CHAPTER X.
DRAIN PIPES. BLASTING, AND POWDER-CARRIAGE.
"The experience you had with cylinder bridge piers reminds me of a near shave for a bowl out I had. They let me a quarter of a mile of work, and I had to put in an 18-inch pipe at the deepest part of an embankment, just to take any surface-water that might accumulate now and again. Of course, an 18-inch pipe will take a lot of water, and I think we agree it is hardly right and proper to throw away good material or provide against events which, an earthquake always excepted, cannot occur in the opinion of the most experienced. You can't accuse me of being wasteful, it's not in me; for I've heard my mother say she never knew me upset anything I could eat or drink, and that I always licked my plate and never lost a crumb. You know it is a quality born in you, and I don't wish to take any credit myself, not me; I'm constructed different. Nor do I wish to say you are not so careful as me, and perhaps more; only, of course, you may put in a lot of strong work when I am not looking, and I think you'll have to do to get level with me. It never was in my heart to see anything wasted. It is against my principles. I hate it, I do.
"I said to myself, 'You shall not waste any material.' So what I did was to put five lengths of 18-inch pipe at each end of the slope, and 9-inch in the middle. The tip was almost on the spot, so I put in the 18-inch and the other pipes, and left a couple of lengths bare each end. The embankment was over 40 feet in height, the slopes were one and a-half to one, and the drain was about 50 yards in length, so it was not bad business.
"I never forget what the engineers tell me, and when I hear a discussion among them I always make a note of it, and wait till I have an opportunity of making a bit 'extra' profit by it. What is the use to the likes of us of a bit of education if we can't turn it into gold? Not much; almost sheer waste, and I hate waste—abominate it. Well, one day the resident engineer was talking to another swell about how a splayed nozzle to a pipe caused an increased discharge.
"So, ever ready to learn, as you and me always are, I said to myself, fond-like and quiet, 'Try it; put it into practice.' And I did, as I told you just now, by the insertion in true scientific manner of smaller pipes in the middle. I wrestled with the subject, and said to myself, 'Now, look here, if I put in all 18-inch pipes that drain can't have a splayed nozzle, that's sure; in fact, it is fact.' So I said, continuing the discussion with myself, 'Don't be beaten. Let science lead you.' And I did."
"Fill up your glass, lad. Grasp. I'm hearty to you."
"Now, it was in the summer, and we are coming to my scare. I said to my men, 'Come an hour earlier to-morrow morning, for I have got a little extra work, and some of you call at my place on your road.'
"They came, and I had the 9-inch pipes handy, and away we went, about fifty of us, with a pipe or two each. It did not take long laying the pipes, nor covering up the lot. In any case you could hardly see through such a length, but as a precaution, I had the pipes put in a shade zigzag after the first six or seven lengths, so everything seemed all serene, at least, I thought so; but it was not, for I had the nearest shave for a bowl out that I ever had, and all on account of a bow-wow."
"How did it happen?"
"Well, the resident engineer came over with his pet dog, and I took to patting him, and felt really happy at the little bit of 'extra' I was to get out of these pipes, when the blessed dog began sniffing about one end and jumping up. The resident engineer got a bit excited.
"'Rat, is it, Dasher?' he said to his dog.
"The dog barked his reply to his master. The resident then said to me, 'Stop here with Dasher until I call him at the other end, as I intend him to go through the drain.'
"Before I could say a word, he was up and down the slopes, and at the other end of the pipe. I sat, or fell down, I don't know which, I did feel bad. I heard him call 'Dasher, Dasher.' The blessed dog rushed in, and then came back. His size was right for the 18-inch pipes but he was near too big in the barrel for a 9-inch pipe.
"To think that after working the show so smoothly and lovely to the satisfaction of all mankind as knew of it, and then to be bowled out by a 'phobia-breeding animal as hardly knows how to scratch his back, was too much. So I braced myself up, and said to myself, 'Mister Dasher you have not done me yet, not you, hardly. It will take a man to do it.'
"I patted him, and smiled pretty at him, and gave him a bit of biscuit, and grasped him round the middle just to see if he could get through the 9-inch lengths. I felt seven years younger when I found he could just manage it, but he would have to do it more like swimming than walking.
"Now I knew the pipes were all sound and whole, for I never put in broken goods, however small they may be.
"The engineer kept calling 'Dasher, Dasher,' so I said to him, through the pipe, 'Wait a minute, sir; Dasher, I fancy is not so used to tunnels as you and me. What do you say to try the other way in, sir, we all have our fancies?'
"I knew it was no use attempting to work him off, as he meant what he said, and would be sure to get suspicious—as he was no flat, I can tell you.
"Well, after a lot of urging, in went the blessed dog, and Stanley's journey in Darkest Africa was outdone then, I'm sure, and Dasher's rear-guard was in trouble.
"We waited, and called, and whistled, but could hear nothing. We must have waited half an hour I should say, at least it seemed to me as long, and the resident engineer shouted to me two or three times, 'If Dasher does not appear in a few minutes, your men must dig him out.'
"Lawks me, it makes me ill to think of the squalls there would have been if I had had to do that. I wished just then that no dogs had ever been made nor nothing on four legs except horses, cattle, sheep, and pigs; but I turned sympathetic like and went to the top of the embankment, and said, 'Perhaps there may be vermin up there; and I know Dasher is a game one, and won't back.'
"This pleased the resident engineer. Believe me, I would have given at that moment a sovereign to anyone who could have produced that dog.
"Old pal, you need not put your hand out, I said, 'at that moment.' Don't excite yourself. I know you are always thirsty, but you have got the gold hunger bad as well. Just keep quiet, and put your hand in your pocket."
"I beg your pardon, I was forgetting myself."
