Life in a Railway Factory Part 8

As a mate Pump is variable. With the men of one s.h.i.+ft he can agree very well, but with the others he is nearly always at loggerheads. The fact is that Pump's stamper on one s.h.i.+ft does not like him, and will not try to like him, either. He quite misunderstands his driver's characteristics, and will not see his good qualities underneath a certain rugged exterior. Accordingly, they quarrel and call each other evil names all day. Very often the stamper will throw down his tongs and walk off. Thereupon Pump lowers the hammer defiantly, folds his arms, and tosses his head with disgust, while the furnaceman, waiting with his heat, calls to them to "come on." Now the stamper picks up his tongs quickly, shouts loudly to Pump, "Hammer up, there!" and on they go again, the stamper snorting and muttering to himself, and glaring fiercely from side to side, while Pump bursts into song, with a broad grin on his countenance. Sometimes the stamper, in a towering fury, will come to the chargeman and swear that he will not hit another stroke with "that thing there," and demand another mate forthwith, but with a little tact and the happy application of a spice of good-humour, the situation will be saved, and everything will go on right merrily, though the old trouble will certainly recur. Pump confides all his troubles to the chargeman and sheds a few tears now and then. He is full of good intentions and tries to do his level best to please, but he cannot avoid friction with his fiery and short-tempered mates of the fortnightly s.h.i.+ft.

He has one very special and ardent desire, which is to go on night duty; he is for ever counting up the days and weeks that must pa.s.s before his birthday will arrive, and so raise him to the age necessary for undertaking the s.h.i.+ft. In common with most other youths, he looks upon the night turn as something "devoutly to be wished," but I very much fear that a few weeks of the change will modify his opinion of the matter, if it does not entirely disillusion him. Notwithstanding a certain amount of novelty attaching to the working on the night-s.h.i.+ft, it is attended with many hards.h.i.+ps and inconveniences. The greater part of those who have to perform it would willingly exchange it for the day duty.

There was at one time another highly distinctive "character" attached to the drop-stamps. He revelled in the nickname of "Smamer." Where he obtained the pseudonym is unknown, though it is notable that the word has an intelligible derivative. Smamer is undoubtedly derived from the Greek verb s?? = sman, meaning _to smear_, and, afterwards, from s?a[1] = soap, so that the nickname is meant to designate a smearer.

As there are many who are in the habit of smearing their faces with soap, the nickname would seem to have a very wide and universal application. Be that as it may, our Smamer was a smearer of the first order; he usually stopped at that and did not care to prosecute the matter further. His face daily bore traces of the initial process of was.h.i.+ng, and that only; it was a genuine smear and little besides.

Whoever first honoured him with the appellation was a person of discernment, though he might not have been aware of the origin of the word. You often hear a workman say that So-and-so is "all smamed up"

with oil or some other greasy substance.

[1] Cla.s.sical, s??, s?a

Smamer was one of the forge hands and heated iron for the middle drop-stamp. His home was in the country, several miles from the town; winter and summer he tramped to and from the shed. For several years after his father and mother died he lived in the cottage by himself, tilled his own garden, prepared his food, performed his housework, made his bed, and did his own was.h.i.+ng, though he was no more than nineteen years of age. He was noted for his eccentric mode of living. Whatever the weather might be he scarcely ever wore an overcoat. He often came to work wet through to the skin, and reached home at night in the same condition, where he received no welcome of any sort, but had to light his own fire before he could dry his clothing or prepare his meal. To every inquiry as to whether he was wet or not he made one reply; he was "just a little bit damp about the knees," that was all.

In manner he was quiet and rather sullen; he was never very sweet-tempered, though he was a quick and clever heater of iron and a very good mate. About his native village he was rough and noisy, fond of fighting and disturbance. He was frequently in conflict with the police, and often on the point of being summoned before the Bench for some offence or other, but he usually sc.r.a.ped out of the difficulty at the last moment, either by means of apologies, or by making some kind of rest.i.tution to the injured party. At week-ends, with a band of a.s.sociates, he paid visits to the neighbouring villages and fought with the young men, until the whole of them became so well-known to the police that wherever they went they were recognised and promptly hustled off in the direction of their native place.

