Page:The Cow Jerry (1925).pdf/119

 the evolution of labor above the lowly state of section hand.

"Let ye stand on your dignity, lad, and lave 'em pass," Mike advised. "If the poor crathurs get any pleasure out of their prancin' and dancin' and posthurin' around, let 'em have it. They're a lot of poor ignorant fellys that never read a book of histhory in their lives. Savages, they are, lad. The nagur savages in the wilds of Africa make faces at strangers, and prance and mock and posthure in insultin' capers, the same as these poor brakeys do, tryin' to provoke the first blow.

"These boxcyar lads think they're the important men in railroadin'. They are not. Take away the section boss and his gang for tin days and lave the thrack go: where would these fine lads land? In the ditch, with the freight cyars on top of them, and not one among the lot with sinse enough in the head of 'im to dhrive a spike.

"It's the lads on the thrack that count in railroadin'; nobody else. Take you and me, spikin' these ties. What would happen if we spread the rails, or dhrawed 'em, three or four inches out o' gauge aither way? Where would Windy Moore be when the ingin sthrook the spot? Sailin' through the wind like a mateor, rammin' the head iv 'im in the ditch. Let 'em go, I tell ye, lad; let 'em pass."

This argument, aside from Mike's prejudice in favor of his own calling, had considerable truth to enforce it, Tom realized, but it did not excuse the offense nor palliate the sting. He studied the worst offenders,