of the movement. The speeches became more and more inflammable and exulting. It is from this period that the gems of Stephens and O'Connor are derived. Attwood was in the seventh heaven, and even the less enthusiastic leaders of the London Working Men's Association began to imagine that the day of redemption was at last about to dawn. All the leaders were, in fact, overjoyed at the amazing response to their propaganda and allowed themselves the wildest prophecies as to future successes. Douglas's assurance that they would achieve success in three years was regarded as insane caution. Enthusiasm centred mainly in the election of the Convention from which the most extravagant results were expected.
The spirit in which the Northerners approached the crisis may be inferred from the speeches and events connected with the series of mass meetings which began to be held during the summer and autumn of 1838. The earlier meetings were called to adopt some sort of organisation. Thus a Manchester Political Union and a Great Northern Union at Leeds, comprising between them the country on both sides the Pennines, came into existence. The Poor Law Amendment Act has already sunk into the background. The Manchester Union proclaimed its abhorrence of violent language and physical force, but its first great demonstration on Kersal Moor, on September 24, was graced by the presence of Stephens, O'Connor, and others who were advocates of violent courses. This demonstration was one of the most remarkable of all Chartist meetings. The Leeds Times thought there were a quarter of a million people present, which is scarcely credible. There was an immense array of speakers, representing all parts of the Chartist world. The dominant note was struck by Stephens, who declared that the Charter was not a political question but a knife and fork question: not a matter of ballot-boxes but of bread and butter. This tone sounded throughout all the subsequent babble about arming or not arming, about natural rights and legal rights, which filled up the debates of the Convention. For Chartism was in these manufacturing areas a cry of distress, the shout of men, women, and children drowning in deep waters, rather than the reasoned logical creed of Lovett, or the fanatical money-mongering theories of Attwood. Impatience, engendered by fireless grates and breakfastless tables, was the driving force of much northern Chartism.
The Manchester demonstration was one of a series arranged
