Then front-wall. I start in search of a spoon and a hook. It's not easy to get one to suit the taste of my first-helper. There's one that looks twenty feet,--I haven't any technical figures on spoons,--but it's too long, I know, for Fred. There's a spoon three feet shorter, just right. Hell--with two inches melted off the end! I pick a short one in good repair,--he can use the thing or get his own,--and drag it to Seven, giving the scoop a ride on the railroad track, to ease the weight. Fred has put a hook over number one door; so I hurry, and lift the spoon handle with gloved hands to slip it on the hook. If it's not done quickly, you'll get a burn; you're an arm's length from molten steel, and no door between. I get it on, and pick up a shovel. Front-wall can be very easy,--you can nearly enjoy it, like any of the jobs,--if the furnace is cool, and there's a breeze blowing down the open spaces of the mill. And, too, if the spoon hangs right in the hook, and the first-helper turns it a little for you, then you can stand off, six feet from the flame, and toss your gravel straight into the spoon's scoop. You hardly go to the water fountain to cool your head when the stunt's over. On number one the hook hung wrong, the spoon wouldn't turn in it, and you had to hug close, and pour, not toss. I tried a toss on my second shovel, and half of it skated on the floor. "Get it on the spoon, goddam you!" from Nick. So I did. After that, we sat around for twenty minutes. Fred looked at the furnace once or twice, and changed the gas. Several gathered in front of Seven--Jock, Dick, the melter, Fred, and Nick. "Do you know what my next job's going to be?" said Fred. The others looked up. "In a bank." "Nine to five," said Dick. "Huh! gentlemen's hours." "Saturday afternoons, and Sundays," said Fred. The other faces glowed and said nothing. "This wouldn't be so bad if there were Sundays," said Fred. "I'll tell you, there'll come a time," broke in the melter, "when Gary and all the other big fellers will have to work it themselves--no one else will." "Now in the old country, a man can have a bit of fun," said the Scotchman. "Picnics, a little singin' and drinkin',--and the like. What can a man do here? We work eight hours in Scotland. They work eight hours in France, in Italy, in Germany--all the steel mills work eight hours, except in this bloody free country." The melter broke in again. "It's the dollar they're after--the sucking dollar. They say they're going to cut out the long turn. I heard they were going to cut out the long turn when I went to work in the mill, as a kid. I'm workin' it, ain't I? Christ!" I left, to shovel in fluor spar with Fred. When we finished, Fred said: "You better get your lunch now, if you want it. Then help Nick on the spout."