Note 6 — Chapter I

No labourer, says Mr. Smiles in his Workman's Earnings, &c., is better worthy of his hire than the English one. It is not merely that he works harder than the labourer of any other country, but he generally produces a better quality of workmanship. He possesses a power of throwing himself bodily into his occupation, which has always been a marvel to foreigners; and he then recurs to the well-known example of the surprise created among the French peasantry when gangs of English navvies proceeded with the works of the Rouen railway, and worked amidst constant exclamations, of Voilà! voilà ces Anglais! comme ils travaillent!