During the autumn months Smamer visited all the orchards along the road on the way to work, and came to the shed with his pockets crammed full of apples. These he used to divide out among his mates, who ate them with little or no compunction; there is small searching of conscience among the boys of the factory, especially when the contraband happens to be sweet, juicy apples plucked from the farmer's trees. Very soon, however, the habit of the life began to tell upon him. His continually getting wet, and the having no one to provide him with any kind of comfort, ruined his const.i.tution; in a few months he wasted away and died. A small party of mates from the shed attended the funeral at the little village churchyard: that was the end of Smamer. His place at the forge was soon filled; he was not missed very much. Everyone said he had but himself to blame; there was no sympathy meted out to him. His brother, who also worked on the drop-stamps, had been killed by a blow on the head with a piece of metal from the die only a short while before. They lay side by side in the little walled enclosure, for ever oblivious of the noise and din of the thunderous hammers and the grinding wheels of the factory.

There are several others, distinguished with t.i.tles of an expressive kind, working on the drop-stamps. Of these one answers to the nickname of "Bovril," one is "Kekky Flapper," one is "Aeroplane Joe," one "Blubber," and another is known about the shed as "Wormy." How they came to possess such inglorious appellatives cannot with certainty be told; a very little will suffice to brand you with an epithet in the work-shed.

In addition to these, in the vicinity of the drop-stamps in the corner are an ex-groom, a grocer, a musical freak, a comedian, a photographer, a boy scout, a territorial, a jockey, a cowman, a pianoforte maker, and a local preacher.

Situated over the coal furnace that feeds the big drop-stamps is a boiler of the "loco" pattern, one of those responsible for the tremendous din that is raised every day at meal-times when the steam is not required for the engines and hammers. These boilers have all served their time on the line--in pa.s.senger or goods traffic--and, after their removal from the engine frames, they have become distributed over the company's system and throughout the factories. The distance a boiler is required to travel under steam on the railway is about thirty thousand miles; after completing this it is superseded and removed from the active list on the permanent way. By the time the boiler and engine have travelled together so many miles they will be half worn out. The wheels, by reason of the frequent application of the brakes and "skidding" on the rails, will be grooved and cut about, and the machinery will require new fittings and bearings. After the boilers have been removed from the frames they are overhauled and tested and then sold out to the different sheds and stations, wherever they may happen to be wanted.

The method of transacting business between the different sheds and departments at the works is exactly like that employed by outside firms and tradesmen. Bills and accounts are rendered, and the whole formula of hire and purchase is entered into by the different parties; everything; in fact, except the actual payment of money, is duly carried out. The sheds are required to show a balance on the right side at the end of each year; percentages are charged for working expenses, and all the rest is profit. Thus, some sheds will show profits of many thousands of pounds annually, though upon paper only; the surpluses do not exist in reality.

Although the new boiler costs 1,000 it is sold to the shed second-hand for 200, so that the cost of ten for the workshop was only 2,000. The charge for setting, and fitting, and also for repairs and cleaning, however, is very great; a big sum is needed to keep them in a fit condition for work. After they have been erected above the furnaces they are covered with a thick jacket of a compound of magnesia and fibre, to enable them to retain the heat, and they are afterwards painted black, so as to harmonise with the general environment. The steam pressure of the repaired boiler is usually fixed at about a hundred and twenty-five pounds per square inch. The capacity of each boiler is very great, and the composite power of the whole set formidable; if one of them should happen to explode the result would indeed be disastrous. A small staff of men superintends them by day and night, and greater care is taken of them than was the case formerly. I can remember when the shed was several times within a hair's breadth of being blown up and forty or fifty men hurled to perdition.

A few years ago, instead of trustworthy men being appointed to superintend the boilers, they were consigned to the charge of several youths, who were very careless and negligent in their work, and who seemed to have no idea whatever of the tremendous responsibility resting upon them for the safety and welfare of the life in the shed. Provided with mouth-organs and bones, or Jew's harps, they would play and skylark about for a long time and leave their boilers unattended at considerable risk. I have often known them to be away from their posts for an hour at a stretch, and to allow the water in the boilers to become almost entirely evaporated before they returned to fill them up again, which, as everyone knows, is an exceedingly dangerous practice. By the common regulation attaching to boilers, the water should never be permitted to fall below that point when it is visible in the gauge-gla.s.s. If it is allowed to do so the position becomes dangerous immediately, and, to obviate accident, the bars of the furnace fire should be withdrawn and no cold water admitted.

