“Don’t tell me, sir, that it is not true! Don’t tell me!”
“I am not telling you anything; for the plain reason, that I have nothing to tell. I only want to ask you one or two things, as you seem to know so much more than we do. Pray what have the masters combined for just now?”
“To lower our wages, to be sure.”
“And yet Mortimer pays one rate, and I another, and Elliott another. Why don’t I ask as much labour for my money as Mortimer?”
“You dare not,” cried Clack.
“You know it’s not fair,” said Taylor.
“You are not the man to grind the poor,” said Gibson.
“You have not hit it, any of you. You all seem to think it is a matter of pure choice with us, what wages we give.”
“To be sure,” said Clack, “and that is the reason we want parliament to settle the matter at once and for ever.”
“Parliament has no more choice in the matter than we masters,” drily observed Mr. Wentworth. “If ever Parliament passes a Bill to regulate wages, we must have a rider put to it to decree how much rain must fall before harvest.”