UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 BENJAMIN RUSH DAVENPORT. 
 
 
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DUKE UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 The Glenn Negley Collection 
 of Utopian Literature 
 
\ 
 
"UNCLE SAMS" 
 
 CABINS. 
 
 A STORY OF AMERICAN LIFE 
 
 LOOKING FORWARD A CENTURY. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 THE MASCOT PUBLISHING CO. 
 
 1895. 
 
Copyright, 1895, 
 
 BY 
 
 THE MASCOT PUBLISHING CO. 
 

 PREFACE 
 
 Friends, to whom the author submitted the manu- 
 script of " ' Uncle Sam's ' Cabins," have unanimously 
 expressed the opinion that the author would be ac- 
 cused of an attempted imitation of that remarkable 
 work of Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe — " Uncle Tom's 
 Cabin." 
 
 The author desires to confess frankly that the 
 motive and title were suggested by the famous book 
 of that talented writer. Indeed, most gladly would the 
 author of " ' Uncle Sam's ' Cabins " plead guilty to the 
 charge of being an imitator throughout the entire 
 work, if this book be only partially as successful 
 in preventing an enslavement more painful for the 
 descendants of Anglo-Saxons to even contemplate, 
 than the slavery which the influence of Mrs. Stowe's 
 work, "' Uncle Tom's' Cabin," so powerfully assisted 
 to terminate. 
 
 By a concatenation of circumstances, the very meas- 
 ures necessary to accomplish the liberation of those 
 slaves, in whose behalf Mrs. Stowe's great book so 
 wonderfully aroused the sympathy of the Nation, have 
 resulted in creating conditions pregnant with danger 
 to the freedom of a large class — in fact, the majority of 
 the population of the United States. 
 
 AUTHOR. 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2010 with funding from 
 Duke University Libraries 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/unclesamscabinssOOdave 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 The mist lay dense upon the face of the earth that 
 April morning, 1994, concealing the bending figure of a 
 woman, as she pushed aside the fast disappearing snow 
 in her search for the first appearing dandelion, fresh 
 and crisp, clinging close to the warm earth, beneath its 
 white and frosty blanket. The woman, rising from her 
 hunt in the snow, stood erect, raising her head and 
 shoulders above the low-lying mist, as mountains 
 lift their heads above humid clouds, disclosing a face 
 of pathetic beauty, accentuated by the total absence 
 of even an attempt at personal adornment. 
 
 The coarse home-made sun-bonnet, falling back from 
 her head as she rose to an erect position, revealed a 
 mass of light brown hair, gathered in a plain knot at 
 the back of her head, (held in place by a wooden pin,) 
 which together with the open brow, full, large grey 
 eyes and almost transparently fair skin, proclaimed her 
 Anglo-Saxon blood ; the mouth and chin though cast 
 in nature's mould of beauty, told a painful story of 
 suffering and resignation, — the sigh, that parted the 
 lips as she gazed about the ghostly clad fields, served 
 to exhibit the white, regular teeth, with which the 
 
6 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 descendants of that race of conquerors, the Anglo- 
 Saxons, are usually blessed. 
 
 The woman was hardly twenty years of age, fresh, 
 beautiful, and, yet the painfully apparent absence of a 
 something in the face, would have caused a pang to 
 the most callous beholder — that something, not to be 
 found reflected in the face of the young woman who 
 stood half revealed above the mist that covered the dis- 
 trict of Ohio, in America, this April morning — was Hope. 
 The drooping shoulders, and slender, bended neck, told 
 the story of hopelessness and despondency as well and 
 clearly as the sad, beautiful eyes, whence the very 
 soul seemed to shine forth only in sadness. 
 
 The unbeautiful bonnet, as it hung by pieces of 
 twine from her neck, had not even one bit of ribbon 
 upon it to proclaim a poor effort at making homely 
 surroundings more attractive. The plain gown, made 
 of roughly woven woolen stuff, had not a frill or tuck, 
 to give evidence of that instinct, last to die in the 
 womanly heart, a desire to appear well, even under the 
 most adverse circumstances. All of this had evi- 
 dently gone out of her young life, or such feelings had 
 never existed in the heart of this woman. Perhaps 
 such natural feelings had been crushed out of the very 
 possibility of existence in the descendants of the 
 American tenantry, by their surrounding conditions 
 which, in each succeeding generation, became more 
 and more hopeless and horrible. 
 
 The mist fading away before the rays of the rising 
 sun, discloses the slim figure moving across the fields 
 towards the road. From time to time she would pause 
 to push aside the snow with the clumsy shoes she 
 wore, made of leather straps nailed to wooden soles, 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 7 
 
 and would stoop and dig up the bunches of dandelion 
 concealed beneath, until the rude basket made of 
 bended willow twigs was filled. 
 
 As the girl, (for she was hardly more,) divided the 
 bushes growing upon the bank of the ditch, which 
 separated the field from the road, and sprang across, 
 she saw riding down the hill towards her at a headlong 
 gallop, a horseman accompanied by three hunting 
 dogs, which seemed to have imbibed, like the impetuous 
 rider of the large black horse, a wild desire for exer- 
 cise and excitement. 
 
 The young woman paused as if meditating flight 
 back into the field, but the opportunity if such were 
 her intention was lost, as the voice of the approaching 
 horseman called out in a cheery, wholesome kind of 
 tone, which bespoke the open, frank nature of the 
 early morning rider : 
 
 " Hello ! Mollie, what are you doing out so early in 
 this damp, cold mist, without cloak or shawl ? " By 
 this time the horse stood impatiently jerking at the 
 bit by the woman's side, the dogs springing and danc- 
 ing around, showing an old and intimate acquaintance 
 with the fair gatherer of dandelions. 
 
 The young man who thus addressed the woman, 
 presented an incongruous appearance. His large muscu- 
 lar frame, together with the scars of past battles, gave 
 evidence not only of the ability to wage war, but also, 
 the fact that he had done so. 
 
 The clear, ruddy, dark skin and nervous, sun-browned 
 hands, told a story of vigorous health and days spent 
 in open air. 
 
 The fact that he wore no mustache or beard made 
 even his twenty-five years of life, seem less to the 
 
8 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 casual observer, but the steady earnestness of his dark 
 eyes soon eradicated the impression of youthfulness in 
 those who met him often. 
 
 The. face carried the idea of determined, steady, 
 tirelessness of character, the chin square and strong, 
 marked the almost bulldog tenacity and combative- 
 ness of the handsome fellow who sprang down from his 
 horse, into the mud of the road, beside the girl whom 
 he had addressed as " Mollie." As he took off his 
 cap in salutation, the black, closely cut curls which 
 lay all over his head, like a frame served to set off 
 the frank, manly face. 
 
 He wore long riding boots reaching nearly to the 
 hips, black cloth trousers and jacket, but beneath the 
 pugnacious chin, bespeaking the spirit of a gladiator, 
 and around a chest which might serve as a model for 
 a statue of Hercules, with seeming incongruity, was 
 the uniform of God's soldiers — the black, buttonless 
 vest and little strip of white collar above, denoted a 
 clerical calling. 
 
 As he grasped the girl's slender hand in his large, 
 strong palm, and held it, while in a jolly, brotherly 
 way, he scolded her for her imprudence in exposing 
 herself, so scantily clad, to the dampness of the early 
 spring morning, the girl looked up into the face of the 
 man, towering above her, and a flush of momentary 
 pleasure stole over the fair neck and face, as she said : 
 
 " Really, Mr. Lawton, I have not felt any chilliness." 
 
