ng along the line of
saloons. From these and from the tenements came pouring angry throngs of
men. And out of the hubbub I caught the words,

"They're bringing in the scabs! By boat!"

Past a watchman that I knew I ran into a dockshed and out to the open
end of the dock. And there I saw a weird ominous scene. Up the empty
harbor, under a dark and cloudy sky, came four barges, black with negro
laborers, and ahead and around and behind them came police boats
throwing their searchlights upon an angry swarm of union picket dories,
from which as they drew nearer I heard furious voices shouting, "Scab!"
One of the barges docked where I stood and the negroes quickly slunk
inside. I drew back from them as they passed, for to me too they were
"scabs" that night. Afraid to face the men outside, whose jobs they had
taken, these strike-breakers were to live on the dock, under cover of
police. Soon half of them lay snoring on long crowded rows of cots. Food
and hot coffee were served to the rest. Then I heard the harsh rattle of
winches, I saw these negroes trundling freight, the cargo went swooping
up into the ship--and with a deep dismay, a sharp foreboding of trouble
ahead, I felt the work of the harbor begun.

I heard a quick voice at my elbow:

"Say. What the hell are _you_ doing here!" I turned to the Pinkerton man
by my side:

"I'm reporting this strike."

"No you're not, you're in here to report what you see to the strikers.
Now don't let's have any words, my friend, we've seen you in their
meeting-hall and we've all got your number. Go on out where you belong!"

So I went out where I belonged.

I went out to the crowd--but I found it changed, split up into furious
swarms of men, I found the beginning of chaos here. And the world that I
had left behind, the old world of order and rule from above, which I had
all but forgotten of late, now sharply made its presence felt. For the
god I had once known so well was neither dead nor sleeping. Behind
closed doors, the doors that had flown open once to show me every
courtesy, it had been silently laying plans and sending forth orders or
"requests" to all those in its service.

The next day the newspapers changed their tone. Until now they had given
us half the front page. Every statement I had written had been printed
word for word. The reporters had been free to dig columns of "human
interest stuff" out of the rich mine of color here, and they had gone at
it hungrily, ma