The Progressionists, and Angela. Part 15

"Do you not belong to the committee in charge of the ballot-box?"

inquired Greifmann.

"No, sir, I wished to remain entirely untrammelled this morning,"

answered the leader with a sly look and tone. "This is going to be an exciting election, the ultramontanes are astir, and it will be necessary for me to step in authoritatively now and then to decide a vote. Moreover, the committee is composed exclusively of men of our party. Not a single ultramontane holds a seat at the polls."

"In that case there can be no question of failure," said the banker.

"Your office is closed to-day, no doubt?"

"Of course!" a.s.sented the manufacturer of straw hats. "This day is celebrated as a free day by the offices of all respectable houses. Our clerks are dispersed through the taverns and election districts to use their pens in filling up tickets."

"I am forced to return to my old a.s.sertion: an election is mere folly, useless jugglery," said the banker, turning to Seraphin. "Holding elections is no longer a rational way of doing, it is no longer a business way of proceeding, it is yielding to stupid timidity. Mr.

Schwefel, don't you think elections are mere folly?"

"I confess I have never considered the subject from that point of view," answered the leader cautiously. "But meanwhile--what do you understand by that?"

"Be good enough to attend to my reasoning for a moment. Progress is in a state of complete organization. What progress wills, must be. Another party having authority and power cannot subsist side by side with progress. Just see those men staggering and blundering over the square with green tickets in their hands! To speak without circ.u.mlocution, look at the slaves doing the behests of their masters. What need of this silly masquerade of an election? Why squander all this money, waste all this beer and time? Why does not progress settle this business summarily? Why not simply nominate candidates fit for the office, and then send them directly to the legislature? This mode would do away with all this nonsensical ado, and would give the matter a prompt and business cast, conformable to the spirit of the age."

"This idea is a good one, but we have an election law that would stand in the way of carrying it out."

"Bosh--election law!" sneered the banker. "Your election law is a mere scarecrow, an antiquated, meaningless instrument. Do away with the election law, and follow my suggestion."

"That would occasion a charming row on the part of the ultramontanes,"

observed the leader laughing.

"Was the lion ever known to heed the bleating of a sheep? When did progress ever pay any attention to a row gotten up by the ultramontanes?" rejoined Greifmann. "Was not the fuss made in Bavaria against the progressionist school-law quite a prodigious one? Did not our own last legislature make heavy a.s.saults on the church? Did not the entire episcopate protest against permitting Jews, Neo-pagans, and Freemasons to legislate, on matters of religion? But did progress suffer itself to be disconcerted by episcopal protests and the agonizing screams of the ultramontanes? Not at all. It calmly pursued the even tenor of its way. Be logical, Mr. Schwefel: progress reigns supreme and decrees with absolute authority--why should it not summarily relegate this election law among the things that were, but are no more?"

"You are right, Greifmann!" exclaimed Gerlach, in a feeling of utter disgust. "What need has the knout of Russian despotism of the sanction of const.i.tutional forms? Progress is lord, the rest are slaves!"

"You have again misunderstood me, my good fellow. I am considering the actual state of things. Should ultramontanism at any time gain the ascendency, then it also will be justified in behaving in the same manner."

Upon more mature consideration, Gerlach found himself forced to admit that Greifmann's view, from the standpoint of modern culture, was entirely correct. Progress independently of G.o.d and of all positive religion could not logically be expected to recognize any moral obligations, for it had not a moral basis. Everything was determined by the force of circ.u.mstances; the autocracy of party rule made anything lawful. Laws proceeded not from the divine source of unalterable justice, but from the whim of a majority--fas.h.i.+oned and framed to suit peculiar interests and pa.s.sions.

"We have yet considerable work to do to bring all to thinking as clearly and rationally as you, Mr. Greifmann," said the leader with a winning smile.

Schwefel accompanied the millionaires into a lengthy hall, across the lower end of which stood a table. There sat the commissary of elections surrounded by the committee, animated gentlemen with great beards, who were occupied in distributing tickets to voters or receiving tickets filled up. The extraordinary good-humor prevailing among these gentlemen was owing to the satisfactory course of the election, for rarely was any ultramontane paper seen mingling in the flood that poured in from the ranks of progress. The sides of the hall were hung with portraits of the sovereigns of the land, quite a goodly row. The last one of the series was youthful in appearance, and some audacious hand had scrawled on the broad gilt frame the following ominous words: "May he be the last in the succession of expensive bread-eaters." Down the middle of the hall ran a baize-covered table, on which were numerous inkstands. Scattered over the table lay a profusion of green bills; the yellow color of the ultramontane bills was nowhere to be seen. The table was lined by gentlemen who were writing. They were not writing for themselves, but for others, who merely sighed their names and then handed the tickets to the commissary. Several corpulent gentlemen also occupied seats at the table, but they were not engaged in writing. These gentlemen, apparently unoccupied, wore ma.s.sive gold watch-chains and sparkling rings, and they had a commanding and stern expression of countenance. They were observing all who entered, to see whether any man would be bold enough to vote the yellow ticket. People of the humbler sort, mechanics and laborers, were constantly coming in and going out. Bowing reverently to the portly gentlemen, they seated themselves and filled out green tickets with the names of the liberal candidates. Most of them did not even trouble themselves to this degree, but simply laid their tickets before the penman appointed for this special service. All went off in the best order. The process of the election resembled the smooth working of an ingenious piece of machinery. And there was no tongue there to denounce the infamous terrorism that had crushed the freedom of the election or had bought the votes of vile and venal men with beer.

