ef befall. So it went on for a few days longer, when a second
deputation waited upon me, and, less ceremonious than the first, they
rushed noisily, and without notice, up the stairs, and crowded into my
bench-room. There were about twenty of them; their spokesman looked
clean and respectable, but the others were a dirty, out-at-elbows,
tobacco-chewing crew, only to be described by that expressive American
epithet, 'loafers;' and they eyed me with very sinister looks, while the
leader began an appeal to my _esprit de corps_. It is scarcely necessary
to repeat the argument that followed. Having nothing new to offer, I
merely said, that I considered myself at full liberty to work for
whatever amount of wages to me seemed satisfactory; that I would no more
submit to any interference with that liberty, than to any tyranny over
my conscience; and that all I claimed at their hands, was to be let
alone. Cries of 'Hustle him out!' frequently interrupted me; and perhaps
a proof that 'blows hurts' might have followed, but just as I finished,
my boss came in, and commanded the party to leave his premises, with an
assurance that he would not suffer me to be molested. The leader, who
seemed as much ashamed of his followers as Falstaff was of his ragged
regiment, immediately beat a retreat, and his troop with him; one or
two, as they went out, declaring that they would 'hammer' me whenever
they caught me in the street. I, however, went and came as usual, and
for some reason--perhaps the boss's declaration in my favour--met with
no annoyance.

What was the upshot? As emigrant cabinet-makers arrived, they were at
once engaged, and set to work; and at the end of six weeks, the strike
came to an end. The turn-outs not only failed in carrying their point,
but found themselves in a worse position than when they began, for
numbers of them were no longer 'wanted,' and had to migrate to the
country, or accept a lower rate of wages than before, besides the loss
of the best part of the busy season. In our own shop, one American and
two of the Germans were altogether dismissed, greatly to their
mortification; and in this unexpected reverse, they began to perceive
how they had been duped. I, on the other hand, having finished the first
bookcase, was well advanced in a second; and had, besides, the
satisfaction of knowing that the overplus of my six weeks' earnings was
safely added to the 'nest-egg,' and of hearing my shopmates applaud my
resolutio