spell
upon his listeners. Swiftly, graphically, he outlined the future of the
country which would be opened up to settlement by this great irrigation
project. His florid face turned a deeper red, his eyes sparkled as the
winged imagination of the natural promoter began to play. It was of the
dirigible kind, Symes's imagination, he could steer it in any direction.
It could rise to any heights. It now shot upward and he saw himself at
the head of a project which would make his name a household word
throughout the State. He saw crowds of Russian Jews crying hosannas as
he walked along the street of Symesville; he heard the clang of
trolleys; he saw the smoke of factories; he heard the name of Symes upon
the lips of little children; he saw, but the dazzling vision made him
blink and he leaned back in his chair with the beneficent smile of a
man who had just endowed a hospital for crippled children, while he
permitted himself to accept a subscription for $15,000 from a guest who
had cleared that modest sum in the manufacture of white lead and paint.
A slow and laborious process compared to the sale of irrigated land to
Russian Jews.

Symes's guests wrung his hand at parting, in silent gratitude at being
permitted to get in on the ground floor of what was undoubtedly the
greatest money making enterprise still open to investors. And they left
him with the assurance of their hearty co-operation and willingness to
endeavor to raise the balance among their friends.

While the subscribers for the stock of the Symes Irrigation Project were
rousing their wives from their first sleep to gloat with them over the
unprecedented good fortune which had thrown the big-hearted and shrewd
but honest westerner in their paths, that person was returning from a
night lunch cart with two hot frankfurter sandwiches for Augusta
concealed in his pocket. The dinner, although so fruitful of results,
had seriously reduced the roll of crisp bank notes.

Strict economy was imperative during the days which followed and it
became no uncommon occurrence for Andy P. Symes to whisk Augusta into a
caravansera where the gentlemen patrons ate large, filling plates of
griddle cakes with their hats on. But such are the sordid straits to
which the proudest spirits are sometimes reduced and depressing as it
was to Andy P. Symes, who winced each time that he seated himself at the
varnished pine table upon which the pewter castor was chained to the
wall and selecte