to make up the time, instead of leaving off at seven-thirty,
they could work till eight.

Misery had known of and winked at the former practice, for he knew that
the men could not work all that time without something to eat, but
Crass's suggestion seemed a much better way, and it was adopted.

When the other masters in Mugsborough heard of this great reform they
all followed suit, and it became the rule in that town, whenever it was
necessary to work overtime, for the men to stay till eight instead of
half past seven as formerly, and they got no more pay than before.

Previous to this summer it had been the almost invariable rule to have
two men in each room that was being painted, but Crass pointed out to
Misery that under such circumstances they wasted time talking to each
other, and they also acted as a check on one another: each of them
regulated the amount of work he did by the amount the other did, and if
the 'job' took too long it was always difficult to decide which of the
two was to blame: but if they were made to work alone, each of them
would be on his mettle; he would not know how much the others were
doing, and the fear of being considered slow in comparison with others
would make them all tear into it all they could.

Misery thought this a very good idea, so the solitary system was
introduced, and as far as practicable, one room, one man became the
rule.

They even tried to make the men distemper large ceilings single-handed,
and succeeded in one or two cases, but after several ceilings had been
spoilt and had to be washed off and done over again, they gave that up:
but nearly all the other work was now arranged on the 'solitary
system', and it worked splendidly: each man was constantly in a state
of panic as to whether the others were doing more work than himself.

Another suggestion that Crass made to Misery was that the sub-foremen
should be instructed never to send a man into a room to prepare it for
painting.

'If you sends a man into a room to get it ready,' said Crass, ''e makes
a meal of it! 'E spends as much time messin' about rubbin' down and
stoppin' up as it would take to paint it. But,' he added, with a
cunning leer, 'give 'em a bit of putty and a little bit of glass-paper,
and the paint at the stand, and then 'e gits it in 'is mind as 'e's
going in there to paint it! And 'e doesn't mess about much over the
preparing of it'.

These and many other suggestions--all sorts of devices f