John Galsworthy

“ ROBERTS. That's right, sir. We have another God down here; I doubt He is rather different to Mr. Wilder's. Ask Henry Thomas; he will tell you whether his God and Mr. Wilder's are the same.
[THOMAS lifts his hand, and cranes his head as though to prophesy.]
WANKLIN. For goodness' sake, let 's keep to the point, Roberts.
ROBERTS. I rather think it is the point, Mr. Wanklin. If you can get the God of Capital to walk through the streets of Labour, and pay attention to what he sees, you're a brighter man than I take you for, for all that you're a Radical.
ANTHONY. Attend to me, Roberts! ”

“ ANTHONY. [Grimly.] And you're weak-kneed enough to teach them how to use it! It seems the fashion nowadays for men to take their enemy's side. I have not learnt that art. Is it my fault that they quarrelled with their Union too?
EDGAR. There is such a thing as Mercy.
ANTHONY. And justice comes before it.
EDGAR. What seems just to one man, sir, is injustice to another.
ANTHONY. [With suppressed passion.] You accuse me of injustice—of what amounts to inhumanity—of cruelty?
[EDGAR makes a gesture of horror—a general frightened movement.] ”

“ Is that your opinion too, sir—and yours— and yours? [The Directors do not answer.] Well, all I can say is: It's a kind of high and mighty aristocratic tone I thought we'd grown out of—seems I was mistaken.
ANTHONY. It's the tone the men use. Remains to be seen which can hold out longest—they without us, or we without them.
HARNESS. As business men, I wonder you're not ashamed of this waste of force, gentlemen. You know what it'll all end in.
ANTHONY. What?
HARNESS. Compromise—it always does.
SCANTLEBURY. Can't you persuade the men that their interests are the same as ours? ”

“ ANTHONY. They will!
WILDER. [Rising and pacing up and down.] I can't have my reputation as a man of business destroyed for the satisfaction of starving the men out. [Almost in tears.] I can't have it! How can we meet the shareholders with things in the state they are?
SCANTLEBURY. Hear, hear—hear, hear!
WILDER. [Lashing himself.] If any one expects me to say to them I've lost you fifty thousand pounds and sooner than put my pride in my pocket I'll lose you another. [Glancing at ANTHONY.] It's—it's unnatural! I don't want to go against you, sir. ”

“ THOMAS. Your wife, man!
[ROBERTS hesitates, then with a gesture, he leaps down, and goes away below the towing-path, the men making way for him. The standing bargeman opens and prepares to light a lantern. Daylight is fast failing.]
MADGE. He need n't have hurried! Annie Roberts is dead. [Then in the silence, passionately.] You pack of blinded hounds! How many more women are you going to let to die?
[The crowd shrinks back from her, and breaks up in groups, with a confused, uneasy movement. MADGE goes quickly away below the towing-path. There is a hush as they look after her.] ”

“ ANTHONY. I do.
[WILDER at the fire makes an emphatic movement of disgust.]
ROBERTS. [Noting it, with dry intensity.] Ye best know whether the condition of the Company is any better than the condition of the men. [Scanning the Directors' faces.] Ye best know whether ye can afford your tyranny—but this I tell ye: If ye think the men will give way the least part of an inch, ye're making the worst mistake ye ever made. [He fixes his eyes on SCANTLEBURY.] Ye think because the Union is not supporting us—more shame to it!—that we'll be coming on our knees to you one fine morning. ”

“ HARNESS. [Sardonically.] The men are far more in the right than you are. The question with us is whether we shan't begin to support them again.
[He ignores them all, except ANTHONY, to whom he turns in speaking.]
ANTHONY. Support them if you like; we'll put in free labour and have done with it.
HARNESS. That won't do, Mr. Anthony. You can't get free labour, and you know it.
ANTHONY. We shall see that.
HARNESS. I'm quite frank with you. We were forced to withhold our support from your men because some of their demands are in excess of current rates. ”

