American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1873-03-01

would, and she'd manage the paying
And she did for awhile; but when hel
husband for three months brought homo
nine, and twelve, and eight shillings, and
then went up to fifty, and then down tC
two pounds, and stuck there for a twelve
month. she having her second baby, anG
and long bout of fever. too, during tho
while, how could the poor woman pay,
should like to know =? OF course my way
was plain. l couldn't afford to lose; and
so at last had to tell her husband. and
the StorIning RACES he got into were
enough to brighten body. He wasn't
going to pay her debts, he'd go 70 prison
first; but he did pay a little, and then he
could pay no more; he had debts al
s. shop" and little gettings, and so was
obliged to county-cOurt him; and some
how he did get into BOdmin jail. as
Re said he would. What could
do? 1t wasn't my fault, You know.
they call tribute work." Nothing
throws me out of my reckoning like that;
there's no certainty in mans pay.
Where a man works ''tO wages you
know what he gets, and what his wife can
afford, and in many parts Though seldom
in this tectotal district) anything that's
spent OH your wares is saved from the
pounds one month, and nothing at all the
next. l was up at Haley one day, and
met an old fellow I'd known years before
as a miner, taking a load of early Cornish
cabbages 10 sell. .'Hallo!" said | (;
''them sort of things don't grow down in
Wheal Kitty" mo-" he reioined; ''no
more Wheales for me. had two-and-
thirty years of it, man and boy; and how
do you think l stood when 1 left off?
no cir
and one month | made as much as eight
ounds. No more tribute work for me
I've turned market-gardener; it pays, and
there's no miners disease.'
Let me explain this. In mine the
''grassmen" (surface workers., who look
after the water, the stamps, etc, get
wages from two pounds five shil-
lings to two pounds ten shilings a
month, rarely higher. The underground
men are either Eat tutwork,' the ground
being let out to the lowest bidder Mt so
much fathOm, or ''under tribute" in
which case, after paying their share to-
ward the working expenses, wear and
tear of tools, etc., they get previously
arranged proportion of the value of the tin
which they have raised.
This "tut-work" is uncertain enough.
The rock varies every few fathons, and
the mems constant complaint is that the
mine captains won't set long bargains,
for fear if a man has bought a hard bill
dear he might come to a very soft bit be-
fore he made his length. "a TUT man
sometimes makes very little ''when the
ground do turn against him.
But ''tribute" is as gambling as specu-
lating in mine shares. A man may have
a itch lode, and then his gettings are
worth having. Half st. Fusty was built
in that way by tributers in North Lcvant.
But mines are poorer nowadays, and
mine captains are sharper. They take
care to put all the rich lodes to tut-wOrk,
and if a man does make six pounds one
month they're pretty sure to ''cut him
down" for three or four months to
come.
That's why so many men have gone
abroad. As soon as the high price of tin
forced up wages little, and so gave them
a pound or two In hand, Off they went, to
the immense disgust of pursers and cap
tains. 1t was quite stampede last spring.
You see, tribute is poor life. Suppos-
ing man only digs out rock and earth,
his lode thinning out to nothing, why he
doesn't receive shilling al the months
end, and has his candles, tools, powder.
and mine dues to pay for out of his CAPT
tai, if he has any. An abOminable sys-
TEN, and keeping the men slaves to the
shops, always in that wretched state of
living from hand to mouth. It's just a
ought to be worked at all, by taking the
men into partnership of the heads 1 win
tails you lose sort. No mine ought ever
to be kept ON which can't afford to pay
fair weekly, not monthly, wages to its
wOrkmen; and since mines vary from
richness to poverty, mines ought. to my
thinking, to be worked by the state.
However, that's not the point; what
say is that tribute ruined the Bosancos,
Il al
shilling. Honest, l say, for I'm, as told
you. highly respectable individual I'd
scorn to do what half the miners i'll my
county delight in-prOmote a mine that
was about as likely to pay the shareholders
as to produce diamonds and gold nuggets.
! wouldn't carry Jumps of good rich ore
in my pocket, and drop them where the
London gentlemen were coming to see If
the ground looked promising. Miners do
these things. though they are very relig-
iOus men. One of them who had turned
fish-hawkcr because his eyes had failed,
told me lie liked underground best be-
cause it gave him more time to attend the
weekday evening means of grace. Very
religious men, and yet they do strange
things-things that 1 should scorn.
Yet, o somehow now respectable aeo as doc
tor, all look suspiciously on me ;
and they say sell ba I goods, and charge
twelve shillings for what could be bought
ut shop for six. They say [ egg women
on to extravaganza, and make them de-
ceitful, and SO bring all sorts of evils on
families and that when a woman takes
10 cheating her husband about shillings,
she wont stop there. | don't know; |
must leave it to you to judge, my candid
public. Remember, Pm a missionary OF
trade; what grand title in this CONNER
cial country! l walk hundreds Of miles
in the year, in the cause of Manchester
and Paisley and Birmingham. Pm a sort
of Livingstone here in West Barl,ary,
and, rs for cheating-not if l know it.
OF course, quality and all that's the
buyers lookout. I'm not going to cry
8 sinking fish" to please any parson,.
| just act up to the exigencies Of bust
ness CHATS the phrase), and you know
as well as do, that every plate glass
tradesman of them all does the
same. Do Messrs. HoOkem and SqueeZ-
ur rise above my level when they
supply some Oxford moOncalf with a
hundred pounds worth of (mostly female)
jewelry: Or is the mooncalfs tailor a
pattern to johnny Fortnights when he al
lows little suppers to be given in his
house, and puts down the same, wine, eli
gars, and all, in his bill rs coats and waist
coats: L think Pm a good many cuts
above that kind of work. | work hard fol
my shilling; and though | once overheard
the parson of st. Fusty sOundly rating {;
woman whom he'd been relieving, and
where I'd just called to look after an old
account, he didn't convince me that gol
it dishonesty as things go. L don't say
with my prototype in Shakespeare.
'What a fool is honesty - but neither dc
see why should shut my mouth ''wher
fortune drops boOties into it," DO you,
baker who have been fined for ShOr