ying to 'shake down' Mr. Rogers. The
truth is that I have no partners. Not a soul knew my plans
until my first advertisement appeared. I have no price, for
there can be no peace now until the whole rotten scheme of
frenzied finance is smashed and things are brought back to
their natural honest level. I am in deadly earnest. No man
knows better than I do how great a service I am rendering to
the American people."

Mr. Lawson stood squarely upon his heels, the incarnation of
strength and courage. The square head, high and wide at the
top, the long line of the jaw and broad, fighting chin, big,
blue-gray eyes, the big, flat teeth, the strong nose, large
firm mouth, sinewy neck, hairy hands, broad, deep chest,
powerfully curved thighs, and the steady voice--these were
eloquent of strength, determination, and concentration.

There was a black pearl in his cravat and an almost
priceless canary-colored diamond sparkling on his little
finger. He wore gray, striped trousers and a black coat and
vest, across which was a beaded gold watch-chain. Everywhere
in his room were flowers, roses, lilies, and bunches of the
famous Lawson Pink, the flower for which he once paid
$30,000.

The man whom I had expected to find haggard, pale,
wild-eyed, and excited, in the centre of a nervous
hurricane, was rosy-cheeked, cheerful, and apparently as
free from care as though he had never heard of Wall Street.
He spoke rapidly but in an even voice, occasionally pacing
the floor and sometimes gesturing or setting his hands
firmly on his hips. He answered questions promptly and with
an almost boyish appearance of frankness. It would be hard
to imagine a more masculine, compact, and concentrated
personality.

This is the man who left school in Cambridge at the age of
twelve, walked into Boston with his books under his arm, and
secured a three-dollar-a-week position as an office-boy
almost on the very spot where, after thirty-six years, he
has worked himself up into a position from which he feels
able to captain the fight against Standard Oil and its
allies. He owns a palace in Boston filled with works of art;
he has a six-hundred acre farm on Cape Cod, with seven miles
of fences, three hundred horses, each one of whom he can
call by name; a h