COLD AND HEAT — MEALS — FAT AND LEAN WORKMEN — WAYS AND MEANS — PRANKS — ALL FOOLS’ DAY — NEW YEAR’S EVE

Two kinds of weather go hard with the toilers in the shed; they are — extreme cold and extreme heat. When it is very cold in the winter the men will be subjected to a considerable amount of draught from the doors and roof; on one side they will be half-baked with the heat, and on the other chilled nearly to the bone. The furnacemen and stampers will be drenched with perspiration day after day, in the coldest weather. When they leave the shed to go home at meal-times and at night they will run great risks of taking cold; it is no wonder that cases of rheumatism and lumbago are very common among those who toil at the furnaces and forges. The workmen, for the most part, wear the same clothes all the year round, winter and summer; they make no allowance for cold and heat with warm or thin clothing.

Very few wear overcoats, or even mufflers, in the coldest weather, unless it is wet. They are often numbed with the cold, for they feel it severely, and they commonly run up the long yard in order to keep themselves warm in frosty weather on their return to the shed after meals. If you ask them why they do not wear a cravat or muffler they tell you it is “no good to coddle yourself up too much, for the more clothes you wear the more you will want to wear.” A great many — of the town workmen especially — do not possess an overcoat of any kind. Whatever the weather may be they journey backwards and forwards quite unprotected. I have known men come to the shed drenched to the skin, many a time, and be forced to work in that condition while the garments were drying on their backs. Now and then, though not often, a bold and hardy workman will remove his shirt or trousers and stand and dry them at the furnace door. If he does this he is certain to be shied at and made the target for various lumps of coke and coal. Amusement is sometimes caused by the shirt taking fire; I have more than once seen a workman reduced to the necessity of borrowing an overcoat to wrap around him in lieu of upper garments. Sometimes the clothes of half the gang are set alight with sparks from the hammers, and burnt to ashes.

The heat of the summer months, for those who toil at the furnaces and forges, is far more painful to endure than are all the inconveniences of cold weather. This is especially the case in close and stuffy sheds where there is a defective system of ventilation, or where the workshop is surrounded by other buildings. The interior of these places will be like a hot oven; it will be impossible for the workmen to maintain any degree of strength and vigour at their labour. In the early morning, before eight o’clock, the air will be somewhat cooler, but by the time of re-starting, after breakfast, the heat will be deadly and overpowering; the temperature in front of the furnaces will be considerably over 100 degrees. Where there is a motion of air the workmen can stand a great amount of heat on all sides, but when that is quite stagnant, and thick and heavy with the nauseous smoke and fumes from the oil forges, it is positively torturous. The exigencies of piecework will admit of no relaxation, however; approximately the same amount of work must be made on the hottest day of summer as on the coldest day of winter.

There is one inevitable result of all this — the work made under such conditions will be inferior in quality, for the men cannot spend the time they should over the hot metal. If you stand and watch the stampers you will see, from their very movements, how wretchedly tired and languid they are; one-half of them are scarcely able to drag their weary limbs backwards and forwards — they are truly objects of misery. At the same time, they do not complain, for that would be fruitless, and they know it. Lost to everything but the sense of their own inexpressible weariness, with grim necessity at their elbows, they spend their last effort on the job, having no interest available for the work, only longing for the next hooter to sound and give them a temporary rest. Those who work out of doors in the extreme heat of the sun, though they perspire much, yet have pure air to breathe, so that there will be a minimum of fatigue resulting from it. In the dust and filth of the shed, however, the perspiration costs very much more. It seems drawn from the marrow of your bones; your very heart’s blood seems to ooze out with it.

The change from cold to heat, and also the shifting of the wind, is immediately felt in the shed; there is no need of a weather-vane to inform you of the wind’s direction. Even when there is air moving, only one half of the place will benefit from it. Entering the shed at one end, it will pile up all the smoke and fume at the other. This, instead of passing out, will whirl round and round in an eddy, and tease and torment the workmen, making them gasp for breath.

The toilers have resort to various methods in order to mitigate the heat during the summer months. The furnacemen, stampers, and forgers usually remove their shirts altogether, and discard their leathern aprons for those made of light canvas, or old rivet bags. The amount of cold water drunk at such times is enormous. It is useless to advise the men to take it in moderation: “I don’t care, I must have it,” is the answer made. Occasionally the officials issue oatmeal from the stores, to be taken with the water. This removes the rawness from the liquid, and makes it much more palatable, and less harmful to the stomach. The boys are especially fond of the mixture; they would drink it by the bucketful, and swallow grouts and all. They do not believe in wasting anything obtained gratis from the company.

