on streets and alleys, consisting of thirty-four
members drawn from all the standing committees. By this committee it
would be considered for one week in the general council-chamber, where
public hearings would be held. By keeping up a bold front Cowperwood
thought the necessary iron could be put into his followers to enable
them to go through with the scorching ordeal which was sure to follow.
Already aldermen were being besieged at their homes and in the
precincts of the ward clubs and meeting-places. Their mail was being
packed with importuning or threatening letters. Their very children
were being derided, their neighbors urged to chastise them. Ministers
wrote them in appealing or denunciatory vein. They were spied upon and
abused daily in the public prints. The mayor, shrewd son of battle that
he was, realizing that he had a whip of terror in his hands, excited by
the long contest waged, and by the smell of battle, was not backward in
urging the most drastic remedies.

"Wait till the thing comes up," he said to his friends, in a great
central music-hall conference in which thousands participated, and when
the matter of ways and means to defeat the venal aldermen was being
discussed. "We have Mr. Cowperwood in a corner, I think. He cannot do
anything for two weeks, once his ordinance is in, and by that time we
shall be able to organize a vigilance committee, ward meetings,
marching clubs, and the like. We ought to organize a great central
mass-meeting for the Sunday night before the Monday when the bill comes
up for final hearing. We want overflow meetings in every ward at the
same time. I tell you, gentlemen, that, while I believe there are
enough honest voters in the city council to prevent the Cowperwood
crowd from passing this bill over my veto, yet I don't think the matter
ought to be allowed to go that far. You never can tell what these
rascals will do once they see an actual cash bid of twenty or thirty
thousand dollars before them. Most of them, even if they were lucky,
would never make the half of that in a lifetime. They don't expect to
be returned to the Chicago City Council. Once is enough. There are
too many others behind them waiting to get their noses in the trough.
Go into your respective wards and districts and organize meetings.
Call your particular alderman before you. Don't let him evade you or
quibble or stand on his rights as a private citizen or a public
officer. Threaten--don't