"All right. Now I'll go on again. Well, I thought the dog had got jammed in, and knew what tight lacing was, and so he did. At last we thought we heard him, and he came out looking more like a turnspit than a well-bred fox terrier.
"Some blood was on him. He had had a squeeze and no mistake, and was about done, but no bones were broken.
"I said slow and solemn like, 'Sir, he has tackled them.'
"'What do you think it was?'
"I said, 'You mean they, sir. He has had more than one against him.'
"I then took up Dasher and carried him to a tub of water and washed him. I did feel very sorry for the dog. I said, 'He has had a regular battle of Waterloo, but it is his high-breeding and proper training that has pulled him through the fight He has finished the lot, sir, you bet.'
"The resident engineer looked pleased, and I am sure I was. Dasher soon recovered and we walked away. Don't forget, what the eye does not see the heart does not grieve for, that is to say, I escaped all right; and those pipes were considered to be 18 inches in diameter, and you know it is not right and proper nor becoming to differ with one's superiors too much, it almost amounts to foolishness I consider in such cases. I always keep my brain in curb till I get a lean measurement, and then I speak, but it don't do to differ with your governor too much. The wheedling lay is the best game to play, and I have an aversion to a quarrel with anyone when you can get more by oil and smiles.
"Take my advice, and before you try splayed nozzles, know whether your guv'nors or the engineers have dogs, and, if so, the size of their barrels and whether they have done growing and laying on bulk, because, to be safe, you must work the pipes to fit the bow-wows. Remember I had a near squeak, and so did the dog. I always keep in with them now, and Dasher gets a biscuit from me whenever I see him, but he nearly cost me all I had. It is indeed a real pleasure to have the opportunity of rewarding virtue in men or dogs."
"That's right. Fill them up."
"The thought of that day rather makes me nervous and dry."
"That pipe and dog business was not exactly a holiday, but I had a worse nerve-shaker than that, for it is a wonder you see me now when I come to think of it. But there, Providence shields us all, good and bad, just to give the bad ones a chance to alter, and to test whether the good ones are really good. Still, I never meant anything wrong, of course not—no one ever does. It is always the surrounding circumstances that make things bad; and so we all humbug ourselves into thinking we are very right and proper and good, and we have our private opinion about other people."
"Stop that. Speak for yourself, and never mind about other people."
"All right. Don't get testy."
"Well, they let me take a cutting in hard marl down at Throatisfield Junction. It wanted a lot of blasting, for it was deceptive material. The powder used to go very quick and not split or move the ground much either. I would fifty times rather had a real rock cutting than this hardened lime and clay soil that won't cleave, and when the blast is fixed it only about blows up the tamping and makes a noise for nothing, but blasting marl rock is often vexatious work. One day, by a mistake, the firm I had the powder from did not send the weekly quantity by road as they ought to have done. I always paid for it prompt. They knew me, as I was an old customer. It was nothing to do with the cash, but a mistake in their office, so the only thing to be done was to fetch it; and as seventy pounds' weight of powder is no joke, and I did not want to lose a relation just then, I got it myself by train, and it nearly cost me my life. I took a large box, just like a cheese box, planed inside and as smooth as glass. We used the large-grained glazed powder. I thought to myself, 'I'll take it in the front van, and ride with it, and then I know all will be safe.'
"Now, there never was much luggage by this local train, although a lot of passengers, and hardly ever above a case or two in the front van. I knew the guards, and all would have gone pretty, but the usual front one had got a day off to bury a relation, and that nearly buried me and a lot more. After the front guard knew from the other who I was, he let me ride in his van when I showed my ticket. We had about 30 miles to travel, and stopped at nearly every station, about six of them altogether. It was nearly a two hours' journey. I got a chap to pack the powder safely for me, and all I had to do was to keep it from flame and heat and being knocked about. Of course the guard did not know what was in my box, and did not seem to care—he had other things to attend to that were, or seemed to be, more important. I sat on the box, and began a yarn about railway travelling, and was making the necessary impression upon him, just to show I knew a few swells and things. There may have been a trifle more imagination than fact about my talk, but not too much, just enough to season it. We were getting on very pleasantly, and nothing ugly occurred till we got two stations from home, then there was a crowd on the platform. Been a football match. The result was that three swells got into the guard's van. The old guard always locked the door, this new one did not. No room in the first, or anywhere else. Now I should not have cared a rap, as these three swells were as sober as judges, but one turned to the guard and said, 'You will not object to our smoking, I suppose?' Asking a question that way always seems to me more than half a command. The guard took it that way, I think, for he said, 'No, gentlemen, as the carriages are full; but if you can keep it as quiet as you can at the stations I shall thank you kindly, as there is a superintendent here as has pickled pork and coffee for tea, that considers smoking worse than poison, and it is against the rules.'
"Well, you can imagine I was just about fit to sink, as I knew there was enough pent-up force in that box to elevate me higher than I wanted to go by that sort of machinery. Two of the swells were free and easy kind, the other rather a lady's man, sort of feminine man—the latter began the game, and said, 'Charlie, have you a Vesuvian?'
"I dared not say a word, but I thought, 'My noble swell, I have not, but I have a Vesuvius here—in fact, I'm sitting on it—and if you are not careful the real one will have to take a back seat, and ashes will be large goods to what we shall be like.' Well, they all started smoking, and threw the fusees out of the window. After all, I thought to myself, there's nothing much to fear now, although it would be considerably more pleasant if you were in some other train somewhere. When I got in I put my box just a little way from the side, so that it should not jar, and there they had me. Soon we got near to the last station we had to stop before mine, and these swells all took their cigars out of their mouths, and as there was no place upon which to put them except on my box,they put them there! Pass me the bottle. Oh dear, oh dear, the thought of it! and they said to me, so nicely, 'You won't mind, I know.' Before I could think almost there were three cigars alight and red, been well puffed, and within 2 inches of 70 lbs. of the best glazed blasting powder, and me sitting on it as a sort of stoker!
