FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84  
85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   >>   >|  
was chairman of a committee which investigated certain phases of New York City official life, and carried through the Legislature a bill taking from the Board of Aldermen the power to reject the Mayor's appointments. He was chairman and practically the only active member of another committee to investigate living conditions in the tenements of New York, and as spokesman of the worn and sad-looking foreigners who constituted the Cigar-Makers' Union, argued before Governor Cleveland for the passage of a bill to prohibit the manufacture of cigars in tenement-houses. His energy was boundless, it seemed, but the heart had gone out of him. He was restless, and thought longingly of the valley of the Little Missouri. The news that came from the boys at Chimney Butte was favorable. The three hundred head of young cattle which Sylvane and Merrifield had bought in Iowa, were doing well in spite of a hard winter. Roosevelt, struck by Sylvane's enthusiastic report, backed by a painstaking account-sheet, wrote Sylvane telling him to buy a thousand or twelve hundred head more. Sylvane's reply was characteristic and would have gratified Uncle James. "Don't put in any more money until you're sure we've scattered the other dollars right," he said in effect. "Better come out first and look around." That struck Roosevelt as good advice, and he accepted it. While Roosevelt was winning clear, meanwhile, of the tangles and snares in Albany, he was unconsciously being enmeshed in the web that was spinning at Medora. It came about this way. The Marquis, who had many likable qualities, did not possess among them any strict regard for the rights of others. He had a curious obsession, in fact, that in the Bad Lands there were no rights but his; and with that point of view had directed his superintendent, a man named Matthews, to drive fifteen hundred head of cattle over on an unusually fine piece of bottom-land northwestward across the river from the Maltese Cross, which, by all the laws of the range, belonged to the "Roosevelt outfit." Matthews declared that the Marquis intended to hold the bottom permanently for fattening beef-cattle, and to build a cabin there. "You'll have to move those cattle by daylight," said Merrifield, "or we'll move them for you. You can take your choice." "I've got my orders from the Marquis to keep the cattle here," answered Matthews. "That's all there is to it. They'll stay here." It was late at nig
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84  
85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

cattle

 

Roosevelt

 
Sylvane
 

hundred

 

Marquis

 

Matthews

 

Merrifield

 

bottom

 

rights

 
struck

committee

 

chairman

 
obsession
 

curious

 

carried

 
strict
 

regard

 

official

 

superintendent

 

directed


possess

 
unconsciously
 

enmeshed

 

Albany

 

snares

 
winning
 

tangles

 
spinning
 

Medora

 
likable

qualities
 

Legislature

 

fifteen

 
choice
 

daylight

 

investigated

 
Governor
 

answered

 

orders

 
northwestward

Cleveland

 

unusually

 
Maltese
 

intended

 

permanently

 

fattening

 
declared
 
outfit
 

phases

 
belonged