Your ShelfYour Projects

CAPITAL AND LABOR

1%

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Oct 29, 1902

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 28, No. 44.

Read the full edition

CAPITAL AND LABOR.

By Horatio Alger, Jr.

A Story for the Capitalist and Employer.
JOHN GRIFFITH, a rich English manufacturer, sat in a room in his elegant mansion one day in autumn. To judge by his face, his reflections were of an agreeable nature.
“The prospect is,” he said to himself, “that my income for the present year will reach fifteen thousand pounds. That is a tidy sum for one who started as a poor boy. And I am not so old, either. Just turned sixty! There is more than one nobleman in the kingdom that would be glad of John Griffith’s income. My Katy will have a rich dowry.”
He was interrupted here by the entrance of a servant.
“Mr. Griffith,” he said, “there are three men below who would like to see you.”
“Three men?”
“Yes, sir. They are not gentlemen,” said the servant, who understood the question. “They are men from the mill, I’m thinking.”
“Very well; show them up.”
It was a holiday and the works were not in operation, so the operatives were off work.
There was heard the tramp of heavy boots on the staircase, and presently entered three men whose dress and appearance indicated clearly that they belonged to the class who are doomed to earn their daily bread by hard and unremitting labor.
“What is your business with me, my men?” asked Mr. Griffith, rising and surveying them with interest. “Are you employed in the mill?”
“Yes, sir,” said the foremost, Hugh Roberts; “yes, Mr. Griffith, we are employed in the mill, and it’s about that we’ve come to see you.”
“Very well,” said John Griffith, resuming his seat, “speak on, whatever you have to say to me.”
“It’s this, Mr. Griffith, sir, and I hope you won’t be offended at what I say. We came here to humbly beg that you would be pleased to raise our wages.”
“To raise your wages!” exclaimed Mr. Griffith, in a displeased tone.
“Yes, sir. I hope you won’t be offended.”
“Don’t I give as high wages as are paid in other mills?”
“Mayhap you do, sir; but it’s very hard to get along on three shillings a day.”
“But if I should pay higher wages than others they could undersell me in the market.”
“I don’t know, sir, but I think we should work more cheerfully and do more in a day if we felt that we had a little more to live on, so that the wife and children needn’t have to pinch and go hungry.”
These words were uttered in a manly and straightforward tone, and there was not a little pathos in them, but it seemed lost on Mr. Griffith.
“It’s only sixpence more a day we ask, sir,” said Hugh Roberts, pleadingly.
Mr. Griffith made a mental calculation. He had three hundred men in his employ. He found that sixpence a day additional would make a sum total during the year of over two thousand pounds. This reflection hardened his heart against the applicants.
“But, sir,” said Hugh Roberts, “think what it is to support a family on three shillings a day.”
“It is hard, no doubt,” said Mr. Griffith; “but I can not afford to make the advance you desire.”
“Then you refuse, sir?”
“I do. If you can do any better, of course I won’t prevent your bettering yourselves.”
“We can’t do better, sir,” said Hugh, bitterly, crushing his hat between his toil-hardened fingers. “We have no other way to live, except to work for you and take what you are pleased to pay.”
“Think it over, my men,” said Mr. Griffith more good-humoredly, for he had carried his point, “and you will see that I can’t pay more than other manufacturers. I’ve no doubt your wives and children will earn something to help you along.”
The three men departed with sad faces, looking as if life were a weary struggle with little to cheer it.
Scarcely had they left the room when Katy Griffith entered.
Born when her father was comparatively late in life, she was his darling and the light of his existence. It was for her that he wished to become very rich, that he might make her a match for the highest, as he was wont to express it.
“They will overlook John Griffith’s pedigree,” he said to himself, “if his daughter has a good hundred thousand pounds to her dowry.”
Katy entered, a bright-eyed, attractive girl of fifteen, of whom her father might well be proud.
“How are you, my darling?” said her father, smiling fondly upon her.
“I’m always well,” she said lightly; “but, papa, who were those poor men that I met on the stairs? Had you been scolding them?”
“What makes you ask, Katy?”
“Because they looked so sad and discouraged.”
“Did they?” asked Mr. Griffith, with momentary compunction.
“Yes, papa, and I heard one of them sigh, as if he were tired of living.”
“They were men from the mill, Katy.”
“And what did they come for? Do you tell them about their work?”
“No, the overseer does that.”
“What did they come for?”
“You are very curious, my darling.”
“That isn’t telling me, papa,” said the young lady, persistently.
“Then, if you must know, it was to ask for higher wages.”
“Of course you gave it.”
“Of course I didn’t. Why should I?”
“Because they need it. How much do they get now?”
“Three shillings a day.”
“Only three shillings a day!” exclaimed Katy, “and have to support their families out of that?”
“Yes.”
“O, papa, how can you pay them such mean wages?”
“I pay as high wages as other manufacturers,” said her father.
“But they can’t live on three shillings a day, poor men. How much more did they ask for?”
“Sixpence a day.”
“Only a sixpence a day, and you refused!” said Katy, reproachfully.
But consider, my dear, on all my workmen it would amount to more than two thousand pounds a year.”
“And how much do you make in a year, papa?”
“This year,” said Mr. Griffith proudly, “I think I shall make nearly fifteen thousand pounds.”
“You don’t surely spend all that, papa?”
“Not more than four thousand pounds.”
“And the rest?”
“I lay up for my Katy.”
“Then,” said Katy, “as it is to be mine, pay the men a shilling more a day. There’ll be enough left for me. I shouldn’t enjoy money that was taken from so many poor people. Think, papa, how much good the extra shilling would do to your poor men, and how little difference it would make to me. I shall be as rich as I want to be. Come, papa, you were once poor yourself. You should pity the poor.”
At these words Mr. Griffith recalled the difficult struggle he had early in life, and the selfishness of his present treatment of his poor operatives struck him forcibly. His own heart joined with his daughter.
“Are you in earnest, Katy, in what you say?” he asked.
“Surely, papa.”
“If I do what you ask it will make a considerable difference in your fortune.”
“But I shall feel so happy when I think that the men are more comfortable. Won’t you do it, papa?”
“Yes, Katy,” said her father; “I will do as you say. Other manufacturers will think I have gone insane, but if I please my Katy I will not care.”
“I love you better than ever now, papa,” and the warm-hearted girl threw her arms around her father’s neck.
A servant was sent to Hugh Roberts’ cottage to bid him come to the great house. He was sitting in moody silence in his poor cabin, which was pervaded by a general air of want and discomfort. He did not understand the summons, but thought he might be going to receive his discharge in return for his bold request. Again he was ushered into the presence of his employer.
“I have been thinking of your request, my man,” said Mr. Griffith in a kind tone, “and tho I doubt whether any other manufacturer would grant it, I have made up my mind to do it.”
“Bless you, sir,” said Hugh Roberts, his face lighting up. “Heaven will reward you. Then we shall have three shillings and sixpence hereafter?”
“You shall have four shillings.”
“Four shillings! Are you really in earnest, sir?”
“Truly so. The overseer shall receive my instructions to-morrow.”
The workman burst into tears, but they were tears of joy.
“The men will bless you,” he said, smiling, and the words had a pleasant sound for Mr. Griffith.
A hearty blessing is not to be despised.
It was found on experiment that the profits of the business were but little affected by the increased wages, for the men now worked with a hearty good-will which enabled them to accomplish more work in a day, so Katy’s sacrifice will be less than was supposed. And every day she rejoices over the thought of the additional comfort secured by the extra shilling paid at her request.—Horatio Alger, Jr.