Page:American Boy's Life of William McKinley.djvu/212

176, and these places were controlled by men who were politically his enemies. It was arranged that as soon as McKinley tried to talk, all the factory whistles should begin to blow, thus drowning him out.

Totally unaware of the plot hatched against him, the would-be governor started to deliver a carefully prepared address. He had hardly gotten as far as "Fellow-citizens," when toot! toot! toot! went one whistle after another, and then began a perfect bedlam of sounds, during which, as one politician afterward said, "you couldn't hear yourself think."

The committee having the candidate in charge were dumfounded and exceedingly chagrined. They waited as patiently as possible for the steam to give out, but the engineers had a good supply on hand, and instead of decreasing the blowing increased, until folks had to put their hands to their ears to shut out some of the noise.

"We are sorry, but we can do nothing," bawled one of the committeemen in McKinley's ear.

"Has anybody a piece of chalk?" shouted back the candidate, calmly.