Emma Leslie

“ That there will, my lass, and a mighty stir too before we get all we want. But, as our Winny says, the first thing is to get the men to think alike about what they want."
"But there won't be a strike?" said poor Mrs. Chaplin with a shiver. She knew by bitter experience what a strike meant, what hunger and cold, what a giving up of treasured household goods, and the desolate homes that it left behind.
"We won't have no strike if we can help it. ”

“ Chaplin could not or would not see that there was any need for such a sacrifice as this. Annie Brown was nothing to them. A rude rough girl at the best, who had got herself into trouble through her uncontrolled temper; why should Winny give up her chance of health for a girl like this? If she had been a gentle, respectable girl, who went to Sunday-school, and behaved herself in a proper manner, there might be some reason in Winny giving up to her if she had happened to need it more than herself, but as it was, the notion was altogether most foolish. ”

“ The next day, the men came out of the other docks, or refused to go in, and the stevedores—the skilled packers who alone knew how to stow a ship's cargo properly—followed the labourers, declaring they would not work until the poor dockers' demands were granted.
"We shall win now, mother, in less than a week," said Chaplin running home to his wife with the news of this piece of self-denial on the part of men who were well able to help themselves.
Winny clasped her hands and tears of joy stood in her eyes as she said, "We shall win, I know we shall, daddy; only we must be patient." ”

“ Rutter sighed. "I wish you had never been made a foreman," she said in a tone of desperation. "We was ever so much happier when you was just a workman with about half the wages."
"What do you mean?" demanded her husband fiercely.
"Why, that money don't always bring happiness," replied his wife evasively, looking half afraid of what she had said.
"What have you got to complain of?" he said. "Don't you have plenty to eat and drink? Ain't you got the best furnished house in the street? Ain't we better off than anybody in the neighbourhood? ”

“ What we must do is to make up our minds to stand shoulder to shoulder, and when the dock companies see that, why, of course, they will hear our complaints, and make some alterations."
"But suppose they shouldn't?" said his wife.
Chaplin could see the dread in her face, and hastened to allay her fears. "We won't strike till we're compelled," he said. "Our Winny won't forget to tell God all about it; and, look here, mother, if the worst comes to the worst, why, don't you see that God will know we're just doing it for bare life, and he'll take care of us?" ”

“ There in the cold rain and the darkness, the usual struggle for an hour's work took place, and Chaplin was among the number not chosen. Brown got a labour-ticket, and the eagerness with which these were struggled for, would have made one think it was for a party of pleasure rather than work of the most laborious kind that they were being given. The foreman was besieged as soon as he appeared at the top of the wall with the coveted tickets in his hand, and men prayed him to give them a chance of earning fivepence, as though it was the greatest favour that he could bestow upon them. ”

“ She gave Winny a slice of bread and dripping for her dinner, and then set off to Mrs. Rutter's, a little doubtful as to whether she might be welcomed, or whether her visit might be looked upon as an intrusion. But as soon as the door was opened, she knew that she was wanted.
"I am so glad you've come, Mrs. Chaplin!" exclaimed Lizzie. "Poor mother does nothing but cry, and the people about here are proud, and don't know us, and we don't know what to do." ”

“ He never felt so thankful for anything in his life as to get back to the country again, and he hoped to get a place ready for them to come into in the course of a day or two. Annie Brown was looking so well, so rosy and happy at her work of fruit-picking, that he hardly knew her, and she quite failed to recognize him in his smart new suit and the carpenter's basket over his shoulder. It was plain enough that he was proud of being regarded as a carpenter again, and his wife shared his feeling, and told her neighbours how well her husband was getting on down in the country. ”

“ Then when the pinch of poverty had been extra keen during the winter, she and they had managed to feed men, women, and children, not only with penny dinners, but free breakfasts and often festival teas, when, after a good meal, they could, for an hour or two at least, forget hunger and cold and all the misery of their lives.
Yes, Winny thought Miss Lavender would be able to understand and sympathize in her desire to help Annie, for she would know that she was only reducing to practice what the lady had so often taught her, as being the Christ-life which all his followers were bound to copy. ”

“ Buttered toast was a luxury that did not often find its way to the Chaplin's room, unless brought by a neighbour, and it was an unwritten law in the house that if one of them did have a little delicacy of any kind, Winny was to share it. But where every one was so poor and had such a hard struggle for daily bread, it was not often that such chances occurred, and Winny wondered as she munched her toast where Annie could have got it from. ”

“ Hunger and dockers have been close acquaintance for years. But look you, the money that feeds the young uns every day comes out of the pockets of people you would ruin. How would that help us, do you think? No, no, I tell you while we get a meal a day, that will keep us from starving, we ought to behave ourselves like men and not like wild beasts."
This from the father of the girl who had thrown a glass at their landlord, and swept all his treasured ornaments from the mantel-piece, was something so astonishing that the men could scarcely believe they had heard aright. ”

“ We know what these are to us; but we cannot know the secret pleasures God gives to Winny, nor the opportunities of usefulness that comes in her way. I happen to know that, by her patience and her firm belief in what I have just said to you, Winny is exercising an influence on her friends and neighbours that makes her life one of the most useful as well as the most happy, for she is quite sure that she is doing God's will as she lies there on her couch, and what higher life can anyone desire? Our Winny is one of the happiest girls I know," concluded the lady.
"She always seems happy," said one. ”

“ Chaplin had got a shilling to spend, her first thought was to go to the butcher and get a pound of steak. This was what most housewives did when they could indulge in the luxury of a piece of meat.
But Mrs. Chaplin reflected that a pound of steak would swallow up nearly all her money, and that if she got some bread and dripping for the tea, she might get a more nourishing and tasty meal for supper. So instead of the steak to fry, she bought some pieces of meat to stew, and some oatmeal to boil with it. This with a pennyworth of vegetables would make a savoury dish that all might enjoy. ”

