I wor turned back two days las' week, an' two days this, _fower_ shillin' lost each week--that's what I call skinnin' ov yer." Wharton nodded at him approvingly.

By now he knew the majority of the men in each village by name, and never forgot a face or a biography.
"You're right there, Watkins.

Eleven shillings, then, when it isn't less, never more, and precious often less; and harvest money--the people that are kind enough to come round and ask you to vote Tory for them make a deal of that, don't they ?--and a few odds and ends here and there--precious few of them! There! that's about it for wages, isn't it?
Thirty pounds a year, somewhere about, to keep a wife and children on--and for ten hours a day work, not counting meal times--that's it, I think.

Oh, you _are_ well off!--aren't you ?" He dropped his arms, folded, on the desk in front of him, and paused to look at them, his bright kindling eye running over rank after rank.

A chuckle of rough laughter, bitter and jeering, ran through the benches.
Then they broke out and applauded him.
Well, and about their cottages?
His glance caught Marcella, passed to her mother sitting stiffly motionless under her veil.