Once a youth--a wild, reckless fellow--was absent from the boiler an unusually long time in the middle of the morning before dinner. The stampers watched the water in the gauge-gla.s.s drop little by little and finally vanish, and still no one came to attend to it. Being a little anxious about it I sent several men and boys to try and find the boilerman, but without avail. His mates were nowhere to be found either, and the foreman was away from the shed at the time. From being anxious I soon felt alarmed. The matter was becoming serious, and we were not allowed, under any circ.u.mstances, to meddle with the injectors ourselves.

As I was warning all men in the locality of the danger the boilerman arrived, a little frightened, but in a desperate mood. I advised him to take the usual course in such a case, to have the fire withdrawn from the furnace and allow the boiler to burn, but as this would have meant certain dismissal for him he decided to risk everything and fill up the boiler or explode it. As he was determined in his foolhardy resolution we collected our mates and left the shed, retiring to a safe distance.

By good fortune, however--by pure luck, and nothing else--the boiler received the water safely, though with a great deal of shuddering, and the danger was past. To make the best--or the worst--of it, there were three men on the back of the boiler at the time, laying on the coat of magnesia, for it had not been erected many days. Although we gave them warning of the danger they took not the slightest notice, but kept working away, in a hurry to get the job done, for it was piecework. If the boiler had exploded, packed as it was with terrific pressure and priming furiously, they would have been blown to atoms.

The bold and daring of the shed indulge in many jeers and uncomplimentary remarks, if some others, in the face of real danger, should adopt precautionary measures and take heed of their safety, but experience has taught me that it is better to be apprehensive and cautious and to take pains to safeguard oneself than to score a cheap victory by bravado and carelessness. When danger threatens in the factory, the best course is to stand quite clear at all costs; it is then no shame to put into practice the words of the old proverb, slightly amended: "He that works and runs away will live to work another day." By far the greater proportion of the accidents that happen daily at the works are the direct result of inattention, of not taking notice of warnings uttered by others, and the failure to exercise the instinct of self-preservation natural to each individual. It is not that the men are absolutely careless of themselves; it is rather that the care they do take is not considerable or sufficient.

CHAPTER XI

FORGING AND SMITHING--HYDRAULIC OPERATIONS--"BALTIMORE"--"BLACK SAM"--"STRAWBERRY" AND GUSTAVUS--THE "FIRE KING"--"TUBBY "--BOLAND--PINNELL OF THE YANKEE PLANT

The drop-stamps and forgers, together with the plant known as the Yankee hammers--so called by reason of their having been introduced from the other side of the Atlantic--are the life and soul of the shed. The hydraulic machines, through their noiseless and almost tedious operation and the considerably less skill required on the part of the workmen in carrying out the various processes, are dull and tame in comparison with them. The steam-hammers, both by their noise, speed, and visible power and by the alertness and dexterity of the stampers and forgers, are certain to compel attention. There is a great fascination, too, in standing near the furnace and watching the sparkling, hissing ma.s.s of metal being withdrawn by the crane, or seeing the heated bars removed from the oil forge and clapped quickly on the steel dies to be beaten into shape. No one can withstand the attraction of the steam-hammers; even those who have spent a lifetime in the shed like to stand and watch the stampers and forgers at work.

