,000 damages, and apropos of the suit an
interesting complication occurred which seriously interfered with Mr.
Rogers's plans. The night before the old owners, from whom Mr. Rogers
had grabbed the _Commercial_, were to be thrown into the street, they
threatened, by way of reprisal for the mean trick that had been served
on them, to confess judgment to Heinze. One was president and the other
secretary of the company, and this action would have settled the
proposition. Rogers, treated to a dose of his own medicine, had to make
a compromise, and the men are still on the paper. The details of this
good story are to be found in the Detroit _Journal_. It was fitting that
when I began my exposures of the "System" this thug should be ordered
to do his worst by me, and he began the series of virulent assaults that
the _Commercial_ published and advertised all over the country. The
first of these was devoted to proving me crazy, and it was carefully
circulated by my friends the insurance companies by way of offsetting
the effects of my revelations of their jugglery of the people's funds.
Later I showed up the fellow so vigorously that John D. Rockefeller
ordered Mr. Rogers to muzzle him in his own paper, whereupon
arrangements were made with a New York weekly to act as the
sewer-conduit for the lies and abuse this thug was warranted to turn
out.

I should not dream of dealing with this man or his fatuous attacks in a
respectable publication save that he has been appointed the "System's"
chief defender. It really seems as though the game were too small to
take time for its killing, but as these weak and febrile maunderings
really represent the "System's" reply to my charges, it may be worth
while to show, once and for all, what idiotic lies they put forth and
what a silly and ineffective falsifier it is that they have made their
champion. I shall take the second article of the series and contrast
Donohoe's statements with the actual facts.

Incidents in Mr. Lawson's versatile career which even those
who are not censorious might well deem shameful.

If in my career I have done anything of which I or any honorable man
should be ashamed, then I am willing to stand convicted of all that this
character thug charges against me--of being a stock-jobber, fakir, liar.

He claims, if the writer understands him aright, that he is
_animated solely_ by a keen regard for the public weal in
performing what he describ