But we prefer liberty to slavery, and war to
starvation. Again we lay down our tools and seek to arouse public
sympathy in our behalf. Again we plead the righteousness of our cause,
and may the God of the poor help us."
This resolution was carried with shouts and the throwing up of hats. The
band began playing, and the procession headed by Captain O'Connor and his
assistants moved forward.
A third of the sober-minded of the employees soon dropped out of the
procession, while three thousand or more, many of them foreigners, were
only too glad to escape the everyday serfdom of a steel plant. All were
armed with clubs and stones. When O'Connor from the hill-top looked back
upon the mob that filled the street down into the valley and far up the
opposite hill, his courage for a moment failed him.
"What shall I do with this vast army?" he said to himself. Just then
the employees made a rush for the company's furnaces by the riverside,
filling the yards and approaches, shouting "Bank the fires! Down with
capital!"
The big engines were stopped and the furnaces were left to cool.
Frightened faces of women and children filled the door-ways and windows
of the many little brown houses on the hillside.
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