Page:A Political Pilgrim in Europe - Snowden - 1921.djvu/21

 opportunities pessimism promised to fly and hope to return and stay.

"Isn't it glorious!" shouted Margaret Bondfield to her colleagues as we shot swiftly into Folkestone station.

"Isn't what glorious?" I asked, thinking she meant our first view of the sea, stretching black and restless beyond the veil of fine rain which dimmed the windows of the railway carriage.

"Why, that we can travel once more, and that we are flying as fast as we can to see the comrades from whom we have been separated so long." And she waved her passport gaily. "I wonder if Clara Zetkin will be at the conference; and Balabanova? It is ages since I saw Angelica."

Margaret's bright face beamed with happiness, and her brown eyes shone like stars as she gathered up her wraps and bags for transport to the boat. She was like a bird set free from the cruel cage that had held her for four tormenting years. She suggested a warm little bird in her looks and manners. Small and brown, with a rich russet colouring of the cheeks, and quick in her movements, there is nothing in the world she resembles so much as the robin with the red breast.

She was one of the delegates representing the Parliamentary Committee of the Trade Union Congress. I was a representative of the political side of the Movement. Miss Sophie Sanger was invited to accompany us as interpreter, and was possibly the most practically useful woman of the party. She speaks four languages with equal fluency. What Miss Sanger does not know about the world's laws regulating labour and labour conditions, especially those affecting women, is said not to be worth knowing; which probably accounts for the fact that she now enjoys an appointment of considerable value and importance in the League of Nations Labour Department.

Mr. Henderson did not travel with us. He had gone ahead several days previously to help M. Huysmans