“Well, you look for an interpreter--and maybe he’s a company spy. Or maybe the first man you try to convert reports you to the boss. For, of course, some of the men are cowards, and some of them are crooks; they’ll sell out the next fellow for a better ‘place’--maybe for a glass of beer.” “That must have a tendency to weaken your convictions,” said Hal. “No,” said the other, in a matter of fact tone. “It’s hard, but one can’t blame the poor devils. They’re ignorant--kept so deliberately. The bosses bring them here, and have a regular system to keep them from getting together. And of course these European peoples have their old prejudices--national prejudices, religious prejudices, that keep them apart. You see two fellows, one you think is exactly as miserable as the other--but you find him despising the other, because back home he was the other’s superior. So they play into the bosses’ hands.” SECTION 28. They had come to a remote place in the canyon, and found themselves seats on a flat rock, where they could talk in comfort. “Put yourself in their place,” said the organiser. “They’re in a strange country, and one person tells them one thing, and another tells them something else. The masters and their agents say: ‘Don’t trust the union agitators. They’re a lot of grafters, they live easy and don’t have to work. They take your money and call you out on strike, and you lose your jobs and your home; they sell you out, maybe, and go on to some other place to repeat the same trick.’ And the workers think maybe that’s true; they haven’t the wit to see that if the union leaders are corrupt, it must be because the bosses are buying them. So you see, they’re completely bedevilled; they don’t know which way to turn.” The man was speaking quietly, but there was a little glow of excitement in his face. “The company is forever repeating that these people are satisfied--that it’s we who are stirring them up. But are they satisfied? You’ve been here long enough to know!” “There’s no need to discuss that,” Hal answered. “Of course they’re not satisfied! They’ve seemed to me like a lot of children crying in the dark--not knowing what’s the matter with them, or who’s to blame, or where to turn for help.” Hal found himself losing his distrust of this man. He did not correspond in any way to Hal’s imaginary picture of a union organiser; he was a blue-eyed, clean-looking young American, and instead of being wild and loud-mouthed, he seemed rather wistful. He had indignation, of course, but it did not take the form of ranting or florid eloquence; and this repression was making its appeal to Hal, who, in spite of his democratic impulses, had the habits of thought of a class which shrinks from noisiness and over-emphasis.