An Appeal to the Young. 25 



beasts like yourself, outraging the young girl's mem- 

 ory by some dirty stories; or, on tlie other hand, 

 your remembrance of the past will touch your heart ; 

 you will try to meet the seducer to denounce him to 

 his face ; you will reflect upon the causes of these 

 events that recur every day, and you will comprehend 

 that they will never cease so long as societ}' is divided 

 into two camps : on one side the wretched and on the 

 other the lazy — the jugglers with fine phrases and 

 bestial lusts. You will understand that it is high 

 time to bridge over this gulf of separation, and you 

 will rush to place yourself among the socialists. 



And you, woman of the people, has this left you 

 cold and unmoved ? While caressing the pretty head 

 of that child who nestles close to you, do you never 

 think about the lot that awaits him, if the present 

 social conditions are not changed. Do you never 

 reflect on the future awaiting your young sister, and 

 all your own children ? Do you wish that your sons 

 should vegetate as your father vegetated, with no 

 other care than how to get his daily bread, with no 

 other pleasure than that of the gin-palace ? Do you 

 want your husband, your boys, to be ever at the 

 mercy of the first comer who has inherited from his 

 father a capital to exploit them with ? Are you 

 anxious that they should remain slaves for a master, 

 food for powder, mere dung wherewith to manure 

 the pasture-lands of the rich expropriator ? 



Nay, never; a thousand times no! I know right 

 well that your blood has boiled when you have heard 

 that your husbands, after they entered on a strike 

 full of fire and determination, have ended by accept- 

 ing, cap in hand, the conditions dictated by the 

 bloated bourgeois in a tone of haughty contempt ! 

 I know that you have admired those Spanish women 

 who in a popular rising presented their breasts to the 

 bayonets of the soldiery in the front ranks of the in- 

 surrectionists. I am certain that you mention with 

 reverence the name of the woman who lodged a 