"I dared not say anything; but worse was to come, for they kept taking a whiff and putting the cigars down again!
"After the train started the van jerked a bit over the crossing or a badly-packed sleeper, and just as one of the swells was going to pick up his cigar, it slipped, fell upon the top of my box of powder and then upon the floor, and the sparks did fly!"
"No wonder you felt bad. I feel for you now, I do. It makes me dry."
"Stop! Worse is to come—worse. Pass the bottle. Wait a minute; I can say no more until I have loosened my collar."
"Well, true as I am here, if there was not a fizz, a few grains had got loose. My box had a hole in it; a knot in the wood had shaken out! I knew the fizz was not like that of sporting powder, but my powder—and to think there might have been a train self-laid right up to the bottom of the box! Providence again."
"Shake."
"I'm hearty to you. It must have been an angel that broke the train of powder, for on looking carefully about I saw a dozen or more grains. Luckily for me, the guard had his head out of the window all the time, as the whistle had been sounding. The swells only laughed at the fizzle. I did not; I knew what a fearfully narrow squeak I had had. I expect they thought it was a match end. However, I have had a life of narrow squeaks, and so I got over it pretty soon, and said, 'The next station is mine, gentlemen!' I moved my box a trifle, and noticed there was a bit of paper on one side sticking out. I saw one of the swells also noticed it, and seemed thoughtful. He soon made me understand that he knew the paper. It was specially prepared, and a peculiar colour. His father was the owner of the powder mills, and lived about five miles from my cutting. If I was not previously blown up, I knew it was in his power to have me fined fearfully heavy, if not imprisoned. He stared at me, and as we were going down a long 1 in 50 gradient and corkscrew line the guard looked out for squalls and two of the swells on the other side. He then whispered in my ear, 'Is your name Dark?'
"I could not speak, it took me back so; but I managed to nod. He said, 'Why did you not telegraph? I would have had it delivered specially'; and he pointed to my box. He gave me a half-dollar, and put out his cigar. I quickly and carefully filled up the hole and picked up the stray grains, and no one knew anything, except him and me. He then said, 'Take my advice, don't try that game again; for if you manage to struggle through such a journey without becoming a million or two atoms you will probably be hanged'; and he motioned with hand to his throat. 'This time I shall say nothing.'
"I thanked him. I never felt so small and weak in my life. Well, I arrived at my station, and got my box out and sat upon it for some time till the reaction on my nervous system had worked; but I would have given just then some one else's gold-mines for a strong lap-up of something neat. Mind you, about five minutes before we stopped the up mail passed us, and we were both going full forty miles an hour. Suppose the box had fizzled out just then, it would have wrecked both trains, killed a few hundreds, blown a big hole in the line, spoilt the dividends for some time, shocked the world, made widows and orphans of half the country round pretty nigh, have ruined a few speculators who were on the 'bull' lay in the main line shares, and have smashed into chips more than half the 'bucket-shop' outside benevolent (?) institutions for the distribution of wealth as were operating for a rise."
"It seems to me you lost a grand opportunity of being a big pot for once, and showing them who's which—but there! you always had a kind heart, and I remember you have often said a too sudden rise in the world never did any one much lasting good."
"You are right; but perhaps it is as well for me. I am so modest, and ambition knows me not."
Note.—On all public works it is advisable to know by what means any blasting agents are brought to the works. Daily use not infrequently causes the men to be very reckless, and stringent regulations in conformity with the various Acts and general experience should be made, and every care taken to have them faithfully observed.
CHAPTER XI.
CONCRETE. PUDDLE.
"Have you managed to squeeze any 'extra' profit on the quiet out of concrete?"
"Yes, twenty or thirty years ago, but there is not much to be got now. Since a few engineers took to writing upon the subject they have reminded or informed others pretty well what to look after, but there were not many thirty years back that knew how it ought to be made; and you see, although one receives the materials, the concrete has to be made with them, manufactured, as it were, on the work, and you can spoil the best Portland cement that is, was, or ever will be made in the proportioning, mixing, and blending it with bad sand and gravel, or dirty broken rock.
"They handed me the Portland cement, and all the specification said was, 'All concrete shall consist of 1 of Portland cement to 6 of clean gravel, and shall be mixed and deposited in a workmanlike manner [which we consider means as the workmen like] to the entire satisfaction of the Company's engineer.'
"This was drawn up by a civil and mechanical engineer, which is a big-drum kind of title, and I should think covered corkscrews and manufacturing machinery, and everything else under the sun that can be handled at any time, including a 6-inch drain, the Forth Bridge, and the Channel Tunnel thrown in. It's too much, it seems to me, for one man to completely understand; and I once heard a celebrated engineer say that, with a few brilliant exceptions, such a man knew thoroughly neither civil nor mechanical engineering—life was too short. I don't presume to say anything, but his specifications of our kind of work might have been more exact; still they were sources of joy and comfort to us.
"Machine mixing was hardly known at the time I am particularly referring to, and the Portland cement was of all qualities, good, bad, and indifferent, and some as I really can't say had any quality in it at all, and was utterly unlike what you get now. It was then sometimes bought on the same principle as going to the first shop handy, and saying, 'Small bag of cement. How much?' There was no name on the bag, for no one wished to own he had made the cement, and it was indeed of illegitimate origin, and had no parents.
"The cement came, and we did pretty well as we liked, for the inspector knew nothing about it; in fact, we were all in the same boat. But what a lucky thing it is that there is such a thing as a margin of safety!"
"You mean the difference between the strain a thing has to bear in ordinary use and what will break it?"
