Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell (read novel full TXT) 📖

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heard of the letter a lot of the workmen adopted the suggestion and

walked in the road so as to avoid contaminating the idlers.

 

This letter was followed by others of a somewhat similar kind, and one

or two written in a patronizing strain in defence of the working

classes by persons who evidently knew nothing about them. There was

also a letter from an individual who signed himself `Morpheus’

complaining that he was often awakened out of his beauty sleep in the

middle of the night by the clattering noise of the workmen’s boots as

they passed his house on their way to work in the morning. `Morpheus’

wrote that not only did they make a dreadful noise with their horrible

ironclad boots, but they were in the habit of coughing and spitting a

great deal, which was very unpleasant to hear, and they conversed in

loud tones. Sometimes their conversation was not at all edifying, for

it consisted largely of bad language, which `Morpheus’ assumed to be

attributable to the fact that they were out of temper because they had

to rise so early.

 

As a rule they worked till half-past five in the evening, and by the

time they reached home it was six o’clock. When they had taken their

evening meal and had a wash it was nearly eight: about nine most of

them went to bed so as to be able to get up about half past four the

next morning to make a cup of tea before leaving home at half past

five to go to work again. Frequently it happened that they had to

leave home earlier than this, because their `job’ was more than half

an hour’s walk away. It did not matter how far away the `job’ was

from the shop, the men had to walk to and fro in their own time, for

Trades Union rules were a dead letter in Mugsborough. There were no

tram fares or train fares or walking time allowed for the likes of

them.

 

Ninety-nine out of every hundred of them did not believe in such

things as those: they had much more sense than to join Trades Unions:

on the contrary, they believed in placing themselves entirely at the

mercy of their good, kind Liberal and Tory masters.

 

Very frequently it happened, when only a few men were working

together, that it was not convenient to make tea for breakfast or

dinner, and then some of them brought tea with them ready made in

bottles and drank it cold; but most of them went to the nearest pub

and ate their food there with a glass of beer. Even those who would

rather have had tea or coffee had beer, because if they went to a

temperance restaurant or coffee tavern it generally happened that they

were not treated very civilly unless they bought something to eat as

well as to drink, and the tea at such places was really dearer than

beer, and the latter was certainly quite as good to drink as the

stewed tea or the liquid mud that was sold as coffee at cheap

`Workmen’s’ Eating Houses.

 

There were some who were - as they thought - exceptionally lucky: the

firms they worked for were busy enough to let them work two hours’

overtime every night - till half past seven - without stopping for

tea. Most of these arrived home about eight, completely flattened

out. Then they had some tea and a wash and before they knew where

they were it was about half past nine. Then they went to sleep again

till half past four or five the next morning.

 

They were usually so tired when they got home at night that they never

had any inclination for study or any kind of self-improvement, even if

they had had the time. They had plenty of time to study during the

winter: and their favourite subject then was, how to preserve

themselves from starving to death.

 

This overtime, however, was the exception, for although in former

years it had been the almost invariable rule to work till half past

seven in summer, most of the firms now made a practice of ceasing work

at five-thirty. The revolution which had taken place in this matter

was a favourite topic of conversation amongst the men, who spoke

regretfully of the glorious past, when things were busy, and they used

to work fifteen, sixteen and even eighteen hours a day. But nowadays

there were nearly as many chaps out of work in the summer as in the

winter. They used to discuss the causes of the change. One was, of

course, the fact that there was not so much building going on as

formerly, and another was the speeding up and slave-driving, and the

manner in which the work was now done, or rather scamped. As old

Philpot said, he could remember the time, when he was a nipper, when

such a `job’ as that at `The Cave’ would have lasted at least six

months, and they would have had more hands on it too! But it would

have been done properly, not messed up like that was: all the woodwork

would have been rubbed down with pumice stone and water: all the knots

cut out and the holes properly filled up, and the work properly rubbed

down with glasspaper between every coat. But nowadays the only place

you’d see a bit of pumice stone was in a glass case in a museum, with

a label on it.

 

`Pumice Stone: formerly used by house-painters.’