Seraphin stood with Greifmann in the recess of a window looking on.

"Who are the fat men at the table?" inquired he.

"The one with the very black beard is house-builder Sand, the second is Eisenhart, machine-builder, the third is Erdfloh, a landowner, the fourth and fifth are tobacco merchants. All those gentlemen are chieftains of the party of progress."

"They show it," observed Gerlach. "Their looks, in a manner, command every man that comes in to take the green ticket, and I imagine I can read on their brows: 'Woe to him who dares vote against us. He shall be under a ban, and shall have neither employment nor bread.' It is unmitigated tyranny! I imagine I see in those fat fellows so many cotton-planters voting their slaves."

"That is a one-sided conclusion, my most esteemed," rejoined the banker. "In country villages, the position here a.s.sumed by the magnates of progress is filled by the lords of ultramontanism, clerical gentlemen in ca.s.socks, who keep a sharp eye on the fingers of their paris.h.i.+oners. This, too, is influencing."

"But not constraining," opposed the millionaire promptly. "The clergy exert a legitimate influence by convincing, by advancing solid grounds for their political creed. They never have recourse to compulsory measures, nor dare they do so, because it would be opposed to the Gospel which they preach. The autocrats of progress, on the contrary, do not hesitate about using threats and violence. Should a man refuse to bow to their dictates, they cruelly deprive him of the means of subsistence. This is not only inhuman, but it is also an accursed scheme for making slaves of the people and robbing them of principle."

"Ah! look yonder--there is Holt."

The land cultivator had walked into the hall head erect. He looked along the table and stood undecided. One of the ministering spirits of progress soon fluttered about him, offering him a green ticket. Holt glanced at it, and a contemptuous smile spread over his face. He next tore it to pieces, which he threw on the floor.

"What are you about?" asked the angel of progress reproachfully.

"I have reduced Shund and his colleagues to fragments," answered Holt dryly, then approaching the commissary he demanded a yellow ticket.

"Glorious!" applauded Gerlach. "I have half a mind to present this true German _man_ with another thousand as a reward for his spirit."

The fat men had observed with astonishment the action of the land cultivator. Their astonishment turned to rage when Holt, leisurely seating himself at the table, took a pen in his mighty fist and began filling out the ticket with the names of the ultramontane candidates.

Whilst he wrote, whisperings could be heard all through the hall, and every eye was directed upon him. After no inconsiderable exertion, the task of filling out the ticket was successfully accomplished, and Holt arose, leaving the ticket lying upon the table. In the twinkling of an eye a hand reached forward to take it up.

"What do you mean, sir?" asked Holt sternly.

"That yellow paper defiles the table," hissed the fellow viciously.

"Hand back that ticket," commanded Holt roughly. "I want it to be here. The yellow ticket has as good a right on this table as the green one--do you hear me?"

"Slave of the priests!" sputtered his antagonist.

"If I am a slave of the priests, then you are a slave of that villain Shund," retorted Holt. "I am not to be browbeaten--by such a fellow as you particularly--least of all by a vile slave of Shund's." He spoke, and then reached his ticket to the commissary.

"That is an impudent dog," growled leader Sand. "Who is he?"

"He is a countryman of the name of Holt," answered he to whom the query was addressed.

"We must spot the boor," said Erdfloh. "His swaggering shall not avail him anything."

Holt was not the only voter that proved refractory. Mr. Schwefel, also, had a disagreeable surprise. He was standing near the entrance, observing with great self-complacency how the workmen in his employ submissively cast their votes for Shund and his a.s.sociates. Schwefel regarded himself as of signal importance in the commonwealth, for he controlled not less than four hundred votes, and the side which it was his pleasure to favor could not fail of victory. The head of the great leader seemed in a manner encircled with the halo of progress: whilst his retainers pa.s.sed and saluted him, he experienced something akin to the pride of a field-marshal reviewing a column of his victorious army.

Just then a spare little man appeared in the door. His yellowish, sickly complexion gave evidence that he was employed in the sulphurating of straw. At sight of the commander the sulphur-hued little man shrank back, but his startled look did not escape the restless eye of Mr. Schwefel. He beckoned to the laborer.

"Have you selected your ticket, Leicht?"

"Yes, sir."

"Let me see the ticket."

The man obeyed reluctantly. Scarcely had Schwefel got a glimpse of the paper when his brows gathered darkly.

"What means this? Have you selected the yellow ticket and not the green one?"

Leicht hung his head. He thought of the consequences of this detection, of his four small children, of want of employment, of hunger and bitter need--he was almost beside himself.

"If you vote for the priests, you may get your bread from the priests,"

said Schwefel. "The moment you hand that ticket to the commissary, you may consider yourself discharged from my employ." With this he angrily turned his back upon the man. Leicht did not reach in his ticket to the commissary. Staggering out of the hall, he stood bewildered hear the railing of the steps, and stared vaguely upon the men who were coming and going. Spitzkopf slipped up to him.

"What were you thinking about, man?" asked he reproachfully. "Mr.

Schwefel is furious--you are ruined. Sheer stupidity, nothing but stupidity in you to wish to vote in opposition to the pleasure of the man from whom you get your bread and meat! Not only that, but you have insulted the whole community, for you have chosen to vote against progress when all the town is in favor of progress. You will be put on the spotted list, and the upshot will be that you will not get employment in any factory in town. Do you want to die of hunger, man--do you want your children to die of hunger?"