 With mock gravity, this clerical giant, bowing low, 
 replied : 
 
 " I beg Miss Mary Hollister's pardon for presuming 
 to — oh ! pshaw, Mollie, stop calling me ' Mister Law- 
 ton.' I am the same rough-and-tumble Jack Lawton 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 9 
 
 who romped with you in boyhood over these fields, 
 and I don't believe that I will prove a poorer soldier in 
 the Great Master's army, by retaining the liberty of 
 loving old friends in the old way, and speaking, and 
 being spoken to, as before I became a clergyman." 
 
 With almost an imperceptible sigh Mary said, releas- 
 ing her hand : " It is not that you are now a clergy- 
 man, Mr. Jack, but you know how many reasons other 
 than that there are." 
 
 " Well, never let any reason, Mollie, prevent you 
 from feeling that the long-standing friendship between 
 us still remains as firm as ever." With this speech he 
 threw the bridle over his arm, saying : " Come, I will 
 walk up the hill to your home, and as we go, I will 
 help you balance accounts with me for the scolding I 
 have been giving you, by confessing some sins of my 
 own." 
 
 As this strongly contrasted couple walked down the 
 muddy road, the man striking away with his whip, the 
 mud clinging to his boots, seemed to hesitate and at 
 last blurted out : " Well ! we had a row last night at 
 home and I fear I was no more respectful to my father 
 than I should have been. I got up early this morning in- 
 tending by a long hard ride to obliterate all recollec- 
 tions of it, and in the freshness of the morning air, lose 
 the fumes of last night's temper, so that by the time 
 the family are in the breakfast-room, I will be in con- 
 dition to beg pardon ! " 
 
 Mary, looking away from the tramping figure strid- 
 ing beside her, heedless of mud or snow, said, seemingly 
 addressing herself more than her companion, " It was 
 a discussion about the tenants ! " 
 
 "Yes, it was, Mollie," almost fiercely said the man ; 
 
10 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 " it will ever and always be that one question as long 
 as the present condition of affairs in this country 
 exists. I regret always, doing or saying anything to 
 offend my father, so I will apologize for my manner of 
 last night and my hot and hasty speeches ; but I hold, 
 of course, to my opinions, and shall ever do so, concern- 
 ing what I consider the duty of a Christian, a man and 
 an American with regard to the Proprietors and tenants. 
 The enforcement of Bonds of Servitude upon the 
 farm-class of the country is, to me a horror, and a 
 disgrace to Christianity and civilization. I have 
 rejoiced that the tenants of my father's estate have 
 been enabled to resist — until now. 
 
 " Last night when the lawyer arrived bringing the 
 bonds to be executed by the tenants, and I heard 
 the chuckle of delight with which he read the 
 conditions of the bonds to my father and elder 
 brother, I recalled that these instruments were intended 
 to make slaves of some of those, with whom the hap- 
 piest hours of my boyhood were passed. I lost all 
 control of myself, and I fear was disrespectful and 
 unjust to my father and brother. I am truly thankful 
 that Weaving, the lawyer, slipped out of the room 
 when I began to talk, for, had he remained I don't 
 believe I could have resisted the temptation to kick 
 him through the window " and he added, half to him- 
 self, as he glanced with a look of satisfaction at his 
 powerful legs, — " He would have sailed out of that 
 window as far as any football I ever kicked for old 
 'Eli.'" 
 
 Turning toward the pale, drooping figure, he saw 
 the effect of the mention of the Bonds of Servitude 
 upon his meek companion. The light had faded from 
 
" UNCLE SAMS CABINS. II 
 
 her downcast eyes, and the color had fled from the 
 face now averted from him — she walked the embodi- 
 ment of a crushed spirit. Seeing her, so poor, so frail, 
 and cast down, he grasped her hand, saying : " Oh, Mol- 
 lie forgive me ! I am so forgetful, so hasty, sometimes 
 I fear so unfitted for the work of my Master, that I 
 almost give up. My indignation and hot temper made 
 me last night forget the uniform I wear, and be 
 disrespectful, unjust and violent. This morning's 
 thoughtlessness, makes me wound the heart of my old- 
 est and dearest friend. I am an unfortunate man, un- 
 suited I begin to believe, for the work I love and 
 have chosen." 
 
 The girl's cold fingers returned the pressure of his 
 kindly hand, and without lifting her head, she said in 
 a low voice, half inaudible : " God never made a brave 
 and honest warrior for His service, Mr. Jack, if you 
 are not one ! From boyhood, you have been the friend 
 and champion of the poor, desolate tenantry. 
 Nightly, in every humble home for miles around, 
 your name is uttered as the prayers of the poor ascend 
 to God." They had now reached in their walk the top 
 of the hill where just back from the road, stood a 
 dreary, wretched hut. 
 
 The girl stopped, placing her disengaged hand over 
 the firm, brown hand holding hers, and looking 
 up into the man's face, said : " Good-bye, Mr. Jack! — 
 Heaven keep you — our only friend except the God 
 above us ! " and hurried across the road into the hut 
 on the hill. 
 
 The man paused as if undecided whether to follow 
 her or not, then looking sadly at the hovel, slowly got 
 into the saddle and rode down the road. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 The hut Mary Hollister called home was the 
 usual mud-plastered hovel of the farming class of Amer- 
 ica in 1994. It stood bleak and dreary on the hill 
 beside the road ; no fence nor trees surrounded the 
 place, nor was there a barn near it. Cheerless and 
 comfortless, it stood alone, in all the ugliness of mud- 
 plaster and squalid poverty. 
 
 A woman bending over a fire in the open chimney- 
 place, turned at the abrupt entrance of Mary. She 
 was the wan, aged, faded picture of the younger wo- 
 man, only the hopelessness and despair in her face 
 were more pronounced by reason of the sunken eyes 
 and the white scanty locks'of hair falling around her pale 
 face, making a background of deathly whiteness 
 for a countenance which, as a picture would have been 
 labeled "The Grave of Joy." 
 
 Mary sank down upon the earthen floor of the room, 
 near her mother's side, and said: "The lawyer has 
 brought the Bonds of Servitude down from the court- 
 house for the tenants to execute and at last, we are 
 to become slaves. Jack Lawton met me on the road 
 this morning and told me he had a quarrel 
 
"UNCLE SAMS ' CABINS. 13 
 
 last night with his father and brother Henry, on 
 the subject of the tenants. God bless Mr. Jack 
 — noblest boy and man that ever lived ! " and 
 Mary's pale face flushed beneath the anxious, intent 
 gaze of her mother as she finished the declara- 
 tion. 
 
 In that subdued tone of voice of one long accustomed 
 to humiliation the mother said : " Well, God's will be 
 done ! I had hoped not to be obliged to see my chil- 
 dren attached as serfs, to the land, that was once the 
 property of their grandfather. I am thankful that your 
 proud, heart-broken father was spared the hateful spec- 
 tacle. 
 
 " Did Mr. Jack say when the tenants will be called 
 upon to settle the matter? " 
 
 " No ; but of course, I fear that it will be very soon, 
 if this weather continues, as the land will be ready for 
 sowing within a few weeks, and the Proprietor has 
 notified all the tenants, as you know, through Johnson 
 the superintendent, that horses to plow the land, and 
 seed to plant it, will only be furnished to those who 
 give the Bonds of Servitude. 
 
 "Oh, mother! what shall we do? It will kill 
 George to become a slave of the Lawton family, for, 
 much as George has always loved Mr. Jack, the fierce 
 resentment against the Lawton name, inherited from 
 our father, has made my brother a rebellious spirit 
 among the tenants of this district. 
 
 " I pray that Mr. Jack will be able to reason, and 
 lead George to acquiescence in this, as I am ever fear- 
 ful of the result of the violent temper of my brother." 
 
 Mrs. Hollister had seated herself upon one of the 
 three rough stools, with which the room was furnished, 
 
14 " UNCLE SAM S ' CABINS. 
 
 and regarded the pitiful, crouching figure and anxious 
 face of her daughter, in sympathetic silence. 
 
