5 OCTOBER 1907, Page 28

ITO THE EDITOR OP THE " SPECTATOR. " ] too, am an

old man, and I agree generally with your correspondent "Senex ". (Spectator, September 21st) on this subject. His fears may be a trifle exaggerated, but that is an error on the right side. I have no nostrum of my own to pro- pose, but there are one or two questions on the surface of the matter which I should like to ask. When the Socialist millennium arrives, who is going to provide the initial capital to start "co-operative production," for, of course, the present capitalists will have withdrawn their money, and probably themselves, from the area of strife ? The Socialists have no money ; if they had, they would not be Socialists. Then, when the much-vaunted motto, "All for each, and each for all," becomes the rallying-cry, it will be no longer possible for a' smart workman, say an engineer or a boilermaker, to make his four or five pounds a week, or for a Lancashire family to make six or seven pounds amongst them in booming times like the present in the cotton trade. These are the people who applaud the Socialists, and who "vote for them. Have they realised that they will be the first to suffer when the spoliation of the capitalist takes place ?—I am, Sir, &c.,

R. W. J.