Chapter 1

LESS BREAD! MORE TAXES!

--and then all the people cheered again, and one man, who was more
excited than the rest, flung his hat high into the air, and shouted
(as well as I could make out) "Who roar for the Sub-Warden?" Everybody
roared, but whether it was for the Sub-Warden, or not, did not clearly
appear: some were shouting "Bread!" and some "Taxes!", but no one
seemed to know what it was they really wanted.

All this I saw from the open window of the Warden's breakfast-saloon,
looking across the shoulder of the Lord Chancellor, who had sprung to
his feet the moment the shouting began, almost as if he had been
expecting it, and had rushed to the window which commanded the best
view of the market-place.

"What can it all mean?" he kept repeating to himself, as, with his
hands clasped behind him, and his gown floating in the air, he paced
rapidly up and down the room. "I never heard such shouting before--
and at this time of the morning, too! And with such unanimity!
Doesn't it strike you as very remarkable?"

I represented, modestly, that to my ears it appeared that they were
shouting for different things, but the Chancellor would not listen to
my suggestion for a moment. "They all shout the same words, I assure
you!" he said: then, leaning well out of the window, he whispered to a
man who was standing close underneath, "Keep'em together, ca'n't you?
The Warden will be here directly. Give'em the signal for the march up!"
All this was evidently not meant for my ears, but I could scarcely help
hearing it, considering that my chin was almost on the Chancellor's
shoulder.

The 'march up' was a very curious sight:

a straggling procession of men, marching two and two, began from the
other side of the market-place, and advanced in an irregular zig-zag
fashion towards the Palace, wildly tacking from side to side, like a
sailing vessel making way against an unfavourable wind so that the head
of the procession was often further from us at the end of one tack than
it had been at the end of the previous one.

Yet it was evident that all was being done under orders, for I noticed
that all eyes were fixed on the man who stood just under the window,
and to whom the Chancellor was continually whispering. This man held
his hat in one hand and a little green flag in the other: whenever he
waved the flag the procession advanced a little nearer, when he dipped
it they sidled a little farther off, and whenever he waved his hat they
all raised a hoarse cheer. "Hoo-roah!" they cried, carefully keeping
time with the hat as it bobbed up and down. "Hoo-roah! Noo! Consti!
Tooshun! Less! Bread! More! Taxes!"