Cæsar's Column: A Story of the Twentieth Century

by Ignatius Donnelly

arousesuspicion."

  CHAPTER VIII.

  THE BROTHERHOOD

  I cannot give you, my dear brother, a detailed account of every day'soccurrences, although I know that your love for me would make everyincident of interest to you. I shall, however, jot down myreflections on sheets, and send them to you as occasion serves.

  The more I have seen, and the more I have conversed with Maximilian,the more clearly I perceive that the civilized world is in adesperate extremity. This Brotherhood of Destruction, with itsterrible purposes and its vast numbers, is a reality. If the rulingclass had to deal only with a brutalized peasantry, they might, asthey did in other ages, trample them into animal-like inability toorganize and defend themselves. But the public school system, which,with the other forms of the Republic, is still kept up, has made, ifnot all, at least a very large percentage of the unhappy laboringclasses intelligent. In fact, they are wonderfully intelligent; theirorganizations have been to them clubs, debating societies andlegislatures. And you know that all the greatest minds of the earthhave come out of the masses, if not directly, at least after one ortwo removes. The higher aristocracy have contributed but very few tothe honored catalogue of men of pre-eminent genius. And therefore youwill not be surprised to hear that in these great organizations therehave arisen, from among the very laborers, splendid orators, capableorganizers, profound students of politics and political economy,statesmen and masterly politicians. Nature, which knows no limit toher capacity for the creation of new varieties, and, dealing withhundreds of millions, has in numerable elements to mingle in hercombinations, has turned out some marvelous leaders among these poormen. Their hard fortunes have driven out of their minds allillusions, all imagination, all poetry; and in solemn fashion theyhave bent themselves to the grim and silent struggle with theirenvironment. Without imagination, I say, for this seems to me to be aworld without a song.

  And it is to the credit of these great masses that they are keenenough to recognize the men of ability that rise up. among them, andeven out of their poor, hard-earned resources to relieve them of thenecessity for daily toil, that they may devote themselves to theimprovement of their minds, and the execution of the great tasksassigned them. There is no doubt that if the ruling classes had beenwilling to recognize these natural leaders as men of the same race,blood, tongue and capacity as themselves, and had reached down tothem a helping and kindly hand, there might have been long since acoming together of the two great divisions of society; and such areadjustment of the values of labor as would, while it insuredhappiness to those below, have not materially lessened the enjoymentsof those above. But the events which preceded the great war againstthe aristocracy in 1640, in England; the great revolution of 1789, inFrance; and the greater civil war of 1861, in America, all show howimpossible it is, by any process of reasoning, to induce a privilegedclass to peacefully yield up a single tittle of its advantages. Thereis no bigotry so blind or intense as that of caste; and longestablished wrongs are only to be rooted out by fire and sword. Andhence the future looks so black to me. The upper classes might reformthe world, but they will not; the lower classes would, but theycannot; and for a generation or more these latter have settled downinto a sullen and unanimous conviction that the only remedy isworld-wide destruction. We can say, as one said at the opening of theCromwellian struggle, "God help the land where ruin must reform!" Butthe proletariat are desperate. They are ready, like the blind Samson,to pull down the pillars of the temple, even though they themselvesfall, crushed to death amid the ruins; for

  "The grave is brighter than their hearths and homes."

  I learn from Maximilian that their organization is most perfect.Every one of their hundred millions is now armed with one of thenewest improved magazine rifles. The use of the white powder reducesvery much the size of the cartridges; the bullets are also muchsmaller than they were formerly, but they are each charged with amost deadly and powerful explosive, which tears the body of thevictim it strikes to pieces. These small cartridges are stored in thesteel stock and barrel of the rifles, which will hold about onehundred of them; and every soldier therefore carries in his hand aweapon almost equal to the old-time Gatling or Armstrong gun.