Forging and smithing are, without doubt, the most interesting of all crafts in the factory; other machinery, however unique it may be, will not claim nearly as much attention. Visitors will pa.s.s by the most elaborate plant to stand near the steam-hammers, or to watch the smith weld a piece of iron on the anvil. The small boy who has just been initiated into the shed, the youth, the grown-up man, and the grey-haired veteran are bound to be attracted by the flas.h.i.+ng of the furnace and the white-hot metal newly brought out. They are greatly delighted, too, with the long, swinging blow of the forging hammers, or the short, sharp stroke of the stampers; to watch the metal being transposed and conforming to the pressure of the dies, to see the sparks shooting out in white showers, and the men sweating; to feel the earth shaking, and to hear the chains jingling, the steam hissing and roaring and the blows echoing like thunder all the time. To stand in the midst of it and view the whole scene when everything is in active operation is a wonderful experience, thrilling and impressive. You see the lines of furnaces and steam-hammers--there are fifteen altogether--with the monkeys travelling up and down continually and beating on the metal one against the other in utter disorder and confusion, the blazing white light cast out from the furnace door or the duller glow of the half-finished forging, the flames leaping and shooting from the oil forges, the clouds of yellow cinders blown out from the smiths' fires, the whirling wheels of the shafting and machinery between the lines and the half-naked workmen, black and bare-headed, in every conceivable att.i.tude, full of quick life and exertion and all in a desperate hurry, as though they had but a few more minutes to live. And what a terrific din is maintained! You hear the loud explosion of the oil and water applied for removing the scale and excrescence from the iron, the ring of the metal under the blows of the stampers or of the anvil under the sledge of the smiths, the simultaneous priming of the boilers, the horrible prolonged screeching of the steam-saw slowly cutting its way through the half-heated rail, the roaring blast, the bellowing furnace, the b.u.mping Ajax, the clanking cogwheels, the groaning shears, and a hundred other sounds and noises intermingled. There is the striker's hammer whirling round, this one pulling and heaving, the forgeman running out with his staff, the stamper twisting his bar over, the furnaceman charging in his fuel, the white slag running out in streams sparkling, spluttering, and crackling, the steam blown down from the roof through the open door, the thick dust, the almost visible heat, the black gloom of the roof and the clouds of smoke drifting slowly about, or hanging quite stationary like a pall, completely blotting out the other half of the shed, all which form a scene never to be forgotten by those who shall happen to have once viewed it.

The hydraulic work, on the other hand, though interesting, is not engrossing. There is a lack of life and animation in it; it is not stirring or dramatic. The huge "rams" of the presses, though capable of exerting a pressure equal to two hundred tons weight, descend very slowly; the quick, alert steam-hammer could strike at least ten or a dozen blows while the ram is once operating. So rapid is the blow of the steam-hammer that the pressure raised in the metal by the impact of the dies is often still unspent when the hammer rebounds, so that, as the dies separate, if the metal is very hot, it explodes and flies asunder.

The speed of the rebound may be gauged by the fact that the stamper can actually see the flow of metal in the dies from the blow after the hammer has left it. The metal, as the result of this, will frequently overflow the edge of the bottom die, and when the hammer descends again the top die will have to shear away a quarter, or half an inch.

It is instructive to note the effect of the blows on the hot metal.

Continual beating it will quickly raise the temperature of the iron or steel; I have many times raised the heat of a piece in operation from a dull yellow to a brilliant welding pitch during the delivery of three or four blows. Hammers have recently been invented that, with continually beating on cold metal, will make it sufficiently hot to allow of drawing and shaping; but though such machinery is interesting, it is not of much use for serious manufacture. Compressed air, directed on metal of a dull yellow heat, will soon considerably increase its temperature; you may easily burn a hole quite through a six-inch steel bloom by the method.

The flying of sparks through the air will greatly intensify their heat; after travelling a few yards they will become very dazzling and brilliant and explode like fireworks. Sometimes a piece of this superfluous metal, an ounce or more in weight, forced out from the die with the blow, will shear off and fly to a great distance--often as much as sixty or seventy yards. This, at the moment of leaving the die, may be no more than a dull yellow, but by the time it falls to the ground it will be intensely hot and will throw off a shower of hissing sparks. The shearing-off of the bur is a source of great danger to the workmen. I have several times been struck with pieces and been brought to the ground in consequence; the effect is almost as though you had been struck with a bullet from a gun.

Nothing of this kind is ever possible with the hydraulic machines. If a weld is to be made it must be performed with one stroke of the ram; after the top die leaves the metal it will be too cool to receive any benefit from a second application of the power. Welding by hand or steam power is always preferable to that performed by hydraulic action; a joint that is made with six or ten small quick blows will be far more effective and durable than where the iron has been simply squeezed together by one operation of the ram. As soon as the hydraulic dies meet the metal is considerably chilled. Instead of intensifying the heat, as in the case of the steam-hammer, the cold tools greatly lessen it. The weld, when made, will most certainly be short and brittle.

