LOOKING FORWARD.
When I was writing the last words of the preceding chapter of this
book, and was about to
"Heed my tired pen's entreaty,
And say, oh, friends, _valete_,"
I seemed to be trying to awake from a trance in which I had been the
unwilling instrument, compelled by an intelligence extraneous to
myself to expose to an incredulous public the most sacred scenes and
thoughts of a lifetime.
I had decided to relieve the patience of my readers with the
thirty-first chapter; but when the retrospective kaleidoscope closed,
a vision rose before me so vivid, so real, that I am constrained to
describe it in the hope that the warning may prevent the tragic part
of the dream from becoming a reality.
It is Christmas day in the year of our Lord, 1910; the thunder-cloud,
which for many years had been increasing in blackness, now surcharged
with pent-up lightnings, and overspreading our entire national
horizon, bursts with the fury of a cyclone.
The great masses of the people had for a long time watched with
ever-increasing rage the seeming conspiracy of the employing and
professional classes to bind to their chariot-wheels those who labored
with their hands. Gigantic trusts had "cornered" all the necessaries
of life, and a few lily-fingered plutocrats in their marble palaces
dictated to the horny-handed sons of toil the amount of their beggarly
wages, and the prices they must pay for every needed article, until
every job of work and every bone of charity was fought for by
multitudes who mercilessly stabbed each other in their mad fury to
assuage the pangs of hunger.
When the people rallied at the polls, and elected to the high offices
members of their own unions, the millionaires bribed these officials
to obey their every command, and these mercenary law-makers, as often
as chosen, joined the ever-growing ranks of the oppressors.
Even the almost innumerable colleges throughout the Republic, whose
treasuries had absorbed countless millions of dollars, had proved
a measureless curse, as they had become mere cramming machines and
nurseries of lawlessness and brutality. The great universities had
long idolized plug-ugly football kickers and baseball sluggers to
the utter ignoring of scholarship, until the hordes of eleemosinary
prize-fighters among the so-called students created a reign of terror
where they were located, and far surpassed in ferocity even the
gladiators of ancient Rome. The annual "athletic contest" between the
two greatest universities was fought out with almost inconceivable
fury on "Soldiers' Field."
Irresistible bodies met the immovable, cheered on by yelling legions,
each phalanx would conquer or die, and die they did by scores; they
kicked and slugged like maniacs until separated by the combined
police-forces of the surrounding cities, and more were killed and
wounded than in the entire Spanish War. When night fell, thousands of
collegians invaded the capitol of the State, and with savage yells and
wedge-rushes drove all citizens from the streets; they closed every
theatre, pelting the actors with whiskey bottles stolen from the
saloons in which they had smashed thousands of dollars' worth of
costly furniture; they stole every sign from stores, which caught
their fancy; no woman was respected, until their orgies were stopped
by the bayonets of the national guard.
Such "scholars" as these had for many years been ground through these
educational mills by thousands, crowding the ranks of the professional
classes to suffocation. Legions of unscrupulous lawyers, more
heartless than pirates or brigands in Bulgaria, infested every city
and town, busy as demons stirring up strife, drilling witnesses to
perjury, bull-dozing the innocent even unto death with the full
connivance of the plunder-sharing judges, until the jails were crowded
with victims who could not pay their outrageous fees.
These lawyer-sharks packed caucuses, stuffed ballot-boxes, and thereby
elected themselves to legislatures where they enacted unjust laws to
subserve their own iniquitous depredations.
But this nefarious pillaging was not confined to the courts alone:
armies of patientless doctors must be fed at the expense of the
long-suffering public, and as all the people were not _naturally_ sick
all the time for the benefit of the quacks, these so-called doctors
prevailed upon their legislative college-chums to pass laws compelling
all to be innoculated with virus, ostensibly to render them immune to
various contagions, but really to furnish unlimited plunder to their
"family physicians."
Even the women caught the craze for "higher education" to fit
themselves for "kid-glove" professional emoluments; they, too, tore
each other's hair, scratched each other's faces in frantic football
rushes, tumbling over each other in the wild scrimmage for fees,
leaving the kitchens to the ignorant foreigners, who ruined digestions
with preposterous cookery, which would have killed a nation of
ostriches.
