Speaker 1: This is section twenty eight of The Gilded Age. This
Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain The Gilded Age,
Speaker 1: A Tale of to Day by Mark Twain and C. D. Warner,
Speaker 1: Chapter twenty seven. Whatever may have been the language of
Speaker 1: Harry's letter to the Colonel, the information it conveyed was
Speaker 1: condensed or expanded one or the other. From the following
Speaker 1: episode of his visit to New York. He called with
Speaker 1: official importance in his mion at number blank Wall Street,
Speaker 1: where a great gilt sign betokened the presence of the
Speaker 1: headquarters of the Columbus River Slackwater Navigation Company. He entered
Speaker 1: and gave a dressy porter his card, and was requested
Speaker 1: to wait a moment in a sort of ante chamber.
Speaker 1: The porter returned in a minute and asked whom he
Speaker 1: would like to see. The president of the company. Of
Speaker 1: course he is busy with some gentleman. Sir, says he
Speaker 1: will be done with them directly, that a copperplate car
Speaker 1: guard with engineer in chief on it should be received
Speaker 1: with such tranquility as this annoyed mister Brierly not a little,
Speaker 1: but he had to submit. Indeed, his annoyance had time
Speaker 1: to augment a good deal, for he was allowed to
Speaker 1: cool his heels a full half hour in the ante
Speaker 1: room before those gentlemen emerged and he was ushered into
Speaker 1: the presence. He found a stately dignitary occupying a very
Speaker 1: official chair behind a long green Morocco covered table in
Speaker 1: a room sumptuously carpeted and furnished and well garnished with pictures.
Speaker 1: Good morning, sir, take a seat, Take a seat, Thank you, sir,
Speaker 1: said Harry, throwing as much chill into his manner as
Speaker 1: his ruffled dignity prompted. We perceived, by your reports and
Speaker 1: the reports of the Chief Superintendent, that you have been
Speaker 1: making gratifying progress with the work. We are all very
Speaker 1: much pleased. Indeed, we did not discover it from your letters,
Speaker 1: which we have not received, nor by the treatment our
Speaker 1: drafts have met with, which were not honored, nor by
Speaker 1: the reception of any part of the appropriation, no part
Speaker 1: of it having come to hand. Why, my dear mister Brierly,
Speaker 1: there must be some mistake. I am sure we wrote
Speaker 1: you and also mister Sellers recently. When my clerk comes,
Speaker 1: he will show copies letters informing you of the ten
Speaker 1: percent assessment. Oh, certainly we got those letters. But what
Speaker 1: we wanted was money to carry on the work, money
Speaker 1: to pay the men. Certainly, certainly, true enough, But we
Speaker 1: credited you both for a large part of your assessments.
Speaker 1: I am sure that was in our letters. Of course,
Speaker 1: that was in I remembered that. Ah, very well. Then
Speaker 1: now we begin to understand each other. Well, I don't
Speaker 1: see that we do. There's two months wages do the men?
Speaker 1: And how haven't you paid the men? Paid them? How
Speaker 1: are we going to pay them when you don't honor
Speaker 1: our drafts? Why, my dear sir, I cannot see how
Speaker 1: you can find any fault with us. I am sure
Speaker 1: we have acted in a perfectly straightforward business way. Now
Speaker 1: let us look at the thing a moment. You subscribed
Speaker 1: for one hundred shares of the capital stock at one
Speaker 1: thousand dollars a share. I believe, yes, sir, I did,
Speaker 1: and mister Sellers took a like amount. Yes, sir, very well.
Speaker 1: No concern can get along without money. We levied a
Speaker 1: ten percent assessment. It was the original understanding that you
Speaker 1: and mister Sellers were to have the positions you now
Speaker 1: hold with salaries of six hundred dollars a month each
Speaker 1: while in active service. You were duly elected to these places,
Speaker 1: and you accepted them. Am I right, certainly, very well.
Speaker 1: You were given your instructions and put to work. By
Speaker 1: your reports, it appears that you have expended the sum
Speaker 1: of nine thousand, six hundred and ten dollars upon the
Speaker 1: said work two months salary to you two officers amounts
Speaker 1: altogether to two thousand, four hundred dollars, about one eighth
Speaker 1: of your ten percent assessment, you see, which leaves you
Speaker 1: in debt to the company for the other seven eighths
Speaker 1: of the assessment viz. Something over eight thousand dollars apiece. Now,
Speaker 1: instead of requiring you to forward this aggregate of sixteen
Speaker 1: thousand dollars or seventeen thousand dollars to New York, the
Speaker 1: company voted unanimously to let you pay it over to
Speaker 1: the contractors laborers from time to time and give you
Speaker 1: credit on the books for it. And they did it
Speaker 1: without a murmur, too, for they were pleased with the
Speaker 1: progress you had made and were glad to pay you
Speaker 1: that little compliment, and a very neat one it was, too.
