The Northern Guardian. — 1899-10-14 (Hartlepool, Cleveland, England)

CHATS WITH THE WORKERS'  NO 2.- THE COST OF GIVILISA [BY THE REV CHARLES PEACH.[  The obt work( had ifs ugly superstitions as Week as do presto fusses. U. rot the former -was its belief in the value of Inman imenfiee. !The magir.t way to prop.... the Gods w. ..he sonnies a/ bums. life. Many you mittenGeated oasts have been wanad which allow that this ....eon entered even Into Juduitnal was thorn kn old auperatiboa corm., w ‘h the building of brillgen. It wist tieught that they would not rest tint uillost Moly foundations were cemented wills the bldet oi sone unionamato Gotaan. When. therefore. the foundations of the bridge were being rOt in same elle, or other helpo le. victim. would be tuned eh., and in that way the tkds nore priltitnited. and the terror at • shifting foundation wit avonled. Thor v. the bkod tar when woo levied on all human progress. Very revoltlng it sounds to us. But how far have we twat., from de We have , freed ourselves fro, doe superatilaust which 1 Mriays it. but ...inter. or otiiervotte we hovel to pay the tas still. Civilisation with wooden and sit As mighty aelneveinents Itss not freed us from dmM. We etill mount the foundations of all the bridges moo. which society puree Ito laLgher life ant greater comfort with oh. bkoi of our industrial martins  I Ws. !ed to think a all this—on civilisation and is oon—by a curious contrut which the incidents of a single any one. tonight befori my mind I sr. then hemp in • South 'Yorkoare tow, where the antlinn anlnnln still ourviv,vl of bolding a -Isaias,' (tiniest, when young nuda. owning of age. was locoed trete the bonds of his apprenticeship. To one of these loosmg fesasols I hat the honour to be iu...ed. And right toykily we MV.int tO honour the occasion. But U... was against a aiel the westher proved inland. Our prom-amme was a dose of thirty nales, lath a pretty Derbyshire village ao our objective. Our trouser.oo wu aa tdeo/ ad-fashionod ate*. Beautiful it looked as we °bathed up on to it in the fickle ohnshme of the earl, morMag. Dow me pahed those whom we met tradging away to business! , How we datudeil erapreferred the utditarisn railway train to the poetic ooseb' But oleo! f.--r hunt. pride. Vie had not gone boa DLito.s before the rain came down as if it would never stop. And it never did—at feast, all Oat day. Ife delayed our hophig for an improvemeut which tf not mute. Ihmtly. lee landed • hem. at Fdnight with all the poetry waehed out of us. it happened, I heil to be of again in an oar to attend a -School Board Conference tni Glasgow. But Dia time I took the nowgerolcome train, and, as it earried me swiftly Wong. I contrasted it, two systems—the old pad the new—a. I was grateful that I had blot got to make that journey oil the n 3). In tils.gow U., the top of • coach. The Cost.  But after the first feeling el gratitude, there I came uneasy retlections upon the chit of this e element of civilisation which I was cow en- I loping. Illy mind wandered ato certsm Board of Trade rotur.a whirb had recer.tly mo before me. I receded the horror with which I e had end their t rages story. md I felt humiliated for my complacent satisfaction in the nerwinel condor, which I ono denims from viers which tore rendered at tho cog of life and litah by iny fellow men. lin re wonld Le . more tolarent and generous feelings on We : part of the cominunity towards the workers : if we thought there thoughts oftener; sad too I workers, too, nun] not help feeling an added dignity to thou, toil if they renennot sometimes upon this eoet of Progreua for which thee must ' provide the human sacrilice. What that. con in d 0 impormlea to ter.. We cannot even • get complete hem. for the hunted aspect of the sial,ect re wircb I em op mlang. But the returns for oue or two induitnee will serve ma an led.. tuoif,tot, peening. The railway and the coal siduiteriee are vital elements to our commercial supremacy. At what price are they mein*? The Bowen of Railway Arcidente for 1E66 the Beard of Trade hid JOOl be published. It ahowa a grend total of 1,179 killed, and of 6,343 injured. For the eioatli of some of them the railways were only indirectly responsible. They nese cam. of suicide, trrapitmerr on lines, and accidents at level crominp. If we ledurt Mese (num our total, as well as the 153 pamongore killed and 1,970 passenger. injured. W 3 run here left • total of over 500 roadway servante killed and 4,149 Mjured. Thin.. the cost then, at which our mtlreMe are worked and maintained. Five hundred lives per ammo land there is a sad monotony about thew animal returns, le Me sAoritte whieh we havo La offer up to the mule/eh of railway travel. The coal mining inehmtry tells an even worse .loe In the fortyvar. during which fatal meiderte have heon reoordrid. over 50 .10.1 numrs have oendied by violence. Year by yew, with appalling to/rule...my, • thousand breve men have been marked down for slieyhteo and for ever, death it is calculated ny Dr le Neve Foster. WM. It:armor o, lifot.tlb Mat upwards of a hundred accidenta oc-aur whiet disable a MAW for sweet or upwards. Bo that we got a grand total of human sacrce in life sad limb of over 50.000 killed end nearly five millions injured. 1 n: Ow tura to other indurtrieo. What of our shipping, our coast service, our I finking Into? The Editor and I ono: worked together oa a journal dime m the South-Eastern Counties where nineping calanutim were almost daily items of -copy. In the Scotch eon• they call Lee, 1.1 ~,re of mci.." they may, for they me bought and paid for dearly ormugh in breve teens linos Awl MI the only touches the fringe of the subject. There are the alkali workers, the lead woe. kern, the file eusera. There now the worker* in a hundred induatrim, all of which demand -the lives of tent' for their maintenance.