The great Republic might have survived even such horrors as these had
it not been for the out-breaking of another craze more terrible far
than an army with gattling guns, I refer to the most destructive of
all scourges, the mania for stock-gambling. The crafty, unscrupulous
managers of bucket-shops, stock-exchanges, and brokerages filled the
columns of the press with manufactured accounts of vast fortunes
made in an hour by imaginary investors of small sums, and at once
multitudes of farmers, mechanics, and even teachers abandoned their
honest pursuits to squander their hard earnings in the vain attempts
to "buck the tiger," and "beard the lion in his den."
The inevitable result followed: the lion and the lamb lay down
together, with the lamb inside the lion, thousands of formerly
well-to-do people were pauperized. Thousands of farms were abandoned,
hundreds of factories were deserted, while the fiendish, cheating
boss-gambler sharks were gorged to repletion with their infamous
plunder; then followed a frenzy of hatred on the part of the masses
against the classes: city treasuries were depleted to feed the
starving with free soup, the cities were crowded with the desperate,
hungry multitudes who had lost their all, and bloody riots capped the
climax of a hell on earth.
From the cupola of the State House in Boston, a little group of
citizens gazed upon a scene which would daunt the stoutest heart;
these five men standing motionless and speechless under the gilded
dome are of widely differing stations in life, as far apart as the
poles in culture, education, and creed, but their faces wore the same
expressions of profound sadness mingled with stern determination.
The tall man on the right is the Governor of the State of
Massachusetts, a millionaire, a classic face showing his aristocratic
lineage in every feature, a scholarly, furrowed brow, dressed with
scrupulous care, and looking at the frightful scenes with the
dauntless eye of an eagle. He is the chosen leader of the Republican
party which for many years has controlled the destinies of the "Old
Bay State." Next stands a man in every way in strong contrast to his
refined companion, a short, stout, ruddy-faced son of Ireland, but
now Mayor of the city of Boston, a Democrat of Democrats, carelessly
dressed, a political boss, who under ordinary circumstances would
never have affiliated with his lordly neighbor.
Next in the line is a smooth-faced portly man, clad in fine
broadcloth, unmistakably a Catholic Priest; next is a man of soldierly
bearing whose uniform and shoulder-straps proclaim him to be the
commander of the national guard of the State; close beside the
guardsman is the stalwart superintendent of the city police. For a few
minutes only, these men were spell-bound by the terrible scenes before
them. A mob of ragged wild-eyed men and women are straggling along the
street, some wearing the red caps of Anarchy, firing revolvers at the
windows of the houses and at every well-dressed person in sight, some
waved strange banners labelled "Bread or blood," "Down with the rich,"
"Shoot the soldiers"; many blood-red flags are waved with demoniacal
yells.
Directly in front of this howling mob is massed the First Corps of
Cadets, and the 9th Regiment of Irish militia; soldiers are seen
falling in the ranks, and blood crimsoned the snow, alarm bells are
clanging, flames are bursting from the elegant buildings, tremendous
explosions are heard which seemed to shake the foundations of the
city. Ferocious men and women are seen looting the stores, drinking
plundered liquors; the off-scouring of all nations are pillaging,
burning, murdering; the spirit of hell seems in full control on this
natal day of the Prince of Peace. Still the national guard did not
fire.
"Father," cried the Governor, "will the 9th Regiment kill their own
brothers if ordered to shoot?"
"My children will obey orders, sir," quietly replied the priest.
"Then in heaven's name, General, Marconi the order; if we wait longer
everything is ruined."
The Mayor's eyes flashed fire; he seemed about to countermand--the
priest lifted his hand, "Brother, we must," he said--the Mayor
hesitated; he saw many of his own constituents among the rioters; his
face was like that of a corpse, then, "Order," he gasped.
