Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1854-07-08
THE ANTI-SLAvERY BUGLE.
SYMPATHY FOR A POOR LABoRER.

When you meet Mt carly morn q hardy son of
toll Fastening rapidly along, you feel q pity for
your brother that is not often misplaced. just
look at him again-tlie tall form as a little bent
forward, as if chasing h hope that could never bel
caught; while the dress that covers it betokensl
either a reckless disregard Of the requirements of
decency aud cleanliness, or q heart .rending, heart
trying poverty, over which the poor man has no
control.
1t is six o'clock-an early hour-yet the me-
chanic hurries to his work; and so fast, that the
dinner in tho pocket Of his coat, which just peeps
out, swings to and fro, up and down, with the crr-l
rents of air that meet it, while the coffee in a
bright tin kettle spills out, stopping it and wetting
the clothes already soiled, Of him who carries it.
After all the ~hurrying and painting and painting
and sweating, suppose our friend arrives at his
shop five minutes after the regular time for COM
mencing work, and receives o greeting from a cross
foreman.
peter! where in the ID have YOU been all
the morDing2 here tbs five minutes past SIX o'clock,
and you have come late again all the other hands
are here in season what's the matter with you -?
on a drunk last night eh2"
Now imagine the eject Of such language on
P1ter. lie listens until the last word is uttered,
and skulks off to his work with q curse on his lips
then ho thinks of his poor wife ut home with O.
new born infant, whom no attended with all the
tenderness of a woman, through the night watches
how he faithfully gave her medicine at the hour
appointed by the doctor how he hushed the cry
% D"'J t.@N - ioh bhhSo lu6t W uCI
had laid down to rest; how at day-break he had
boiled the water, and made his own coffee how he
took time to dress the other two children, and then
wash the dishes, because mother" could not rise
from her bed, and he did not like to trouble the
neigh5ors on the same floor with himself, to do
this.
Then no remembers his poverty. Then he looks
at his begrimed hands, and his torn clothes,-and
wipes his nose upon his coat sleeve with a sigh fer
better days. Then he thinks how he would like 70
be a foreman, and come in late if he pleased.
" Besides" he says, II couldn't help it; sis want
ed a string put into her shoe, and had to stop
oh dear, how tired / feel, how sleepyl"
Perhaps from a curse the poor man goes to a
dram shop for solace. He knows that he has
worked during the past night, and that it was re-
ALL not his fault in entering the shop late. But
he cannot explain to a cross man, and relieve his
pont up feeling but continues through the day up
happy, miserable, and detected in mind, all for the
want Of a kind word from the one who had power
10 give it. His work goes wrong, he feels wrong
himself, and wishes that he were dead,-far away
from n world of trouble and woe, of poverty and
oppression. He reasons with himself and asks
why he, made in Gods image, should be defaced,
his manly form having yielded to burdens that ho
never sought?
He asks if there is right or Justice in the regu-
lations Of labor, that compel him to work hard
from e in tho morning until 7 O'Clock at night, or
compassion in a society that demands labor from
his hands, and YET refuses him the mems of recre-
alton for body and mind that are the best stimu-
llants to activity? Every laboring man asks these
questions, which are worthy of an answer, and
hopes for better days, heralded by expressions Of
sympathy from his brethren of the race Of man.
) kind.-HeyaM