But she
knew from her reading infinitely more of the ways of toiling
insects than of these toiling men and women.
Something to be worked so much and paid so much, and there ended;
something to be infallibly settled by laws of supply and demand;
something that blundered against those laws, and floundered into
difficulty; something that was a little pinched when wheat was
dear, and over-ate itself when wheat was cheap; something that
increased at such a rate of percentage, and yielded such another
percentage of crime, and such another percentage of pauperism;
something wholesale, of which vast fortunes were made; something
that occasionally rose like a sea, and did some harm and waste
(chiefly to itself), and fell again; this she knew the Coketown
Hands to be. But, she had scarcely thought more of separating them
into units, than of separating the sea itself into its component
drops.
She stood for some moments looking round the room. From the few
chairs, the few books, the common prints, and the bed, she glanced
to the two women, and to Stephen.
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