“You’re tired, Sam,” said his little wife anxiously.
“Well, I am a bit. It’s no wonder, for it’s a pretty hard job to work them levers for twelve hours at a stretch without an interval, even for meals, but I’m gittin’ used to it—like the eels to bein’ skinned.”
“It’s a great shame of the Company,” cried Mrs Natly with indignation.
“Come, come,” cried Sam, “no treason! It ain’t such a shame as it looks. You see the Company have just bin introducin’ a noo system of signallin’, an’ they ha’n’t got enough of men who understand the thing to work it, d’ye see; so of course we’ve got to work double tides, as the Jack-tars say. If they continue to keep us at it like that I’ll say it’s a shame too, but we must give ’em time to git things into workin’ order. Besides, they’re hard-up just now. There’s a deal o’ money throw’d away by companies fightin’ an’ opposin’ one another—cuttin’ their own throats, I calls it—and they’re awful hard used by the public in the way o’ compensation too. It’s nothin’ short o’ plunder and robbery. If the public would claim moderately, and juries would judge fairly, an’ directors would fight less, shareholders would git higher dividends, the public would be better served, and railway servants would be less worked and better paid.”
“I don’t care two straws, Sam,” said little Mrs Natly with great firmness, “not two straws for their fightin’s, an’ joories, and davydens—all I know is that they’ve no right whatever to kill my ’usband, and it’s a great shame!”
With this noble sentiment the earnest little woman concluded the evening’s conversation, and allowed her wearied partner to retire to rest.