 

Most of them spoke of those bygone times with poignant regret, but

there were a few - generally fellows who had been contaminated by

contact with Socialists or whose characters had been warped and

degraded by the perusal of Socialist literature - who said that they

did not desire to work overtime at all - ten hours a day were quite

enough for them - in fact they would rather do only eight. What they

wanted, they said, was not more work, but more grub, more clothes,

more leisure, more pleasure and better homes. They wanted to be able

to go for country walks or bicycle rides, to go out fishing or to go

to the seaside and bathe and lie on the beach and so forth. But these

were only a very few; there were not many so selfish as this. The

majority desired nothing but to be allowed to work, and as for their

children, why, `what was good enough for themselves oughter be good

enough for the kids’.

 

They often said that such things as leisure, culture, pleasure and the

benefits of civilization were never intended for `the likes of us’.

 

They did not - all - actually say this, but that was what their

conduct amounted to; for they not only refused to help to bring about

a better state of things for their children, but they ridiculed and

opposed and cursed and abused those who were trying to do it for them.

The foulest words that came out of their mouths were directed against

the men of their own class in the House of Commons - the Labour

Members - and especially the Socialists, whom they spoke of as fellows

who were too bloody lazy to work for a living, and who wanted the

working classes to keep them.

 

Some of them said that they did not believe in helping their children

to become anything better than their parents had been because in such

cases the children, when they grew up, `looked down’ upon and were

ashamed of their fathers and mothers! They seemed to think that if

they loved and did their duty to their children, the probability was

that the children would prove ungrateful: as if even if that were

true, it would be any excuse for their indifference.

 

Another cause of the shortage of work was the intrusion into the trade

of so many outsiders: fellows like Sawkins and the other lightweights.

Whatever other causes there were, there could be no doubt that the

hurrying and scamping was a very real one. Every `job’ had to be done

at once! as if it were a matter of life or death! It must be finished

by a certain time. If the `job’ was at an empty house, Misery’s yarn

was that it was let! the people were coming in at the end of the week!

therefore everything must be finished by Wednesday night. All the

ceilings had to be washed off, the walls stripped and repapered, and

two coats of paint inside and outside the house. New drains were to

be put in, and all broken windows and locks and broken plaster

repaired. A number of men - usually about half as many as there

should have been - would be sent to do the work, and one man was put

in charge of the `job’. These sub-foremen or `coddies’ knew that if

they `made their jobs pay’ they would be put in charge of others and

be kept on in preference to other men as long as the firm had any

work; so they helped Misery to scheme and scamp the work and watched

and drove the men under their charge; and these latter poor wretches,

knowing that their only chance of retaining their employment was to

`tear into it’, tore into it like so many maniacs. Instead of

cleaning any parts of the woodwork that were greasy or very dirty,

they brushed them over with a coat of spirit varnish before painting

to make sure that the paint would dry: places where the plaster of the

walls was damaged were repaired with what was humorously called

`garden cement’ - which was the technical term for dirt out of the

garden - and the surface was skimmed over with proper material.

Ceilings that were not very dirty were not washed off, but dusted, and

lightly gone over with a thin coat of whitewash. The old paper was

often left upon the wails of rooms that were supposed to be stripped

before being repapered, and to conceal this the joints of the old

paper were rubbed down so that they should not be perceptible through

the new paper. As far as possible, Misery and the sub-foreman avoided

doing the work the customers paid for, and even what little they did

was hurried over anyhow.

 

A reign of terror - the terror of the sack - prevailed on all the

`jobs’, which were carried on to the accompaniment of a series of

alarums and excursions: no man felt safe for a moment: at the most

unexpected times Misery would arrive and rush like a whirlwind all

over the `job’. If he happened to find a man having a spell the

culprit was immediately discharged, but he did not get the opportunity

of doing this very often for everybody was too terrified to leave off

working even for a few minutes’ rest.

 

From the moment of Hunter’s arrival until his departure, a state of

panic, hurry, scurry and turmoil reigned. His strident voice rang

through the house as he bellowed out to them to `Rouse themselves!

Get it done! Smear it on anyhow! Tar it over! We’ve got another job

to start when you’ve done this!’

 

Occasionally, just to keep the others up to concert pitch, he used to

sack one of the men for being too slow. They all trembled before him

and ran about whenever he spoke to or called them, because they knew

that there were always a lot of other men out of work who would be

willing and eager to fill their places if they got the sack.

 

Although it was now summer, and the Distress Committee and all the

other committees had suspended operations, there was still always a