Salome Shepard gazed wonderingly at the crowd of people in the street, as she guided her pony-phaeton through the factory precincts. "What can be the matter with these people?" she thought. "I'm sure they ought to have gone to their work before this." It was a wet October day. The narrow street was slippery with the muddy water that oozed along to the gutters. The factory boardinghouses loomed up on either side, dingy and desolate. Even the mills looked larger and coarser, in the gloomy air of the morning...
