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"It's a very true word, Master Nixon, and by this token that when we went to play in 28, and the masters said they would meet us; what did they do but walk about the ground and speak to the butties. The butties has their ear."
In a low dark room, dimly lighted that evening by wick-and-saucer butties, squatted, lay, sat, stood and sprawled a curious collection of scoundrels.
Morel, as master of the house, sat in his armchair, with his back to the hot fire. The two butties had cooler seats. None of them counted the money. "What did we say Simpson's was?" asked Morel; and the butties cavilled for a minute over the dayman's earnings. Then the amount was put aside. "An' Bill Naylor's?" This money also was taken from the pack.
Women were not supposed to spy into such a masculine privacy as the butties' reckoning, nor were they to know the exact amount of the week's earnings. So, whilst her father was spluttering in the scullery, Annie went out to spend an hour with a neighbour. Mrs. Morel attended to her baking. "Shut that doo-er!" bawled Morel furiously. Annie banged it behind her, and was gone.
"Mebbe you-aw wight, cap'n. 'Best look at a bull ov-ah a fence, as they say in the Canny Toon. Eh, but I'll have a fine tale to tell when next I meet my butties on the Quay-side. Did ye ev-ah see such faces as yon, all daubed wi' black an' white! Talk about Chirgwin " Courtenay smiled and passed on. He was in no mood for jesting: the death of the Chilean fireman had damped his high spirits.
"Well, for my part," said the crone, "meat's my grievance: all the best bits go to the butties, and the pieces with bone in are chopped off for the colliers' wives." "Dame, when will the door open?" asked a very little palefaced boy. "I have been here all this morn, and never broke my fast." "And what do you want, chilt?"
The butties that knock about the poor collier-boys; and the nailers that file off their lads' noses and hammer their fingers; and all the master sweeps, like my master Grimes? I saw him fall into the water long ago; so I surely expected he would have been here. I'm sure he was bad enough to me."
Add to all these causes of suffering and discontent among the workmen the apprehension of still greater evils and the tyranny of the butties or middlemen, and it will with little difficulty be felt that the public mind of this district was well-prepared for the excitement of the political agitator, especially if he were discreet enough rather to descant on their physical sufferings and personal injuries than to attempt the propagation of abstract political principles, with which it was impossible for them to sympathise with the impulse and facility of the inhabitants of manufacturing towns, members of literary and scientific institutes, habitual readers of political journals and accustomed to habits of discussion of all public questions.
Then he began to mend. And then, knowing he was going to get better, the whole family sighed with relief, and proceeded to live happily. They were not badly off whilst Morel was in the hospital. There were fourteen shillings a week from the pit, ten shillings from the sick club, and five shillings from the Disability Fund; and then every week the butties had something for Mrs.
She apologetically continued to Margaret, 'He's always mithering me for "daddy" and "butty;" and I ha' no butties to give him, and daddy's away, and forgotten us a', I think. He's his father's darling, he is, said she, with a sudden turn of mood, and, dragging the child up to her knee, she began kissing it fondly. Margaret laid her hand on the woman's arm to arrest her attention. Their eyes met.
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