'Ay, miss. It's save as save can. Th' factory doors will need

open wide to-morrow to let in all who'll be axing for work; if

it's only just to show they'd nought to do wi' a measure, which

if we'd been made o' th' right stuff would ha' brought wages up

to a point they'n not been at this ten year.' 'You'll get work, shan't you?' asked Margaret. 'You're a famous

workman, are not you?' 'Hamper'll let me work at his mill, when he cuts off his right

hand--not before, and not after,' said Nicholas, quietly.

Margaret was silenced and sad.

'About the wages,' said Mr. Hale. 'You'll not be offended, but I

think you make some sad mistakes. I should like to read you some

remarks in a book I have.' He got up and went to his

book-shelves.

'Yo' needn't trouble yoursel', sir,' said Nicholas. 'Their

book-stuff goes in at one ear and out at t'other. I can make

nought on't. Afore Hamper and me had this split, th' overlooker

telled him I were stirring up the men to ask for higher wages;

and Hamper met me one day in th' yard. He'd a thin book i' his

hand, and says he, "Higgins, I'm told you're one of those damned

fools that think you can get higher wages for asking for 'em; ay,

and keep 'em up too, when you've forced 'em up. Now, I'll give

yo' a chance and try if yo've any sense in yo'. Here's a book

written by a friend o' mine, and if yo'll read it yo'll see how

wages find their own level, without either masters or men having

aught to do with them; except the men cut their own throats wi'

striking, like the confounded noodles they are." Well, now, sir,

I put it to yo', being a parson, and having been in th' preaching

line, and having had to try and bring folk o'er to what yo'

thought was a right way o' thinking--did yo' begin by calling 'em

fools and such like, or didn't yo' rayther give 'em some kind

words at first, to make 'em ready for to listen and be convinced,

if they could; and in yo'r preaching, did yo' stop every now and

then, and say, half to them and half to yo'rsel', "But yo're such

a pack o' fools, that I've a strong notion it's no use my trying

to put sense into yo'?" I were not i' th' best state, I'll own,

for taking in what Hamper's friend had to say--I were so vexed at

the way it were put to me;--but I thought, "Come, I'll see what

these chaps has got to say, and try if it's them or me as is th'

noodle." So I took th' book and tugged at it; but, Lord bless

yo', it went on about capital and labour, and labour and capital,

till it fair sent me off to sleep. I ne'er could rightly fix i'

my mind which was which; and it spoke on 'em as if they was

vartues or vices; and what I wanted for to know were the rights

o' men, whether they were rich or poor--so be they only were

men.' 'But for all that,' said Mr. Hale, 'and granting to the full the

offensiveness, the folly, the unchristianness of Mr. Hamper's way

of speaking to you in recommending his friend's book, yet if it

told you what he said it did, that wages find their own level,

and that the most successful strike can only force them up for a

moment, to sink in far greater proportion afterwards, in

consequence of that very strike, the book would have told you the

truth.' 'Well, sir,' said Higgins, rather doggedly; 'it might, or it

might not. There's two opinions go to settling that point. But

suppose it was truth double strong, it were no truth to me if I

couldna take it in. I daresay there's truth in yon Latin book on

your shelves; but it's gibberish and not truth to me, unless I

know the meaning o' the words. If yo', sir, or any other

knowledgable, patient man come to me, and says he'll larn me what

the words mean, and not blow me up if I'm a bit stupid, or forget

how one thing hangs on another--why, in time I may get to see the

truth of it; or I may not. I'll not be bound to say I shall end

in thinking the same as any man. And I'm not one who think truth

can be shaped out in words, all neat and clean, as th' men at th'

foundry cut out sheet-iron. Same bones won't go down wi' every

one. It'll stick here i' this man's throat, and there i'

t'other's. Let alone that, when down, it may be too strong for

this one, too weak for that. Folk who sets up to doctor th' world

wi' their truth, mun suit different for different minds; and be a

bit tender in th' way of giving it too, or th' poor sick fools

may spit it out i' their faces. Now Hamper first gi'es me a box

on my ear, and then he throws his big bolus at me, and says he

reckons it'll do me no good, I'm such a fool, but there it is.' 'I wish some of the kindest and wisest of the masters would meet

some of you men, and have a good talk on these things; it would,

surely, be the best way of getting over your difficulties, which,

I do believe, arise from your ignorance--excuse me, Mr.

Higgins--on subjects which it is for the mutual interest of both

masters and men should be well understood by both. I

wonder'--(half to his daughter), 'if Mr. Thornton might not be

induced to do such a thing?' 'Remember, papa,' said she in a very low voice, 'what he said one

day--about governments, you know.' She was unwilling to make any

clearer allusion to the conversation they had held on the mode of

governing work-people--by giving men intelligence enough to rule

themselves, or by a wise despotism on the part of the master--for

she saw that Higgins had caught Mr. Thornton s name, if not the

whole of the speech: indeed, he began to speak of him.




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