making the hours of labor in different
trades to differ according to their arduousness. The lighter trades,
prosecuted under the most agreeable circumstances, have in this way the
longest hours, while an arduous trade, such as mining, has very short
hours. There is no theory, no a priori rule, by which the respective
attractiveness of industries is determined. The administration, in
taking burdens off one class of workers and adding them to other
classes, simply follows the fluctuations of opinion among the workers
themselves as indicated by the rate of volunteering. The principle is
that no man's work ought to be, on the whole, harder for him than any
other man's for him, the workers themselves to be the judges. There are
no limits to the application of this rule. If any particular occupation
is in itself so arduous or so oppressive that, in order to induce
volunteers, the day's work in it had to be reduced to ten minutes, it
would be done. If, even then, no man was willing to do it, it would
remain undone. But of course, in point of fact, a moderate reduction in
the hours of labor, or addition of other privileges, suffices to secure
all needed volunteers for any occupation necessary to men. If, indeed,
the unavoidable difficulties and dangers of such a necessary pursuit
were so great that no inducement of compensating advantages would
overcome men's repugnance to it, the administration would only need to
take it out of the common order of occupations by declaring it 'extra
hazardous,' and those who pursued it especially worthy of the national
gratitude, to be overrun with volunteers. Our young men are very greedy
of honor, and do not let slip such opportunities. Of course you will
see that dependence on the purely voluntary choice of avocations
involves the abolition in all of anything like unhygienic conditions or
special peril to life and limb. Health and safety are conditions common
to all industries. The nation does not maim and slaughter its workmen
by thousands, as did the private capitalists and corporations of your
day."

"When there are more who want to enter a particular trade than there is
room for, how do you decide between the applicants?" I inquired.

"Preference is given to those who have acquired the most knowledge of
the trade they wish to follow. No man, however, who through successive
years remains persistent in his desire to show what he can do at any
particular trade, is in the end denied an opp