Scamping Tricks and Odd Knowledge Part 5

"'Look out! the ground is settling. Run for your lives.' About half of the men heard me, and got away, but the front lot went on. I should think 200 of them. Bless you, the ground began to yaw and sink with the rails very quickly, and the wall pressed forward and toppled over in one place for about a 30-feet length with men upon the top of it, and the director as well, and fell very slowly, and quite majestically, right into the river, and there was a splash and crash. I said before it was nearly low water, and I should think there was about 5 feet on the sill and 2 feet of mud. After all, somehow or other, only about thirty men and the director were cast, and they were all taken out right, for there was plenty of a.s.sistance. Still one man had his arm broken, which was a good thing for him as it turned out, for the director made him one of his lodge-keepers; but as he was a smart-looking chap, and had been brought up right, and could not work much after, it was an even bargain."

"How about the director?"

"Ah! that's the only fun we had; for I tell you, when I saw the men and the wall go over it made me take root, and my boots were nearly pressed into the ground, and they said I went awfully white in the face. It did give me a shock; but it was lucky the break-up was so slow, for those that could not get off had time to jump and get clear of the rails, but I tell you it was a shave. As it turned out, the director had the worst ducking of the lot that fell in. He went sprawling into the mud; but he could swim, and when we saw him I nearly burst out laughing, only my feelings had been so shaken, for he was smothered in slime from head to foot, and looked like a real savage. All his hair, face, and beard were thick with mud, to say nothing of his tailoring; and I tell you he put me in mind of a baboon just then, and I don't think he will attempt any more testing.

"Of course, the warehouses were not erected upon the quay, and the engineer was not sorry at the way things had turned out. Anyhow, he let me do the clearing away the rails and the rebuilding; and I drove in the piles just the same length as the others, and nothing was said to me or suspected. It worked all right; but suppose a lot of the men had been killed, and the director as well! I tell you it was a near shave, and all before my eyes. It would just have killed me; for I should have known about another 3 feet down of those piles would have made them stand all serene. As it was, my wife said I was that disturbed in my sleep, and kicked so, that she hardly got a wink of rest, and had to double herself up in bed for fear of having her legs broken; however, it wore off in time, although once I sent myself and my old woman clean off the bedstead, and I saw by the light of the moon we were sitting on the floor, and the clothes were all of a heap close by. It made a nice picture of domestic bliss. My wife gave it me hot, and she said she would stand it no longer. I said, 'Don't grumble, you have not got to stand. You are sitting down now, and you ought to know it.' She said she heard me mumble several times in my sleep 'Cut 3 feet off her, Bill!' That was my ganger's name, and, of course, my brain was alluding to cutting off the piles; she thought it was her--no fear. Still, she always makes out I was not so good as I once was, and she felt sure Old Nick and me had night conversations. I laugh over the whole thing now.

I hardly did then."

CHAPTER VII.

MASONRY BRIDGES.

"Now I'll tell you how we got on with some masonry bridges. Being more of a scholar than most of them--thanks to the parish school--and being able to read, write, and sum a bit, I knew a trifle extra to the other chaps, and was made a ganger when very young. Somehow or other, I drifted into being crafty, and just then made friends with a man that was up to every game, and remembered old George Stephenson. He could tell and teach you something, and did me; but even I have known the time when we hardly ever had a drawing to work to, except the section, and have walked many miles behind an engineer, and heard him say to my partner--who was a mason, and a real good one--'Joe, put a bridge there, the same span and width between the inside of the parapets as the others.' 'All right, sir!'

"You know that was the time of the rush for railways, and few understood the business. Too many do now, I think, and the old country is too full of mouths generally. Then there was scarcely time to think, much more for many drawings; they were made after.

"We used to take a bridge at a time, at so much the cubic yard, and we did put it in thick, abutments, counterforts, wingwalls, and parapets, and all the work was as straight as could be made; and I have known my partner, Joe, nearly drawn into tears when he was forced by circ.u.mstances over which he had no control to own an arch to a bridge was not exactly a straight line. Spirals and winders made him that waspish as I took good care to make myself particularly wanted somewhere else than at the bridge at which he was busy when he had to do them.

"Some of the bridges we built have enough masonry in them to nearly build a church or a small breakwater, and lucky they have, as it gave one the chance of a bit of profit; and the depth of the foundations was hardly so deep as shown in the drawings made after we had built a bridge. Somehow or other our imagination used to scare away reality, and we generally were paid for a foot or more extra depth all round.

"Joe said that was the way he got his professional fees for building a bridge without a drawing, and the only way he could and, moreover, did; but he always put the masonry in solid, that is to say, when he considered it should be, although hardly, perhaps, to the specification throughout, but the face looked lovely; and if the inside work was rather rough and tumble and really "random," he knew what a good bond was, and would have it, and was really clever at selecting the right rock in the cuttings for masonry; but there, no one can expect the filling-in work to be done the same way as the facework.

"Of course, it was not exactly honest to be paid for more work than we had done; but it is only fair to say we were generous with our _extra_ profits, and always treated the inspector and our men right. We were bound to educate them and enlighten their minds. I own it was not right, and, after all, it would want an 'old parliamentary hand' to tell the difference in dishonesty between over-measurement founded on lies and stealing. However, one is supposed to be the result of cleverness, the other, crime.

