"You've all been hearing a lot o' sensible words spoke this evening. More sensible by a long chalk than some as I've heard spoke other evenings. Werry good, so far! But it won't do to end with talk, lads; you've got to make up your minds for to act."
"Just you let me say first of all that I takes it this here is a conversational sort of a meetin' like, an' if any man don't agree with what's said, he's free to say so."
If this was a clever dodge of Stuckey's, to cover a sudden confusion of ideas, consequent on his unaccustomed position, it proved successful. Up started two or three men, and two or three voices cried—
"Got to act how? What action? Put it plain, Stuckey."
"Well, if ye wants me to be the mouthpiece of the meeting, I'll put it plain an' no mistake," said Stuckey. "Ye've got to consider these here proposals, and to answer them. Ye've got to settle whether ye'll say 'yes,' and go back to your work; or whether you give up, once an' for all. For mind ye, they ain't going to shilly-shally. There's work to be done, and if you won't do it, somebody else will. Yes—furriners, maybe—" in response to a general groan.
"It's no manner o' use to howl, boys! Howlin' won't stop 'em. I'm not especial fond o' furriners; no more than yourselves; but I hopes I've got a bit o' common' sense; and I do see that. If Englishmen won't work, furriners will. There's where it is. And it ain't likely the masters 'll keep the works all idle just as long as you choose, if others is willing to come and work. I wouldn't, if I was a master; nor none of you wouldn't, if you was masters. It's common-sense, lads."
"But the masters is willin' to come half-way to you, if you'll go half-way to them. That's reasonable, that is! As fair an end to a quarrel as can be; each side a-going half-way to meet the other. You wouldn't have all the givin' in on one side, would you? Leastways, save and except the wrong was all o' one side, which is a most uncommon state of affairs."
"Now I wouldn't go for to say in this here strike which side's been most wrong, nor which has been most right. Ain't no doubt it's been a half-and-half concern, right and wrong mixed up o' both sides like the plums an' suet in a pudden'. There's been mistakes, and there's been misunderstandings, and there's been a lot of hard words, not to speak of hard blows; and some o' you's misbehaved yourselves, an' forgotten your manliness, lads, for all Mr. Pope's so fond o' telling ye what a set of manly chaps ye be. It is forgetting your manliness, and it's acting like miserable curs an' sneaks, to set upon an innocent man in the dark, 'cause he don't see things just as you see 'em! An' you all know among yourselves whether there hasn't been some'at o' that sort going on, once and agin. But, howsoever, let's hope we won't have nothin' o' the sort agin, nor Englishmen forgetting they're men."
"Nor I won't go for to say as the masters is altogether right. For why? I ain't sure about it. Uncommon pleasant-spoken gentlemen they is, an' you knows it, an' ready to do a kindness any day. But there's a law of love and kindness, men, an' a law of thinking for others afore a man's own pocket; an' I shouldn't wonder if that 'ere law of Christian love don't always reign in the hearts of masters towards their men, no more than it always reigns in the hearts o' the men towards the masters. Eh, lads! I wonder now, I do, which is fittest to fling a stone at the other, for t'other's want of loving-kindness!"
"Well, now, to be werry plain indeed, an' to come to the p'int—my advice to you is,—End the strike! Accept these here proposals!"