 The worry and care of the women were too great to 
 be expressed in words. 
 
 A glance around the humble abode of the Hollisters. 
 where lived widowed mother, daughter and a son of 
 twenty-seven years of age, disclosed the condition of 
 the farm-class at the time, of which, we write. 
 
 The floor was made of clayey earth, beaten hard, 
 clean, but, of course, without carpet or other covering. 
 The walls of the hut had originally been made of planed 
 boards, tongued and grooved, but time and weather 
 so destroyed the planks that it had become neces- 
 sary to plaster the entire outer walls with mud, to keep 
 the wind and rain out of the cheerless interior. 
 
 Just over the rough mantel-shelf there was a circular 
 hole in the chimney, showing, where at some long past 
 time, a stove-pipe had done duty ; now, stoves were un- 
 known in the homes of the farm-class in America. All 
 cooking was done in an open fireplace, the stoves of 
 a century before having become worn out and impos- 
 sible to replace because of the poverty of the tenantry. 
 Two rough, unplaned shelves, attached to the wall at 
 either side of the room, covered with a coarse kind of 
 bagging, beneath which was a sort of mattress made 
 of dried moss, served as the sleeping-places for mother 
 and daughter. 
 
 A ladder at the back of the room led to the dark 
 leaky attic, where George Hollister slept upon a bundle 
 of straw not even covered by bagging. 
 
 Across one corner of the room was hung a curtain, 
 made of the woven twigs of willow bushes, arranged to 
 form a closet, in which, was kept the few poor articles 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 1 5 
 
 of wearing apparel owned by the two women. A box 
 of crude workmanship at one side of the hearth, held 
 the scanty stock of provisions for the household. 
 
 In place of the bright tins and glazed crockeryware 
 of the latter part of the nineteenth century, a few, 
 brown, unglazed plates of earthenware were placed on 
 the mantel-piece. A table made from the remains of 
 a packing-case, stood in the centre of the room, and 
 with three stools and two common benches, constituted 
 all the furniture of the hovel. 
 
 A battered pot was boiling on the hearth, over a fire 
 made of bits of branches, collected in the nearby for- 
 est. Instead of andirons, pieces of rock supported the 
 blazing branches of wood. Only one window admitted 
 light to the gloomy interior of the hovel, and as that 
 was without glass, light was obtained only at the 
 expense of comfort, this damp morning. 
 
 Mary arose and in an automatic manner began to 
 place the earthenware platters upon the clothless table, 
 then having emptied the basket of dandelions into a 
 basin, began to wash and assort the welcome addition 
 to the meagre meal, which, when the boiling pot was 
 placed upon the table, consisted of coarse corn, hominy 
 or grits, water, salt and the dandelions. 
 
 As the two sorrowful inmates of the hovel seated 
 themselves to partake of the poor fare upon the table, 
 Mary asked : 
 
 " Mother, where is George ? is he sleeping still ? " 
 
 " No ; he left the house soon after you did, to gather 
 wood in the forest. He said not to wait for him, as he 
 intended to make some bird snares in the woods before 
 returning," said the mother. 
 
 The women bowed their heads in prayer, before tast- 
 
l6 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 ing the uninviting food. In their gratitude for even 
 that little, in the cheerless waste of their lives, thank- 
 ing God with a fervor unfelt in more prosperous times, 
 by even those blessed with luxurious surroundings. 
 
 The frugal meal quickly finished, the table cleared, 
 Mary gathered up out of one corner of the room several 
 bundles of dry broom grass, and, seated at one side of 
 the hearth, began with nimble fingers to weave, or 
 rather plait a straw basket. Her mother sat near 
 the window, enduring the dampness and cold for the 
 sake of the light, which was necessary for her failing 
 sight, to enable her to knit the coarse stockings then 
 worn by all the women of the Avorking people of the 
 country. 
 
 The stillness was not broken by mother or daughter; 
 each absorbed in her own bitter thoughts, each loath 
 to add to the already crushing load of sorrow borne by 
 the other, by giving expression to the feelings filling 
 their wretched minds. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 The three men seated at the breakfast table, when 
 the Rev. John Lawton entered the room after his morn- 
 ing ride, afforded the strongest possible contrast to that 
 vigorous clerical athlete. The oldest man of the party, 
 at the head of the table, to whom he addressed a 
 hearty " Good-morning father," was past sixty years 
 of age, pale, slender, of refined, ascetic appearance, 
 but with the evidences of physical weakness, the firm 
 chin and small blue eyes marking him as a man of reso- 
 lute character. There was an expression upon the face 
 of John Lawton, Sr., which, in some manner, conveyed 
 the idea of cruelty, in spite of the refined and gentle- 
 manly bearing of the man. 
 
 The youngest man at the table was Henry Lawton, 
 the eldest son, and heir of the proprietor of the Ohio 
 District. His colorless skin, and wasted form, told a 
 story of ill health. The effect of the contrast between 
 him and his sturdy younger brother became painfully 
 apparent as the newcomer took his seat oppo- 
 site him. Henry Lawton had hastened the foot-steps 
 of time by early dissipation, and while only thirty- 
 five years of age, so like was he to his father in 
 
1 8 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 form and features, that one not knowing them, might 
 have guessed them to be brothers of nearly the same 
 age. 
 
 The third man who greeted the new arrival, was Mr. 
 Weaving, the lawyer of the Lawton family. He was 
 a dried up, brown, parchment-like old-young man, of 
 any age from forty to sixty. The deep set, glittering, 
 small black eyes, with which he regarded the young 
 minister, recalled to mind the baleful light of the bead- 
 like eyes of the deadly rattle-snake. 
 
 The room was plainly yet handsomely furnished, 
 some paintings of game adorned the walls, the bright 
 flame from the blazing English cannel coal, with which 
 the large grate was heaped, was reflected in the polished, 
 mirror-like hard- wood floor, where the warm rugs 
 beneath the table and before the fireplace, left the 
 smooth surface exposed. The table held the usual 
 glass and china to be found in the homes of the large 
 landowners. A tempting and delicately served meal 
 presented a welcome sight to the hungry horseman 
 who, now as he raised his head after a silent prayer, 
 said : 
 
 " Father, I am exceedingly sorry for permitting my- 
 self to become angry last night and to use language 
 disrespectful to you, unkind to Henry, impolite to Mr. 
 Weaving, and unbecoming a clergyman, I most humbly 
 apologize to you all." 
 
 Mr. Lawton smiled in an indulgent manner, saying: 
 " Oh! it's all right Jack, but my dear impetuous boy, 
 you don't consider the welfare of the estate a minute, 
 when your sympathy is aroused for your old playmates, 
 the tenants ; if you were the first son and heir to the 
 property, I really don't know what would happen. 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 19 
 
 Truly, Jack, I begin to appreciate the wisdom of our 
 forefathers in creating the " Family Compact " a cen- 
 tury ago, whereby the eldest son inherits all the estate 
 of the ancestor. True, it was originated to obviate the 
 operation of the laws against entailment, and to 
 magnify in succeeding generations the fortunes inher- 
 ited,but verily, I am now thankful that Henry, at my 
 death, will become the sole inheritor of the estate. 
 You are so blinded by your sympathy, that it would 
 hardly be safe under your control." 
 
 Henry Lawton cast a glance of pitying contempt 
 upon his robust brother, as his father paused, Weaving 
 grinned his acquiescence to the speaker. 
 
 "Well," said Jack Lawton, as he helped himself to 
 toast, " I may regret with propriety my manner and 
 temper, but I cannot change or regret my opinion with 
 regard to the condition of the poor people of America ; 
 a wrong has been committed, possibly with the best in- 
 tention, a century ago. I attach no blame to our ances- 
 tors because I believe many of them meditated no in- 
 jury to their fellow citizens, but I think it now the duty 
 of every Christian man in America to reject the benefits 
 derived from the wrong." 
 