  The mode in which these guns were procured shows the marvelous natureof the organization and its resources. Finding that the cost of theguns was greatly increased by the profits of the manufacturer and themiddleman, and that it was, in fact, very doubtful whether thegovernment would permit them to purchase them in any largequantities, they resolved to make them for themselves. In the depthsof abandoned coal mines, in the wildest and most mountainous part ofTennessee, they established, years ago, their armories and foundries.Here, under pretense of coal-mining and iron-working, they broughtmembers of their Brotherhood, workmen from the national gun-works;and these, teaching hundreds of others the craft, and working day andnight, in double gangs, have toiled until every able-bodied man inthe whole vast Brotherhood, in America and Europe, has been suppliedwith his weapon and a full accompaniment of ammunition. The cost ofall this was reduced to a minimum, and has been paid by each memberof the Brotherhood setting aside each week a small percentage of hisearnings. But, lest they should break out permaturely,{sic} beforethe leaders gave the word, these guns have not been delivereddirectly to their owners, but to the "commanders of tens," as theyare called; for the Brotherhood is divided into groups of ten each;and it is the duty of these commanders to bury the weapons andammunition in the earth in rubber sacks, furnished for the purpose,and only to deliver them when the signal comes to strike. In themeantime the men are trained. with sticks in all the evolutions ofsoldiers. You can see how cunning is all this system. A traitorcannot betray more than nine of his fellows, and his own death iscertain to follow. If the commander of a squad goes over to theenemy, he can but deliver up nine men and ten guns, and perhapsreveal the supposed name of the one man who, in a disguise, hascommunicated with him from the parent society. But when the signal isgiven a hundred million trained soldiers will stand side by side,armed with the most efficient weapons the cunning of man is able toproduce, and directed by a central authority of extraordinaryability. Above all this dreadful preparation the merry world goes on,singing and dancing, marrying and giving in marriage, as thoughtlessof the impending catastrophe as were the people of Pompeii in thosepleasant August days in 79, just before the city was buried inashes;--and yet the terrible volcano had stood there, in theimmediate presence of themselves and their ancestors, forgenerations, and more than once the rocking earth had given signaltokens of its awful Possibilities.

  If I believed that this wonderful Brotherhood was capable of anythingbeyond destruction, I should not look with such terror as I do uponthe prospect. But after destruction there must come construction--theerection of law and civilization upon the ruins of the present orderof things. Who can believe that these poor brutalized men will becapable, armed to the teeth with deadly weapons, and full ofpassions, hates and revenges, to recreate the slaughtered society? Incivilized life the many must work; and who among these liberatedslaves will be ready to lay down their weapons and take up theirtasks? When the negroes of San Domingo broke out, in thatworld-famous and bloody insurrection, they found themselves, whenthey had triumphed, in a tropical land, where the plentiful bountiesof nature hung abundant supplies of food upon every tree and shrub.But in the temperate regions of America and Europe these vastpopulations can only live by great toil, and if none will toil allmust starve; but before they starve they will slay each other, andthat means universal conflict, savagery, barbarism, chaos.

  I tremble, my brother, I tremble with horror when I think of what iscrawling toward us, with noiseless steps; couchant, silent,treacherous, pardlike; scarce rustling the dry leaves as it moves,and yet with bloodshot, glaring eyes and tense-drawn limbs of steel,ready for the fatal spring. When comes it? To-night? To-morrow? Aweek hence? Who can say?

  And the thought forever presses on me, Can I do
nothing to avert thiscatastrophe? Is there no hope? For mankind is in itself so noble, sobeautiful, so full of all graces and capacities; with aspirationsfitted to sing among the angels; with comprehension fitted to embracethe universe! Consider the exquisite, lithe-limbed figures of thefirst man and woman, as they stood forth against the red light oftheir first sunset--fresh from the hand of the Mighty One--Hisgraceful, perfected, magnificent thoughts! What love shines out oftheir great eyes; what goodness, like dawn-awakened flowers, isblooming in their singing hearts! And all to come to this. To this! Ahell of injustice, ending in a holocaust of slaughter.

  God is not at fault. Nature is not to blame. Civilization, signifyingincreased human power, is not responsible. But human greed,--blind,insatiable human greed,--shallow cunning; the basest, stuff-grabbing,nut-gathering, selfish instincts, these have done this work! The ratsknow too much to gnaw through the sides of the ship that carriesthem;