One plan, in very hot weather, is to wrap a wet towel or wiper about the head, cooling it now and then with fresh water. Some hold their heads and faces underneath the tap and let the cool water run upon them; and others engage their mates to squirt it in their faces instead. Such as do this tie an apron close around the neck under the chin, and receive the volume of water full in the face. It is delicious, when you are baked and half-choked with the heat in midsummer, to go to the big tap under the wall and receive the cold water on the inside part of the arm, just below the shoulder, allowing it to run down and flow off the finger tips. This is very cooling and refreshing, and is a certain restorative.

Now and then, during the meal-hour, a hardy workman will strip himself and bathe in the big bosh used for cooling the furnace tools. In the evening, after a hard sweating at the fires, many of the young men will pay a visit to the baths in the town. Little Jim and his mates, who have no coppers to squander upon the luxury of a dip under cover, betake themselves to the clay-pits in a neighbouring brick-field. There they dive down among the fishes and forget about the punishment they have suffered to-day, and which is certainly awaiting them on the morrow.

The majority of the workmen go out of the sheds to have their food. In very many workshops they are not permitted, under any consideration, to remain in to meals. On the score of health this is as it should be; it forces the workman, whether he likes it or not, to breathe a little fresh air. It also removes him from his surroundings for the time, and affords him some refreshment in that way. The sheds in which the men are allowed to have their meals unmolested are the smiths’ shops, the steam-hammer shops, and the rolling mills shed. In all these places the men perspire considerably, and they would be very liable to take a chill, especially in the winter months, if they were forced to go out into the cold air to meals. Mess-rooms are provided for the men of some shops, and tea is brewed and food cooked for as many as like to repair to them. Very many will not patronise them, however, because they do not like eating their food in public; they say it is “like being among a lot of cattle.” Such as these take their food in their hand and eat it as they walk about, or perhaps they visit a coffee tavern or an inn of the town. During fine weather a large number have their meals in the recreation field underneath the trees. Their little sons or daughters bring the food from home, with hot tea in a mug or bottle, and meet them outside the entrances. Then they sit down together in the shade of the elm-trees and enjoy the repast.

The forgers and furnacemen do not eat much food in the shed during the summer months. The heat of the fires and the fumes from the oil furnaces impair their appetites, and large quantities of bread and other victuals are thrown out in the yard for the rats and birds. Rooks and sparrows are the only regular feathered inhabitants of the yard, if, indeed, the rooks can be so called, for they have their nests a long way off. They merely obtain their food about the yard during the day and go home to bed at night. The sparrows build their nests almost anywhere, though their favourite place seems to be in the sockets made in the walls for containing the lamp brackets. As the lamps are removed during the summer months, the holes afford a convenient resting-place for the ubiquitous passeres.

No starlings frequent the yard; they prefer a quieter and more natural habitation. A robin, even, is an unusual visitor, while martins and swallows never visit the precincts of the factory. The sweet chelidon — the darling stranger from the far-off shores of the blue Mediterranean — shuns the unearthly noise and smother of the factory altogether; her delight is in places far removed from the whirling of wheels and the chu-chuing of engines.

The rooks seem perfectly inured to the smoke and steam and the life of the factory yard; at all hours of the day they may be seen scavenging around the sheds, picking up any stray morsel that happens to be lying about. Four of these frequent the yard regularly. Summer and winter they are to be seen strutting up and down over the ashes of the track, or perched upon the tops of the high lamps. Once, during a gale, I saw a rook try to alight upon the summit of a lamp, eighty feet high — on the small curved iron stay that crowns the whole like a bow. Although it secured a footing on the top, it could not balance itself to rest there, but was forced to keep its two wings entirely expanded in order to maintain any equilibrium at all. This it did for nearly two minutes, but the force of the wind was so great that it could not keep its balance and was presently blown away. To view it there, with wings outstretched, brought to mind a bird of a much nobler reputation than that of Master Rook; it was worthy of the traditions of the eagle.