 " But ! Jack, my son," said the smiling father, " you 
 suggest difficulties and objections but offer no means 
 of escape from the consequences of the policy pursued 
 for more than a century by those gone before us. As 
 a matter of fact the situation is just this— money must 
 be obtained in some manner by the Government to 
 pay the expenses of the Nation. 
 
 " And since our imports amount to almost nothing, 
 the tax collected now hardly pays the wages of the 
 custom officers. As the last resource, the Proprietors 
 
20 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 are obliged to tax their lands and incomes. The 
 European markets are flooded with products similar 
 to those of our farms, but which are drawn from Africa, 
 Asia and South America. The prices, therefore, now 
 obtained are so low that they leave no margin for the 
 tenantry — the farm-class in America — consequently 
 they can buy not even the necessaries of fifty years 
 ago, and as a result, the factory property of the Lawton 
 estate in New England stands idle, and is going to ruin. 
 
 " The houses belonging to our factory companies, 
 formerly rented by the mill-hands and mechanics are 
 vacant and tenantless, only serving to increase our 
 taxes. The former occupants have become tramps 
 and vagrants, or emigrants to other countries. 
 
 " Were it not for the strong army which we the 
 Proprietors, are obliged to tax ourselves to maintain, 
 rapine and riot would rule the land. Under such cir- 
 cumstances, slave labor alone can save the owners of 
 property in America. It is not cruelty, it is self pres- 
 ervation. Without slave labor, we cannot compete 
 with the raisers of farm products in other lands." 
 
 " Father," replied Jack, " I grant the truth of what 
 you say concerning the difficulties confronting the land 
 owners, but somehow the feeling that we and men of 
 our position are as much responsible for the present 
 state of the country, as the poor tenants, leads me to a 
 willingness and desire to share the burden inherited 
 from past generations, along with the miserable farm- 
 class whom, necessity and self preservation, you say, 
 force the Proprietors to make slaves." 
 
 "But Jack, how can we share the load ? I respect 
 your charity, but tell me how you would advise the 
 Proprietors of America to act ? " 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 21 
 
 " I think, sir," said the young man, " That it is not 
 a matter of charity, but it is the duty of the Proprie- 
 tors as Christian men, to refuse to be benefitted by acts 
 of injustice done by their ancestors, which, at the time 
 of doing may have seemed harmless, but they have 
 proven ruinous to the majority of the people of this 
 country, and I believe fully, that, if advantage be now 
 taken of the position of the tenants, when all educated 
 men recognize the falsity of the system of taxation by 
 which, the farm-class has been brought to this condi- 
 tion, the Proprietors will be punished by a just God to 
 the third and fourth generations, as the farm-class are 
 now being punished in the third and fourth generation 
 for the faults and errors of their ancestors, committed 
 a century ago." 
 
 Weaving could no longer resist the desire to prod 
 the man of sentiment and charity, with the goad of 
 practical business. 
 
 " That is very pretty sentiment for men of your 
 cloth, but can you suggest some every day method of 
 accomplishing any permanent benefit for the tenants?" 
 said the lawyer. 
 
 Jack colored to the fringe of black curls on his fore- 
 head, for he knew he was no match for the cold, 
 hard, practical man of business affairs, who addressed 
 him, but looking around the room, an idea was sug- 
 gested by the various imported articles he saw. 
 
 " To begin with, Mr. Weaving," replied the young 
 man, " Why do not the Proprietors buy rugs, glass, 
 clocks, furniture, in America, instead of in Europe?" 
 " Well, first, Mr. Jack," said the man of law, as he smiled 
 at the Proprietor, " for the best of reasons, we do not 
 manufacture them in America." 
 
22 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 "Then, why not?" exclaimed the undaunted Jack. 
 
 " For a second most excellent reason, we have not a 
 sufficient number of people in the country who have 
 enough money to purchase them even if made here, 
 hence the manufacturers cannot run their factories to 
 supply the very limited demand arising from the few- 
 Proprietors," answered Weaving with exultation, and 
 added : " You see the greatest land owner or Proprie- 
 tor in America can only use one coat at a time, but a 
 limited number of rugs, clocks, glass, etc. It is impos- 
 sible for him to create a sufficient demand to run home 
 factories, so he is obliged to purchase in Europe, and 
 pay the import duty which, of course, helps to support 
 the government." 
 
 "But," said young Lawton, "my father just now 
 said that the duties collected were hardly enough to 
 pay the wages of the custom house officers." 
 
 "That is true, and has been so for years, and, of 
 course, as estates become larger and wealth concen- 
 trated, the amount collected as customs, will ever grow 
 smaller as there will be fewer people able to buy any- 
 thing but the commonest necessaries of life; however, 
 that is not the fault of the present Proprietors, it is 
 the result of the American system," said Weaving. 
 
 Not to be silenced by the unanswerable truth of the 
 statements of Weaving, young Lawton said : 
 
 " Why not manufacture goods for exportation to 
 other countries, since our farming people are too poor 
 to purchase the result of the labors of the mechanics?" 
 
 " To reply properly, my dear sir, to that question 
 would keep us at table until bedtime," said the crafty 
 lawyer, " however, to put it briefly, at present, skilled 
 artisans are so few in America that it would be difficult to 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 23 
 
 supply the necessary operators to manufacture — fac- 
 tories having been closed for many years here, — and 
 again, to go over all the causes which created the 
 impossibility of manufacturing goods as cheaply in 
 this country as in Europe, would be to relate the stoiy 
 of a system by which the materials used in manufac- 
 turing, cost more in a raw state in this country than 
 elsewhere, and also to explain that wages paid to labor 
 were higher than elsewhere." 
 
 " If," said the listening clergyman, interrupting the 
 speaker, " the wages received by mechanics and arti- 
 sans were too high in the former period of American 
 prosperity, why were they not reduced?" 
 
 " I can explain that by saying that the cost of 
 living, rent, clothing, etc., was so much higher here 
 than in Europe that a mechanic could not live in 
 America unless he received higher wages than those 
 received in Europe. In fact, he had very little oppor- 
 tunity to save even with the higher wages paid." 
 
 " By whom was cloth and other things which the 
 mechanics were obliged to use, manufactured?" again 
 broke in Jack. 
 
 The lawyer chuckled in silent glee, and replied : 
 
 " In looking over the family papers I found, Mr. 
 Jack, that your great-grandfather owned a great main- 
 tenement houses, much factory stock, bank stock. I 
 expect he was paid a good part of the wages received 
 by mechanics, in his life time." 
 
 The Rev. Jack Lawton had finished his breakfast. 
 He arose, with an indignant flush mantling his manly 
 face, bending not toward the lawyer, but looking 
 straight into his father's cold blue eyes, he said : 
 
 " Now you see, sir, how even the advocate of the 
 
24 " unxle sam's" cabins. 
 
 ' Bonds of Servitude ' for your tenants, admits the trick 
 by which our family and others in our position became 
 rich. Our ancestors deceived the farmers years ago, 
 telling them that by buying goods in America and 
 paying higher prices than similar goods cost in the 
 markets wherein their produce was sold, resulted in 
 high wages to their fellow-countrymen, the mechanics. 
 Thus they made the agriculturalists poorer, year after 
 year, deluding them by the higher wages paid me- 
 chanics, while gathering in the wages of the same 
 mechanics whom, they posed as benefitting in the 
 form of rents and profits upon every necessity of life." 
 
 The very meanness of the trick is disgusting and 
 repugnant, for it was played through the one weak 
 spot in the armor of the American character — patriot- 
 ism. I, sir, am sure, that the accumulated wealth 
 resulting from the first ill-gotten gains of a trick would 
 not be sacred in my hands, the Lawton estate would 
 soon disappear." 
 
