Now Girard, Kansas, was a quiet, peaceable town. There had never been
any labor troubles there. The Appeal paid union wages; and, in fact,
was the backbone of the town, giving employment to hundreds of men and
women. It was not the citizens of Girard that composed the mob. This
mob had risen up out of the earth apparently, and to all intents and
purposes, its work done, it had gone back into the earth. Ernest saw in
the affair the most sinister import.

"The Black Hundreds* are being organized in the United States," he said.
"This is the beginning. There will be more of it. The Iron Heel is
getting bold."

* The Black Hundreds were reactionary mobs organized by the
perishing Autocracy in the Russian Revolution. These
reactionary groups attacked the revolutionary groups, and
also, at needed moments, rioted and destroyed property so as
to afford the Autocracy the pretext of calling out the
Cossacks.

And so perished father's book. We were to see much of the Black Hundreds
as the days went by. Week by week more of the socialist papers were
barred from the mails, and in a number of instances the Black Hundreds
destroyed the socialist presses. Of course, the newspapers of the
land lived up to the reactionary policy of the ruling class, and the
destroyed socialist press was misrepresented and vilified, while
the Black Hundreds were represented as true patriots and saviours of
society. So convincing was all this misrepresentation that even sincere
ministers in the pulpit praised the Black Hundreds while regretting the
necessity of violence.