Some portion of the personnel of the shed has already been given, but of the hundred and fifty comprising the permanent staff of the place several are conspicuous among the rest for strangeness of habit, queer characteristics, or strong personality. The men are a mixture of many sorts and of several nationalities--English, Scotch, Welsh, and Irish.

There is the s.h.a.ggy-browed, fierce-looking son of Erin; the canny Scot from Motherwell over the border; the gruff and short-tempered old furnaceman from Dowlais; the doughty forger from Middlesborough; the cultured c.o.c.kney with his superb nasal tw.a.n.g; the Lancastrian with his picturesque brogue; a representative of distant Penzance; an ex-seaman, nicknamed "The Jersey Lily," from the Channel Islands, and those hailing from nearly every county in the Midlands and south of England, from "Brummagem Bill" to "Southampton Charlie." There are ex-soldiers and sailors with arms and b.r.e.a.s.t.s tattooed with birds, flowers, serpents, fair women and other emblems, and who have seen service in the East and West Indies, China, Egypt, or the Transvaal; those who constantly pride themselves on having once been in gentlemen's service--though they do not tell you how they came to leave it! butchers and bakers, professional football players, conjurers, bandsmen, and cheap-jacks.

"Baltimore" works the middle drop-stamp, about halfway up the shed, and, in the line of smaller steam-hammers opposite to him, toils a mulatto known to everyone about the place as "Black Sam," or "Sambo." They are old hands, having both come to the premises as boys, where they have since been, except for the time when "Balty" was absent for the annual training in the local Militia. It is not explained how he came to receive the nickname. Black Sam is so called from his very dark complexion, his short, black, curly hair and large, dark eyes. Baltimore is rather ordinary in appearance. His forehead is low, his cheek-bones high and his nose irregular. His lips are thick, he has a pointed chin and lantern jaws. He is of medium height, square and broad shouldered.

As he walks his shoulders sway to and fro and up and down, keeping time with his footsteps; he is exceedingly unmilitary both in physique and movement.

It was by reason of these characteristics that Baltimore obtained the attention of his shopmates. They all laughed rudely to see him in the old-time Militia uniform--scarlet tunic much too big, with regulation white belt, baggy trousers too long in the legs, heavy bluchers on the feet and, instead of the swagger headgear worn in the Service to-day, the old Scotch cap with long streamers behind and a little swis.h.i.+ng cane in the hand or under the arm. It is carefully handed down and pa.s.sed from one to the other that when Balty was at home on furlough all the small boys of the street would gather round him, sn.i.g.g.e.ring and jeering, and making fun of his cut and appearance, and it is said furthermore that he used very unceremoniously to drive them away with his cane crying--"Get out, you young varmints! 'Aven't you never seen a sojer before?" In the shed and at the furnace he continued to attract attention and be the subject of jocular remarks made by his workmates.

They never would take him seriously, not even though he came in time to work one of the biggest drop-stamps and be reckoned among the honourable company of forgers.

To all the superfluous attentions and mock regard of his fellow-mates Baltimore preserves a good-natured and even an indulgent att.i.tude; he is not at all disconcerted with their wit and sarcasm. Though not one of the most skilful of workmen, he is very shrewd and painstaking; his whole heart and soul are in the business. From morning till night he is toiling and sweating over his blooms and forgings, and when he is off the premises he is still concerned with his occupations at the hammer.

He will sometimes tell one of his mates how he lay awake the greater part of a night working out in his mind some problem connected with a difficult piece of forging and then came in the next morning and triumphantly finished the job.

Sambo's father was an army veteran, a sergeant, who took for his wife an Indian woman and became the parent of a family, of whom Samuel is the eldest. He is of medium height, thin, but very erect, with low shoulders and long neck. The forehead is sloping, the nose rather thick. He has large dark eyes with tremendous whites, short woolly hair, high cheekbones, skin very dark and sallow. The whole countenance is long and the head angular; he has the clear characteristics of the half-cast. The general opinion is that Sambo is out of place in the shed. He ought rather to have been trained for a life on the stage; without doubt he would have made a good pantomimist. Both his appearance and manner are comical; he causes everyone to smile by reason of his ludicrous expressions and grotesque facial contortions.

