Table-cloths and napkins are unknown. A man eats
in the midst of the debris left by his predecessor, and dribbles his own
scraps about him and on the floor. In rush times, in such places, I have
positively waded through the muck and mess that covered the floor, and I
have managed to eat because I was abominably hungry and capable of eating
anything.
This seems to be the normal condition of the working-man, from the zest
with which he addresses himself to the board. Eating is a necessity, and
there are no frills about it. He brings in with him a primitive
voraciousness, and, I am confident, carries away with him a fairly
healthy appetite. When you see such a man, on his way to work in the
morning, order a pint of tea, which is no more tea than it is ambrosia,
pull a hunk of dry bread from his pocket, and wash the one down with the
other, depend upon it, that man has not the right sort of stuff in his
belly, nor enough of the wrong sort of stuff, to fit him for big day's
work. And further, depend upon it, he and a thousand of his kind will
not turn out the quantity or quality of work that a thousand men will who
have eaten heartily of meat and potatoes, and drunk coffee that is
coffee.
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