CHAPTER XXXII.
BLOODSHED.
When, at the head of his Labour legions, the Dumpling set forth on that eventful Sunday afternoon to march westwards, he and his lieutenants—and, by means of his lieutenants, his men—knew exactly what work lay in front of them. That work done, the order had gone forth that the multitude was to break up, and each man was to return quietly to his home, so that next day, at the hour appointed, the legions might re-assemble, rested and ready for the fray. It was known that the Dumpling had told off a certain number of picked and tried men to patrol the streets after the hour of dismissal, and through the night, and that these patrols would deal summarily with all who disobeyed orders.
The man with a genius for organisation is rare. The man who has not only a genius for organisation, but has also a genius for compelling other people implicitly to accept his orders, and to abide by his organisation—the man who can, at will, mould mankind in the lump, as the potter moulds clay—comes only once in a hundred years. Such a man was the Dumpling. Instead of letting his vast army straggle invertebrately westwards under his single command, his system of subdividing it into companies, each under a separate picked leader, taking orders from himself, worked out with surprisingly successful results. There was no aimless moving from place to place. Though East London was practically in the hands of the rioters, orders had been given that no man was to leave the ranks, and that London Fields was to be the first halting-place, each company to march thither by a pre-arranged route. At every open space where two or more roads met—as, for instance, Hackney Triangle—and where assailing forces of police or military might be expected, expert riflemen, sent on slightly in advance of the main body, were stationed. At Hackney Triangle it was, indeed, that the first brush with the police occurred. Some two or three hundred of the force, hastily gathered together, attempted to stem the onward march of the rioters. The Dumpling at once came forward,speaking to them considerately, even humanely.
"With you personally," he said, "we have no quarrel; you we have no wish to harm. These people are your brethren, and you are theirs. The only difference between you and them is that you wear the uniform of a Social System to which we are here to put an end. By that ending you will benefit as much as we. You, no less than we, are the servants of an iniquitous system, by which all the hardship, the toil, and the privations of life are apportioned to one class, and all the ease, luxury, wealth, and comfort to another. You are poorly paid; you are iron ruled. You must tramp the streets by day and by night, exposed to burning heat and biting cold, risking your life daily—and for no other reason than that the rich, the vicious, the luxurious, the sweaters of the poor, the oppressors of the people, may increase their ill-gotten gains and live their idle, easy lives of pleasure-seeking and debauchery. In risking your lives to protect your fellow-citizens against crime, you are doing noble and heroic work, for which you are inadequately paid. Butweare not criminals. We have done wrongto none. We are men and women like you, compelled at last, at the cost of our lives if it must be, to assert the common right of all God's creatures to live. We and our wives and children have starved and suffered over-long. But our rights we will have, so help us God, and I appeal to you, our brother men, who have many of you wives and children of your own, not to shed our blood, or to compel us to shed yours, in defending ourselves. You have done your work well and faithfully, as witness your heroic attempt—mere handful as you are—to oppose this army of God which, as surely as you and I still breathe the breath of life, is marching on to victory. Brother Englishmen, brother citizens, brother sufferers, let us not shed each other's blood. Join us; throw in your lot with us; cast off the yoke of the tyrant, and you shall share in the rewards which shall soon be ours."
He stopped, panting with passion; and then—the words snapping like three pistol-shots following the one after the other—came the order of the officer in command of the police: "Arrest—that—man!"
"For God's sake, for humanity's sake, don't compel us to violence," interposed theDumpling with lifted hand. "If you wish to come to hand-grips with us, if you wish to test the temper of the people, you shall have plenty of opportunity, I promise, later on. You have done, at this point, all that is required. You have done your duty bravely and well. Few as you are, compared to us, you can do nothing more. For the present, at least, retire until the odds are less unequal. It would be suicide, at this juncture, to oppose us by force, for in that case I warn you I shall give my sharp-shooters the order to fire, and you will fall almost to a man."
Again he stopped, and again came the police officer's word of command:
"Officers, do your duty. Arrest that man."
They were the last words he was to speak on earth, for as they passed his lips the Dumpling raised a hand.
"God's will be done!" he said. "I can say no more. Riflemen, make ready! Present! Fire!"
The result was what he had foretold. The gallant little band of police fell, dead or dying, almost to a man.