“ When they were ready, Chaplin lifted Winny from her couch to the opposite side of the room and Letty helped her take off her clothes, and very soon three out of the four were sound asleep.
But for Winny there was very little rest that night. Her father had set her thinking in a fashion that was not pleasant. How could it be that poor men like her father should not be able to put, as he said, his heart into his work, and do it, as she knew God would have all work done, intelligently and heartily. ”

“ He used to think about neighbours and friends once in a friendly way, but he's got to think so much of his contracts and how much money he can make by them that he forgets everything else, and God won't let the man be happy or comfortable who thinks of nothing else but making money."
But Mrs. Chaplin shook her head dissentingly. "I don't know so much about that," she said. "It's a shame that the Rutters don't make themselves more comfortable, for they've got everything to do it with; and yet my heart aches sometimes for the poor thing, she seems to have got so afraid of her husband lately." ”

“ That's what Brown and I used to talk about, and when he found out that you had given up your holiday ticket for Annie, he set himself to give up the drink, and be as steady and sober as he could, so that he might be able to keep the rest steady too, when the strike came, that nothing might spoil it, and prevent you from having a front window to look out of."
"How kind of him!" exclaimed Winny smiling through her tears. "But God is kinder, father, for he is going to let us live in the country, which is ever so much better than having a front window even." ”

“ Chaplin had been putting the tea things away.
"What do you mean?" asked his wife, looking round from the cupboard in her surprise.
"Well, about the way he makes his money. The fellows grumble and carry on, and threaten this and that, but what wants altering is the method on which we are paid. Labourers and foremen alike."
Mrs. Chaplin frowned. "I wish you'd leave all that sort of thing alone," she said.
Poor woman! She had such a horror of strikes, and for underpaid labourers to think of doing anything beyond a little occasional grumbling filled her with dismay. ”

“ But the girl herself developed a cheerfulness that made her a very fountain of hope and good cheer for others, although she seemed to have given up all thought of being any better herself.
No one seeing that pale patient face on the pillow of her couch would ever have dreamt what she was, not only to her own mother, father, and sister, but to all who lived in the house. When people came as new tenants, they would hear from one and the other of "little Winny Chaplin" before they had been in the house a week, and if anybody was in trouble, Winny was sure to know all about it. ”

“ She thought of her own father, and what he was to her, and then of Annie Brown—rough and thoughtless and uncontrolled—Annie who yet loved her father so dearly, while he could think of nothing but in its relation to his "little un."
Surely a man like poor Rutter was to be pitied that he had learned to love money so much that he had no room in his heart for anything else, and the system that encouraged this was greatly to be blamed for the result. And therefore if it could be amended, the foremen ought to be as grateful as the poor dockers in whose behalf the work had been undertaken. ”

“ No one grudged the Chaplins their good fortune, for among the men he had proved himself steady and reliable, and was therefore chosen for the most difficult and delicate work picketing which no man coveted, but which Chaplin was always ready to do, and never known to forsake a post when once he had taken it.
Among their more immediate neighbours there was genuine rejoicing, for now Winny would get the chance of growing strong which she had given up to Annie Brown. This action of hers had not met with the unqualified approval of her friends and neighbours. ”

“ It was a sore trial to those usually so busy to have to sit at home with folded hands and look at their denuded homes, or wander aimlessly about the dull streets, for after the procession of men had gone by on their usual perambulations, there was nothing to break the monotony of their lives, and it was a hard test of their patience to sit dumb and idle. ”

“ Brown knew the signs of slow starvation, and saw the money that his neighbour put down on the table, and recalled the time when Winny had sent him the cold mutton for tea. Although he, too, had a hard fight to make ends meet sometimes, still he was better off than most, for he had only himself to think of, and he had earned four times as much as Chaplin, just because he had been able to get better food, and was therefore stronger and able to stand four hours' work. ”

“ Each day, too, saw the men better organized and more prepared to act from a feeling of common brotherhood instead of individual gain. Each day, crowds of men gathered round the dock gates, and there the leaders would tell them what had been done the day before, and exhort them to restrain their impatience, no matter what the provocation might be, to use no violence in word or deed. ”

“ The coming of Annie Brown's letter every week came to be looked forward to as the red-letter day of the seven, for besides the words of cheerful hope the girl always sent herself, it often contained a kindly message and a few pence from some of her fellow-workers.
But one day there came a letter with news that set the little household in a quiver of excitement.
"My master wants a carpenter," she wrote, "a man who can turn his hand to anything—make boxes, put up shelves, or build a shed. ”

“ With five shillings in hand, and Letty sure of one meal a day, Mrs. Chaplin felt herself quite rich, and reproached herself for complaining so much.
"I was sure God would take care of us," said Winny with a beaming smile.
When Chaplin came in and heard the news, he declared that they were safe from starvation now, for the strike must end before this week was over. "We are going in procession to-morrow to the west end; we must let the rich see what hunger means, and I am pretty sure more help will come in. ”

“ The chap that knows he's just hired for a couple of hours, and will be put off the job then, ain't going to take the interest in his work that he ought. Mind, I ain't saying he ought not, for I know well enough that if a man puts heart into his work, it's a deal better than just brute strength only; and that's why so many of us grumble at the way things are managed at the docks. I tell you it's bad for foremen and labourers too, though the foremen don't mind so much, as they make money by it. See how Rutter has got on since he's been foreman," added Chaplin with some bitterness. ”