Speaker 1: I am sure the work you did fell short of
Speaker 1: ten thousand dollars a trifle. Let me see nine thousand,
Speaker 1: six hundred and forty dollars from twenty thousand dollars salary
Speaker 1: two thousand, four hundred dollars added, I asked, The balance
Speaker 1: due the company from yourself and mister Sellers is seven thousand,
Speaker 1: nine hundred sixty dollars, which I will take the responsibility
Speaker 1: of allowing to stand for the present, unless you prefer
Speaker 1: to draw a check now and thus confound it. Do
Speaker 1: you mean to say that instead of the company owing
Speaker 1: us two thousand, four hundred dollars, we owe the company
Speaker 1: seven thousand, nine hundred and sixty dollars. Well, yes, and
Speaker 1: that we owe the men and the contractor's nearly ten
Speaker 1: thousand dollars besides, oh them, Oh, bless my soul. You
Speaker 1: can't mean that you have not paid these people. But
Speaker 1: I do mean it. The President rose and walked the
Speaker 1: floor like a man in bodily pain. His brows contracted.
Speaker 1: He put his hand up and clasped his forehead, and
Speaker 1: kept saying, Oh, it is too bad, too bad, too bad. Oh,
Speaker 1: it is bound to be found out. Nothing can prevent it. Nothing.
Speaker 1: Then he threw himself into his chair and said, my
Speaker 1: dear mister Bryerson, this is dreadful, perfectly dreadful. It will
Speaker 1: be found out. It is bound to tarnish the good
Speaker 1: name of the company. Our credit will be seriously, most
Speaker 1: seriously impaired. How could you be so thoughtless that the
Speaker 1: man ought to have been paid? Though it beggared us all,
Speaker 1: but they ought ought they? Then? Why the devil my
Speaker 1: name is not Brierson, by the way, Why the mischief
Speaker 1: didn't the company? Why what in the nation ever became
Speaker 1: of the appropriation? Where is that appropriation? If a stockholder
Speaker 1: may make so bold as to ask the appropriation that
Speaker 1: paltry two hundred thousand dollars? Do you mean? Of course?
Speaker 1: But I didn't know that two hundred thousand dollars was
Speaker 1: so very paltry, though I grant, of course, that it
Speaker 1: is not a large sum strictly speaking. But where is it,
Speaker 1: my dear sir, you surprise me. You surely cannot have
Speaker 1: had a large acquaintance with this sort of thing, Otherwise
Speaker 1: you would not have expected much of a result from
Speaker 1: a mere initial appropriation like that. It was never intended
Speaker 1: for anything but a mere nest egg for the future,
Speaker 1: and real appropriations to cluster around indeed, well, was it
Speaker 1: a myth or was it a reality? Whatever become of it?
Speaker 1: Why the matter is simple enough. A congressional appropriation costs money.
Speaker 1: Just reflect For instance, a majority of the House Committee,
Speaker 1: say ten thousand dollars apiece, forty thousand dollars. A majority
Speaker 1: of the Senate committee the same each, say forty thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: A little extra to one or two chairmen of one
Speaker 1: or two such committees, say ten thousand dollars each, twenty
Speaker 1: thousand dollars, and then there's one hundred thousand dollars of
Speaker 1: the money gone to begin with. Then seven male lobbyists
Speaker 1: at three thousand dollars each twenty one thousand dollars, one
Speaker 1: female lobbyist ten thousand dollars. A high moral congressman or
Speaker 1: senator here and there. The high moral ones cost more
Speaker 1: because they give tone to a measure. Say ten of
Speaker 1: these at three thousand dollars each thirty thousand dollars. Then
Speaker 1: a lot of small fry country members who won't vote
Speaker 1: for anything whatever without pay, say twenty at five hundred
Speaker 1: dollars a piece is ten thousand dollars. A lot of
Speaker 1: dinners to members, say ten thousand dollars altogether, a lot
Speaker 1: of jim cracks for congressmen's wives and children. Those go
Speaker 1: a long way. You can't spend too much money in
Speaker 1: that line. Well, those things cost in a lump, say,
Speaker 1: ten thousand dollars along there somewhere. And then comes your
Speaker 1: printed documents, your maps, your tinted engravings, your pamphlets, your
Speaker 1: illuminated show cards, your advertisements in one hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: papers at ever so much a line, because you've got
Speaker 1: to keep the papers all right, or you are gone up,
Speaker 1: you know. Oh, my dear sir, printing bills are destruction itself.
