Harper's Round Table, July 23, 1895 Part 1

Harper's Round Table, July 23, 1895.

by Various.

CORPORAL FRED.

A Story of the Riots.

BY CAPTAIN CHARLES KING, U.S.A.

CHAPTER I.

It was a warm June evening, and the family was taking the air on the back porch--father and mother, two stalwart young men, the elder sons, two slender girls, and a romping boy of nine--the little Benjamin of the tribe. It was a placid homelike group; father deep in the daily paper and his easy-chair, mother absorbed in chat with the girls even while keeping watchful eye on "the baby," the family's pet, pride, and torment by turns, and the two elder sons sitting on the edge of the porch, talking in low tone of an event that had called for no little discussion all over the neighborhood--the strike of the switchmen in the great freight yards only a block away. Five railway companies rolled their trains in and out of the thronging, far-spreading metropolis to the eastward--the great city whose hum and murmur were borne to them on the soft breeze sweeping inland from the cool blue bosom of the lake. For two miles along a number of parallel tracks were idly resting now by hundreds the grimy freight cars of a dozen lines, while the gleaming steel rails on the "through" tracks, kept cleared from end to end, were as silent, as deserted, as the long tangents over the boundless prairies miles to west and south, for, except on the mail trains, over the whole system since the stroke of five that afternoon not a wheel was turning.

Never before in all their seven years of residence in this homelike little frame cottage had the Wallace household known such utter silence at "the yards." They missed the rush and roar of the great express engines, the clatter of the puffing little "switchers," the rumble and jar of the heavy freight trains, the dancing will-o'-the-wisp signals of the trainmen's lights, the clang of bell, and hiss of steam. There was something unnatural in the stillness, something almost oppressive, and mother and the girls, glad ordinarily to have both Jim and Fred at home, seemed weighted with a sense of something strained and troublous in the situation. Jim had been a railway man for several years, rising by industry, intelligence, and steadiness, to his present grade as a freight conductor. Fred, the younger, held a clerkship in the great "plant" of the Amity Wagon-works. He had received a good High-School education, while Jim's wages, added to his father's, had supported the family and built the little suburban home. The elder brother's hands were browned by long contact with grimy brake and blistering, sun-baked car roofs. The younger's were white and slender--hands that knew no labor other than the pen. Both boys were athletic and powerful; Jim, through long years in the open air and active, energetic life, Fred, through systematic training in the gymnasium and the camp and armory of the National Guard, for Fred had been three years a soldier in a "crack"

city regiment, and the corporal's chevrons on his uniform were his greatest pride. Even in boy days he had begun his training in the cadet corps of the public school, where military drill, especially the "setting-up" system of the regular army, had been wisely added to the daily course of instruction; and while Jim's burly form was a trifle bowed and heavy, Fred's slender frame was erect, sinewy, and, in every motion, quick and elastic. "Jim could hug the breath out of you, Fred, like a thundering big bear if he once got his arms around you, and Fred could dance all around and hammer you into pulp, Jim, while you were trying to grip him," was the way the father expressed it, and old Wallace knew young men in general and his own boys in particular as well as might be expected of the clear-eyed, shrewd-headed veteran that he was. He himself had served the Great Western railway faithfully from the days when it was only the struggling Lake Sh.o.r.e, and now as a first-cla.s.s mechanic in the repair shops he was a foreman whom officials and operators alike respected. He had lived a sober, honest, industrious life, had reared his family on the principle of mind your own business and pay as you go, and was looking forward to retiring within a year or two, and giving his aching old bones the rest they deserved, and enjoying the fruits of his life of toil, when the long-predicted irruption began with the strike ordered by the Switchmen's Union.

With anxious face Mr. Wallace was reading the newspaper accounts of the stormy meetings held the previous night and well along into the dawning day. Some of the men involved were his life-long friends, others of them he had known many years. Their names were not among those of the speakers whose fiery oratory had finally prevailed. They were of the silent, almost pa.s.sive element, which, largely in the majority at first, found itself little by little swinging over under the lash of the more aggressive, and at last giving reluctant "aye" or sitting in moody silence rather than face the furious denunciation of the agitators that followed sharp on every "no." At two o'clock in the morning the members of the union, three-fourths of whom were originally bitterly opposed to the project, had pa.s.sed a resolution that unless certain men discharged by the management of one of the five roads using the yards were reinstated by twelve o'clock that day they would quit work to a man, and tie up the business of that and all the others. At nine in the morning the committee had waited on the division superintendent with their ultimatum. The superintendent replied that the three men discharged were freight handlers who had refused to touch the contents of certain cars of the Air Line because of some unsettled disagreement between the officials of that line and their employees. "We know nothing of that matter," said the superintendent. "It is none of our business. We employed these men to handle any and all freight run into these yards, and we have no use for men who refuse to do so. They not only flatly refused to handle that Air Line stuff, but said they'd see to it that no one else did. That ended the matter so far as we're concerned. Now you come and demand that men be restored to work who not only will not work themselves, but will not let others work. You and I have grown up together, some of you, at least, in the employment of this road. You, Morton, and you, Toohey, were switchmen here under me when I was yard-master six years ago. You know and I know that what you ask is utterly absurd. No road can do business on any such principles as that.

