The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1912-07-16

death Dy Impoverished milk which was
| yet the best that strike benefits could
buy.
De more trouble We make. Holtz-
man continued. de quicker dey come
to settle, and de slower deg come to =
lockoudt next time"
After the shade Of emotion that
swept orer them. Martins features
settled themselves in black taciturn-
ity, and he sat speechless for quarter
Of an hour, cutting the piece Of fuse
into tiny bits with his jackknife. and all
the while Hoffman was buzzing in his
ear in low, insistent tones. When the
German had finished. he stopped and
lifted loose bit OF planking at his
| feet, revealing hole In the ground
that Martin saw was exactly nlled BY
: box labeled Nitro"
Holtxman let the board drop gently
back into place. and It looked like
every other BIT OF planking about 1t.
We shoot him tonight he COM
mented.
Martin had been looking down at the
plank. He shifted his gaze to the face
of Holtzman. In look that was cold
and hard.
tHoltzman," he said. in steady
tones. but with certain ominous quail
ity in them. II you shoot on as much
as a f1recracker in this town or round
those works before this strikes lost
or won I'll wiring your neck like
chickens"
He walked away and left Holtzman
standing.
| Looking about to see there was no
one in sight In the lanes between lum-
Der piles through which Martin was
going, the German ran after him. His
face was working in an insane rage.
'To-night!' he Missed In the mans
ear, tonight"
But Martin did not even glance at
him. He had listened, he had pom
dered. and he had had his word. That,
therefore, was all for him. He had
decided, not from the boss's stand
point. not from society's standpoint,
but from the point of view Of the
union, and more Immediately Of the
strike, for 1t was in the strike that he
lived and moved and had his being.
Through 1t he had become class con.
scious Above the crowd of his fellow
Ibattlers he doomed, great, sad Lin
coin.
Once he forgot his role. It was after
his baby died. and when some fresh
despair entered his soul at sight Of a
crowd Of strike-breakers leaving the
| train. He ragged through them, a
| jungle beast, swinging his great arms
like fails, and wherever his mighty
fist impacted man crumpled up on
the pave. But presently he mastered
himself He held back his hand from
murder that day, and after it more
than ever he held back his fellows
from deeds Of violence.
"Our cause Is just" he would say.
why do wrong in the name OF the
just?''
But there was, for all that. conflict
in the breast Of Martin himself. He
was man who could live his life in
the life OF Others When strikers
wife was sick, when another's baby
died, or when Strunskey's house
burned out to shell, the big man car
ried all this on his heart He found
way, too, to show his sympathy, ant
do his little share in this common
burden-bearing.
And Ii there was no violence among
the strikers, there was violence In tn,
heart Of this giant shepherd of tn,
flock. He had transplanted the con
f1ict to his own breast, and fought /
out there daily. In that heart wa
agony, and tears, and hunger, an,
wrestling against odds and tTamplinl
on things tender and sore. His mind
too, was a battle-ground. There wer
reasonings and wranglings, combats o
ideals and conflicts of ideals, wresi
lings with sayings that we're hard AM
conclusions that seemed at once IN
evitable and impossible.
And here now was this crazy Dutch
man secreting dynamite to blow u
the Rockport Foundry and Machin
Shop where John Martin and four 0
the twelve hundred strikers had bee
employed. John was against 1t on prir
ciple. and he was against 1t on policy
There might be short-sighted, priys
4 tion-crazed men among the striker
to aid and abet him; there Nigh
be those who theorized that, anythin
that made trouble for the bosses wa
good for the strikers; but John MAJ
tin could see beyond all this-to tn
right
At least, he thought he could.
And then came Denny WEIGH to NEE
him, right at the corner by Jack F,
garty's place. where some portion Of tn
. idle men who nourished their endu
ance on spirituous beverages hung OF
j most regularly.
j THE boys are goin' to quit" sal