He hadn't claimed
damages from the railway company and wasn't going to. 'Oh, it's only a
few scratches,' he said. 'They'll be hit hard enough as it is.' If he'd
been a poor devil on eighteen shillings a week it would have been
different. He was an engineer earning good wages; so he wasn't feeling
sore and bitter against half the world. Suppose you tried to run an army
with your men half starved while your officers had more than they could
eat. It's been tried and what's been the result? See that your soldiers
have their proper rations, and the General can sit down to his six-course
dinner, if he will. They are not begrudging it to him.
"A nation works on its stomach. Underfeed your rank and file, and what
sort of a fight are you going to put up against your rivals. I want to
see England going ahead. I want to see her workers properly fed. I want
to see the corn upon her unused acres, the cattle grazing on her wasted
pastures. I object to the food being thrown into the sea--left to rot
upon the ground while men are hungry--side-tracked in Chicago, while the
children grow up stunted.
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