United States or Nepal ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The workers displayed an extraordinary readiness to undergo sacrifices. The locked-out workers left their work with magnificent courage; the sense of community made them heroic. Destitute though they were as a result of the hard winter, they agreed, during the first two weeks, to do without assistance.
And now it's the spring out there!" he cried once more. "The poor man's winter is past, and the bright day is coming for him! And here you go over to the wrong side and walk into prison! Do you know what the locked-out workers call you? They call you the locked-in workers!" There were a few suppressed smiles at this. "That's a dam' good smack!" they told, one another. "He made that up himself!"
They had kept step with the rapid growth of the movement, and they were still growing. The feeling that they were well prepared inspired them with courage and the prospect of a favorable result. From the country offers of employment for the locked-out workers daily reached the central office.
He had inaugurated a huge parade, every morning all the locked-out workers reported themselves at various stations in the city, and there the roll was called, every worker being entered according to his Union. By means of this vast daily roll-call of nearly forty thousand men it was possible to discover which of them had deserted in order to act as strike-breakers.
But those workers who still had work to do forsook it, in order to join themselves, in blind solidarity, to their locked-out comrades. They thought it was required of them! One day the masons made an unexpected demand that an hour should be struck off the day's work. They received a refusal. But that evening they knocked off at six instead of seven.
The iron-masters had followed up their victory and had managed to set yet another industry in motion again. If this sort of thing went much further the entire iron industry would one day be operated without the locked-out workers, who could stand outside and look on. But now a blow was about to be struck! Pelle's heart was full of warmth and joy as he left home, and he felt equal for anything.
The distribution of relief in the form of provisions could not have been entrusted to better hands. He superintended the whole business of distribution, but what he liked best was to stand, knife in hand, cutting up pork for the families of locked-out workers. The portions were strictly weighed; none the less, the women always thronged about him.
They had not yet recovered from the winter when he was drawn into the conflict; and the preparations for his new position had plunged them into debt. Pelle received the same relief as the other locked-out workers ten to twelve kroner a week and out of this Ellen had to provide them with food and firing.
They forbade the merchants and contractors to supply those who worked at home on their own account with materials for their work; and secret agents were despatched all over the country to the small employers and the farmers, in order to prejudice them against the locked-out workers; and the frontier of the country was covered with placards.
And yet, every year there are thousands of strikes and lock-outs in Europe and America the most severe and protracted contests being, as a rule, the so-called "sympathy strikes," which are entered upon to support locked-out comrades or to maintain the rights of the unions.
Word Of The Day