'Because it won't succeed. You might as well try to stop the stream of the Hudson, as to keep up wages, while fifty or a hundred cabinet-makers are coming in every week from Germany, ready to work for twelve dollars a month.'
'That shews how much you know about it. In our great and free country, there's work for all Europe; so it's no use saying wages can't be kept up.'
'Whether or not,' I retorted, 'that's my opinion, and I shall stick to it till I find a better.'
On this, the opposite party delivered himself of a lengthy harangue, in which arguments were quoted from Adam Smith, De Tocqueville, and others, with considerable fluency; all intended, apparently, to convict me of flagrant error, and prognosticate 'consequences.' I had not at that time read the works of these writers, and had only very youthful experience to oppose to such a weight of authority; and being, besides, one of those unfortunate individuals who cannot think of the right thing to say until twenty-four hours after the occasion has passed, I remained silent. My opponents mistook silence for assent, and left me, expressing a hope that they should see me at their committee-room next day.
The passage, at the entrance of which this scene had taken place, was separated from a turner's shop adjoining by a thin wooden partition, and the turner, who was a New Yorker, stopped his lathe to listen to our parley. When he heard me turn to go up stairs, he shouted: 'Hillo! Johnny Bull, they were rather too many for you. You must get up a little sooner in the mornin', if you want to circumvent Yankees! Look out for squalls, old fellow!'
'Words is only wind,' I replied, quoting one-half of a 'down-east' adage, as I ran up the stairs; he, however, before I got out of hearing, added the second half: 'but blows hurts.'
Three or four days passed away; trade was remarkably brisk, and a few of the bosses gave in--a fact announced with great exultation by the turn-outs, who now felt confident of victory, and urged their demands more strenuously than ever. But compliance was no part of the bosses' intentions, for no sooner were the arrears of unfinished work cleared off, than the hands found themselves again at liberty. This proceeding naturally irritated the struggle somewhat; and subscriptions for the support of those who, habituated to live from hand to mouth, had saved nothing, were called for with renewed importunity. The strike was beginning to feel the pressure of the laws of nature.