he was guilty of taking a leading part.And that was the end of Dan Cullen.From that day he was a marked man, and every day, for ten years and more, he was 'paid off' for what he had done.
A docker is a casual laborer.Work ebbs and flows, and he works or does not work according to the amount of goods on hand to be moved.
Dan Cullen was discriminated against.While he was not absolutely turned away (which would have caused trouble, and which would certainly have been more merciful), he was called in by the foreman to do not more than two or three days' work per week.This is what is called being 'disciplined,' or 'drilled.' It means being starved.
There is no politer word.Ten years of it broke his heart, and broken-hearted men cannot live.
He took to his bed in his terrible den, which grew more terrible with his helplessness.He was without kith or kin, a lonely old man, embittered and pessimistic, fighting vermin the while and looking at Garibaldi, Engels, and Dan Burns gazing down at him from the blood-bespattered walls.No one came to see him in that crowded municipal barracks (he had made friends with none of them), and he was left to rot.