been the outcasts of the old society.
Is it possible? Are we able immediately to provide everybody with food, shelter, and clothes? None of those who know the richness of our modern society will doubt the possibility. We have plenty; and we have plenty of food in our stores to satisfy their first wants.
And if we thus consider the satisfaction of everybody's first wants as the first duty of each social movement, we shall soon find out the best means of reorganising our production so as to supply everbody with, at least, the first necessaries of life.
We shall return again and again to this subject in subsequent numbers of Freedom; but the preliminary point upon which we wish especially to insist is, that unless Socialists are prepared openly and avowedly to profess that the satisfaction of the needs of each individual must lie their very first aim; unless they have prepared public opinion to establish itself firmly at this standpoint, the people in their next attempt to free themselves will once more suffer a defeat.

ACROSS THE NORTH SEA.

WE are a mixed race, we English, and perhaps the mixture of which we have most reason to be proud is our strain of Norse blood, our kinship with the Scandinavians.
We are accustomed in our childish history books to read of the "Danes" and their continual invasions of England as if these human beings, many of whom came from Norway and not Denmark at all, were a mere swarm of locusts, seekIng what they might devour. Certainly their resolute efforts to obtain a share of the soil and wealth of Britain from the earlier settlers were frequently attended with destruction of life and of peaceful industry. Those old Norsemen cared as little for the life of the man or woman of an alien community as their descendant, the fisherman of to-day, cares for the suffering of the wretched whiting, from whose living body he cuts slices for bait, and then throws it back to agonise in the water. Nevertheless, they were fine fellows, them old searovers who colonised England, the ancestors from whose resolution, enterprise and daring comes much of the most sterling stuff in our national character.

Just such a bold, sturdy, resolute, independent race are their descendants of the nineteenth century across the North Sea. The Norwegians have not been corrupted as we have been by immense wealth, and, as a rule, the peasantry, that is the vast majority of the people, have known how to protect themselves from land thieves. There are large estates in Norway, but they are few and far betweenl; the greater part of the land still belongs to peasant families who cultivate it themselves. In 1865, there were 147,000 farms, i.e., a farm for every 12 persons, and 131,800 of these holdings were cultivated by their owners.
Much of the country is a barren rocky plateau, partly covered with perpetual snow, and inhabited only by bears and reindeer. The only portions habitable by men are the valleys, from 2,000 to 6,000 feet below, where foaming rivers rush down from the glaciers into the fiord, and the deep lakes sleep beneath mighty cliffs. There, amongst the pine trees beside the waterfall, on a grassy ledge of the precipitous mountain, or on the narrow strip of meadow near the sea, nestles here and there a farmstead, with its wooden dwelling-house, roofed with turf, where a hay-crop grows in summer, and sometimes a birch or ash 12 or 15 feet high springs up beside the stone chimney. The outbuildings too are built of logs, and there are often five or six of them; for everything must be kept under cover, even the manure, through the long, dark, icy winter. Very often there is also a little water-mill; for a Norwegian peasant family do almost everything for themselves. Grow their own corn, mostly rye and oats, grind it and make it into bread, shear from their town sheep the wool for their own clothes, comb and spin and weave it, dye the cloth or serge, and make it up themselves, or get the travelling tailor, who works from house to house, to make it. The things they want and cannot make, like coffee or cotton, they buy out of what they get by selling their butter and cheese.
Sometimes one farm holding belongs to several families. Then each family considers its particular house and bits of cultivated land scattered amongst the rocks as its own, whilst the forest and grazing ground is held in common. Again, , large estate (for Norway) often consists of a priLcipal farm, and four or five smaller holdings cultivated by " housemen." The houseman and his wife have a life tenure of their house and land, and pay a sort of rent in labour to the proprietor of the principal farm. The lads and lasses usually go out as farm assistants, if they are not all wanted on their parents' farm. They get their food, clothes, and lodging, and from E2 to 94 wages. Of course they live with the family of the farmer they are assisting, and there are no social barriers between employer and employed; the "servants" are treated as sons and daughters of the house.
When a Norwegian peasant dies, his land and property belong to all his children; but if there are too many for the farm to support them comfortably, one or two usually buy out their brothers and sisters'; so that the land has not been broken up into over-small portions. These young Norwegians, for whom there is no land at home, constantly emigrate to America, where they form Norwegian colonies, and continue the simple honest life of the mother country, living by their own labour and exploiting no man.The effect of this human, dignified, independent life of honest labour, is to fill the majority of Norwegians with a manly respect for themselves and for others. They treat one another with the true politeness which springs naturally from real kindness and fellow feeling–that real kindness between man and man which is impossible in a nation of masters and slaves. The curses of social inequality and the uneven distribution of wealth have touched Norway but very slightly. There are next to no great industries under the control of monopolists of the means of production; and by dint of much'hard fighting the brave Norsemen have held their own against the land-grabbing of king, churchman, and baron. Though they are poor–many a worthy farmer lives upon nothing better than porridge, musty rye bread, cheese, dried fish, and sour milk–they have preserved their freedom to a greater extent than almost any other civilised people, and they are meeting their present grievances and the encroachments of the Court in the same bold and rebellious spirit which defeated so many previous attempts to enslave them. Would that their English cousins showed equal manhood in resisting the extortions of landlord and capitalist.

FRIEND AND FOE.

THE admission made in the debate on the Navy Estimates by the First Lord of the Admiralty, that our dockyard management is nothing better than a gigantic job, somewhat tarnishes the glory of the brilliant naval review, for which the workers had to pay last month. No sooner is one government department officially whitewashed than another stands revealed as a den of uncleanness.

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"IF there's a Government then I'm agin it." We are emphatically of the opinion of that oft quoted Irishman. We are opposed to all centralised administration whether of labour or of affairs. We are in revolt against all domination whether of majority or minority. Of course, therefore, we protest, as against means not in accordance with our ends, against every attempt of the popular party to liberate the people by making use of the machinery of Government.
All this is true of us Anarchists; is it the whole truth? Is this negative policy of perpetual protest essentially Anarchism? Active protest against evil is certainly better than dull submission to it; but he who whilst protesting against a wrong can point to no right capable of attainment, is likely to protest in vain. For does not all intelligent protest necessarily imply some vantage ground of definite and positive belief occupied by the protestant?

PRISON LIFE.¹