"Go
into one of the great rooms where many men are at work. Stand
perfectly still. Don't try to think. Wait."
Jumping out of his seat the excited man had walked up and down before
his companions. A group of men standing before the bar listened, their
glasses held half way to their lips.
"I tell you there is already a song of labour. It has not got itself
expressed and understood but it is in every shop, in every field where
men work. In a dim way the men who work are conscious of the song
although if you talk of the matter they only laugh. The song is low
harsh rhythmical. I tell you it comes out of the very soul of labour.
It is akin to the thing that artists understand and that is called
form. This McGregor understands something of that. He is the first
leader of labour that has understood. The world shall hear from him.
One of these days the world shall ring with his name."
In the bicycle factory John Van Moore looked at the pad of paper
before him and thought of the words of the half drunken man in the
saloon. In the great shop at his back there was the steady grinding
roar of many machines. The fat man, hypnotised by his own words,
continued to walk up and down telling of the hardship that had once
confronted the imaginary young workman and above which he had risen
triumphant.
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