 For the first time during the morning meal, Henry 
 Lawton, with the contempt which he felt for the 
 sentiments expressed by his brother but half concealed, 
 said : 
 
 " My dear Jack, it is well for you that your profes- 
 sion raises you above suspicion, else one would guess 
 you were bewitched by your beautiful pauper friend, 
 the fair Hollister." 
 
 The hot, quick temper, which, at Yale, had made 
 Jack Lawton, one not to quietly submit to being 
 slugged, either on the foot-ball field, or insulted with 
 impunity anywhere else, flamed out as he leaned one 
 brawny hand upon the table, and exclaimed : 
 
 " Here, Henry, leave Mary Hollister's name alone, 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 2% 
 
 or as I am a living man, and you say one word unwor- 
 thy of being spoken in connection with the name of 
 that good girl, clergyman and your brother though I 
 be, I will hurl you through that window ! " and at the 
 smile of malice which his heated words brought to his 
 brother's face he added : 
 
 " You know how to annoy me and arouse a temper 
 of which I am ashamed ! — Never having had a mother's 
 love or care my only kind friends in babyhood or boy- 
 hood, outside of this dark and gloomy house, were the 
 poor tenants of the estate ; — and that I esteem the Hoi 
 listers more than any other family because they possess 
 education and refinement, which the hard lot of the 
 tenantry has crushed out of all the others." 
 
 With which speech, Jack Lawton turned and opened 
 the door, but Henry did not intend that he should 
 leave the field without firing one last shot at him, so 
 he called to him : 
 
 " Hold on, old man ! when the tenants sign the 
 bonds I will gladly resign all my interest in the Hol- 
 listergirl to you — you doubtless will prove a better 
 master." 
 
 The departing man slammed the door, without re- 
 plying to the taunt of his brother. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 In the year 1862, or just one hundred and thirty-two 
 years before the date of the events narrated in the 
 former chapters — one Charles Lawton kept a little 
 cheap restaurant near the depot in Philadelphia, at 
 which the soldiers from the North and West 
 proceeding to the scene of the war then going 
 on between the Southern States and the balance of 
 the Union, changed cars. He had dragged out a pre- 
 carious existence in this, (until the War,) undesirable 
 business, having a constant struggle with the necessity 
 of paying rent and obtaining enough money to satisfy 
 his butcher and baker. But as soon as the thousands 
 en route for the " front," and the sick and wounded 
 from the fields of battle, returning home, began to 
 stop at the nearby station while waiting to change cars, 
 his prospects brightened and dollars commenced to 
 accumulate in his till as the hungry soldiers flocked 
 into, his once almost unknown restaurant. 
 
 Charles Lawton lacked neither courage nor patriot- 
 ism. He had ever the desire to enlist in the army and 
 join the Southward-moving soldiers, but Nature 
 had been unkind to him, inasmuch as from infancy, he 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S CABINS. 2/ 
 
 had been crippled in his lower limbs and by that mis- 
 fortune or chance, he was obliged to remain at home. 
 Being deprived by his infirmities from participating in 
 the pleasures of dissipation or protected by the same 
 reason from all temptation to indulge therein, during 
 a time of war and extravagance, (money being easy to 
 make,) he did, as many others, make a great deal of 
 money, and in the very nature of things, he did, what 
 many others did not do, saved it — Soon, he was en- 
 abled to purchase the small building, for the use of 
 which, he had so long been obliged to pay rent — 
 Shortly after his purchase, a railroad company needing 
 more room to accommodate its largely increased busi- 
 ness, resulting from the war, purchased the property 
 recently acquired by him, at a large advance upon the 
 price he had paid, for the purpose of erecting addi- 
 tional freight warehouses. 
 
 At the time of the sale of his old restaurant, Charles 
 Lawton's family consisted of his wife, one son a lad of 
 sixteen, and himself. 
 
 The necessity to furnish a sufficient revenue for the 
 expenses of the Federal Government in carrying on the 
 war then waging, was so great that it became impera- 
 tive to place large import duties or taxes upon all 
 manufactured articles, and most raw materials brought 
 from Europe. 
 
 Inasmuch as the farmers had a steady demand for 
 all of their products, at good prices — the result of the 
 large armies in the field — they did not, of course, resist 
 the imposition of the taxes, but aided the passage of 
 laws to that effect by their votes — and also from the 
 fact that the farmer folk of America have ever been 
 especially patriotic, having quickly responded to the 
 
28 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 call of the Government, for soldiers, enlisting them- 
 selves and sons. 
 
 The result, of course, of the almost entire exclusion 
 of European goods from the American market, was 
 to greatly increase the price of all manufactured goods 
 in America, and consequently, largely increase the 
 profits of those engaged in the manufacturing busi- 
 ness in this country. The farmers did not complain of 
 the increased price of their manufactured supplies, be- 
 cause the war was giving an artificial stimulant to the 
 prices of their farm-products. 
 
 Such was the state of affairs at the time Charles Law- 
 ton sold his restaurant. The cash obtained from 
 the advantageous sale to the railroad company, to- 
 gether with his savings from the sale of food to the 
 hungry soldiers, gave him control of quite a sum of 
 ready money. 
 
 In looking for an investment, where but little 
 physical activity would be required of him, he found 
 an opportunity to purchase the interest of one part- 
 ner in a thread factory. The interest offered had been 
 that of a partner, who being more patriotic than pru- 
 dent, had risked and lost his life while fighting to 
 preserve the Union. Charles Lawton, anxious to ob- 
 tain some revenue from the money then lying idle in 
 bank, gladly availed himself of the opportunity and 
 purchased the interest in the factory, from the widow 
 of the dead soldier. 
 
 Thread, being indispensable and used by every man, 
 woman and child in the land, practically, European 
 competition being cut off by the importation taxes, a 
 monopoly was obtained by the American thread man- 
 ufacturers of this, one of the most universally used 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 29 
 
 articles. By combinations, afterwards called Trusts, 
 the prices were fixed by and between the American 
 manufacturers, this, of course, the whole people had 
 to pay. The prices so fixed however, while suf- 
 ficiently low to prevent any European thread man- 
 ufacturers from sending thread to America and paying 
 the high taxes on it, were also, so high as to obtain 
 from the American consumers an enormous profit, 
 which, went into the coffers of the American thread 
 combination. 
 
 Charles Lawton from the money invested by him in 
 the thread business, gained a large income, more in fact 
 than he, with his humble tastes and small family, could 
 spend. He invested the surplus in land near the fac- 
 tory in which he was one of the owners, and built small 
 houses for the mechanics who worked in the factory, 
 to rent. The rents being high because wages were 
 high, Lawton as the years went by, bought other land 
 out of his surplus income — which was derived not only 
 from the manufacture of thread — but also from taking 
 back, a large part of the high wages paid to the work- 
 men engaged in the factory, in the shape of rents. He 
 erected many tenement houses in the city of Philadel- 
 phia, which he rented to mechanics, artisans and labor- 
 ers, thus year by year, adding to the number of those 
 who paid tribute to him. 
 
 When Charles Lawton died a few years after the 
 close of the Civil War, his son Thomas, (then a man of 
 twenty-five,) inherited nearly a million dollars, invested 
 in factory stock, land and houses. Within a short 
 time after the death of his father, Thomas married the 
 only daughter and child of his late father's partner in 
 the thread business. By this marriage, upon the 
 
30 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 death of his wife's parents, another million was added 
 to his rapidly increasing fortune. 
 
