The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-08-04
DEATH: SLA VERY: THE
SEA AND HE'LL SHIPS

tives, was soon laying down and
washing about in the "lee scuppers,"
very much scared of his life! Had
1t not been for some foreign" sail
ors, he too would have gone to
Davey Jones locker, but they merci-
fuIly picked him up and taking him
to his bunk nursed him while he
was sick and hlpless. Gone was all
his bravado, gone was all his patrio-
mania, he became mild, meak and
weak. Even so weak that the Young
future officers of the middle class
(that constitute fascismo and 100
per cent tismo nowadays) soon took
advantage in making a clown out
of the soldier to amuse themselves.
The poor fellow had no peace, even
the captains "missus" sloppy. fat
and pasty-faced woman of the So
called "Mayflower stock" swore at
him Damn you, you bloody soldierl"
Soon the poor man began to see
daylight. England had lost its "for-
mer fairness and sweetness" The
once proudly floating Union Jack
was no longer the much praised
blood and guts"-but only the
bloody sweat of the exploited, so
that men like Jank and the rest of
his dirty gang could live and fatten!
He stopped talking of England GO
ing to war and licking Germany; he
stopped dispising the Russian Bear;
there were no more "Dagoes" or
Dutch" to him now-only we and
the "Big Bugs"
4 And when the lofty peaks of the
Andes showed above the horizon the
/. once hard boiled sargeant-major was
so overjoyed at the sight of land,
that he burst forth in the famous
workers song: "The Red Flag!" He
had found himself, he had become
aX-man!
We made our port after bolster
GUS passage of ~ days and an
chored at Squique, Chile. There we
lay anchored at the time about 80
deep sailing vessels discharging
coal and nitrate for Europe that
already was then prepared for "the
big slaughter" which was to come
four years later.
Tropics. Not cloud in the sky.
Not breath of wind in the air.
Searching run rays are heating
down the hatch and lashing stripped
to the waist sailors bodies red and
raw, as they bend shoveling coal
into the baskets. . f. Dirty, coal
black, sweaty faces. On deck the
officers are watching down the
hatch, and yelling and swearing at
the sweaty, grim faces and coal
A be seen through the clouds of coal
black bodies that at times can hardly
dust rolling up from below! Swelter-
ing heatl Hurry up, you slaves,
Coal must come out. Nitrate must
be. loaded, explosives must be made,
men must fight, go to war, be killed,
stink and rot on battlefields, so that
empires can be saved for pluto
cracy!
On the poop below a heavy avn
ing all is so nice, so clean, and SO
cool. The almighty" master is
lazily laying back in his deck chair
A much worn bible resting in his
lap, clean, white flannel trousers
"The almighty" had just finished
a chapter and is thinking of the
profits for the next voyage, has
he not 5000 pounds sterling in the
ship? Smiling happily as if sur.
rounded by angels the old bible pun.
: cher is doing off and there is 9
prayer on his thick ugly lips: Money
rata bene.
The soldier did not go to war. That
one voyage was more than enough
for him to see that England, or any
other country, was not worth fight.
ing for. Old pig-head was torpedoec
on his ship and taken to Germany 9
prisoner Of war, where the writer
also prisoner of war (wounded anC
taken before Amiens, France, 1879
met him shortly after the armistice
But what a change in the old hog
No one can keep pot belly on one
meal of kartoffel soup a day. True
he was broken physically, but moi
financially. Not yet. Not as long
as "blood and CUTS" will dangle from
the pole. But how long?
Events are marching fast. -.
The end of the pig-head money-mas-
ter grafters is coming to an end
Coming fast; ending fast.
R. J. PETERSEN.