"Yes, that is it. One day an engineer said to me, 'There is a large factor of safety in this case, which is fortunate.' I thought he was talking about a flour factor near the works that also sold fire-escapes and fire-extinguishers, so I said, 'He weighs nearly eighteen stone, and I should call him big rather than large, for he is like the prices at which he sells flour, and charges a penny a quartern too much; but he is greatly respected in the neighbourhood by those who don't know what fair prices are, for he is so oily and civil, as just suits a lot.' Between you and me, he swindled them, and beat us for 'extra' profit.
"The engineer looked as if he could not at first make out what I was talking about, and, as it turned out, I did not know whathewas. He seemed to enjoy himself, and let me finish my sermon. He then explained to me what we call 'margins' of safety, and what they call 'factors' of safety are the same goods."
"You have learnt something now."
"I have, another name; no doubt their word is the right one, but they ought to consider the likes of us are not poets, or fed on stewed grammar, and should remember we were boss-gangers once, and have blossomed into sub-contractors.
"Let that pass. You should have seen the cement. It was lucky we never had to sift it as we do now, or we should never have got any through a forty-to-the-inch mesh. It was just like fine sand, and nearly the colour of it, too, instead of grey. I have had a fair experience with Portland cement now, for we had testing-rooms, machines and troughs, fresh and sea water, slabs, and a host of other detective apparatus at the last dock works I was on. However, the cement we had and I was just referring to, was pretty nearly all residue, and of course it did not stick the gravel together except in streaks that had good luck rather than anything else. And the gravel! Well, it is an elastic truth to call it gravel, for it was dirty; and I conscientiously feel I am close to thinking I am not speaking in accordance with the principles of strict veracity if I call it gravel.
"And the mixing! Well, there was not much of it, just a turning over or two, and we deluged the stuff with water so as to make it easy to handle, and we hurled it into the foundations as we pleased and at all sorts of heights, just as might happen to be convenient. I did not trouble myself about it then, but I do now, for I had a month or two in and about the testing places when there was no other job for me that suited, and I firmly believe almost all the failures of Portland cement concrete occur because the men that used it do not understand it, or the specification is not carried out, or is wrong somewhere. The best goods in the world want proper treatment, and, after all, the abuse of a thing is no argument against its use. Some quarry owners and stone merchants don't like cement concrete; it is poison to them, because it hurts their trade. It is my opinion, founded on what I have seen and know, that Portland cement concrete is grand stuff when properly made; but you can't make the 'extra' profit on it you could, unless you can forget to rightly proportion the material. I mean leave out anything on the quiet you find is more profitable when it is absent; and now mixing machines are always used on works of importance where concrete is made in any considerable quantity, that is the only way you get a chance of a bit 'extra,' at least so runs my experience.
"Bless me! when I come to think of it, it is really wonderful that some of the concrete I have cast in has set at all, and don't believe it can all have set; for, first, the cement was wrong, then the gravel was not gravel, the sand was like road siftings, no trouble was taken to proportion the materials properly, and no mixing was done rightly, only an apology for it. The water was dirty, and used anyhow, and if a lump got a bit stiff it was rolled over, broken up in the trench and watered down below. Some went in like the soup that has balls in it, and we threw the concrete (?) down just anyhow. The inspector, as I said before, knew nothing much about it, although he was a beautiful kidder and could patter sweet and pretty just as if he were courting, and the engineer was away, so the road was clear for a bit 'extra,' and we took it."
"Now, how the dickens could any concrete be right with such treatment? It is cruelty to expect it."
"I left those works, and the engineer got corpsed, so he is past blaming; but, fortunately, the middle wall of the dock that got strained the most—the one in which was some of the concrete (?) I have been telling you about—had to be removed for improvements, and when they pulled it down I heard the concrete was in layers like thick streaky bacon, a layer of gravel with hardly a bit of cement in it, then a few lumps of solid on the top and hard as all would have been if the cement, gravel, sand, proportioning, mixing, and the putting into place had been done properly; then another layer of open stuff that had stuck together a bit, and then a lot of soft oozy rubbish, like decayed cheese, bad, coarse cement, you know, that would not or could not hold together and had done the 'fly' trick, you know, had cracked about, the coarsest part of the cement The streaks were there because we watered the cement so much that it was not concrete but weak grout, and bad too; and it could not drain down because one of the thin, hardish streaks, already set, stopped it, and it was bound to make friends with the gravel and dirt somehow, although trying to shun such company by running away and so get off duty. It was the same all the way through, and there were a lot of holes in it caused by the nearly set lumps coming together and slightly sticking, and therefore preventing the other material from filling the voids.Hardly a cubic yard of the whole mass was the same.
"That is what I call a real bit of scamping; but, honestly, I did not think I was putting it in so bad as that, but I then knew hardly anything about the material. I shall never do it again, for I know I shall not get the chance, besides we all must draw the line somewhere; but there, a lot is now known about concrete that was only in the brains of a very few then.
"As the cement is now supplied to you, I often put it in a bit thick, that is when I have to find the gravel and sand. It would be the other way about under different circumstances; but at the present time, with Carey's concrete mixer—which, luckily for plunder for us, is the only machine that measures and mixes the materials mechanically, and turns out from 10 to 70 cubic yards of concrete per hour—you do not get much chance of 'extras' and none with it; and concrete mixing is now nearly done as carefully as mixing medicine, and I don't regard concrete as fondly as I used to, for no 'extras' worth thinking of are to be made out of it. My old love, consequently, is cooling off, becoming warm and perhaps distant respect, not much else; but good Portland cement concrete is the best material, bar granite, I know of, if properly used, as it is then all the same strength—that is when the Portland cement is right, the proportions, mixing, and depositing even and proper, and the gravel and sand really clean sharp gravel and sand. You see, in that case, it is uniform throughout, and, after all, what is the good of the hardest stone or brick when you have a weak mortar to join them together which cannot nearly stand the same strain in any direction as the stone or brick?"
