ed by his secretary, who was a detective. But that the circular
went out properly signed and sealed is beyond dispute, and in reply to
it there came protests from hundreds of honest engine-drivers all up and
down the land. The chief of a local division came to Chicago with a copy
of the circular and protested so vigorously that he was expelled from
the Brotherhood, to the Brotherhood's disgrace.

Smarting under what he deemed a great wrong, he gave the letter into the
hands of the officials, and now whenever he secures a position the road
that employs him is forced to let him go again or have a strike. He is
an outcast--a vagabond, so far as the union is concerned. Ah, the scars
of that conflict are deep in the souls of men. The blight of it has
shadowed hundreds of happy homes, and ruined many a useful life.

With this "sal-soda" circular in their possession the managers caused
the arrest of its author, charging him with conspiracy--a serious
offense in Illinois.

A sunny-faced man, with big, soulful blue eyes and a blond mustache, had
been living on the same floor occupied by the strike committee. He had
conceived a great interest in the struggle. For a man of wealth and
culture he showed a remarkable sympathy for the strikers, and so won the
heart and confidence of the striker-in-chief. It was perfectly natural,
then, that in the excitement incidental to the arrest, the accused
should rush into the apartments of the sympathetic stranger and thrust
into his keeping an armful of letters and papers.

As the officers of the law led the fallen hero away the blond man
selected a number of letters and papers from the bundle, abandoned the
balance and strolled forth. For weeks, months, he had been planning the
capture of some of these letters, and now they had all come to him as
suddenly as fame comes to a man who sinks a ship under the enemy's
guns.

This blond man was a detective. His victim was a child.

Yes, the great struggle that had caused so much misery and cost so many
millions was at an end, but it was worth to labor and capital all it had
cost. The lesson has lasted ten years, and will last ten more.

It had been a long, bitter fight in which even the victorious had lost.
They had lost at least five million dollars in wrecked and ruined
rolling stock, bridges and buildings. The loss in net earnings alone was
nearly five millions in the first five months of the strike that lasted
nearly a year. It would cost