Out of the crowds there came the note of that wailing march. Some one always started that.
That night on the North Side Doctor Cowell got hold of the shoulder of a newspaper man and led him to a car. He who knew Bismarck and who had sat in council with kings went walking and babbling half the night through the empty streets.
It is amusing now to think of the things men said under the influence of McGregor. Like old Doctor Johnson and his friend Savage they walked half drunk through the streets swearing that whatever happened they would stick to the movement. Doctor Cowell himself said things just as absurd as that.
And all over the country men were getting the idea—the Marching Men—old Labour in one mass marching before the eyes of men—old Labour that was going to make the world see—see and feel its bigness at last. Men were to come to the end of strife—men united—Marching! Marching! Marching!
CHAPTER V
In all of the time of The Marching Men there was but one bit of written matter from the leader McGregor. It had a circulation running into the millions and was printed in every tongue spoken in America. A copy of the little circular lies before me now.
THE MARCHERS
“They ask us what we mean.
Well, here is our answer.
We mean to go on marching.
We mean to march in the morning and in the evening when the sun
goes down.
On Sundays they may sit on their porches or shout at men playing
ball in a field
But we will march.
On the hard cobblestones of the city streets and through the dust
of country roads we will march.
Our legs may be weary and our throats hot and dry,
But still we will march, shoulder to shoulder.
We will march until the ground shakes and tall buildings tremble.
Shoulder to shoulder we will go—all of us—
On and on forever.
We will not talk nor listen to talk.
We will march and we will teach our sons and our daughters to
march.
Their minds are troubled. Our minds are clear.
We do not think and banter words.
We march.
Our faces are coarse and there is dust in our hair and beards.
See, the inner parts of our hands are rough.
And still we march—we the workers.”