Omaha daily bee., 1902-09-28

no brightness in them. nothing but cold
and hunger. days when proud men asked for
bread and gentlewomen took aims. Those
we're days when misery and desperation
came upon God-fearing men-until. like
Jobs wife. they could curse God and die"
His father writes him to discharge his
men, close down the elevators and suspend
everything. Then follows many dramatic
scenes picturing the causes that drove peo-
pie TO despair. Field witnesses scenes and
sees the suffering among his employees, and
this touches a new chord in his heart. He
disregards his fathers orders and at a per-
sonal sacrifice retains his men. In the de-
scriptions OF acts that drove men TO despair
and crazed the people at the time the reader
will ind an account that reads very much
like what Is known as the Barrett Scott
tragedy.
story of Her Life.
Fields sympathies are stirred by all this
suffering, and when Edith Hull again makes
her appearance she tells him part Of her
past, and he is won over to the populist
cause. Her story is that all her childhood
she had known nothing but mortgage. The
land her father once owned turned out to
contain rich ore, but not until it had passed
from his hands. Her brother was com
PEELED to go to work as a section hand and
was finally killed by the soldiers in a strike.
They shot my brother she repeated
They brought his body to me-. some Of the
strikers, who we're with him when he fell.
I cried when my father was dead and when
l think Of my little brother and my mother
l sob at the thought. When my brother
was killed there was something eating and
burning in me. l felt l must do something.
Until he was buried / did not leave him.
II seemed there was something l could still
do for aim. At first ! tried to comb his
curls over the dull, red hole in his fore
head. His right hand was torn by a bay
onet. 1 hid 1t in flowers. But before they
put him In the CONN I lifted his hair from
his forehead; / took the flowers from his
hand; I let the people see where the sol
diers had pierced his head. I showed them
the torn, dead hand. It seemed to me, too.
that he was going before God with bullet
and bayonet marked upon him; he was
taking his evidence to the last Judge"
And this picture continually before her
is what, though apparently weak, rave her
the strange strength and furnished her the
fire for her speeches.
And So They Were Married.
Eventually he marries Edith. who be-
lieves that he can do more than she for
the cause she considers so vital to the
west. She merges her personality in his
and he grows in strength and purpose. He
leaves his fathers employ, starts to prac-
ticing law and after a term in the state
legislature, during which his wife per-
suades him to return. unused. some passes
presented him by the railroads. Later he
is elected to congress and takes up his life
in Washington. He falls into the hands Of
the lobbyists and lmost loses the love and
esteem Of his wife. But the death Of his
child brings back his better self. His suf-
fering at the grave is one Of the strong
scenes In the book. He returns to Wash
ins,on after the boys funeral, brings forth
a bill he introduced, but which the lobby
lists had persuaded and hired him to let die
in the hands Of a committee, makes q stir
ring speech in It's favor. thereby securing
the passage OF the maximum freight-rate
bill. His father then dies. leaving him a
fortune, which he uses to bring happiness
to the people in Columbia Junction. Pub
lished by Harper & Bros.