Great as has been the world’s wonder at the uprising of Mr. Bryan’s
“struggling masses” in the city by the sea, and the narrow escape of its
magnificent homes from fire and brand, yet greater still was the
wonderment when the news was flashed across the land that Chicago did
not stand in need of a single Federal soldier.
“Chicago is mad, but it is the madness of joy. Chicago is in the hands
of a mob, but it is a mob made up of her own people—noisy, rude and
boisterous, the natural exultation of a suddenly enfranchised class; but
bent on no other mischief than glorying over the villainous and
self-seeking souls who have ground the faces of the poor and turned the
pitiless screw of social and political power into the hearts of the
‘common people’ until its last thread had been reached, and despair
pressed its lupine visage hard against the door of the laboring man.”
And yet, at this moment when the night air quivered with the mad
vociferations of the “common people,” that the Lord had been good to
them; that the wicked money-changers had been driven from the temple,
that the stony-hearted usurers were beaten at last, that the “People’s
William” was at the helm now, that peace and plenty would in a few moons
come back to the poor man’s cottage, that Silver was King, aye, King at
last, the world still went wondering why red-eyed anarchy, as she stood
in Haymarket Square, with thin arms aloft, with wild mien and wilder
gesticulation, drew no bomb of dynamite from her bosom, to hurl at the
hated minions of the law who were silent spectators of this delirium of
popular joy.
Why was it thus? Look and you shall know why white robed peace kept step
with this turbulent band and turned its thought from red handed pillage.
He was there. The master spirit to hold them in leash. He, and he alone,
had lifted Bryan to his great eminence. Without these twenty-four
electoral votes, Bryan had been doomed, hopelessly doomed. He, and he
alone, held the great Commonwealth of the West hard and fast in the
Democratic line; hence he came as conqueror, as King-maker, and the very
walls of the sky-touching edifices trembled as he was dragged through
the crowded streets by this orderly mob, and ten times ten thousand of
his creatures bellowed his name and shook their hats aloft in mad
exultation:
“You’re our Saviour, you’ve cleaned the Temple of Liberty of its foul
horde of usurers. We salute you. We call you King-maker. Bryan shall
call you Master too. You shall have your reward. You shall stand behind
the throne. Your wisdom shall make us whole. You shall purge the land of
this unlawful crowd of money-lenders. You shall save the Republic. You
are greater than Washington. You’re a better friend of ours than
Lincoln. You’ll do more for us than Grant. We’re your slaves. We salute
you. We thank you. We bless you. Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!”
But yet this vast throng of tamed monsters, this mighty mob of
momentarily good-natured haters of established order, broke away from
the master’s control for a few brief moments, and dipped their hands in
the enemy’s blood. The deed was swift as it was terrible. There were but
four of them, unarmed, on pleasure bent. At sight of these men, a
thousand throats belched out a deep and awful growl of hatred. They were
brave men, and backed against the wall to die like brave men, stricken
down, beaten, torn, trampled, dragged, it was quick work. They had faced
howling savages in the far West, painted monsters in human form, but
never had they heard such yells leave the throats of men; and so they
died, four brave men, clad in the blue livery of the Republic, whose
only crime was that some months back, against the solemn protest of the
Master, their comrades had set foot on the soil of the commonwealth, and
saved the Metropolis of the West from the hands of this same mob.
And so Chicago celebrated the election of the new President who was to
free the land from the grasp of the money-lenders, and undo the bad
business of years of unholy union between barterers and sellers of human
toil and the law makers of the land.
Throughout the length and breadth of the South, and beyond the Great
Divide, the news struck hamlet and village like the glad tidings of a
new evangel, almost as potent for human happiness as the heavenly
message of two thousand years ago. Bells rang out in joyful acclaim, and
the very stars trembled at the telling, and the telling over and over of
what had been done for the poor man by his brethren of the North, and
around the blazing pine knots of the Southern cabin and in front of the
mining camp fires of the Far West, the cry went up: “Silver is King!
Silver is King!” Black palms and white were clasped in this strange
love-feast, and the dark skinned grand child no longer felt the sting of
the lash on his sire’s shoulder. All was peace and good will, for the
people were at last victorious over their enemies who had taxed and
tithed them into a very living death. Now the laborer would not only be
worthy of his hire, but it would be paid to him in a people’s dollar,
for the people’s good, and now the rich man’s coffers would be made to
yield up their ill-gotten gain, and the sun would look upon this broad
and fair land, and find no man without a market for the product of his
labors. Henceforth, the rich man should, as was right and proper, pay a
royal sum for the privilege of his happiness, and take the nation’s
taxes on his broad shoulders, where they belong.