Like all right-thinking citizens of this fair town of Blackwater, he deeply regretted this industrial strife.

It interfered with business.

It meant loss of money to the strikers.

It was an occasion of much inconvenience to the citizens and it engendered bitterness of feeling that might take months, even years, to remove.

He stood there as the friend of the working man.
He was a working man himself and was proud of it.