Sons and Lovers | Page 9

and she was almost a fanatic with him, because she
loved him, or had loved him. If he sinned, she tortured him. If he drank,
and lied, was often a poltroon, sometimes a knave, she wielded the lash
unmercifully.
The pity was, she was too much his opposite. She could not be content
with the little he might be; she would have him the much that he ought
to be. So, in seeking to make him nobler than he could be, she
destroyed him. She injured and hurt and scarred herself, but she lost
none of her worth. She also had the children.
He drank rather heavily, though not more than many miners, and
always beer, so that whilst his health was affected, it was never injured.
The week-end was his chief carouse. He sat in the Miners' Arms until
turning-out time every Friday, every Saturday, and every Sunday
evening. On Monday and Tuesday he had to get up and reluctantly
leave towards ten o'clock. Sometimes he stayed at home on Wednesday
and Thursday evenings, or was only out for an hour. He practically
never had to miss work owing to his drinking.
But although he was very steady at work, his wages fell off. He was
blab-mouthed, a tongue-wagger. Authority was hateful to him,
therefore he could only abuse the pit-managers. He would say, in the
Palmerston:
"Th' gaffer come down to our stall this morning, an' 'e says, 'You know,
Walter, this 'ere'll not do. What about these props?' An' I says to him,
'Why, what art talkin' about? What d'st mean about th' props?' 'It'll
never do, this 'ere,' 'e says. 'You'll be havin' th' roof in, one o' these
days.' An' I says, 'Tha'd better stan' on a bit o' clunch, then, an' hold it

up wi' thy 'ead.' So 'e wor that mad, 'e cossed an' 'e swore, an' t'other
chaps they did laugh." Morel was a good mimic. He imitated the
manager's fat, squeaky voice, with its attempt at good English.
"'I shan't have it, Walter. Who knows more about it, me or you?' So I
says, 'I've niver fun out how much tha' knows, Alfred. It'll 'appen carry
thee ter bed an' back."'
So Morel would go on to the amusement of his boon companions. And
some of this would be true. The pit-manager was not an educated man.
He had been a boy along with Morel, so that, while the two disliked
each other, they more or less took each other for granted. But Alfred
Charlesworth did not forgive the butty these public-house sayings.
Consequently, although Morel was a good miner, sometimes earning as
much as five pounds a week when he married, he came gradually to
have worse and worse stalls, where the coal was thin, and hard to get,
and unprofitable.
Also, in summer, the pits are slack. Often, on bright sunny mornings,
the men are seen trooping home again at ten, eleven, or twelve o'clock.
No empty trucks stand at the pit-mouth. The women on the hillside
look across as they shake the hearthrug against the fence, and count the
wagons the engine is taking along the line up the valley. And the
children, as they come from school at dinner-time, looking down the
fields and seeing the wheels on the headstocks standing, say:
"Minton's knocked off. My dad'll be at home."
And there is a sort of shadow over all, women and children and men,
because money will be short at the end of the week.
Morel was supposed to give his wife thirty shillings a week, to provide
everything--rent, food, clothes, clubs, insurance, doctors. Occasionally,
if he were flush, he gave her thirty-five. But these occasions by no
means balanced those when he gave her twenty-five. In winter, with a
decent stall, the miner might earn fifty or fifty-five shillings a week.
Then he was happy. On Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday, he spent
royally, getting rid of his sovereign or thereabouts. And out of so much,

he scarcely spared the children an extra penny or bought them a pound
of apples. It all went in drink. In the bad times, matters were more
worrying, but he was not so often drunk, so that Mrs. Morel used to
say:
"I'm not sure I wouldn't rather be short, for when he's flush, there isn't a
minute of peace."
If he earned forty shillings he kept ten; from thirty-five he kept five;
from thirty-two he kept four; from twenty-eight he kept three; from
twenty-four he kept two; from twenty he kept one-and-six; from
eighteen he kept a shilling; from sixteen he kept sixpence. He never
saved a penny, and he gave his wife no opportunity of saving; instead,
she had occasionally to pay his debts; not public-house debts, for those
never