“ If this strike's not brought to an end before the General Meeting, the shareholders will certainly haul us over the coals.
SCANTLEBURY. [Stirring.] What—what's that?
WANKLIN. I know it for a fact.
ANTHONY. Let them!
WILDER. And get turned out?
WANKLIN. [To ANTHONY.] I don't mind martyrdom for a policy in which I believe, but I object to being burnt for some one else's principles.
SCANTLEBURY. Very reasonable—you must see that, Chairman.
ANTHONY. We owe it to other employers to stand firm.
WANKLIN. There's a limit to that.
ANTHONY. You were all full of fight at the start. ”

“ Anthony, you are not a young man now; from the time I remember anything ye have been an enemy to every man that has come into your works. I don't say that ye're a mean man, or a cruel man, but ye've grudged them the say of any word in their own fate. Ye've fought them down four times. I've heard ye say ye love a fight—mark my words—ye're fighting the last fight ye'll ever fight! ”

“ There is only one way of treating "men"—with the iron hand. This half and half business, the half and half manners of this generation, has brought all this upon us. Sentiment and softness, and what this young man, no doubt, would call his social policy. You can't eat cake and have it! This middle-class sentiment, or socialism, or whatever it may be, is rotten. Masters are masters, men are men! ”

“ There can only be one master in a house! Where two men meet the better man will rule. It has been said that Capital and Labour have the same interests. Cant! Their interests are as wide asunder as the poles. It has been said that the Board is only part of a machine. Cant! We are the machine; its brains and sinews; it is for us to lead and to determine what is to be done, and to do it without fear or favour. Fear of the men! Fear of the shareholders! Fear of our own shadows! ”

“ It is a thing that will take as much and give you as little as it can. That's Capital! A thing that will say—"I'm very sorry for you, poor fellows—you have a cruel time of it, I know," but will not give one sixpence of its dividends to help you have a better time. That's Capital! Tell me, for all their talk, is there one of them that will consent to another penny on the Income Tax to help the poor? ”

“ EDGAR. I 've had enough of cowardice.
WANKLIN. Cowardice is an unpleasant word, Mr. Edgar Anthony. It will look very like cowardice if we suddenly concede the men's demands when a thing like this happens; we must be careful! ”

“ EDGAR. Men of business are excused from decency, you think?
WILDER. Nobody's more sorry for the men than I am, but if they [lashing himself] choose to be such a pig-headed lot, it's nothing to do with us; we've quite enough on our hands to think of ourselves and the shareholders.
EDGAR. [Irritably.] It won't kill the shareholders to miss a dividend or two ”

“ WILDER. Oh, that rag! Give it to Wanklin. Suit his Radical views. They call us monsters, I suppose. The editor of that rubbish ought to be shot.
EDGAR. [Reading.] "If the Board of worthy gentlemen who control the Trenartha Tin Plate Works from their arm-chairs in London would condescend to come and see for themselves the conditions prevailing amongst their work-people during this strike——"
WILDER. Well, we have come.
EDGAR. [Continuing.] "We cannot believe that even their leg-of-mutton hearts would remain untouched."
[WANKLIN takes the paper from him.] ”

“ The woman was in bad health. Nobody can say there's any responsibility on us. At least—not on me.
EDGAR. [Hotly.] I say that we are responsible.
ANTHONY. War is war!
EDGAR. Not on women!
WANKLIN. It not infrequently happens that women are the greatest sufferers.
EDGAR. If we knew that, all the more responsibility rests on us.
ANTHONY. This is no matter for amateurs.
EDGAR. Call me what you like, sir. It's sickened me. We had no right to carry things to such a length. ”

“ I looked into his eyes and I saw he was afraid—afraid for himself and his dividends; afraid for his fees, afraid of the very shareholders he stands for; and all but one of them's afraid—like children that get into a wood at night, and start at every rustle of the leaves. I ask you, men— [he pauses, holding out his hand till there is utter silence] —give me a free hand to tell them: "Go you back to London. The men have nothing for you!" ”