It is instructive to note the various types of men and to consider how they compare with one another. Big, fat workmen invariably make better mates than do small, thin ones. Their temper is certain to be more genial, and they are usually more open and simple, hearty and free; everything with them, to use a time-honoured phrase, seems to go “as easy as an old cut shoe.” Even CÆsar, though very thin himself, wished to have about him men who were fat and sleek — he was suspicious of the lean and hungry-looking Cassius. Fat workmen, as a rule, seem incapable of much worry. If anything goes amiss they look upon it with the greatest unconcern and lightly brush it aside, while the thin, small individual is forever fretting and grieving over some trivial thing or other. It is noteworthy that hairy men, as well as being considerably stronger, are usually better-tempered than are those who are lacking in this respect. The little person is proverbially vain and conceited and “thinks great things” of himself, as the Greeks would have said, while the words of the old rhyme are uniformly true and applicable: —

Small pride is discovered in the individual of sixteen or seventeen stone weight. Nor are size and bulk in a workman always indicative of the greatest prowess. Very many men of no more than five feet or less in stature, and of correspondingly small proportions, are veritable lions in strength.

Of all styles of workmen soever the dandy, or, as he is vulgarly called, the “swanker,” is usually the least proficient at his trade. There is another who would delight to stand with his hands behind him, or perhaps to walk about like it: he is certain to be of the self-conscious type, one not extra fond of making unnatural exertions. This one, whenever an opportunity presents itself, would stand with his thumbs thrust in the arm-holes of his waistcoat and complacently look upon all around him; you may know him for one who would rather see you do a job than do it himself. That one yonder is fond of standing with his arms folded, and another would thrust his hands deep into his trousers pockets at every stray opportunity. Such as these may come in time to draw as much wages as the best workmen on the premises, or they may even obtain more, but they will never be experts themselves; they are too choice, and too dilatory. Your capital workman never adopts any of these attitudes. Walking or standing, pausing, resting, or viewing any other operation, his hands are down by his sides — free, and in the most advantageous position for rendering assistance to himself, or to others, as the case may be.

The men of one department or shed — except in the case of a fire — never help those of another, no matter how great the difficulty may be, unless they have been officially lent, and this is of extremely rare occurrence. One might think that where two sheds stand side by side, help would occasionally be given, when it was required, but such is the condition of things, and so rigid is the system imposed at the works, that this is completely out of the question. The men of two contingent sheds, though they may have been working close together for twenty or thirty years, are almost total strangers. They may see each other now and then, and recognise one another by sight, but they do not think of exchanging conversations.

There is one matter, however, in which, notwithstanding the many facilities at hand for perfect equipment, the works resembles most other establishments, and that is in the frequently defective supply of proper tools for the workmen and the too great tendency to use anything that may be lying about for a makeshift. When I came into the factory as a boy I expected to find everything of this sort in perfect arrangement. In the rough and ready trade of agriculture I had been accustomed to making the best use of old, worn-out tools. The farmer, if he is not blessed with abundant capital, is often forced to have recourse to crude means and expedients in order to tide himself over a difficulty. He must bind up this and patch that, and sometimes set his men to work with tackle that is broken and antiquated. One looks for this, naturally, out on the farm, and is surprised if he does not find it so. But in the factory, thought I, there will be none of it. I supposed that all the machinery would be in perfect trim, that tools would be very plentiful and of the best description, and that everything would be ordered for the men’s convenience in order to expedite the work.

A short acquaintance with matters in the shed soon dispelled this illusion, however. I found that the same condition of things obtained in the factory as was the case on the far away, deserted farm. There something ailed the chaffcutter, the mowing- or reaping-machine, the plough, the elevator, or the horse-rake. Some links were missing from the traces and had to be replaced with stout wire; many things were in use that were heavy, cumbersome, and primitive. Here something is wrong with the steam-hammer, drill, lathe, or hydraulic machine. The wheel-barrows are broken, the shovels are without handles, the besoms are worn out; hammers and chisels, tongs, sets, and other tools are almost as scarce as pound pieces. You seldom have any decent tools to work with unless you can make them yourself, or pay the smith for doing it out of your own pocket. Then, in nine cases out of ten, if the machinery breaks down, the same means are resorted to as were adopted by the farmer or haulier; any patching up will do until such time as someone or other can make it convenient to carry out the necessary repairs. As long as the parts hang together and the wheels go round, that will be considered sufficient. This kind of procedure, in the case of a farmer or other, who has no very great convenience for equipping himself with every desirable apparatus, may be condoned, but in a large and professedly up-to-date factory there is no excuse at all for it — it is pure misdemeanour and slovenliness.