The General touched the keys before him, the Colonel of the 9th
flinched as if struck by a bullet, then a quick command, the clear
notes of the bugle sounded, the Irish soldiers hesitated, glanced at
the cupola; the priest with outstretched arms confirmed the mandate;
the repeating rifles were levelled, and crash upon crash went the
volleys of bullets into the bosoms of the mob. Again pealed the bugle
note, and quick as a flash forward rushed the dandy Cadets and the
Irish soldiers, shoulder to shoulder in a wild bayonet charge.
Screams, groans and curses rend the air, scores of the rioters are
weltering in their gore, the rest broke, fled, leaving the streets
strewn with the dead and wounded.
"Marconi the hospitals," said the Governor; and in a trice the
ambulances are bearing away the sufferers to be tenderly cared for, as
if they were the best, instead of the worst of the human race.
"Brothers," said the Governor, "shall we order the troops and police
in every city to fire? It will be merciful to end this horrible
suspense." "Amen," came the response from the bowed heads of his
companions; instantly the command was Marconied to every place which
was in a state of anarchy.
Suddenly came the crash of musketry from many parts of the city,
accompanied by the grumbling bass of the gattling guns, then the
defiant yells ceased, and all was quiet.
"Your Excellency," calmly spoke the General, "here are Marconis from
every city that the fight is over, the mobs have dispersed.
"Thank God," came the chorus from each in this remarkable quintette
who had co-operated in the carefully-considered plans which had so
quickly brought peace to the distracted city and State.
"Brothers," said the Governor, "we must feed the hungry, and give
work to the people of our overcrowded cities: there is but one way to
accomplish this, we must colonize the unemployed upon the Southern and
Western lands, the people must go back to the bosom of mother earth
where they can have independent homes of their own; there are no
public funds for this purpose, and the rich must furnish the necessary
money for transportation, or the Republic is dead. I will personally
guarantee the funds necessary to furnish homes for all who will go
from Massachusetts to cultivate the unimproved lands in Florida and
Colorado, which, with others, I purchased years ago to provide for
this crisis which many prophesied was sure to come. I will at once
telegraph to secure the co-operation of the Governors of all the
States in our Union; the evening papers will announce our plans to the
world."
In a few minutes the lightnings were flashing full accounts of this,
the most important meeting ever held, throughout the length and
breadth of the nation; the responses were the most enthusiastic and
thrilling ever known in the history of mankind. Money in vast sums was
wired by the rich to every Governor, for the purpose of transforming
the poverty-stricken of the slums into self-supporting self-respecting
farmers; railroad presidents tendered free transportation; one touch
of nature made the whole world kin.
In an uncompleted tunnel under the harbor of Boston was gathered a
vast crowd of wild-eyed Anarchists, and desperate hungry wretches from
the vilest dens, who had just sworn with unspeakable oaths to burn and
plunder the city that very night, to murder all the rich, to commit
outrages no fiend had ever dared to dream before. When they were about
to rush out and let loose the dogs of carnage and unspeakable horrors,
suddenly in the glare of their torches appeared the priest who an hour
before, had played such an important part in the State House cupola
conference. A hush fell upon the rabble as they recognized their
spiritual adviser; with a voice of almost super-human power, he
shouted,
"Brothers, there is no excuse for murder, no cause for lawlessness,
money is flowing in like water to furnish homes for us all away from
these stifling factories out in God's pure air of the prairies and
fields of the great West and the sunny South. For the sake of your
wives and children do no violence; assemble all to-morrow morning in
the amphitheatre, where you will find food in abundance, until we are
located upon our own portion of God's green earth."
The effect of these sympathetic words was wonderful; malice and frenzy
were driven from the minds of these children of the slums, even as the
devils were exorcised from the Magdalen of old, and inspired with new
hopes and holier aspirations they vanished into the shades of evening.
All night long the Salvation Army, the Volunteers of America, hundreds
of every nationality and creed, labored strenuously in making
preparations to feed the hungry, clothe the shivering, and care for
the sick. When the morning dawned fair and balmy beyond all precedent
for this season of the year, the scene in the vast amphitheatre
baffled description, over which the heavenly host rejoiced as never
before. The united bands of the city discoursed sweet music from the
balcony, from steaming cauldrons the multitudes were fed to repletion
with nourishing delicious food; the sick, the weak, the women and
children were abundantly supplied in their homes, all seemed like one
great family, the rich and the poor clasped hands like brothers, and
the spirit of peace on earth good will toward men reigned supreme.