Sambo is quite aware of his own funniosity and readily lends himself to the amus.e.m.e.nt of the small fry that sometimes come to gaze upon him.

s.n.a.t.c.hing up a shovel, he claps it to his shoulder as though it were the traditional n.i.g.g.e.r's instrument and, rolling his eyes and turning up the whites of them, pretends to be fingering the banjo while he sings a few lines of the "Swanee River" or other c.o.o.n song. Sambo has always been the b.u.t.t of the rougher section in the shed and has been forced to suffer many indignities. It was a common thing for the bullies of the place to throw him on the ground and disgrace him. This they continued to do long after he had married and become the father of children.

Working just beyond Sambo, at the next furnace, is the very shadow of a man--a mere frame, a skeleton, which a good puff of wind might very likely throw down. He is stripped to the waist and hatless. His hair is long and it stands upright. His flannel s.h.i.+rt is thrown open; his trousers merely hang on him, and he is as black as a sweep with the smoke and grime of the furnace. This is "Strawberry," sometimes also known as "Gooseberry." His features are remarkably small and fine, and his neck is no bigger round than a span. He does not appear strong enough to do any work, but, for all that, he is very tough and wiry.

Many a one laughs at him and tells him that he is melting away "like a tallow candle," but he answers them all boldly and tells them, with a merry twinkle in his tiny dark eyes, that he is all right. "You look after yourself, mate, and don't fret about me," says he.

Strawberry was at one time a cobbler, and used to get his living by the patching up and renovation of old soles. Long after he entered the shed he kept up the employment in his spare time, but by and by he discontinued the work and betook himself to the more genteel though less lucrative pursuits of flute-playing and photography. For a time he donned uniform and played in the local band, and then, after a while, that had to be discontinued. Now all his thought and care is to take photographs and make models of steam-engines, magic lanterns and cinematographic instruments. Mounted on a cycle, and provided with a camera, he scours the country round at week-ends for customers and comes home and does the developing and printing on Sundays. He is thoroughly versed in time exposures and the various mysteries of photographic development. Wherever he goes he carries a book of instructions in his pocket, and if you stop to speak with him for a moment he is sure to tell you of some new lens or snap-shot arrangement he has lately made, or wearies you nearly to death with an attempted explanation of the compounds in his home-made developers--"Hypo-ta.s.sum" something or other, and the rest of it.

Another of Strawberry's hobbies is the blind poring over fusty books, several hundreds of years old, bought at auctions and usually fit for nothing but the fire or dust-heap. These he treasures with great care, and he is frequently trying to expound the contents of them to his workmates, and to any others who will suffer to listen to him for a few moments. His latest pa.s.sion is to seek out old caves, ruins and legendary sites; he is musician, artist, engineer, archaeologist and antiquarian combined. What he will become ultimately no one knows. I much fear, however, that he will suffer the furnaceman's fate in the end and perish of the smoke and heat of the fires.

Strawberry succeeded Gustavus, who died under very sad circ.u.mstances.

Poor Gus was most unfortunate, though such cases as his are not of uncommon occurrence. He had been through the war in South Africa, and had fought there for his country. He had not been long on the furnace.

His health was not good at the best of times. If regard for a man's health were had at the time of putting him on a job Gus would never have gone to the fires, but there is a ruthless, and very often a sinister, disregard of a man's physical condition when he is wanted to fill a difficult post. About a year before Gus's wife contracted milk fever, after confinement. This affected her reason and she had to be removed; her case was p.r.o.nounced hopeless--absolutely hopeless. This came as a great shock to Gus; there were five little children, all babies, one of them new-born. He had no friends to come and take care of them and he was poor--very poor. Accordingly, with a little a.s.sistance from the neighbour, he determined to look after them himself. The oldest boy prepared the meals by day; Gus saw to the general needs at night and did the was.h.i.+ng Sundays. Very soon one of the mites fell ill and had to go to the workhouse hospital. All the others but one suffered sickness, and Gus very soon followed suit. Worn out with the day's work at the furnace and obliged to toil and watch half the night over his infants, he soon fell a prey to ill-health, and was compelled to stop at home from work.

Then the little stinging insects of the shed began to cavil and sneer.

