than the abject slavery of the American people.

END OF VOLUME

LAWSON AND HIS CRITICS

I

THE INSURANCE CONTROVERSY

In the July, 1904, number of _Everybody's Magazine_ I announced that I
proposed to give to the world a story concerned with events which had
taken place in real life--a true story.

I outlined it, giving the names of the persons and events it would deal
with.

These things happened:

The edition of the magazine was sold out in three days; my chapter was
printed in part or in full in nearly all the papers and periodicals of
the United States and Canada; many of the representative journals, even
in England, published long editorials on the subject, and with but few
exceptions, editorials and news comments were favorable.

I was urged to continue. My second chapter appeared.

The magazine, with an additional 100,000 copies, was sold out in two
days. The press took hold of the matter with even greater interest than
it had accorded my first chapter.

The third chapter met with a still more cordial reception. The edition
of the magazine, although increased another 100,000, sold out as before,
and my mail expanded to a degree that surprised me. In addition to
thousands of press notices and criticisms, I received ever so many
letters from all classes of Americans and Canadians--teachers of the
Word of God, and members of the flocks who are taught, earnest statesmen
and insincere politicians, millionnaires and paupers, anarchists,
socialists, municipal-ownershipists, and the hundred and one travelers
on the beaten highways and lowways of life, who, spurred by ambition or
unrest, pantingly seek a chance to blaze a way for the trudging millions
of the future to that goal of all ambitious and restless dreamers--a
people's Utopia. Nearly all appealed to me to give them the word as to
the ultimate intention of "Frenzied Finance"--"Is it only to point to
the sores, or will it prick them with its long sharp point and will its
double edge cut the flesh in which they are rooted?" Others required
further information or explanation about the subjects I had treated;
another section questioned my statements and found fault with my
disclosures. The volume of these communications and criticisms finally
became so large and they were so urgent in tone that I made up my mind
it was necessary to devise some fair and intelligent way to remove the
writers' difficulties and resolve their doubts. The modern surge