Speaker 1: Ours so far amount to let me see ten fifty
Speaker 1: two twenty two thirteen, And then there's eleven fourteen thirty three. Well,
Speaker 1: never mind the details. The tot in clear numbers foots
Speaker 1: up one hundred eighteen thousand, two hundred and fifty four
Speaker 1: dollars and forty two cents thus far. Oh yes, indeed,
Speaker 1: printing's no bactell I can tell you. And then there's
Speaker 1: your contributions as a company to Chicago fires and Boston
Speaker 1: fires and orphan asylums and all that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: Head the list you see with the company's full name
Speaker 1: and a thousand dollars set opposite great card, Sir. One
Speaker 1: of the finest advertisements in the world. The preachers mention
Speaker 1: it in the pulpit when it's a religious charity. One
Speaker 1: of the happiest advertisements in the world is your benevolent donation.
Speaker 1: Ours have amounted to sixteen thousand dollars and some cents
Speaker 1: up to this time. Good heavens. Oh yes. Perhaps the
Speaker 1: biggest thing we've done in the advertising line was to
Speaker 1: get an officer of the US government, of perfectly Himalayan
Speaker 1: official altitude to write up our little internal improvement for
Speaker 1: a religious paper of enormous circulation. I tell you that
Speaker 1: makes as our bonds go handsomely among the pious poor.
Speaker 1: Your religious paper is by far the best vehicle for
Speaker 1: a thing of this kind, because they'll lead your article
Speaker 1: and put it right in the midst of the reading matter.
Speaker 1: And if it's got a few scripture quotations in it,
Speaker 1: and some temperance platitudes and a bit of gush here
Speaker 1: and there about Sunday schools, and a sentimental snuffle now
Speaker 1: and then about God's precious ones, the honest, hard handed poor,
Speaker 1: it works the nation like a charm my dear sir,
Speaker 1: and never a man suspects that it is an advertisement.
Speaker 1: But your secular paper sticks you right into the advertising columns.
Speaker 1: And of course you don't take a trick. Give me
Speaker 1: a religious paper to advertise in every time, and if
Speaker 1: you'll just look at their advertising pages, you'll observe that
Speaker 1: other people think a good deal as I do, especially
Speaker 1: people who have got little financial schemes to make everybody
Speaker 1: rich with. Of course, I mean your great, big metropolitan
Speaker 1: religious papers that know how to serve God and make
Speaker 1: money at the same time. That's your sort, sir, that's
Speaker 1: your sort. A religious paper that isn't run to make
Speaker 1: money is no use to us, sir, as an advertising medium,
Speaker 1: no use to anybody in our line of business. I
Speaker 1: guess our next best dodge was sending a pleasure trip
Speaker 1: of newspaper reporters out to Napoleon. Never paid them a cent,
Speaker 1: just filled them up with champagne and the fat of
Speaker 1: the land, put pen, ink and paper before them while
Speaker 1: they were red hot, and bless your soul, when you
Speaker 1: come to read their letters, you'll have supposed they'd been
Speaker 1: to heaven. And if a sentimental squeamishness held one or
Speaker 1: two of them back from taking a less rosy view
Speaker 1: of Napoleon. Our hospitalities tied his tongue at least, and
Speaker 1: he said nothing at all, and so did us no harm.
Speaker 1: Let me see, have I stated all the expenses I've
Speaker 1: been at, No I was near forgetting one or two items.
Speaker 1: There's your official salaries. You can't get good men for nothing.
Speaker 1: Salaries cost pretty lively. And then there's your big high
Speaker 1: sounding millionaire names stuck into your advertisements as stockholders. Another
Speaker 1: card that, and they are stockholders too, but you have
Speaker 1: to give them the stock and non accessible at that,
Speaker 1: So they're an expensive lot, very very expensive thing. Take
Speaker 1: it all round is a big internal improvement concern. But
Speaker 1: you see that yourself, mister Bryerman. You see that yourself, sir.
Speaker 1: But look here, I think you are a little mistaken
Speaker 1: about it's ever having cost anything for congressional votes. I
Speaker 1: happen to know something about that. I've let you say
Speaker 1: your say, Now let me say mine. I don't wish
Speaker 1: to seem to throw any suspicion on anybody's statements, because
Speaker 1: we are all liable to be mistaken. But how would
Speaker 1: it strike you if I were to say that I
Speaker 1: was in Washington all the time this bill was pending.