 It was this ancestor of the Reverend Jack Lawton 
 who adopted the idea of a family agreement, or as it 
 was called afterward " The Family Compact " — when 
 it became generally adopted by the wealthy American 
 families — whereby, the laws preventing the entailment 
 of property, were avoided, by an agreement between 
 the members of the family concerned, that the eldest 
 son should inherit the bulk of the accumulations of the 
 preceding generations, thus hindering the distribution 
 and dissipation of the enormous fortunes gathered 
 during and shortly after the Civil War. 
 
 Each succeeding generation of the Lawtons after 
 the said Thomas, adhering strictly to the traditions of 
 the family, had continued to keep the now perpetually 
 growing mass of property and money concentrated in 
 the hands of the eldest son of the family in each gen- 
 eration — until the grandfather of the present head of 
 the Lawton family, was recognized as the wealthiest 
 man in America. 
 
 He had followed the practice of his ancestors and 
 by lending money (through land, trust and insurance 
 companies of which he was a large stockholder) 
 to the farmers of the (then) state of Ohio, and tak- 
 ing mortgages on the land, until at last, he practically 
 held all the farming land of the state of Ohio in pawn. 
 
 The price of all farm-products now constantly de- 
 clined to such an extent (as new fields were 
 opened for cultivation in other countries than Amer- 
 ica), and the farmers received such small returns for 
 their crops that they were unable to pay the interest 
 due, on the money borrowed on mortgages — or the 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 3 1 
 
 taxes of the State. The final outcome of this condi- 
 tion was that Jack Lavvton, Sr. inherited almost the 
 entire state of Ohio by reason of the foreclosure of 
 these mortgages, by his grandfather. Ever after this 
 time the farms had been rented to the former owners of 
 the land which was now the property of the Lawton 
 estate. 
 
 During the lifetime of the present owner's father, 
 the great landlords had been so much annoyed by the 
 conflict between state and Federal authority, that, by 
 the use of their enormous wealth and patronage, they 
 had been enabled to have laws enacted, abolishing all 
 state governments, and concentrating all power in the 
 
 Federal government having the largest landowner 
 
 appointed as executive of the Federal government in 
 each district, which, corresponded with the territory 
 of the former state — the executive of each district 
 having the title of Proprietor. 
 
 These proprietors being also the owners of the fac- 
 tories, continued the old laws in force, taxing all man- 
 ufactured articles imported from other countries, thus 
 deriving all the profit possible out of the tenants of the 
 land — until at the period of this story, the farm-class 
 had become so absolutely impoverished that they could 
 no longer even pay the rent of the land they planted. 
 
 It was then that the " Bonds of Servitude " were in- 
 troduced, whereby in return for the opportunity to 
 merely exist by laboring upon the land formerly owned 
 by them, the farmers bound themselves and their de- 
 scendants as serfs to the soil and passed as any other 
 chattel with the land, to each succeeding heir of the 
 great landed gentry. 
 
 These " Bonds of Servitude " had been so eenerallv 
 
32 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 entered into by the tenantry of America, that, in the 
 year of which this narrative is given, there was not a 
 freeman tilling the soil in the whole country except in 
 the district of Ohio — where, by the exercise of almost 
 superhuman exertions and self privations, the tenants 
 had struggled, and succeeded in paying their rents, until 
 within the last two years, when the great central table 
 land of Central Africa had been placed under cultiva- 
 tion by the British government. This new field pro- 
 duced grain so cheaply that at last, the few remaining 
 American farmers were confronted with no other al- 
 ternative but slavery or starvation. 
 
 John Lawton, the Proprietor of the district, had 
 while still a very young man, come into possession of 
 the vast Lawton Estate, by the death of his father. 
 The young ruler of the District, had been most care- 
 fully educated and his mind most thoroughly impreg- 
 nated with the traditions and theories of his forefathers 
 and absolutely made impervious to the teachings of the 
 lectures on Political Economy, delivered before him, 
 at the university where he was graduated. 
 
 His faith in the "American system " of the exclus- 
 ion of imported goods, was as absolute and firm as that 
 of the Chinese, two hundred years before. He knew 
 by that system, his ancestors had amassed the immense 
 wealth which now was his, and heedless of the increas- 
 ing poverty of the larger part of the population, he 
 clung with unshakable hold to the faith of his fore- 
 fathers. 
 
 While still a boy, his father had arranged a marriage 
 for him, (which duly took place when he became of 
 age,) with the daughter and heiress of the " Sugar 
 King" (as the people called the great man) who con- 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 33 
 
 trolled the manufacture of refined sugar in America, 
 from which source he had accumulated an immense 
 fortune. At one time, sugar had been considered one 
 of the necessaries of life, by the Americans. 
 
 Of this marriage was born Henry Lawton, the heir 
 apparent to the Lawton estate, and the Rev. " Jack" 
 Lawton. A difference of ten years in the ages of the 
 brothers, had been the cause of their being almost 
 strangers to each other. While Jack was still in frocks, 
 Henry had been sent away to college and as the heir 
 and future proprietor, his father had taken great care 
 of this son's association and instruction so that the prin- 
 ciples of the "American system " should be persist- 
 ently instilled into the mind of the elder son, and that 
 his character should be formed upon the model of the 
 past generations of the Lawtons so eminently suc- 
 cessful in building up the family fortune. 
 
 Jack, being only a younger son, was permitted 
 much greater liberty, or rather, was more carelessly 
 trained and educated, the more so by reason of the 
 fact that the mother of the two sons had died soon 
 after the birth of Jack, which had caused the break- 
 ing up of the home life of the Lawton family. Young 
 Jack being left to the care of a nurse and the servants 
 at the Lawton mansion in the country, while his father 
 made his home at his club in New York. 
 
 From his mother, the daughter of the great " Sugar 
 King," Jack inherited, together with his magnificent phy- 
 sique and handsome dark face — a courageous, frank, 
 Christian spirit — Jack's mother had been a perfect angel 
 of mercy to the poor peasantry of the Lawton Estate 
 — as far as possible, fearlessly defending them from 
 each new encroachment upon their liberties and rights. 
 
34 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 Unlike the majority of the women of her class, she 
 remained unspoiled by wealth, presenting a grand type 
 of the independence and intelligence of American wo- 
 manhood. 
 
 The Hollister family had been always especially an 
 object of sympathy to her. The fathers of both Hol- 
 lister and his wife, had been among the last farmers of 
 the district of Ohio, forced by resistless fate, to sur- 
 render the ownership of the lands occupied by them, 
 and become tenants of the proprietor. 
 
 This fact accounted for the superior education ob- 
 tained by the parents of Mary Hollister, and the linger- 
 ing evidences of refinement in the lives of the now 
 impoverished family ; however, in the same proportion 
 as it aroused the interest and sympathy of Mrs. Law- 
 ton, in like manner did it make their lot in life harder 
 to bear. 
 
 George Hollister' s father (the grandfather of Mary 
 Hollister) had owned and cultivated five hundred acres 
 of the land now the property of the Lawton Estate, 
 which had been secured to it by means of the mort- 
 gages placed upon it years before. The remembrance 
 of that fact had embittered the life of Mary's father, 
 who was forced to work as a tenant of the Lawtons, 
 being a man of strong prejudices and unreasoning tem- 
 per, he had always associated the loss of the land with 
 some unknown act of injustice upon the part of the 
 Lawtons. 
 
 This ceaseless inward volcano of temper and anger 
 had so worn upon the man, together with the hard la- 
 bor necessary in his struggle to pay rent, that shortly 
 after the birth of Mary, his youngest child, his health 
 began to give way and it only required the proposed 
 introduction of the "Bonds of Servitude," like the last 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 35 
 
 straw upon the camel's back, to finally break the heart 
 as well as the health of the proud-spirited tenant, 
 bringing him to his grave. 
 
