J. B. PRIESTLEY: An Inspector Calls Remember to support your ideas with details from the text. Read this passage, and then answer the question that follows it: Sheila: [who has put ring on, admiringly] I think it's perfect. Now I really feel engaged. Mrs Birling: So you ought, darling. It's a lovely ring. Be careful with it. Sheila: Careful! I'll never let it out of my sight for an instant. Mrs Birling: [smiling] Well, it came just at the right moment. That was clever of you, Gerald. Now, Arthur, if you've got no more to say, I think Sheila and I had better go in the drawing-room and leave you men Birling: [rather heavily] I just want to say this. [Noticing that SHEILA is still admiring her ring.] Are you listening, Sheila? This concerns you too. And after all I don't often make speeches at you Sheila: I'm sorry, Daddy. Actually I was listening. Birling: She looks attentive, as they all do. He holds them for a moment before continuing. I'm delighted about this engagement and I hope it won't be too long before you're married. And I want to say this. There's a good deal of silly talk about these days but – and I speak as a hard-headed business man, who has to take risks and know what he's about – I say, you can ignore all this silly pessimistic talk. When you marry, you'll be marrying at a very good time. Yes, a very good time – and soon it'll be an even better time. Last month, just because the miners came out on strike, there's a lot of wild talk about possible labour trouble in the near future. Don't worry. We've passed the worst of it. We employers at last are coming together to see that our interests – and the interests of Capital are properly protected. And we're in for a time of steadily increasing prosperity. Gerald: I believe you're right, sir. Eric: What about war? Birling: Glad you mentioned it, Eric. I'm coming to that. Just because the Kaiser makes a speech or two, or a few German officers have too much to drink and begin talking nonsense, you'll hear some people say that war's inevitable. And to that I say – fiddlesticks! The Germans don't want war. Nobody wants war, except some half-civilised folks in the Balkans. And why? There's too much at stake these days. Everything to lose and nothing to gain by war. Eric: Yes, I know - but still Birling: Just let me finish, Eric. You've a lot to learn yet. And I'm talking as a hard-headed, practical man of business. And I say there isn't a chance of war. The world's developing so fast that it'll make war impossible. Look at the progress we're making. In a year or two we'll have aeroplanes that will be able to go anywhere. And look at the way the automobile's making headway – bigger and faster all the time. And then ships. Why, a friend of mine went over this new liner last week - the Titanic – she sails next week – forty-six thousand eight hundred tons – New York in five days – and every luxury – and unsinkable, absolutely unsinkable. That's what you've got to keep your eye on, facts like that, progress like that - and not a few German officers talking nonsense and a few scaremongers here making a fuss about nothing. Now you three young people, just listen to this remember what I'm telling you now. In twenty or thirty years' time – let's say, in you may be giving a little party like this – your son or daughter might be getting engaged - and I tell you, by that time you'll be living in a world that'll have forgotten' all these Capital versus Labour agitations and all these silly little war scares. There'll be peace and prosperity and rapid progress everywhere – except of course in Russia, which will always be behindhand naturally. Mrs Birling: Arthur! Birling: As MRS BIRLING shows signs of interrupting. Yes, my dear, I know – I'm talking too much. But you youngsters just remember what I said. We can't let these Bernard Shaws and H.G. Wellses do all the talking. We hard-headed practical business men must say something sometime. And we don't guess – we've had experience – and we know. Mrs Birling: [rising. The others rise] Yes, of course, dear. Well – don't keep Gerald in here too long. Eric - I want you a minute. [from Act 1]

1. How does Priestley strikingly portray Mr Birling at this moment in the play?[25]