Even if these discharged men did not richly deserve their discharge, what affair is it of yours? You are switchmen. You've never had a grievance that I know of. You never would have come to me with such a demand in this world but that you had been bamboozled or bulldozed into it by fellows who have no earthly connection with you, and whose only business in life is to go round stirring up trouble among honest men, living on their contributions, and taking precious good care to keep out of the way when the clash comes. No, lads. I've been your friend, and you know it. Between you and injustice of any kind I'm as ready to stand to-day as ever before, but I'd be no friend of yours. I'd deserve your contempt as well as that of our employers and the whole people, if I allowed my freight handlers to dictate to me whose freight they should handle. Those men courted discharge and they got it. Out they went and out they stay if I have to handle every pound of freight myself."

There was dead silence a moment in the office. The committeemen stood uneasily before their old friend and chief; three of them looked as though they wished they hadn't come and wanted to quit, two were more determined. It was one of these who spoke.

"Then, Mr. Williams, you refuse to listen to our appeal for justice!"

Mr. Williams whirled around in his chair, sharply confronting the speaker; his clear blue eyes seemed to look him through and through, a flush almost of anger swept over his face a moment, and he waited before he spoke. He had picked up a ruler, and was lightly tapping the edge of the desk as he tilted back in his chair.

"Your name is Stoltz, I believe. I refuse nothing of the kind, and you know it. I have listened with more patience than it deserved. None of these, the old hands, would have hinted at such a thing, and if they and their fellows will take the advice of a man they've known ten years to your ten months they'll not again be led by a word-juggler. Now if there's any other matter any of the rest of you wish to bring up," and here the Superintendent looked frankly around upon the anxious, almost crest-fallen faces of the other men, "I'll listen to you gladly, but you, Stoltz, have been far too short a time an employe of the road to presume to speak for those who have served it almost as long as I have."

"Yes, and what have they got for it? Do they sit in a swell office, ride in parlor cars, drive fast horses, sport handsome clothes--" began Stoltz, sneeringly.

"That's enough, Stoltz. They know that with a railway as with an army the men can't all be generals and colonels. Say to your friends, boys,"

he continued, in kindly tone, "that when they want anything of the road hereafter they'll be far more apt to get it by coming themselves than by sending Stoltz. That's all, then."

"No, it isn't all!" declaimed Stoltz, angrily. "You haven't heard our side. If those three men ain't back in their places at twelve o'clock, we of the Switchmen's Union go out to a man," and the spokesman paused to let this announcement have its due effect. It had.

"So far as one of the Union is concerned he goes out here and now, and that one," said Mr. Williams, "is yourself. The others will, I hope, think twice before they act."

"You mean I'm discharged?"

"On the spot," said Mr. Williams, "and there is the door."

For hours that hot June day had the story of that interview sped from tongue to tongue. The managers of the Switchmen's Union had been shrewd and wise in naming as members of their committee three of the oldest, stanchest, and most faithful hands in the employ of the company. They were sure of a hearing. Then to do the aggressive, this comparatively new man, Stoltz, was named, together with a kindred spirit of less ability, and these two men were the backbone, so said the managers, of the first attack. Stoltz was a German-American of good education, though deeply imbued with socialistic theories, and a seductive, plausible speaker on the theme of the wrongs of the laboring man. It was he who, under the guidance of shrewd agitators and "walking delegates," had been most active and denunciatory at the switchmen's meetings. Honest laboring men are slow of speech, as a rule, and fluency often impresses them where logic would have no effect. The committee came away, two of them exultant and eager for the fray. They had been disdainfully treated, said they, sneered at, reviled, and one of them summarily "fired" as the result of this visit to the magnate. The others were gloomily silent. It was too late to recede. The javelin was already thrown. At the stroke of five every man on duty quietly quit his post.

Many left the yard. Others, eager to see what the officials might do, remained. Stopped at the outskirts of the city, no trains came in. Only the evening mail crept out, its own crew manning the successive switches.

It was now 8.45, and barely dark. The western sky was still faintly illumined. Old Wallace could no longer read, and bent down to take a hand in the talk between his boys. Silence still reigned in the deserted yards. Men hovered in muttering groups, and watched the few officials who flitted about with lanterns in their hands. A rumor was going around that the management had determined to send out all the night pa.s.senger trains as usual, and the first of these should be along by ten o'clock.

