e men to put down this riot!"

"Fool!" said the Colonel, "don't you see our men are in this crowd!"

"Then order them into columns, and we will protect this man."

"I never give orders unless I know they will be obeyed. Besides, this
man Garrison is a rioter himself--he opposes the government."

"But, do we uphold mob-law--here, in Boston!"

"Don't blame me--I haven't anything to do with this business. I tell
you, if this man Garrison had minded his own affairs, this scene would
never have occurred."

"And those women?"

"Oh, they are members of the Anti-Slavery Society. It was their holding
the meeting that made the trouble. The children followed them, hooting
them through the streets!"

"Children?"

"Yes; you know children repeat what they hear at home--they echo the
thoughts of their elders. The children hooted them, then some one threw
a stone through a window. A crowd gathered, and here you are!"

The Colonel shook himself loose from the lawyer and followed the mob.
The Mayor's counsel prevailed: "Give the prisoner to me--I will see that
he is punished!"

And so he was dragged to the City Hall and there locked up.

The crowd lingered, then thinned out. The shouts grew less, and soon the
police were able to rout the loiterers.

The young lawyer went back to his law-office, but not to study. The law
looked different to him now--the whole legal aspect of things had
changed in an hour.

It was a pivotal point.

He had heard much of the majesty of the law, and here he had seen the
entire machinery of justice brushed aside.

Law! It is the thing we make with our hands and then fall down and
worship. Men want to do things, so they do them, and afterward they
legalize them, just as we believe things first and later hunt for
reasons. Or we illegalize the thing we do not want others to do.

Boston, standing for law and order, will not even allow a few women to
meet and discuss an economic proposition!

Abolition is a fool idea, but we must have free speech--that is what our
Constitution is built upon! Law is supposed to protect free speech, even
to voicing wrong ideas! Surely a man has a legal right to a wrong
opinion! A mob in Boston to put down free speech!

This young lawyer was not an Abolitionist--not he, but he was an
American, descended from the Puritans, with ancestors who fought in the
War of the Revolution--he believed in fair play.

His cheeks burned with shame.

* * *