 Jack's mother, not being a Lawton by birth, had not 
 shared the measure of resentment poured out by Hol- 
 lister's bitter spirit upon that family. She had not 
 patronized in the character of " Lady Bountiful " the 
 Hollister family, but as one young mother had met 
 Hollister's wife as simply meeting another — while deli- 
 cacy forbade open charity, still, during the lifetime of 
 Mrs. Lawton, many comforts and pleasures came to 
 the Hollister family, which shed a ray of light into the 
 lives of the unfortunate people. 
 
 By means of the books obtained from this source, 
 Mary's mother had been enabled to give to her children 
 something of an education. In fact, the constant aim 
 and object of the life of Mrs. Hollister, even after the 
 death of her husband, and while struggling alone 
 against want and poverty, was to prevent her children 
 becoming ignorant and degraded. 
 
 Upon the death of Mrs. Lawton and the breaking 
 up of the family at the Lawton mansion, the lonely, 
 little, motherless boy left to the care of the servants in 
 the cheerless great house, appealed strongly to the 
 motherly heart of Mrs. Hollister, particularly, as the 
 child in his face and character, recalled his mother, to 
 whom Mary's mother was indebted for all that had 
 made her miserable existence bearable. Consequently, 
 the servants, only too willing to be rid of the care and 
 responsibility of the little fellow, gladly acquiesced 
 in an arrangement by which Jack spent most of his 
 time in the cottage of the tenant Hollister. Here 
 with Hollister's son, George, only two years older than 
 
$6 '• UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 himself, Jack found all the happiness of his babyhood 
 and early boyhood. 
 
 When Mary was born, she became the object of in- 
 tense interest to these two little chaps, respectively five 
 and seven years of age. When she was old enough to be 
 trusted out of her mother's arms, the boys would battle 
 for the honor of being her nurse. Jack was only too 
 happy to be permitted to lug the baby about in his 
 arms, — or to act the part of horse in the little home- 
 made wagon and trot about the fields dragging the 
 crude baby carriage,— George driving, with unstinted 
 lashes, the son of his father's landlord. 
 
 Thus these children one — the son of the proprietor — 
 the others, the children of the tenant, had grown to' be 
 almost one family, until, at the age of ten years, Jack 
 was sent to a boarding-school in the city. All of Jack's 
 vacations, however, were spent at the family mansion 
 in the country, and the girl and boys grew up, continu- 
 ing the old association, until Jack, at the age of six- 
 teen, had been sent to the University, where he re- 
 mained for four years, his father, during his vacations, 
 sending the youth to travel in Europe with a tutor. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 UNTIL Jack Lawton was ten years of age, he had 
 been almost forgotten by his father who only saw the 
 boy during the hunting season, when he came down 
 into the District bringing a lot of men of his Club set, 
 to hunt. When Jack was only a boy of eight, and had 
 to be lifted up on his horse, he could ride with the bold- 
 est and best horsemen of the hunting parties. He 
 knew every fence and ditch, and was up in the front 
 rank of the riders — "At the Death." 
 
 George Hollister and he had, with their first trousers, 
 imbibed a love for the chase and hunt, which, had led 
 them as almost babies into every hole and hollow of 
 the surrounding country. 
 
 After an exciting day of sport, one of the Proprie- 
 tor's friends, when Jack was eight years of age, sug- 
 gested to the boy's father, the fact, that such a sturdy, 
 fearless fellow should not be left entirely to the care of 
 women to be educated, whereupon, a young man who 
 had been educated by charity at one of the Universi- 
 ties, was sent down to the country house of the Law- 
 tons, to instruct the neglected child, so that when Jack 
 was ten years of age, his father concluded that he was 
 
38 "Uncle sam's" cabins. 
 
 far enough advanced to be sent to a boarding- 
 school. 
 
 The young man who had been Jack's teacher during 
 the two years prior to his father's suggestion that it was 
 time to send him to a boarding-school, had utilized all 
 his leisure hours while at the Lawton home, in fitting 
 himself for the profession chosen by him — the minis- 
 try. From this teacher, and in the home of the Hollis- 
 ters, where the only hope of the heart was in the love 
 and mercy of Christ, (the earth and present being so 
 dark and desolate to the poor tenantry of America,) 
 Jack had the latent and inherited truths of Christianity 
 derived from his good mother, so developed, that when 
 as a lad of ten years, he came to the boarding-school, 
 in his sturdy breast and frank fearless heart, he 
 carried the spirit of a Crusader, ever ready to break 
 lance for right, justice, and for the sake of his dear 
 Christ. 
 
 The boy soon won the respect of his fellow scholars, 
 both by reason of his leadership in all games requiring 
 the exercise of skill and strength, and by the frank and 
 honest heart of the chap who not ashamed to kneel 
 down and pray at bedtime surrounded by a ring of 
 jeering companions, did not hesitate to rise from his 
 knees, select the largest and strongest of his tormentors, 
 and assail him with blazing eye and vigorous blows, as 
 earnestly and fearlessly as Richard Coeur de Lion ever 
 entered battle with the Saracens. 
 
 " Jack Lawton's Principles," as the boys at the board- 
 ing-school got into the habit of calling honesty, frank- 
 ness and Christianity, became soon well understood and 
 respected, for Jack had a warrior's soul in his bosom, — 
 the natural combativeness of his character found vent 
 like that of the followers of Peter the Hermit, or the 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 39 
 
 soldiers of Cromwell, in a desire to fight the battles of 
 the Cross. 
 
 During the time spent at boarding-school, Jack re- 
 turned every vacation to the Lawton mansion in the 
 district of Ohio. His first thoughts were of his old 
 playmates, George and " Mollie " Hollister with whom 
 he spent his holidays, romping and rambling over the 
 hills and through the woods of Ohio. Upon these 
 happy occasions all idea of the difference in their 
 stations in life, landlord and tenant, was absent from 
 the minds of the children. 
 
 However, when Jack arrived at the age of sixteen he 
 was sent to Yale College, and these joyous periods of 
 reunion ceased, as his father insisted that he should 
 travel abroad during the season of vacation — deeming 
 it unwise to allow the son of the Proprietor of the dis- 
 trict to form too strong and matured an attachment 
 for the tenants of the land. 
 
 " Jack Lawton's Principles" became at Yale, as well 
 known and highly respected as at the boarding-school. 
 While he was a member of the football eleven, and 
 pulled an oar in the University eight, he still was a 
 hard student. When he was graduated, his father and 
 elder brother suggested his entering the army, the 
 idea, doubtless, occurring to both because of Jack's 
 martial figure and combative disposition, however, 
 much to the surprise of both, Jack rejected the offer of 
 a commission in the Federal army, with absolute scorn, 
 saying that he saw — " nothing tempting in a career 
 where the highest duty to be performed, was to play 
 the part of constable to defend the property of the 
 Proprietors, or to charge a mob of unarmed tenants 
 driven to desperation by the injustice of their land- 
 
40 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 lords. That he believed more lasting laurels awaited 
 a soldier of the Cross ; the field was large and notwith- 
 standing the defects of his temper, he might be able to 
 render some service to his brother men who suffered 
 from the crushing effects of poverty ; that therefore he 
 had determined to study theology and enter the minis- 
 try." Consequently he went to England, and for the 
 next succeeding five years devoted himself to preparing 
 for the work, he had chosen. 
 
 At the time our story opens, Jack Lawton had just 
 been ordained, but assigned to no field of labor. Three 
 days before his meeting on the road with Mary Hollis- 
 ter, he had returned to his father's house in the dis- 
 trict after a continuous absence of nearly nine years — 
 four of which, had been spent at the University and 
 five at a theological college in England. 
 