"You are right, it is simply waste. Like deluging good spirits with pure water, and spoiling them both. Lucky you had finally left those dock works before they pulled the middle wall down, or you might have had a bad quarter of an hour in a very sultry atmosphere."
"After that we will have a toothful neat."
"That's warming and is real comfort."
"I have never had much to do with concrete, but I remember seeing a lot go in on some dock works where I had some puddle to make for the cofferdam, and I got something 'extra' out of that."
"How did you do it?"
"Well, you know, working such stuff all day and nothing else makes anyone rather sick of it, it is like breaking stones for metalling, I should think, and the weariness of it makes the big stones have a tendency to hide and cause the face to look small and even. I had a dozen men besides casuals, and all old hands at the game of 'extras.' We had to, or were supposed to, work up a certain right proportion of sand with the clay so as to prevent the puddle cracking and keep it sufficiently moist. I own we sometimes let the clay have a taste of peace; in fact, between you and me, we were going express speed, and 'extras' was the name of our engine.
"One day the resident engineer came, and somehow got up close to us rather unawares, and took us by surprise. Of course, the material ought to have been worked the same throughout, and we nearly did it, but nearly is not quite. He seemed to sniff out that all was not just as right as it might be, and said:—
"'Don't forget to work it up thoroughly. You have a good price, and it is important the clay should be uniformly mixed with a little sand.'
"'Certainly, sir.'
"I generally agree with my boss, it pays best. So I at once called out sharp to my chaps, as if all I loved in this world was at stake, 'Don't fear mixing it, lads. Get it well mixed.'
"One of them, he was a new chap to me, and belonged to the militia I found out, turned round, and said:—
"'All right, boss; I always make the broad-arrow kitchens in the camp, and the flues and the openings for the Flanders kettles, so I know how it ought to be done; but if you think I'm a white-faced doughey [i.e. a baker's man] I am not, and you had better fetch a batch of dougheys and start them at work feet and hands. It will make them sweat. That puddle, I tell you, is as well mixed as the dougheys do the different kinds of flour, and call all the bake the best and purest bread, and make it smell sweet with hay water.'"
"I suppose you silenced him quickly?"
"No, I pretended to take no notice, for I knew I had spoken too sharp, but the resident engineer smiled downwards and passed on.
"We had a heap of clay on one side and the same of sand on the other, and the inspector saw we had from time to time a small mound of clay and one of sand put separate and measured ready for mixing. We had a few piles of clay and sand at first measured exactly, and then we got used to it, and did it by sight only. We were close to the river, or rather estuary, and used to fill a barrow now and again with the sand and shoot it over the entrance jetty. A little was taken from each heap. The engineer knew his book, and would not have it worked from one or two big heaps, and the sand brought to it, but he would have separate mounds of about 20 cubic yards at a time. There were nearly 5000 cubic yards of puddle to work up, and as the clay came from the trenches so we worked it up. A kind of filling and discharging, and everything on the move.
"I made a nice thing 'extra' that way, but nearly got bowled out, for one day there was an extraordinary low tide, a low tide was expected, but a land wind was blowing great guns, and it was the lowest tide known for fifty years or so. Now, when you start the game of 'extra' profit you will agree with me, it is necessary to have someone you can rely upon, or else things may not go exactly as you expect. They may work wrong, and then you have to look out for squalls when they lay you bare and find out all. Here, I had been getting a rise out of my bosses, and blessed if old Ginger's snip, his boy, whom I paid a bit extra to do the harrowing well out, did not get a rise out of me. It caused a near shave, too.
"Well, the tide ran down till it laid dry a little sandbank, that is, some of the stuff that should have been at home in the puddle, had travelled by the wrong road by the entrance jetty. I did give Ginger's snip a talking-to, I tell you, after; but it was a near shave, as you will soon know. I saw the bank, so I sent him down the jetty with two chaps that knew what was up and got duly rewarded by me. They knew me. I never forget friends—too good, I am. Not even to borrow from them, if occasion requires, so that they should remember me in their dreams. I said to them: 'Stir up the sand, lads, for I think I saw a leg in it, and a bit of a dress; it may be there has been another midnight horror. It's really shocking!' And that was true, for I thought the sand was shocking, and that murder will out, as the saying goes. It was a shave, for just as the tide began to turn, up came the resident engineer, and there could not have been more than an inch or two over the sand, but it soon rises, as you know, and almost walks up. I had not time to call the men, and there they were, stirring away. It was lucky I thought of the leg and the woman's dress. So I shouted, 'Come up, lads, it's nothing.'
"Then the resident engineer started asking me questions; and I was afraid he might ask the men something, so I kept him as long as I could, and spun a yarn, and pointed out the spot where a body was found some time ago, and talked away like a paid spouter, for every minute that passed was good business, for the water was rising quickly, and I knew the tide would soon just about put it right. After a little while the resident engineer went away, and I was rubbing my waistcoat thinking I had been in another near squeak, but won on the post by a short head owing to jockeyship, when I saw him down below with a large black retriever, and the blessed dog was half out of the water. I kept as far away as I could, but I saw he had taken off his boots and turned up his trousers, and was walking about on the heap probing with his stick. He did not stop long, as he knew the tide was rising, and then he came to me afterwards and said that a sandbank had been deposited at least 30 feet in length.
"'Very likely, sir; but did you find the leg, or body, or dress of a woman?' 'No. But I found a lot of sand that would have been better in the puddle.' And he looked straight at me.
