nced
politicians who shook their heads. They blessed us and wished us well.
They even contributed liberally to our campaign fund; but the most
experienced among them were not hopeful.

It was a vigorous campaign--on our side; with meetings, brass bands,
constant house-to-house canvassing, and processions _ad libitum_. On the
other side, there was no campaign at all to speak of; only the man whom
we were seeking to unseat spent some portion of every day and the whole
of every night going about the ward from saloon to saloon, always
forgetting the change for those five-dollar and ten-dollar bills, always
willing to cheer lustily when one of our processions went by, and, as we
heard, daily increasing his orders for turkeys for the approaching
Thanksgiving season.

So far as the saloon keepers, the gamblers, the owners and patrons of
disorderly houses went, we had no hope of winning their allegiance; but,
after all, they were a small numerical minority of the voters of the
ward. The majority consisted of low-class Italians, unskilled labourers,
and it was their votes that must decide the issue. There was not one of
them who was not thoroughly talked to, as well as every member of his
family of a reasoning age. There was not one who did not fully recognise
that the alderman was a thief and an entirely immoral scamp; but their
labour was farmed by, perhaps, half a dozen Italian contractors. These
men were the Alderman's henchmen. As long as he continued in the
Council, he was able to keep their men employed--on municipal works and
on the work of the various railway and other large corporations which he
was able to blackmail. We, on our part, had obtained promises of
employment, from friends of decent government regardless of politics in
all parts of the city, for approximately as many men as could possibly
be thrown out of work in case of an upheaval. But of what use were
these, more or less unverifiable, promises, when on the eve of the
election the half a dozen contractors (who of course had grown rich with
their alderman's continuance in office) gave each individual labourer in
the ward to understand clearly that if the present alderman was defeated
each one of them would have to go and live somewhere--live or
starve,--for not one stroke of work would they ever get so long as they
lived in that ward?

It was, as I have said, a vigorous campaign on our side; and the
Delectable One was re-elected by something more than hi