Page:The leopard's spots - a romance of the white man's burden-1865-1900 (IA leopardsspotsrom00dixo).pdf/429

 was abolished in this country in 1865 is the silliest. Slavery was never firmly established until the chattel form was abandoned for the wage system in 1865. Chattel slavery was too expensive. The wage system is cheaper. Now they never have to worry about food, or clothes, or houses, or the children, or the aged and infirm among wage slaves.

"Once the master hunted the slave,—now the slave must hunt the master, beg for the privilege of serving him and trample others to death trying to fasten the chains on when a brother slave drops dead in his tracks.

"No, I don't shed any crocodile tears over the Negro slavery of the South. It was a mild form of servitude, in which the Negro had plenty to eat and wear, never suffered from cold, slept soundly and reared his children in droves with never a thought for the morrow.

"Then mothers and babes were sometimes, though not often, separated by an executor's or sheriff's sale. Now, we know better than to allow babes to be born. Then, a babe was a valuable asset and received the utmost care. Now, we have baby farms which we fertilise with their bones. I know of one old hag in this city who has killed over two thousand babes.

"What chance has your girl or mine to marry and build a home? Not one in a hundred will ever feel the breath of a babe at her breast.

"No!" he closed in thunder tones. "I'll fight the encroachment of the Negro on our life with every power of body and soul!"

A hundred men leaped to their feet at once, shouting and gesticulating. The chairman recognised a tall dark man with a Russian face, but who spoke perfect English.

"I, gentlemen, am an anarchist in principle, and differ slightly in the process by which I come to the same conclusion as my friend who has taken his seat. I grieve at