Speaker 1: And what if I added that I put the measure
Speaker 1: through myself. Yes, sir, I did that little thing. And moreover,
Speaker 1: I never paid a dollar for any man's vote, and
Speaker 1: never promised one. There are in some ways of doing
Speaker 1: a thing that are as good as others, which other
Speaker 1: people don't happen to think about, or don't have the
Speaker 1: knack of succeeding in if they do happen to think
Speaker 1: of them. My dear sir, I am obliged to knock
Speaker 1: some of your expenses in the head, for never a
Speaker 1: cent was paid a Congressman or senator on the part
Speaker 1: of this navigation company. The President smiled blandly, even sweetly,
Speaker 1: all through this harangue, and then said, is that so
Speaker 1: every word of it? Well, it does seem to alter
Speaker 1: the complexion of things a little. You are acquainted with
Speaker 1: the members down there, of course, else you could not
Speaker 1: have worked to such advantage. I know them all, sir.
Speaker 1: I know their wives, their children, their babies. I even
Speaker 1: made it a point to be on good terms with
Speaker 1: their lackeys. I know every congressman well, even familiarly, very good.
Speaker 1: Do you know any of their signatures. Do you know
Speaker 1: their handwriting? Why I know their handwriting as well as
Speaker 1: I know my own, have had correspond Condon's enough with them,
Speaker 1: I should think, And their signatures, why I can tell
Speaker 1: their initials? Even The President went to a private safe,
Speaker 1: unlocked it, and got out some letters in certain slips
Speaker 1: of paper. Then he said, now here, for instance, do
Speaker 1: you believe that that is a genuine letter? Do you
Speaker 1: know this signature here and this one? Do you know
Speaker 1: who those initials represent? And are they forgeries? Harry was stupefied.
Speaker 1: There were things there that made his brain swim. Presently,
Speaker 1: at the bottom of one of the letters, he saw
Speaker 1: a signature that restored his equilibrium. It even brought the
Speaker 1: sunshine of a smile to his face. The President said,
Speaker 1: that one amuses you. You never suspected him. Of course
Speaker 1: I ought to have suspected him, but I don't believe
Speaker 1: it ever really occurred to me. Well, well, well, how
Speaker 1: did you ever have the nerve to approach him of
Speaker 1: all the others? Why, my friend, we never think of
Speaker 1: accomplishing anything without his help. He is our main stay.
Speaker 1: But how do those letters strike you? They strike me dumb?
Speaker 1: What a stone blind idiot? I have been. Well, take
Speaker 1: it all round. I suppose you had a pleasant time
Speaker 1: in Washington, said the President, gathering up the letters. Of
Speaker 1: course you must have had. Very few men could go
Speaker 1: there and get a money bill through without buying a
Speaker 1: single Come now, mister President, that's plenty of that. I
Speaker 1: take back everything I said on that head. I'm a
Speaker 1: wiser man to day than I was yesterday. I can
Speaker 1: tell you I think you are. In fact, I am
Speaker 1: satisfied you are. But now I showed you these things
Speaker 1: in confidence. You understand. Mention facts as much as you
Speaker 1: want to, but don't mention names to anybody. I can
Speaker 1: depend on you for that, can't I. Oh, of course
Speaker 1: I understand the necessity of that. I will not betray
Speaker 1: the names. But to go back a bit, it begins
Speaker 1: to look as if you never saw any of that
Speaker 1: appropriation at all. We saw nearly ten thousand dollars of it,
Speaker 1: and that was all several of us took to tarns
Speaker 1: at log Rolling in Washington. And if we had charged
Speaker 1: anything for that service, none of that ten thousand dollars
Speaker 1: would ever have reached New York. If you hadn't levied
Speaker 1: the assessment, you would have been in a close place,
Speaker 1: I judge close. Have you figured up the total of
Speaker 1: the disbursements I told you of? No, I didn't think
Speaker 1: of that. Well, let's see spent in Washington, say one
Speaker 1: hundred and ninety one thousand dollars, printing, advertising, et cetera,
Speaker 1: say one hundred eighteen thousand dollars. Charity say sixteen thousand
Speaker 1: dollars total three hundred and twenty five thousand dollars. The
Speaker 1: money to do that with comes from appropriation two hundred
Speaker 1: thousand dollars, ten percent assessment on capital of one million
Speaker 1: dollars one hundred thousand dollars total three hundred thousand dollars,
Speaker 1: which leaves us in debt some twenty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: At this moment. Salaries of home officers are still going on. Also,
Speaker 1: printing and advertising. Next month will show a state of
Speaker 1: things and then burst up. I suppose by no means
Speaker 1: levy another assessment. I see that's dismal. By no means
Speaker 1: why isn't it? What's the road out? Another appropriation? Don't
Speaker 1: you see? Bother the appropriations they cost more than they
Speaker 1: come to and not the next one. We'll call for
Speaker 1: half a million, get it and go for a million
Speaker 1: the very next month. Yes, but the cost of it.