When all had been refreshed, while the bands played "Hail to the
Chief," the Governor, with a great number of the most prominent in
church, state, and philanthropy, filed in upon the rostrum, welcomed
by enthusiastic cheers. As the applause died away His Excellency said,
"In the city hives are clustered far too many human bees, we must
swarm out into the country where there is honey enough and to spare,
"'Go back to your mother, ye children, for shame,
Who have wandered like truants, for riches and fame!
With a smile on her face, and a sprig in her cap,
She calls you to feast from her bountiful lap.
Come out from your alleys, your courts, and your lanes,
And breathe, like your eagles, the air of our plains;
Take a whiff from our fields, and your excellent wives
Will declare it all nonsense insuring your lives.'
"You, who are strong, and who delight in buffetting the cold and snows,
should go to the deserted New England farms or to the broad prairies
of the West, the graneries of the world; but you who shrivel in the
wintry blasts, and who are subject to rheumatism and coughs, should go
to the sunny southlands where you can work and rejoice in a climate of
perpetual summer.
"We have funds in abundance to secure lands for all, build houses,
furnish essentials for tilling the soil, and provisions, until crops
can be raised; this money you can repay in easy installments to be
used to equip future applicants. All wishing to secure these homes
without money and without price can apply at the State House
to-morrow."
A glad shout which reached the stars and gladdened the angelic hosts
was the immediate response to these tidings, and poverty was banished
forever from the Great Republic.
The scene changes--from stygian darkness, desolation and gloom of
dingy, malodorous factories and streets, where ragged, hopeless
beggars-for-work delve and curse, to the glorious sunlight and balmy
air of the "Land of Flowers." Here we see pretty vine-clad cottages
embowered in orange groves, and surrounded by luxuriant harvests of
everything to make life worth the living. Here we see the murderous
villains of the Boston Christmas-day mobs, no longer blood-thirsty,
but smiling and happy as they listen to the songs of birds, the
bleating of their own flocks, the laughter of their delighted
children, while the prosperous fathers "tickle the bosom of their own
mother earth with the hoe to make it laugh with abundant crops for man
and beast." The grateful citizens have named their towns in honor of
their generous benefactors, thus establishing for Carneiges, Morgans
and Rockefellers monuments to their memories which will endure
forever.
Thus was removed for all time the antagonism between labor and
capital; thus were envy and class hatreds banished from society, and
thus was our glorious Republic secured upon firm foundations, which
will endure "until the final day breaks and all earthly shadows flee
away."
Thus at last the prophetic vision of the poet seemed to be realized in
"the land of the free and the home of the brave."
"One dream through all the ages
Has led the world along:
The wise words of the sages,
The poet in his song,
The prophet in his vision,--
All these have caught the gleam,
Have caught the light elysian,
Have told the haunting dream.
This dream is that the story
The ages have unrolled
Shall blossom in the glory
Of one long age of gold;
That every man and woman
Shall find life glad and free,
That in whate'er is human
Is hid Divinity.
The rod of old oppression
One day shall broken be;
Those held in night's possession
The light of hope shall see;
For tears there shall be laughing,
And peace shall be for strife,
And thirsty lips be quaffing
The wine of glorious life.
The rage and noise of battle
Shall sink, and fall to peace,
The lowing of the cattle,
The fruit and corn increase;
No more the wide sky under
The rattle of the drum,
No more the cannon's thunder,--
God's kingdom shall have come.
Some day, dearest, where skies are bright,
We'll dwell in the beauty of love and light;
And sorrow will seem
Like a far-off dream,
And life shall be morning, that knows no night!
Some day, dearest--that perfect day
For which we knelt in the dark to pray
We'll reap the rest
That God deems best--
In the beautiful vales of the far-away!"
End of Project Gutenberg's The Gentleman from Everywhere, by James Henry Foss