"I forgot to tell you we took a cue from a director who occasionally walked over the line, and who always showed about half-an-inch of his cheque-book sticking up out of his pocket. We were told he wore his cheque-book like the mashers do their pocket-handkerchiefs; but that he was not worth much, and was on the war path for 'plunder,' and so were we, and took his tip. I said to myself, as he has brought a new fashion into play in these parts, let us take the hint.

"'So we will,' said my partner.

"'How long is the specification for masonry?

"'I am sure I don't know. What _are_ you talking about? I never read such things. All I want to know is for what purpose the bridge is to be erected, and whether it is to be coursed work, ashlar, or the same as the others, and up it goes according to my specification. I'm above other people's specifications, thank you. What's the use of my education if I am not? Do you think the alphabet must be again taught me?'

"'I beg pardon, partner, you are right; but appearances go a long way, and shamming is fashionable.'

"'Oh, well, have your way; we all look better when we are properly clothed; and I once heard an engineer say he never felt right when on any works without a plan in his hand, and we know a music-hall singer is generally not at home without a hat; besides, it will please them to see we have the specification always on the premises.'

"'That is what I think.'

"Well, I made two copies of it, one for Joe, my partner then, and one for me, and wrote in large letters on the top, 'Specification--masonry --bridges and culverts.' Then we both showed the top out of our pockets, with that writing on it, in the same way the director did his cheque-book. It worked beautifully; for a few days after a big engineer came down, and we heard he had said he thought we were the smartest masons on the work, and he was pleased to see we appeared careful to comply with the specification, for he noticed we each had a copy in our pockets.

"The fun was, my partner had never read it at all; I only when copying.

"The game worked really lovely; we were looked upon as downright straight ones, and the inspector--who wanted some dodging, I can tell you, as well as a tip, now and again--was taken away and posted at the other end of the work, and then we made hay while the sun shone, and no mistake. We used to make the bridges rise out of the ground; we gave some drink to our chaps; and then, as soon as the wagons with the rock arrived from the cutting, in it went. The difficulty was to keep the face going fast enough for the filling-in work. It was a game. First a wagon-load of rock, and then--well, I suppose I must say--the mortar, but it is squeezing the truth very hard indeed. There was Joe, my partner, superintending in his own style, the raking and mortar business, and I was busy at the facework looking after our best mason.

"Give my partner his due, he was always careful about bond and throughs, and he was fond of mixing up the flat stones a bit, for he said it prevented their sliding on the beds, and always maintained that the weight above kept all tight enough and more than the mortar, so long as the stones were flat and large. I said, it's lucky it did.

"One day he frightened me. We were short of stone, owing to a mistake in the cutting, and so the facework was up a good height. At last Joe caught sight of the engine and wagons coming round the hill, and said to me--

"'Hold hard, here they come, thirteen wagons; they will fill you up both sides.'

"'I agree with you; they will, and more.'

"It was then past one o'clock, and Joe called out to me--

"'Before we leave I mean to be level with you, but you must help.'

"'Joe, it can't be done.'

"'Away with your cant's; it _shall_ be done.'

"Well, it was tempting us too much, such a lot of rock to work on all at once; if we had only had a little more than sufficient for one day's work at a time, we could not have done what we did. By Jove, he did go it. Down came the rock--I know you will kindly excuse me from calling it building stone.

"'Easy does it, Joe, or you will burst the show.'

"'Not I,' he shouted.

"Now listen to me, for this _is_ truth. Never since the foundation of this world did bridges grow at this rate. It beats mustard-and-cress raising and high farming into fits.

"'Smash them in, lads, bar them down; give them a dose of gravel liquor. Now then, for some real cream mortar.'"

"These, and such-like, were his war-cries."

"'Bless me, if the mortar is not as thin-placed as the powder on a girl's face, Joe.'"

"'It's pretty.'

"'Now, lads, five minutes for beer.'

"All was soon comparatively silent.

"'Joe, you must draw it milder, for the row going on is more like an earthquake let loose than anything else I can think of, and it may spoil the game, for it is bound to draw a crowd.'

"'All right, partner, I never thought of that. Talk about Jack and the beanstalk, this beats it to squash. It's lucky the rock works in flat, and is not hollow. Of course, all the stones are on their natural beds, according to the specification--understand that. Don't let us have any mistake as to the catechism; if they are not, they will grow used to their new ones and shake down to rest.'

"I've never built a bridge that fell or gave much, perhaps a wingwall has bulged, but then it is the want of proper drainage and backing and nothing to do with the masonry. _We_ only attend to the masonry according to the specification. Chorus--According to the specification.

But they all do it, as the song says.

"It's my firm conviction that the man that invented wall-plates ought to have a marble monument in his native town, for they are beautiful distributors of weight, and when the stones are small, they are salvation for such masonry as we made rise."

"I agree with you, they cover a mult.i.tude of sins, and are powerful agents in the cause of unity and good behaviour."

"That is right."

"Have a sip?"