Speaker 1: The President smiled and patted his secret letters affectionately. He said,
Speaker 1: all these people are in the next congress. We shan't
Speaker 1: have to pay them a cent. And what is more,
Speaker 1: they will work like beavers for us. Perhaps it might
Speaker 1: be to their advantage, Harry reflected profoundly Awhile, then he said,
Speaker 1: we send many missionaries to lift up the benighted races
Speaker 1: of other lands. How much cheaper and better it would
Speaker 1: be if those people could only come here and drink
Speaker 1: of our civilization at its fountain head. I agree with you,
Speaker 1: mister Beverley. Must you go well, good morning, look in
Speaker 1: when you are passing, and whenever I can give you
Speaker 1: any information about our affairs and prospects, I shall be
Speaker 1: glad to do it. Harry's letter was not a long one,
Speaker 1: but it contained at least the calamitous figures that came
Speaker 1: out in the above conversation. The colonel found himself in
Speaker 1: a rather uncomfortable place. No one thousand, two hundred dollars
Speaker 1: salary forthcoming, and himself held responsible for half of the
Speaker 1: nine thousand, six hundred and forty dollars due the workmen,
Speaker 1: to say nothing of being in debt to the company
Speaker 1: to the extent of nearly four thousand dollars. Polly's heart
Speaker 1: was nearly broken. The blues returned in fearful force, and
Speaker 1: she had to go out of the room to hide
Speaker 1: the tears that nothing could keep back. Now there was
Speaker 1: morning in another quarter two, for Louise had a letter.
Speaker 1: Washington had refused at the last moment to take forty
Speaker 1: thousand dollars for the Tennessee land, and had demanded one
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty thousand. So the trade fell through, and
Speaker 1: now Washington was wailing because he had been so foolish.
Speaker 1: But he wrote that his man might probably return to
Speaker 1: the city soon, and then he meant to sell to
Speaker 1: him sure, even if he had to take ten thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: Louise had a good cry, several of them, indeed, and
Speaker 1: the family charitably forbore to make any comments that would
Speaker 1: increase her grief. Spring blossomed, summer came dragged its hot
Speaker 1: weeks by, and the colonel's spirits rose day by day,
Speaker 1: for the railroad was making good progress, but by and
Speaker 1: by something happened. Hawkeye had always declined to subscribe anything
Speaker 1: toward the railway, imagining that her large business would be
Speaker 1: a sufficient compulsory influence. But now Hawkeye was frightened, and
Speaker 1: before Colonel Sellers knew what he was about, Hawkeye, in
Speaker 1: a panic, had rushed to the front and subscribed such
Speaker 1: a sum that Napoleon's attractions suddenly sank into insignificance, and
Speaker 1: the railroad concluded to follow a comparatively straight course instead
Speaker 1: of going miles out of its way to build up
Speaker 1: a metropolis in the muddy desert of Stone's Landing. The
Speaker 1: thunderbolt fell. After all the Colonel's deep planning, after all
Speaker 1: his brain work and tongue work in drawing public attention
Speaker 1: to his pet project and enlisting interest in it, after
Speaker 1: all his faithful hard toil with his hands and running
Speaker 1: hither and thither on his busy feet, after all his
Speaker 1: high hopes and splendid prophecies, the fates had turned their
Speaker 1: backs on him at last, and all in a moment,
Speaker 1: his air castles crumbled to ruins about him. Hawkeye rose
Speaker 1: from her fright triumphant and rejoicing, and down went stones Landing.
Speaker 1: One by one. Its meager parcel of inhabitants packed up
Speaker 1: and moved away. As the summer waned and fall approached,
Speaker 1: town lots were no longer saleable, traffic ceased, A deadly
Speaker 1: lethargy fell upon the place once more. The weakly telegraph
Speaker 1: faded into an early grave. The waried tadpole returned from exile.
Speaker 1: The bullfrog resumed his ancient song. The tranquil turtle sunned
Speaker 1: his back upon bank and log, and drowsed his grateful
Speaker 1: life away, as in the old sweet days of yore.
Speaker 1: End of Chapter twenty eight.