"Revenge, working men! to arms! Your masters sent out their bloodhounds--the police. They killed six of your brothers at McCormick's this afternoon. They killed the poor wretches, because they, like you, had the courage to disobey the supreme will of your bosses. They killed them because they dared ask for the shortening of the hours of toil. They killed them to show you, 'free American citizens,' that you _must_ be satisfied and contented with whatever your bosses condescend to allow you, or you'll get killed. You have for years endured the most abject humiliation; you have for years suffered immeasurable iniquities; you have worked yourselves to death; you have endured the pangs of want and hunger; your children you have sacrificed to the factory lords--in short, you have been miserable, obedient slaves all these years. Why? To satisfy the insatiable greed to fill the coffers of your lazy, thieving master. When you ask them now to lessen your burden he sends his bloodhounds out to shoot you, kill you. If you are men, if you are the sons of your grandsires who have shed their blood to free you, then you will rise in your might, Hercules, and destroy the hideous monster that seeks to destroy you. To arms we call you! To arms! YOUR BROTHERS." The German portion differed from the above mainly in the following passage: "_Why? Because_ you dared ask for the shortening of the hours of labor." In the German copy it ran: "Because you dared ask for all that you believed to be your rights." Instead of being addressed, as in the English, to American citizens, it was directed to the followers of anarchy and socialism. Another circular was distributed calling a meeting at the Haymarket for the night of May 4, and urging working men to arm and go in full force. In the _Arbeiter Zeitung_ appeared the letter "Y," meaning Ypsilon, which was the signal for the armed anarchists to turn out, and in the department of the paper known as the "Letter-Box" the word "Ruhe," signifying that the time for revolution was at hand.