"Well, I had to put on my best sweet, innocent child face, and I hazarded the mild remark, 'It's the eddies that have done it. I have known them bring stuff for miles, sir.' It was no use saying from the other side or nearer, because there was no sand like we had to mix with the clay for the puddle for many miles, nor could I declare that a barge had got upset. He did not say anything more, but called his dog and went to the office. Let me impress upon you that the last 1500 or so yards of puddle had more sand in them than the first 3500. Tides I like, and they are healthy and useful; but it is the deuce to pay if you think you can go against them, as King Canute showed his courtiers, when he did the chair trick upon the sea-shore. Do you know I go so far as to think that if a floating caisson were taken about and sunk so as to lay bare the bed of the Thames in certain places, things would be found by a little digging that neither you nor me dream of, and perhaps might not like to see, for even sandbanks at certain times and places are not pleasant to gaze upon. Eh?"
CHAPTER XII.
BRICKWORK. TIDAL WARNINGS. PIPE JOINTS. DREDGING.
"You remember my old partner on the last dock works we were on?"
"Rather. He had been properly educated, and knew the time of day, and there are few things he ever had to do with he did not get a bit 'extra' out of. On that you can bet the family plate."
"Right you are. Old partner, do you know I have a weakness. I liked the old times when there was plenty of work to be had, and few that knew how to do it. Then the likes of you and me were regarded at their proper value, and estimated as worth something extra. Now there are about a million too many of us, and not half the work to be done. Old England is not like a big place that wants opening up, and it is a rare high old breeding country, and a lot of folks seem to wish it to be nothing else.
"My then partner took, labour only, a lot of brickwork in cement. It was a dock wall, and it averaged not far from 20 feet in thickness. It was a wall, and not a mere facing like little bridges. It gave a man a chance of something to work on. When a chap takes a contract, labour only, not having to find the materials, it is no use turning your attention to saving them; the only game to play is to use the mortar nearly liquid, so that it runs about of itself almost, and put some random work in between the face work and the back, and trust to mortar-rakes and grout, and oiling the human wheels as much as required. I don't like the word bribe the inspectors. For two chaps like us, that will have what we consider good work, it is not bribery, it is downright pure philanthropy that prompts us to give a sovereign away now and then in the proper and most deserving direction, which I generally find to be the inspector. I never give gold away without knowing it will come back well married, and may bring a family, and they are welcome to my best spread. That's just where our education enables us to grasp things right. What a shame it is for people to find fault with the School Board rate, when it is only about four times more than its promised highest figure, and the school buildings are such models of art and strength; and how thankful we ought to be to the teachers for their kind attendance, given for almost nothing! How pleased our old schoolmaster would be when he knew we took every advantage to make a profit somehow or other from what he taught us."
"I guess he would be, the joy might kill him; but how did you apply your schooling to the brickwork?"
"Wait, patience please! As I said before, or nearly did, there was not much face work compared with bulk in the wall. I had a lot of militia chaps, and well paid and lushed them. They were something like brickies. Bless me, the wall used to rise up; and I was half afraid if those at the office worked out the check time, and compared it with our cubic measurement, they would think I was paying all my chaps more than any other member of creation ever did, or making too big a profit to suit them, and don't you mistake. But there! the Company did the work themselves, or let it in bits, and of course the check-time game was not played anything like so strong as if we had been working for a boss contractor.
"Well, we were doing trench work, and had shoots for the materials to travel from the surface down to the wall, and the trench was about 50 feet in depth from the top to the foundation. We had one shoot for bricks and another for mortar in between each frame, and that would have been plenty if all the work had been laid to a bond, but when only about 4 feet in the front and 2 feet at the back was, and the rest raked in level, except a course or two now and again, we used to want a couple of shoots for each. I had the face of the wall made really pretty, just like a doll's house, and pointed up lovely; but let me give a bit of credit to the Company, for they gave us the best materials with which I ever had to do."
"You mean the bricks and mortar were such that it would have been a downright waste of good muscle to put the bond the same throughout, simply pampering up the materials and turning them sickly, like some people do children, so as to appear so fond of them before other people!"
"Precisely; so after my partner got the face in right, the stuff went down and in. All we had to be careful about was not to smash the bricks. We soon managed that, and we had few broken ones, for they were good, hard, and dark. Well, in they went, and when we began to work the show, some of the scenery was hard to get right. Of course the inspector began to find fault, that was what he was paid for, and was about the only way he could work round for his 'extras.' After oiling him a little, and pleasing him in the old-fashioned way, we managed gradually to overcome the natural dulness of his mind, and we became a happy crew—a lot of brickies with a single thought, and hearts that beat as one.
"Well, in the stuff went; and after working out the averages according to the rules of the exact sciences, me and my partner arrived at the conclusion accordingly that about one-half or a trifle more bricks were put in by hand, and the rest were like machine-made bread, unsoiled by hand, and therefore must have been good and pure, as those alone know who work on the same lines. My partner, in his younger days, before he took to brickwork, had been to sea, and all the men used to call him 'Captain.' When he wanted to give the chaps in the office the straight griffin, he used to say, 'Nelson's my guide.' That meant give them 'biff,' in other words, finish off the enemy as quick as you know how."
"You mean get the bricks in as fast as you canonly get them in quick."
"Yes, that's it. If good old Nelson sent his shots in as fast as these bricks were squatted, all I can say is the guns did not get much time to cool. Let me give my partner all praise, for although he had a nice spot to work on—as of course the timber in the trenches hid a lot of the work, and made a nice gloom—as a precaution he kept the ladder away from the top of the trenches, so that anyone had to walk along the top strut and then get down, consequently there was not much chance of being caught; and after the bottom courses were in and the face and back right, it was easy work, because there was always time to get the road right and all went as peacefully as could be wished. But the old Captain, on the same dock, nearly overdid it one day, and all to save him scarcely one hundred pence, but he got so eager that money to him was food, and it is my opinion if he had been born rich he would have made a fine miser; but apart from that, he knew how to make a contract and what work was, and the training on board ship he had in his young days set him right, and he was always on the work looking out for a bit 'extra,' or on scout. But once he nearly overreached himself."
