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.