“ WILDER. I don't like this business a bit—that Radical rag will twist it to their own ends; see if they don't! They'll get up some cock and bull story about the poor woman's dying from starvation. I wash my hands of it.
EDGAR. You can't. None of us can.
SCANTLEBURY. [Striking his fist on the arm of his chair.] But I protest against this!
EDGAR. Protest as you like, Mr. Scantlebury, it won't alter facts.
ANTHONY. That's enough.
EDGAR. [Facing him angrily.] No, sir. I tell you exactly what I think. If we pretend the men are not suffering, it's humbug ”

“ The men have no use for your pity, sir. What they want is justice.
ANTHONY. Then let them be just.
HARNESS. For that word "just" read "humble," Mr. Anthony. Why should they be humble? Barring the accident of money, are n't they as good men as you?
ANTHONY. Cant!
HARNESS. Well, I've been five years in America. It colours a man's notions. ”

“ ANTHONY. It's you who don't know the simple facts of the position. What sort of mercy do you suppose you'd get if no one stood between you and the continual demands of labour? This sort of mercy— [He puts his hand up to his throat and squeezes it.] ”

“ Harness; you'll want it, sir.
HARNESS. Come, get to business, man!
THOMAS. What we're asking, look you, is just simple justice.
ROBERTS. [Venomously.] Justice from London? What are you talking about, Henry Thomas? Have you gone silly? [THOMAS is silent.] We know very well what we are—discontented dogs—never satisfied. What did the Chairman tell me up in London? That I did n't know what I was talking about. I was a foolish, uneducated man, that knew nothing of the wants of the men I spoke for.
EDGAR. Do please keep to the point.
ANTHONY. [Holding up his hand.] ”

“ FROST. Shall I dispose of her, M'm?
ENID. I 'll come out. No, show her in here, Ellen.
[The PARLOUR MAID and FROST go out. ENID pursing her lips, sits at the little table, taking up the baby's frock. The PARLOURMAID ushers in MADGE THOMAS and goes out; MADGE stands by the door.]
ENID. Come in. What is it. What have you come for, please?
MADGE. Brought a message from Mrs. Roberts.
ENID. A message? Yes.
MADGE. She asks you to look after her mother.
ENID. I don't understand.
MADGE. [Sullenly.] That's the message.
ENID. But—what—why?
MADGE. Annie Roberts is dead. ”

“ ROBERTS. Right, Sir!
[Throughout all that follows, he and ANTHONY look fixedly upon each other. Men and Directors show in their various ways suppressed uneasiness, as though listening to words that they themselves would not have spoken.]
The men can't afford to travel up to London; and they don't trust you to believe what they say in black and white. They know what the post is [he darts a look at UNDERWOOD and TENCH] , and what Directors' meetings are: "Refer it to the manager—let the manager advise us on the men's condition. Can we squeeze them a little more?" ”

“ Roberts! [The shout is taken up.]
[There is a slight movement in the crowd, and MADGE passing below the towing-path, stops by the platform, looking up at ROBERTS. A sudden doubting silence.]
ROBERTS. "Nature," says that old man, "give in to Nature." I tell you, strike your blow in Nature's face—an' let it do its worst! ”

“ So they say! They can remember the women when their own bellies speak! The women never stop them from the drink; but from a little suffering to themselves in a sacred cause, the women stop them fast enough. ”

“ Oh! men—for the love o' them, don't roll up another stone upon their heads, don't help to blacken the sky, an' let the bitter sea in over them. They're welcome to the worst that can happen to me, to the worst that can happen to us all, are n't they—are n't they? ”

“ In a grey, failing light, an open muddy space is crowded with workmen. Beyond, divided from it by a barbed-wire fence, is the raised towing-path of a canal, on which is moored a barge. In the distance are marshes and snow-covered hills. The "Works" high wall runs from the canal across the open space, and ivy the angle of this wall is a rude platform of barrels and boards. On it, HARNESS is standing. ROBERTS, a little apart from the crowd, leans his back against the wall. On the raised towing-path two bargemen lounge and smoke indifferently. ”