"How did he do that?"
"I will tell you, if you keep quiet."
"Right away."
"It happened like this, and might have wrecked the whole place, and was the consequence of working against orders. At one part of the works there was an old slope at the end of the dock which was no use without a new entrance. Where the trenches had been dug out for a wall a piece of earth was left in at the dock end, and was stepped down like a retaining wall, although only earth. Well, the orders were to keep it 4 feet above a certain level, which made it not so nice for unloading from barges as 2 feet or so. As that end of the dock was only sloped off, and left to itself, for no one ever seemed to go there, and it was a good height, and up and down a bit at top, been stuff run to spoil, my partner, the old Captain thought he might as well take another 2 feet off for about 10 feet or so, and ease the unloading the bricks, cement, and sand, and made certain it would not be noticed. Now of course it did not take long to pare a slice from that short length sufficient to help the unloading, and I should have said this was done soon after we began the brickwork. I remember the day well enough, for if I had not have happened to have been having my dinner by myself on the cofferdam, I believe we might have been flooded out and wrecked.
"The wind was blowing strong and had been for several days from the same quarter, and it brought the water up till it was heaped. Before the wind began to blow it had been very wet, and it was also the time high tides were expected, so everything worked in the direction for a real high one. I began my dinner before the usual time, feeling a bit hollow, and had done by a quarter of an hour after the whistle had blown. I was just lighting my pipe when I happened to look upon the water. It wanted about an hour or more to high water, I watched the tide flowing up, and, all of a sudden, it struck me it would be a topper; but as the cofferdam was a long way above high water, so as to stop any waves breaking over, for the estuary was nearly one mile in width, and as this dam was a really well strutted one, it did not trouble me. I dare say I smoked for nearly ten minutes, and was thinking it was a nice job, and that 'extras' would have a good look in, when, just as things that frighten you do occur to you very quickly, it struck me—How about the Captain and his two feet off, pared off, up at the trench end bank? Well, I did not stop, but went at once to the place, although a good half mile away, and was soon there. I saw it must be a near squeak, and I knew there was no chance of the entrance gates being shut because a lot of craft was waiting to go into the dock, besides it would give the office that something was wrong, and I knew the chances were a thousand to one no one would come near as it was right away one end of the works, and nothing doing there except for us when we were unloading. Most of the chaps had never been that end of the works at all. Now this was all very pretty looked at from getting a bit of 'extra,' but it was hardly the same when that game was played by the tide putting in a bit 'extra' and rising nearly 2 feet more than ever recorded before. I looked at my watch and knew the tide had about an hour yet to run up. I got out my rule and measured, and then I was sure it would not be far off two feet over the dip the old Captain had cut to save an odd penny or two. I was just turning round to go to fetch him—for I knew where he was, and of course we always let one another know, although we don't name it—when I saw him coming pretty sharp with his ganger and a few trusty chaps. I beckoned to him. He was alongside very quickly, and I said, 'The tide will be over.'
"He answered: 'I thought it might, as the bottom of the tenth step down on the landing place was just the same level as the top of the dip. I knew it by the water.'
"I said, 'There may be a chance about it, but I don't think so, for this tide is running up so strongly that I know, from experience of the estuary, that it will beat the highest tide ever recorded.'
"While I was speaking he measured, and took out his watch and timed five minutes. He measured again, and then off went his coat like greased lightning, and we all followed suit as if we were a lot of figures pulled by strings, and he shouted, 'We have not a moment to lose. It will rise 1 foot 6 inches above where we are.'
"He then clenched his teeth. 'Planks, stakes, bags, tarpaulins, bring anything you can get, and come back at once or we are drowned out, wrecked, and lost, all ends up.'
"We soon got some stakes in, and some planks, and we set to work, all six of us, raising the dip in the bank the old captain had made. He turned white as a sheet, and said, 'She is on us, simply romping in. Half a dollar each if you can stop her.'
"We all worked like black devils flying from torture, for we only had half an inch start of the tide. It was a sort of life and death race, and death for choice.
"'She is still rising, Captain.'
"He then cried out: 'By thunder! She's over the far end at the plank dip. Once really over, and all will go.'
"He stood still for a moment and then dashed to the place and laid down on his side full length, and shouted: 'Give me a short plank, and my coat.' He would not get up although we asked him. He had got the frights, so we let him be. He placed the plank in front of him, and his coat over it, and there we were filling in stuff at the back of him as fast as we could, and putting in stakes for the planks. The tide was still rising, He turned his head, and said: 'Are you ready?'
"'Yes.'
"He then rose, and a pretty mess he was in.
"'By thunder! that was a close shave. If we had only had another tarpaulin or two we should have been right sooner. There was some sand there, I remember we upset a wagon-load.'
"He looked scared, but soon brightened up and said: 'We are right now though. The tide has stopped, but keep at it, lads, we must bury everything and get a good 2 feet higher, for if once the water runs over, the tail-race of the largest mill stream in creation will be a fool to it, and it would only be a question of minutes before the whole earth-bank would burst and let in ten acres or more of dock water, and the sea, and perhaps break up a lot of craft and wreck the whole place. Lads, I well remember seeing a catch-water earth-bank give way, and it is soon over when the water runs down the back slope, and there is not much chance of stopping a breach.'
"The men went away, and the captain said to me: 'My word, I shall not forget this.' He then sat down and wiped his forehead and said on the quiet to me: 'There is one blessing, no one on the work knows about it but us, and, if we are careful, no one will.'
"'You had better get home at once and have a rub down and change and sixpenn'orth or more, hot. I know what to do, and will see all is put right.' He took the hint and skipped, but came back in half an hour, and then we had a talk.'
