opolis, Iowa, a
future Sparta or Athens or Rome, or anyhow, a Louisville or Cincinnati
or Dubuque--a place in which to achieve greatness--or anyhow, a chance
to deal in town lots, defend criminals, or prosecute them, and where the
unsettled will have to be settled in the courts as well as on the farm.
On to Lithopolis! G'lang, Whiteface, g'lang!"

[8] The editor acknowledges the invaluable assistance of Honorable N.V.
Creede in the editing of the proofs of this and a few other
passages.--G.v.d.M.

"I thought you were going to Monterey Centre," I said.

"Not if the court knows itself," he said, "and it thinks it does.
Lithopolis is the permanent town in Monterey County, and Monterey Centre
is the mushroom."

4

Monterey County, like all the eastern counties of Iowa, all the counties
along the Missouri, and every other county which was crossed by a
considerable river, was dotted with paper towns. We passed many of these
staked-out sites on the Old Ridge Road; and we heard of them from buyers
of and dealers in their lots.

Lithopolis was laid out by Judge Horace Stone, the great outsider in the
affairs of the county until he died. He platted a town in Howard County
when the town-lot fever first broke out, at a place called Stone's
Ferry, and named it Lithopolis, because his name was Stone, and for the
additional reason that there was a stone quarry there. I've been told
that the word means Stone City. The people insisted upon calling it
Stone's Ferry and would not have the name Lithopolis. Judge Stone raved
and tore, but he was voted down, and pulled up stakes in disgust, sold
out his interests and went on to Monterey County, where he could
establish a new city and name it Lithopolis. He seemed to care more for
the name than anything else, and never seemed to see how funny it was
that he felt it possible to make a city wherever he decreed. This was a
part of the spirit of the time. The prairies were infested with
Romuluses and Remuses, flourishing, not on the milk of the wolves, but
seemingly on their howls, of which they often gave a pretty fair
imitation.

"But Monterey Centre is the county-seat," I suggested.

"It just thinks it's going to be," said N.V. "The fact is that Monterey
County is not organized, but is attached to the county south of it for
judicial purposes. Let me whisper in your ear that it will soon be
organized, and that the county-seat will not be Monterey Centre, but
Lithopolis--that clas