But the poor man suffered from a handicap that rendered him futile. He had a wife whom he loved and children whom he adored. If he did his duty and hurled bombs at the oppressors, what would become of his family? He could not do anything that might cause them distress or suffering. He had given hostages to fortune. But if he had been a free man—The conflict between his radical brain and his kindly heart furnished the most tragic comedy that has ever come within my experience.
But these serene altruists, often well-read and thoughtful, are much more dangerous than the most raving Reds. They are so sure of the economic soundness of their views and so kindly in their intentions that one almost feels ashamed to oppose them or laugh at them. They are not parlor Bolshevists, but men who might be described as super-sane—men who are too rational for a mad world.
My first experience with this class was on the Western prairies, just before the Winnipeg strike. I was travelling on a branch railroad, and not being willing to wait for an express train I found accommodation in the caboose of a freight. Being thrown into the company of the conductor and trainmen I cultivated their society and induced them to talk. What amazed me was their satisfied certainty that the world was to be made over at once without a struggle. Capital, the great robber of labor, was to be eliminated. Government was to be taken over by the workers and all profits would go to those who earned them. As to the management of affairs—wasn't that all done already by hard-worked, under-paid clerks while highly paid officials took all the credit? Take President Beatty, of the C. P. R. What did he do but sit at a flat-topped desk in a luxuriously appointed office and draw a big salary while others did the work? They were not angry about it. They were merely ashamed that the matter had not been settled long ago. It was all so simple.
In Edmonton I met with more of these men who were about to shatter organized society and "remould it nearer to the heart's desire." One in particular impressed me curiously. He had the appearance of a man accustomed to hard labor who was taking a rest and meditating on world problems. His aspect was dreamy but kindly. I found him in the office of the Honorable Frank Oliver, and he was trying to induce that hardheaded statesman of the old régime to publish in his paper a prospectus for the new world. According to the new plan all the people from the farms of Alberta were to move into the cities, where they could get proper shelter when the big hotels and the homes of the rich would be taken over by the men whose labor had built them and had made them possible. I wish I had a copy of the document, but one phrase that stuck in my memory will give a taste of its quality. The ingenuous dreamer proposed a method of dealing with the crops needed to supply food that struck me as unique. He proposed that when seeding-time came round, "joyous bands" would go out from the cities and put in the crops. Having some experience of the drudgery of farm work that phrase impressed me. Similar bands would go out at harvest-time and garner the grain. Mr. Oliver was so dazed that he didn't say a word. He passed over the document and waited for my opinion. I had nothing to say. And yet neither of us is without a certain command of language.
The cumulative effect of this contact with the new altruism was that, when I started for home from Winnipeg, I reminded myself of the soul of Stephen Leacock's Melpomenus Jones, which escaped from its earthly tenement "like a hunted cat over the back-yard fence." I hoped devoutly that my kindly friend of the prairie freight would not succeed President Beatty at the flat-topped desk until we had been travelling for at least twenty-four hours. If we got through the rocky district and reached old Ontario, I could walk the rest of the way home.
Because of such experiences I am not unduly surprised at the kind of talk I hear among the advanced and kindly thinkers of labor circles. I hope to pick up a few more phrases as delightful as "joyous bands" and "get back to the primitive."
Surely, oh, surely it is high time that some one turned light and laughter on this muddle. Canada and the United States are alike in their need of a solution for this problem. They have more important matters pressing for attention than the question of who won the Great War. And, in concluding this chapter, let me record the astounding fact that as yet no one has assured me that the United States won the war.