"'I am sure I don't know. What are you talking about? I never read such things. All I want to know is for what purpose the bridge is to be erected, and whether it is to be coursed work, ashlar, or the same as the others, and up it goes according to my specification. I'm above other people's specifications, thank you. What's the use of my education if I am not? Do you think the alphabet must be again taught me?'
"'I beg pardon, partner, you are right; but appearances go a long way, and shamming is fashionable.'
"'Oh, well, have your way; we all look better when we are properly clothed; and I once heard an engineer say he never felt right when on any works without a plan in his hand, and we know a music-hall singer is generally not at home without a hat; besides, it will please them to see we have the specification always on the premises.'
"'That is what I think.'
"Well, I made two copies of it, one for Joe, my partner then, and one for me, and wrote in large letters on the top, 'Specification—masonry —bridges and culverts.' Then we both showed the top out of our pockets, with that writing on it, in the same way the director did his cheque-book. It worked beautifully; for a few days after a big engineer came down, and we heard he had said he thought we were the smartest masons on the work, and he was pleased to see we appeared careful to comply with the specification, for he noticed we each had a copy in our pockets.
"The fun was, my partner had never read it at all; I only when copying.
"The game worked really lovely; we were looked upon as downright straight ones, and the inspector—who wanted some dodging, I can tell you, as well as a tip, now and again—was taken away and posted at the other end of the work, and then we made hay while the sun shone, and no mistake. We used to make the bridges rise out of the ground; we gave some drink to our chaps; and then, as soon as the wagons with the rock arrived from the cutting, in it went. The difficulty was to keep the face going fast enough for the filling-in work. It was a game. First a wagon-load of rock, and then—well, I suppose I must say—the mortar, but it is squeezing the truth very hard indeed. There was Joe, my partner, superintending in his own style, the raking and mortar business, and I was busy at the facework looking after our best mason.
"Give my partner his due, he was always careful about bond and throughs, and he was fond of mixing up the flat stones a bit, for he said it prevented their sliding on the beds, and always maintained that the weight above kept all tight enough and more than the mortar, so long as the stones were flat and large. I said, it's lucky it did.
"One day he frightened me. We were short of stone, owing to a mistake in the cutting, and so the facework was up a good height. At last Joe caught sight of the engine and wagons coming round the hill, and said to me—
"'Hold hard, here they come, thirteen wagons; they will fill you up both sides.'