A razor-grinder showed him his shirt: it was a deep buff-color.

"There, sir," said he, "that was clean on yesterday.

All the washerwomen in Hillsbro' can't make a shirt of mine any other color but that." The effect on life, health, and happiness was visible; a single glance revealed rounded shoulders and narrow chests, caused partly by the grinder's position on his horsing, a position very injurious to the organs of breathing, and partly by the two devil's dusts that filled the air; cadaverous faces, the muscles of which betrayed habitual suffering, coughs short and dry, or with a frothy expectoration peculiar to the trade.

In answer to questions, many complained of a fearful tightness across the chest, of inability to eat or to digest.

One said it took him five minutes to get up the factory stairs, and he had to lean against the wall several times.
A razor-grinder of twenty-two, with death in his face, told Henry he had come into that room when he was eleven.