Many pranks are played upon one another by the workmen, though it is significant of the times that skylarking and horse-play are not nearly as common and frequent as they were formerly. The supervision of the sheds is much more strict, and the prices are considerably lower than they used to be; there is not now the time and opportunity, nor even the inclination to indulge in practical jokes. Under the new discipline the men are generally more sober and silent, though they are none the happier, nevertheless. The increased efforts they are bound to make at work and the higher speed of the machinery has caused them to become gloomy and unnatural, and, very often, peevish and irritable. It is a further illustration of the old adage —

There is one matter for congratulation, however, and that is that the youngsters are not to be deprived of their sports and amusements on any pretext whatever. Though you set them to do almost impossible tasks they will find the time and the means to exercise their natural propensity to playfulness.

It is a bad sign when there is a total absence of play in the shed. It is bad for the individual and for the men collectively; it indicates too great a subjection to working conditions — the subjugation of inherent nature. It is of far greater value and importance to mankind that spirit and character should be cherished and maintained, than that the trifling and petty rules of the factory should be scrupulously observed and adhered to. At the same time, no sane person would recommend that an unrestricted liberty be allowed the workmen. There is bound to be a certain amount of law and order, but where everything is done at the piece rate and the firm is not in a position to lose on the bargain, it is stupid obstinately to insist upon the observance of every little rule laid down. Piece-rated men seldom or never work at a perfectly uniform speed; there are dull and intensely active periods depending sometimes upon the physical condition of the workman and sometimes upon the quality known as “luck” in operation. Give the workman his head and he will fashion out his own time-table, he will speedily make up for any losses he has incurred before. The feeling of fitness is bound to come; he revels in the toil while it possesses him. There never was, and there never will be, a truly mechanical man who shall work with the systematical regularity of a clock or steam-engine; that is beyond all hope and reason, beyond possibility and beyond nature. What is more, it is absolutely unnecessary and undesirable. One prank that used to be greatly in vogue in the shed was that of inserting a brick in the sleeve of a workmate’s jacket as it was hanging up underneath the wall or behind the forge. This was sometimes done for pure sport, though occasionally there was more than a spice of malice in the jest. Perhaps the owner of the garment had been guilty of an offence, of tale-bearing, or something or other to the prejudice of his fellow-mates, and this was the means adopted for his punishment. Accordingly, a large brick was quietly dropped into the sleeve from inside the shoulder and well shaken down to the cuff, and the jacket was left hanging innocently in its position. At hooter time all those in the secret congregated and waited for the victim of the joke to come for his coat. Suddenly, as the hooter sounded, he rushed up in a great hurry, seized his coat and discovered the impediment, while all the others speedily decamped. He had considerable difficulty in dislodging the brick from the sleeve. After trying in vain for ten minutes or more he was usually forced to cut away the sleeve, or the lining, with his pocket-knife.

Another favourite trick was to place some kind of seat under a wall in order to entice the unwary, and to fix up above it a large tin full of soot, so arranged as to work on a pivot, and operated by means of a string. The soot was also sometimes mixed with water, and stirred up so as to make an intensely black fluid. By and by an unsuspecting workman — usually an interloper from the yard or elsewhere — would come along and sit down upon the improvised seat. Very soon one of the gang shouted out “Hey up!” sharply, and as the victim jumped up someone pulled the string and down came soot, water, and very often the pot, too, upon his head. If the joke was successful the dupe’s face was as black as a sweep’s; a loud roar of laughter went up from the workmen and the unhappy victim very quickly got outside. Sometimes, however, he did not take it so quietly, and I have seen a free fight as the outcome of this adventure.

