It was found that the prisoners could not be removed till the next day; and when food, and drink, and straw to sleep on was being supplied to them, it was melancholy to see how the relations of the men wandered about hoping to find means to speak to one or another. Many an entreaty was addressed to the soldiers just to be permitted to step up to the window between the horses, and see whether John, or Will, or George wanted anything or had anything to say. This could not of course be allowed; but it was long after dark before the last lingerer had shut herself into her cheerless home to watch for the morning.
That morning rose fair and bright as a June morning can be. Mr. Wallace opened the shutters of his drawing-room, where, with Mr. Bernard, he had passed the night, arranging plans for their next proceedings, and writing letters to their partners in London respecting the readiest mode of closing their concern; and to their law officers, respecting the redress which they should obtain for the injury done to their property. The crimson light of the dawn, the glittering of the dew on the shrubs, and the cheruping of the waking birds, were so beautiful a contrast to the lamp-light and silence within, that Mr. Wallace felt his spirits rise at once. They were at once depressed, however, when he saw the glancing of weapons in the first rays of the sun, and observed that the furnaces were out, and that all the scene, usually so busy, was as still as if it had been wasted by the plague. Manly as he was, and well as he had sustained himself and everybody about him till now, he could not bear these changes of feeling; and tears, of which he had no reason to be ashamed, rolled down his cheeks.
“You dread the sending off the prisoners,” said his partner. “So do I; and the sooner we can get it done the better.”
They therefore went out and saw that their sentinels were properly refreshed, and that every thing was prepared for their departure as speedily as might be. No one who walked about the place that morning could think for a moment that any further violence was to be apprehended. The most restless spirits were well guarded; and of those who were at large, all, the injurers and the injured, seemed equally subdued by sorrow and fear.
Just as the great clock of the works struck eight, a waggon drew up to the door of the building where the prisoners were confined. In a few minutes the whole population was on the spot. The soldiers kept a space clear, and obliged the people to form a half-circle, within which stood the partners and the commanding officer; and here the relations of each prisoner were allowed to come as he was brought out. The parting was so heart-breaking a scene that it was found necessary to shorten it; and for the sake of the prisoners themselves, it was ordered that they should only take one farewell embrace. Some took a shorter leave still; for there were wives and sisters—though not one mother—who would not own a relation in disgrace, and hid themselves when entreated by the prisoner to come and say “Farewell.” The entreaty was not in one instance repeated. A look of gloomy displeasure was all the further notice taken by the culprit as he mounted to his seat in the waggon.
At length, the last prisoner was brought out; the soldiers formed themselves round the waggon, and it drove off, amidst a chorus of lamentation from the crowd. Almost every face was turned to watch it till it was out of sight; but some few stole into the place which had lately been a prison, and sank down in the straw to hide their shame and their tears.
The partners thought that no time could be fitter than this for explaining to the assembled people the present state of affairs as it regarded them, and the prospect which lay before them. Mr. Wallace, who, as longest known to the people, had agreed to make this explanation, mounted to the window of a neighbouring building, and, while Mr. Bernard and his sons stood beside him, thus addressed the crowd below:—
“It is partly for our own sakes, though chiefly for yours, that we now offer to explain to you the condition and prospects of this concern. We still say, what we have often said, that we are accountable to no man for our manner of conducting our own affairs; but we wish you clearly to understand why we close our iron-work, in order that you may see that we cannot help doing so, and that it is through no act of ours that so many industrious and sober labourers are turned out of work in one day. We make this explanation for your sakes; because we hope that those among you who have been guilty of the intention, if not the deed of riot, will learn the folly as well as the sin of such proceedings, and that those who are innocent will train up their children in such a knowledge of facts as will prevent their ever bringing destruction on themselves and others by such errors as have ruined our concern.
“When we came here to settle, an agreement was made, in act if not in words, between the two classes who hoped to make profit out of these works. You offered your labour in return for a subsistence paid out of our capital. We spent the money we and our fathers had earned in buying the estate, building the furnaces, making or improving roads, and paying the wages which were your due. Both parties were satisfied with an agreement by which both were gainers, and hoped that it would long be maintained without difficulty or misunderstanding. No promise was or could reasonably be made as to how long the labour should be furnished on the one side and the capital on the other, in the same proportions; for it was impossible for either party to tell what might happen to the other.[other.] It was possible that so great a demand for labour might take place in some other manufacture as to justify your asking us for higher wages, or leaving us if we did not think proper to give them. It was equally possible that the prices of our manufacture might fall so as to justify us in lowering your wages, or in getting a part of our work done without your assistance.
“Nothing was said, therefore, about the length of time that your labour and our capital were to work together: and it was well that there was not; for in time both the changes happened that I have described. First, the demand for labour increased so much that you asked higher wages, which we cheerfully gave, because the prosperous state of trade pointed them out as your due. After a while the opposite change took place. Demand declined, prices fell, and we could not afford to give you such high wages, and you agreed to take less, and again less, as trade grew worse. So far both parties were of one mind. Both felt the change of times, and were sorry on account of all; but neither supposed that the other could have helped the misfortune. The point on which they split—unhappily for both—was the introduction of new machinery.”