"I tell you what it is, one can play a lot of tricks on land, and get 'extras' many roads, but water won't stand it. It is too honest, and turns upon you and soon finds you out. I never did like water much, you can't beat it, that's why I left the sea. It's an unsociable element, and is most always in the way except when you're boating, washing, fishing, or mixing something. You can't educate it so as to look at work from an 'extras' point of view, for it cares for no one.
"Take my advice and always give it a margin and allow in temporary structures a good 3 feet above the highest recorded water line, unless you want the work wrecked, and then add a height necessary to keep out the waves."
"You are right, for I remember getting a bit 'extra' out of some pipe joints. Instead of making all the joints according to the specification, we made a good many with brown paper and covered them up quickly. The pipes were laid at a depth of some 20 feet, and it took a considerable time before they began to leak. At last there was a burst up, but it was so powerful that all the jointing was washed out, so they never knew who was to blame. The place where that happened is fully a couple of hundred miles away, and will never see me in it again as I did not like the people, so I said to myself, all right, I will leave something behind that will tickle you up, and cost the lot of you some beans to put right, and I did, and so got even with them all. It was one of those lovely small towns where everyone knew everybody's business much better than their own."
"Do you remember Carotty Jack?"
"Yes, rather. You mean him who was up to snuff in spoon-bag dredging. 'Old tenpenny labor' only was his 'chaff' name."
"He was the sharpest card, so I was told, on the river for getting 'extras' out of dredging. He was measured by the barge, and paid accordingly. I confess I don't quite know how he worked it, but he did for years, and never got found out. You see, what is ten or twenty yards of dredging, nothing either way? It is never noticed, and you can't measure under the water as you can on land. It can't be done, except in new cuts, when new cross-sections have been taken over the ground. The beds of most rivers being always more or less on the move, water then becomes a nice servant to work a bit of 'extras' out of, and that is about the only way I am aware of where it comes in useful in that direction.
"How Carotty did it, as I said before, I don't quite know, although I saw the thing, but he used to work it somehow or other by movable boards fixed on a pivot. He had three or four of them, and could fit them together just about as quick as the roulette tables are fastened by racecourse thieves and stowed away. They had two flaps at the sides covered with stiff tarpaulin, and the ends were closed by planks loosely fastened by a catch to the pivot. They were well made and fitted splendidly, just like hinged box-lids, and the whole thing was similar to a box with the bottom out and the sides hinged and ends to slide up and down. I believe Carotty would have made furniture A 1, if he had turned his attention to it.
"He had an old ship's boat of his own. The apparatus was stowed away in it, and I might further say it resembled a shallow box upside down, with the lid off, working on a saddle, and the flaps at the sides moved as the box got pushed down on either side; but they kept the stuff from getting under it almost always; for when they measured the barge-load for depth, if they put the measuring-rod down on one side and touched the board, it went up a foot or so on the other, and no one suspected anything. The barges were all narrow ones, as usual with spoon-bag dredging. The measurer used to walk round the barge and be busy trying the stuff here and there, to see if there was no gammon. The mud was thick, and went up and down very slowly. Carotty always had two or three of these boxes fixed on the saddle, and just the right distance to be out of reach, and he did not fix them on the same line. He kept the frames two or three feet apart, so that if by any chance two men started probing on the same line he would soon shift them a little, and say it was an odd brick, or a tin, or a bottle, and then everything went down easily upon both sides, and for one place where they were extra sharp, he made the machinery in very short lengths, and zigzag fashion. He told me he got pretty nearly from six to ten yards extra out of every barge, according as the stuff and the size of the barge was kind towards 'extras.' Of course, from the solid dredging he had the best haul. Carotty was a cool card at the game of 'extras,' and had a face on him like a nun, and could look that innocent and lamb-like as only humbugs can. He used to laugh over it.
"He told me that he had known the time when no 'extra' machinery such as his was needed, for plenty of water, some boxes, a false bottom, and a few planks, were all the things that were wanted. Then they had to be given up, and he said he was really compelled to make himself a present of the first small pump he could privately annex, and soon found the chance on one of the works where he had a little contract.
"He got some old bags, mended them, and soaked them in some solution that made them tight, and he used to fill them with water and weight them with a stone or two. He had a rope with a draw-knot attached to short lengths of line so that he could let the bags loose or fasten them against a hook when he discharged the barge out at sea or elsewhere. Generally he used to unscrew the stopper of each bag at the side of the barge, and when on the return journey let out the water and then haul up. Although it cost him some labour, he said he used to get one way or other a bit of gold 'extra' by that means every barge load, or, rather, what was thought to be; and sometimes he did not let the water out of the bags at all if the people he had to deal with were easy, but now times were very hard on him, as he had to work at night to keep the machinery right, and he thought it very cruel of them, as it gave him a very short eight hours' recreation, as was the cry now for the third part of a day.
"He was clever, and I believe he could have made an iron-clad out of old fire-irons and coal scuttles if they had given him enough goods, plenty of time, and paid him sufficiently, and you may bet the ship would have answered its rudder all serene.
"He told me he actually got twopence a yard more on one occasion by using the boxes right for a week, on the ground of extra hard dredging, for, of course, all the stones and heaviest dredgings fall to the bottom. He put in his machinery pretty close together, and heaped up the stuff in the middle, and did the injured innocence business properly, and after they had done a lot of probing about, during which he told me the machinery worked lovely, they gave him another twopence a cubic yard. Measurement by the ton would have spoilt that game, though; but then it was not canal dredging he was doing, but in the open. Give Carotty his due, I was told there was not a man on the river who could dredge to a section as he could, and he did the work quickly and well, but he always managed to get paid for more than he did, and he told me he never meant to do otherwise. He said he considered he was cheap goods at the price, and wholesome; but he complained tremendously of the dredgers and excavators introduced lately, for they spoilt him, and there was but little chance of 'extras' now worth the trouble or the risk. In consequence, he had given up doing dredging."