The water-pipe plays a great part in practical joking in the shed, though this is more usually the juvenile’s method of perpetrating a jest or paying off an old score. There is also the water-squirt, which is another juvenile weapon. It is sufficient to say that the use of this, whenever it is detected, is rigidly put down by the workmen themselves; it is universally looked upon as a nuisance. Great injuries to health have been done, in some cases, by senseless practical joking with the water-pipe. I have known instances in which a workman has thrust the nose of a pipe up the trouser leg of another as he lay asleep on the floor in the meal-hour, during night duty, and he has been awakened by it to find himself quite drenched with the stream of water and most wretchedly cold. One lad, who used to drive the steam-hammer for me, was often treated to this by some roughs of the shed, and, as a consequence, was afflicted with chronic rheumatism. Finally he had to stop away from work altogether, and he lay as helpless as a child for nine years, with all his joints stiff and set, and died of the torture.

There is a touch of humour in the situation sometimes, however, as when, for instance, upon breaking up for the Christmas holidays, a group of workmen were singing “Let some drops now fall on me,” and a wag, in the middle of the hymn, shot a large volume of water over them from the hose-pipe. Another trick is to fill a thin paper bag with water and throw it from a distance. If it happens to strike its object the bag bursts, and the individual forming the target receives a good wetting.

All Fools’ Day is sure to be the occasion for many jokes of a suitable kind. A common one at this time is to take a coin and solder it to the head of a nail, and then to drive the nail into the sill of a door, or into the floor in a well-frequented spot where it is bound to be noticed. As soon as it is spied efforts will certainly be made to detach the coin, and, in the midst of it, the party of youths who prepared the trap rush forward and bowl the other over on the floor, at the same time greeting him with boisterous laughter and jeers. Even the chief manager of the works’ department has been the victim of this jest. In this case an old sixpence was strongly soldered to the nail, which was then well driven into the floor. Presently the manager came along, saw the coin, and made several attempts to pick it up. It needs not to be said that the jest itself was witnessed in respectful silence; the bowling over a chief might have been attended with certain undesirable consequences.

New Year’s Eve was always suitably observed and celebrated by those on the night-shift. When the men came in to work they set about their toils with extra special celerity, and the steam-hammers thumped away with all possible power and speed. This effort was maintained till towards midnight, and then everyone slowed down. At about one o’clock a general cessation of hostilities took place. The steam-hammers were silenced, the fires were damped, and the tools were thrown on one side. All that could be heard was the continual “chu-chu” of the engine outside forcing the hydraulic pumps, and the exhaust of the donkey engine whirling the fan. In one corner of the shed a large coal fire was kindled on the ground, and around it were placed seats for the company. Then an inventive and musical-minded workman stretched a rope across from the principals and came forward with two sets of steel rods, of various lengths and thicknesses, and capable of emitting almost any note in the scale. These were tied about with twine and suspended from the rope in a graduated order, from the shortest to the longest. Someone else fetched a big brass dome from a worn-out boiler, while others had brought several old buffers from the scrap waggon. Two were trained to strike the rods, and the others were instructed to beat on the dome and buffers.

Shortly before midnight, when the bells in the town and the far-off villages began to peal out, the workmen commenced their carnival. Bells were perfectly imitated by striking the bars of steel suspended from the rope; the buffers contributed their sharp, clear notes, and the brass dome sounded deeply and richly. This was called “Ringing the changes.” When the noise had been continued for a sufficient length of time food was brought out and the midnight meal partaken of. Although strictly against the rules of the factory, someone or other would be sure to have smuggled into the shed a bottle or jar of ale; this would be passed round and healths drunk with great gusto. When supper was over a melodeon or several mouth-organs were produced, and selections were played for another hour. After that the majority had a nap; they seldom started work any more that morning. The foremen and watchmen were usually missing on New Year’s Eve, or if they should happen to arrive upon the scene they never interfered. For once in their lives they, too, became human, and accepted the situation, and perhaps the old watchman sat down with the men and drank out of their bottle and afterwards puffed away at his pipe. If the high officials at the works had only known of what was going on at the time they would have sacked half the men the next day, but even they, sharp as they are, do not get intelligence of everything.

All this happened some twenty years ago and would not be possible to-day. The shed in which it took place has been deserted by the forgers and transformed into a storehouse for manufactures. The kindly disposed old watchmen are dead, or have been superseded, and a new race of foremen has sprung up. Of the workmen some are dead and others have retired. A great number are missing, and many of those who remain have altered to such an extent under the new conditions that I have sometimes wondered whether they are really the same who worked the night shift and jested with us in the years ago. So striking is the change that has taken place, not only in the administration, but in the very life and temper of the men of the factory during the last decade.