St. Landry democrat., 1886-06-19

|
ments will be swallowed up quicker tina
South American earthquake ever too
down city. God will catch these op
| pressors between the two mill stones o
his wrath, and grind them to powder.
Why is it that a female principal in
| school gets only $S25 for doing work 70
which male principal gets 1850? Thea
| from all this land the wall of womanhood
Man has nothing to answer to that wal
but batteries. He says she is an angel
| She is not. She knows she is not. She il
| a human being who gets hungry whe1
| she has no food and cold when she has NJ
fire. Give her no more batteries; give hel
justice. There are $1,000 sewing girls il
New York and Brooklyn. Across the sun
light comes their death groan. 1t is MOI
such a cry as comes from those who are
suddenly hurled out of life, but a slow
grinding, horrible wasting away. Gather
them before you and look into their faces
pinched, CHASTITY, hunger struck! Look al
their fingers, needle pricked and blood
tippedl See that premature stoop in the
shoulders! Hear that dry, hacking, mer-
ciless cough! At large meeting of these
L
grand speeches were delivered, but a
needle woman took the stand, threw aside
her faded shawl, and with her shriveled
arm hurled a very thunderbolt of elo-
quence, speaking out the horrors of her
own experience.
l speak more fifty of woman's wrongs
because she has not been heard in the
present agitation. You know more of
what men have suffered. l said to a coll
ored man who, in Missouri last March,
came into my room in the morning to build
my fire: "Sam, how much wages do you
people get around here?" He replied
"Ten dollars a month, STRIP I asked:
"Have you family?" eyes," said he,
"wife and children" Think of it; $120
year to support a family on. Ny friends,
there is something in this world awfully
atwist. When 1 think of these things I
am not bothered as some of my brethren
with the abstract questions as to why
God let sin come into the world. The only
wonder with me is that God don't smash
this world up and start another in place
of it.
One great trial that the working classes
feel is physical exhaustion. There are
athletes who go out to their work at six or
seven O'Clock in the morning and come
back at night as fresh as when they start
ed. They turn their back upon the shut
tie or the forge OF the rising wall, and
they come away elastic and whistling.
That is the exception. have noticed that
when the factory bell taps for six O'Clock,
the hard-working man wearily puts his
arm into his coat-sleeve and starts for
home. He sits down in the family circle
resolved to make hiriself agreeable, to be
the means of culture and education to his
children; but in five minutes he is sound
asleep. He is tagged out-strength of
body, mind and soul utterly exhausted.
He rises in the morning only half rested
from the toll. Indeed he will never have
any perfect rest in this world, until he
gets into one narrow spot which is the
only perfect rest for the human body in this
world. I think they call it grave! Has
toll frosted the color of your cheeks? Has
it taken all spontaneity from your laugh
ter? Has it subtracted the spring from
your step and the luster from your eye,
until it has left you only half the man you
were when you first put your hand on the
hammer and your foot on the wheel? To-
in your place of toll, listen, and
you will hear a voice above the hiss of the
furnace and the groan of the foundry and
the clatter of the shuttle-a voice not of
nor of the task-master, but the
voice of an all-sympathetic God, as he
says:
Come unto me all you who labor and are
leavy laden, and 1 Will give you rest.
Let all men and women of toll re-
member that this work will soon be over.
Have they not heard that there is great
Holiday coming? o! that home, and no
ong walk to get to it. o! that bread and
10 sweating toll necessary to earn it. o!
hese deep wells of eternal rapture and no
leavy buckets to draw up. wish they
would put their head on this pillow stuffed
With the down from the wing of all Gods |
promises. There remains rest for the |
'eople of God.
wonder how many tired people there |
re in the house to-day. thousand? |
fore than that. Two thousand people |
Who are tired, tired out with their life, |
ired in hand and foot and back and heart. |
Nh! there are more than two thousand |
'eople bere to-day, supposing all the rest
o be in luxury and in ease. Yonder is a
voman who has her head down on her
and. What does that mean? Ask her.
has been tiresome week to her.
"OW she says, "when will I ever get
ny rest?"
May God comfort all who toll with the
eedle and the sewing machine, and have
on those borne down under the
atigues of life.
Another great trial is privation of taste
nd sentiment. There are mechanics who
ave their beautiful homes, who have their
ne wardrobes, who have all the best
'uits and meats of the earth brought to