had an impulse to
send for Miss McCoy and ask her if she had understood what Krebs was
"driving at," but for reasons that must be fairly obvious I refrained. I
read over again that part of Krebs's speech which dealt with the
immediate programme of the Citizens Union. After paying a tribute to
Greenhalge as a man of common sense and dependability who would make a
good mayor, he went on to explain the principle of the new charter they
hoped ultimately to get, which should put the management of the city in
the hands of one man, an expert employed by a commission; an expert whose
duty it would be to conduct the affairs of the city on a business basis,
precisely as those of any efficient corporation were conducted. This plan
had already been adopted, with encouraging results, in several smaller
cities of the country. He explained in some detail, with statistics, the
waste and inefficiency and dishonesty in various departments under the
present system, dwelling particularly upon the deplorable state of
affairs in the city hospital.

I need not dwell upon this portion of his remarks. Since then text-books
and serious periodicals have dealt with these matters thoroughly. They
are now familiar to all thinking Americans.

XXV.

My entrance into the campaign was accompanied by a blare of publicity,
and during that fortnight I never picked up a morning or evening
newspaper without reading, on the first page, some such headline as
"Crowds flock to hear Paret." As a matter of fact, the crowds did flock;
but I never quite knew as I looked down from platforms on seas of faces
how much of the flocking was spontaneous. Much of it was so, since the
struggle had then become sufficiently dramatic to appeal to the larger
public imagination that is but occasionally waked; on the other hand, the
magic of advertising cannot be underestimated; nor must the existence be
ignored of an organized corps of shepherds under the vigilant direction
of Mr. Judd Jason, whose duty it was to see that none of our meetings was
lacking in numbers and enthusiasm. There was always a demonstrative
gathering overflowing the sidewalk in front of the entrance, swaying and
cheering in the light of the street lamps, and on the floor within an
ample scattering of suspiciously bleary-eyed voters to start the stamping
and applauding. In spite of these known facts, the impression of
popularity, of repudiation of reform by a large majority of level-headed
inhabitan