"He's oni shammin'. Ther's nothin' the matter wi' he. He's as well as I be. He oni wants to s.h.i.+rk the furnace. Kip un to't when a comes in." By and by Gus started work again, but not till the overseer had played a treacherous trick upon him and tried to have him rejected at the medical examination through an innocent and incautious remark he had chanced to let fall concerning himself. The fact of the matter was, Gus was a broken, ruined man. His general health was gone. His sight was failing; his const.i.tution was wrecked. For several weeks he dragged himself to work, in a last desperate effort to keep a home for his babes and supply them with food, though anyone might have seen that he was in positive torture all the while. At last he could bear up no longer. He came to work the fore part of the week, then stopped at home; in three days he was dead. His little boys and girls went to the workhouse, or to charities. One has to die before his mates in the shed think there is anything the matter with him. Then, in nine cases out of ten--especially if he happens to be one of the poorest and most unfortunate--he is mercilessly sneered over. Probably that was his own fault. They even blame him for dying; in three days he is almost totally forgotten. Cruel hearts and feelings are bred in the atmosphere of the factory.

There is one "Fire King" and only one; all the others are mere apprentices--n.o.bodies. He comes from "The Noth," from Middlesborough, of great iron fame. Without doubt he is a marvel. He is always talking about the "haats" they used to draw "way up there." It was prodigious.

There is nothing like it down south. "Wales! I tell you Wales is a dung-hill; they can't do it for nuts." He looks at you with inexpressible scorn. Then he plunges the bar into the furnace hole and stirs up the coals, "stops up" again, peers through the iron door and comes back mopping his face with the wiper. "I tell you tha be a lot o'

cow-bangers about here. Tha never sin a furnace nor a haat afore. When I was at Sunderland"--here he gives an especially knowing wink, and scratches one side of his nose with his forefinger, drawing his head near to your ear and speaking in an undertone--"when I was at Sunderland, though I says it myself, there wasn't a man on the ground as could hold a candle to Phil Clegg. The manager allus used to stop and talk to me about the haats, and slip a crown piece into mi hand for a drink. 'Clegg,' says he, 'I've learned from you what I never knew before.'" All this is accepted with reserve in the shed. It may or may not have been true; one is not compelled to believe all the extraordinary reports circulated by the forgers and furnacemen.

Some years ago the doughty one was set to do some initial forging in steel blooms and spoiled three parts of the material by overheating.

"Bad steel! d.a.m.n bad steel! 't.w.u.n.t stand a bit o' haat," said he. The matter was accordingly reported to the managers, and word was sent to the firm that had manufactured the blooms--"Bad steel! Bad steel!"

pa.s.sed all along the line. Then the manufacturers' representative came to inspect the process and to report upon the quality of the metal. The Fire King sc.r.a.ped his leg and scratched his nose and talked much of "kimicals," winking at his mates and getting his metal to a fizzing heat. "Too hot, too hot," said the representative. "Aye! man, but we must get it so hot or the hammer wunt bate it down," the Fire King replied. "Get a heavier hammer," said the inspector, touching the spot immediately, and walking off in disgust. The steel was all right, it was merely overheated. Thereafter the Fire King's prestige visibly diminished. He became the scorn of the furnaces; he was humbled and disgraced for ever. He was subsequently put in charge of the damping-up of the furnaces, and he styled himself foreman of the night s.h.i.+ft there, which was one, besides himself.

After all, "Tubby" is the best furnaceman. He hails from Wales, "the true old country, where the men comes from," according to him. Tubby is short, fat and round, about the size of a thirty-six barrel, and he is extremely short-legged. His head is quite bald and s.h.i.+nes well. His features are regular and well-formed. He has an aristocratic nose, thick neck, and shoulders shapeless with fat. At the fire he strips off his outer s.h.i.+rt and only retains his flannel vest. The sleeves of this are cut short to the shoulders and it is fastened at the neck by means of strings threaded with a bodkin. He drinks an enormous quant.i.ty of cold water, and it is singular that he never uses a cup but swallows it from the large two-gallon pot. To this habit he attributes his uncommonly good health and fine proportions.

He is a genius at the fire. Whether the furnace be in a good or bad condition he will soon have it as radiant as a star, and he is marvellously cool at it. His speech has a strongly Welsh accent and he talks with great rapidity, especially when he happens to become excited.

At such times it is difficult to understand him; he pours out his words and sentences like a cataract.