The Beaver herald. [volume] (Beaver, O.T. [Okla.]) 1895-1923, 1898-11-03
III.--CoNTINUED.

Are We listenin'P" Mike inquired,
seeing that Darcie was eying his pa
pers in meditative way. "Beca'se av
ye are not, I'll not waste me breath"
GO on" said Darcie. "I was only
comparing what l have said myself
with what you are saying. It's odd we
should look at it in the same way.
You're a hot-headed Irishman, like all
the rest of them, Mike. Why aren't
you swearing vows against the oppres-
sors?"
"Beca'se I'm wan av thin meself.
It's not hobo 1 am, packin' me blank
cts from camp to camp. I've n shtake
av me own in the country; and II this
foolishness goes on, I'm clane ruined.
There's no man can run a mine in the
Cor de 'Lane-no, nor sell it, av he was
to give it away-the gait things is GO
in now.
"Ah, it's not n question av the miner
at all! They wants to run things here
the same as they does in Montany. Ye
wouldn't believe the power av the
union in Butte. Things was gettin'
mighty quare last spring before the
mine-owners TUX the definsive. Faith.
there was little law in the Cor de Lanes
that could howld above the law av the
union!
"Whin Hogan, the shif'boss, was
murdered in the Caltrop mine
shtabbed in the breast wild the prong
av miners can'le-shtick, an him
comm out o. the tunnel to the dhryin'-
house in broad day-there was plenty
that saw it; but him that done it was
a union man, an divil witness c'u'd
be found to say he seen it. They
wouldn't .dast, for the union can pro-
tect its own, be they lambs or wolves.
The hand av it was. that heavy on the
owners, n man couldn't be seen shpali-
in fri'ndly on the street with wan av
them but the union TUX note av him for
a thraitor. There was not thing the
mines c'u'd do but combine, or quit
business, or be dictated to by the
union bosses, like childher! Last au-
tumn, whin the mines shut down by
common. consint, it was partly to get
betther rates for transportation; but
that wouldn't go down with the union
boys. They had it the owners had
turned the tables on them, and gone on
shtrike themselves; and that wouldn' Z
do. we know; for the first principle av
the unions is that nobody shall COM
bine but themselves.
"Well, the shuttin' down didn't work
in all ways as they hoped. Fightin' it
out is bad; whichever side makes the
kick, the wrong ones is sure to get
hurted., The best meE, wsKt off seelin'
work where they could find it; the
vans that shtayed an growled, they
was the worst av the lot, and all winter
they was cussin' an blowin' an gettin'
up shtesm for big fight. Take town
full av idle men, an free whisky flow
in by the gallon, and set av bull
headed chumps that never did an hon
est days work in their lives talkin'
about the wrongs av the lab'rin' man
-ye know what'll be the end of that.
The mines gev out in the spring
they was ready to reshume, and pub
lished their scale av wages: three for
unshlSilled and three and half for
shkilled miners, the same as it was at
first. And then the union put forth its
last word: livery man workin' undher-
ground sh'u'd get three fifty and no
man sh'u'd take less and work wild
his life in the Cor de Lane. Twas
then the owners SHE'D their hat into
the ring, and both sides shtripped for
fight.
"'Twas aisy bringin' in men that was
willin' to work for three dollars, and
glad to get it, but it wasn't aisy kapin'
them here. They couldn't bide the life
they led, with the union putin its
shpite on them. Some was sediuced
into j'inin', but more was scared out
Nv the country entirely. They leaked
bway faster than they was fetched in
and thin that stayed was that harassed
an worried they couldn't do their
work like min.
AT last there was two boys workin'
in the o'Woe' that had the sand to
say they would nayther jine nor quit.
They stud out an tux their punisE-
ment. Wan av them was an Amerikin,
and he was oliver wild his talk about
his rights to work where he pl'ased,
and for who he pl'ased, under the laws
av the country, widout Fave av the
brotherhoods. But they quinched him
and his prattle about his rights. Him
and the other lad that was workin'
wild him, they hailed up the mountain
by long thrail.
"'Where are ye takin' us?' says they
Well go out PEACEFUL. the way we
come in, by the railroad
aye might get hurted that way,
says big Dan Rafferty,, pollin' his ugly
fun at thin. Wallace and Gem is full
av excited min; ii might not be safe
for ye. Wen take ye by quiet road
where yen meet wild no wan
"And they prodded the boys up the
mountain, abusin' thin all the way;
two hundred men dhrivin' two-b'atin
on ile-cans wild shticks, and cussin' them
wild every foul name they could turn
their tongue to. They showed them out
over the Montany divide, and the
clothes half tore off them wild the hand
lin they got. Twas the month av April
an the SHOWS was cruel deep. They
put them out on forsaken road to
wally through the drifts forty-five miles
to Thompson's falls, and they strangers
TO the way. There's mare a house but
wan, an that wan closed ag'inst them
for fear of the union.
"And that's how wan lab'rin' man
taches another who are his bosses in
this free country. By the Lord above!
a. l,.zus as.t