As Mr. Wallace bent over Jim's broad shoulder his wife and daughters ceased their low chatter. Evidently something was on the old man's mind.

"There's no danger of its spreading to your people, is there, Jim? Would you go out if they did?"

"Father," said the young man, slowly, "you know the ties by which we are bound. Suppose now that Fred's regiment were ordered out, would you ask him would he go?"

Old Wallace looked graver still. "I consider that a very different proposition," said he. "I was hoping--" he faltered, when a young fellow in soiled blue flannel garb slipped quietly in through the rear gate, and coming up to the freight conductor, said the two words,

"Wanted, Jim."

Jim's bronzed cheek turned a shade lighter.

"What hour?"

"At once."

And before the others could ask explanation of this scene a bicycle came flashing up to the same gate, and the tall rider dismounted and strode quickly toward the party. Young Fred's eyes glistened at sight of him.

"Orders, Sergeant?" he eagerly inquired.

"Yes. Notify your squad to make arrangements with their employers, and be ready to report at the armory at a moment's notice."

The two brothers stood facing each other a little later, then silently clasped hands. One at the beck of a secret protective organization, the other at the call of duty to State and nation, parted at their father's gate to go their separate ways.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

A BOY'S AQUARIUM.

Boys who live in the city do not, perhaps, get quite the freedom of action and fun generally that a country boy can, but they do manage to have a pretty good time, even if they have to work a little harder for it. It is hard to keep pets in the city. Dogs need a lot of exercising, birds are apt to be a nuisance to the neighbors, if not to the boy's family, and yet pets are a necessity to every well-brought-up boy's happiness.

An aquarium is always dear to every boy's heart. And aquariums are not impossible in a city house. Fortunately they can be just as well taken care of in the city as in the country. A medium-sized aquarium which will hold quite a lot of stuff can be bought for $1.50 or $1.75. This must be filled with gravel or sand to the depth of four inches. In the sand must be, securely fastened, some water-gra.s.ses, which are for sale at any of the stores where fish are to be bought. The boys who succeed best with their aquariums are those who study the matter pretty thoroughly before they begin, and read up the scientific books of natural history. The simpler works of this sort contain any amount of practical information which any boy can apply to his own use.

A porous stone seems to be necessary in the middle of the aquarium. As for the placing of the water plants, they must be left to the boy's own taste and judgment. Indeed, the arrangement of the whole aquarium must be left to the boy who owns it. In this place I must stop and say that it is foolish for any boy to consult many of his playmates as to how the thing should be arranged, for when he has asked and received much advice, he will find that most of it is directly opposed to what he already knew, and besides is so varied as to be nearly useless. A gla.s.s tube for removing the manure from the sand must be kept beside the aquarium, if the scavengers, such as pollywogs and snails, fail to do their duty in cleaning up.

An extremely pretty aquarium has lately been fitted up by a boy about eleven years old. It is not a very large one, and stands on a small table near the window of his room--too near, it may be said, for the sun these summer days having unusual power has caused the untimely death of two many-tailed j.a.panese gold-fish and four extremely graceful little silver-fish. With the exception of this mortality, the death rate has been quite low. The original occupants of the aquarium before these recent deaths consisted of two pair of j.a.panese gold-fish, two pair of silver-fish, two pollywogs--one small one, who worked busily all day trying to do his share of the work in keeping the place clean, and one big fat pollywog, who sadly neglected his duty and spent his time trying to turn into a frog as quickly as he possibly could. Six snails, who were put in the aquarium to keep the gla.s.s clean, worked hard and satisfactorily in accomplishing their mission (in the beginning one snail was at first relegated to this work, but the task was beyond his power, and, after making a superhuman effort to go the whole round, he yielded up his life).

The water in the aquarium is changed twice a month, and when that is done the fish are lifted out very tenderly and carefully with a little scoop net, and put in a basin near by overnight, until every impurity of the sand shall have settled and the water is absolutely transparent.

This performance is always one of deep anxiety, and requires unremitting attention to be sure that everything is replaced exactly as it was before, so that the fishes will know their home when they get back to it. There was a lizard put in this aquarium, to begin with, but he proved of a very quarrelsome disposition, and tried to bite the tails of the fish, so that he had to be removed to a basin, where he lives a life of solitude. The pleasure given by this little aquarium has far exceeded the outlay of money, and many a useful lesson in neatness and care has been learned in looking out for the needs of the fish.

ANNE HELME.

MOTHER. "Jack, why is it you have so many holes in your pockets?"

JACK. "I guess it's my money which burns through."