 The now, Reverend Jack Lawton upon his arrival at 
 the Lawton homestead hastened to see his old friends, 
 the Hollisters. The horrible change in the lives and 
 surroundings of his former intimate companions, which 
 the past nine years had brought to them, filled him 
 with astonishment and overpowered him with sorrow. 
 The widow Hollister and her young son, George had 
 been unable to pay the rent of the land formerly oc- 
 cupied by them, and they had been obliged to move 
 to the hovel where they now lived. 
 
 The former home was at present the residence of 
 Johnson, the superintendent of the district. Mrs. 
 Hollister had become an aged, broken, despairing 
 woman ; George, her son, a reckless, desperate, revenge- 
 ful tenant ; Mary, time had developed into a beautiful 
 young woman, in whom misery had crushed out all joy 
 and mirthfulness ; he found her only as a moving mar- 
 
"UNCLE SAMS' CABINS. 41 
 
 ble statue bearing some outward likeness to his friend 
 of childhood. 
 
 Jack Lawton had been surprised to learn in New 
 York when he arrived from England, that his father 
 and brother had both left the city and gone to the dis- 
 trict of Ohio, at that season — unaware as the new 
 comer was that the question of " Bonds of Servitude " 
 was then agitating the Proprietor and tenants of the 
 district of Ohio, and it was the reason that had taken 
 his father and brother to the Lawton mansion house in 
 the country, at this time of the year. 
 
 On the first night of his stay at the mansion, after 
 his visit to the Hollisters and his learning something 
 of the deplorable condition of the tenants on the es- 
 tate, a heated argument had occurred between his fa- 
 ther and brother on one side, and Jack on the other; 
 the next day, when Weaving, the lawyer, arrived and 
 Jack was first informed of the intention of his father 
 and brother to force the tenants to enter into " Bonds 
 of Servitude," his indignation knew no limit and led 
 to the discussion of which Jack had spoken to Mary 
 Hollister when he met her in the early morning, on 
 the road. 
 
 Poor Jack ! he had looked forward to this, his home- 
 coming, with so much pleasure for such a long time. 
 The only spot in which he had known any love or ten- 
 derness in his motherless life, had been the home of 
 the Hollisters, poor fellow! Jack had lost sight of the 
 fact that time had not stood still during his absence. 
 He had looked forward to finding the same boy and 
 girl that he had left, the same affectionate motherly 
 reception accorded him by Mrs. Hollister, as when a lad 
 of twelve he had come home from boarding-school. In- 
 
42 " UNCLE SAM'S *' CABINS. 
 
 stead, he found two despairing, heart-broken, silent 
 women, and a wild, almost insane young man. For 
 fully forty-eight hours, Jack Lawton remained so com- 
 pletely dazed by his disappointment and horrible sur- 
 prise, that he had even forgotten the many little gifts 
 he had gathered in Europe, as tokens of remembrance 
 for these loving friends of his early life. 
 
 He had been so perplexed by the unhappy position 
 in which he found the Hollisters and so anxious to 
 render them assistance in proportion to his love for 
 them all, that he neglected to do what he considered 
 trifling. 
 
 By the " Family Compact " now merged into a law, 
 the younger sons were entitled to no share in the 
 property of the father — the eldest son, by a system of 
 entailment, being the sole heir — thus Jack had no ex- 
 pectation of ever receiving any part of the Lawton es- 
 tate, unless his brother died without sons, and was, 
 therefore entirely dependent upon the pension allowed 
 him by his father. 
 
 This pension, while liberal enough, was always 
 
 promptly gotten rid of by Jack upon its receipt — for 
 
 among his other characteristics, generosity was most 
 
 conspicuous. It was only necessary for any one 
 
 in want to make that fact known, and the last dollar 
 
 possessed by Jack would instantly be at the disposal 
 
 of him who needed it ; thus, the poor fellow found 
 
 himself, almost helpless in this hour of the greatest 
 
 need in the lives of his dearest friends. 
 
 ****** 
 
 When Jack left the breakfast-room, after the taunt 
 of his brother, the morning of the discussion with 
 Weaving, he ascended the stairs to his own room, and 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 43 
 
 opening his trunk, spread out the presents intended 
 for his friends, but when he gazed on them, the hollow 
 mockery of sending pictures, books, trinkets and such 
 things into that abode of wretchedness and hunger, 
 struck him with such force he quickly replaced the 
 pretty things in his trunk and sat down on the side of 
 the bed, his head resting in his hands, to have what, 
 as a student, he used to call a " square think — " 
 
 The result of his meditations was apparent in the 
 large hamper, — filled with all kinds of groceries and 
 good things, packed by the old butler, happy to do 
 anything to please one, whom he and all the old ser- 
 vants at the Lawton mansion, loved almost as one of 
 their own children,- — which was placed in a cart to be 
 taken to the Hollisters' home with a note, saying — 
 
 "Dear Mollie : 
 
 " I have made up my mind to be a boy again for 
 one afternoon, and, as in the days when we went gathering ber- 
 ries, each fellow brought his own lunch, so now I insist upon 
 playing boy properly, and be allowed to do the same thing— only 
 as I can't come until late this afternoon, I am obliged to send it — I 
 shall be on hand to eat it with the same hearty appetite as when I 
 was called 
 
 "Friend Jack." 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 As Jack Lawton, Mrs. Hollister and Mary sat in the 
 twilight waiting for George, who had been absent since 
 morning, to return and join them in what Jack had 
 written of, as a " lunch," many straggling figures were 
 making their way towards the large, mud-beplastered 
 farm house occupied by Robert Rossmore, which stood 
 in a ravine or hollow near the bank of the stream which 
 drained this section of the country. 
 
 The house, like the home of the Hollisters, was 
 sheltered by no tree, surrounded by no fence, the only 
 out-building being a sod-covered chicken house at the 
 door of which were gathered a few scraggy fowls. Still 
 Rossmore's house, and the lands he held with it as 
 tenant of John Lawton, was considered the most desir- 
 able of any upon the great Lawton estate. 
 
 There came through the dusk of the evening, some- 
 times two or three together, and again, singly, the Law- 
 ton tenants, George Hollister among the others, until 
 the large room of which the entire lower story of the 
 house consisted, held nearly sixty men. The room was 
 lighted only by the flame in the wide fire-place at one 
 end of it — unlike the usual homes of the farm-class in 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABIN'S. 45 
 
 America, the room had a floor made of plank — patched 
 and worn, it is true — but white from constant scrub- 
 bing, which covered with fine sand, presented an ap- 
 pearance so much superior to the earthen floors of the 
 ordinary tenants, as to seem almost luxurious. 
 
 The Rossmore house had been built more than a 
 hundred years before the time of which this story is 
 written. At a time when the land upon which the 
 house stood was owned by its occupant — that more 
 prosperous period for the farmers was evidenced by the 
 material used in the construction of the house. 
 
 The room in which the crowd of men now stood, 
 had, when the house was built, been divided by parti- 
 tions into a hall and six rooms, as the marks of the di- 
 viding walls still indicated. All of the windows which 
 formerly gave light and air to the lower story of the 
 house had been boarded over, save two alone, which 
 still retained panes of glass — the scarcity and costliness 
 of glass was doubtless the cause for closing the many 
 other windows with boards. 
 
 At one side of the room was a dilapidated stairway, 
 without railing, by which means, the upper story of the 
 house was reached. An unusual (in the homes of ten- 
 ants) number of pieces of crude furniture were scat- 
 tered around the large room. 
 
 As each new arrival entered the door, the crowd 
 made a place for him in silence — no salutations were 
 exchanged — the lack of even the clasp of a friendly 
 hand made the gloomy room seem absolutely a sepul- 
 chre of all that is cheerful. Patiently, like a lot of 
 cattle, the men waited in dumb silence. 
 
 Night having fallen, and all at last who were ex- 
 pected, having arrived, Rossmore, the tenant of the 
 place, arose from a bench in a dark corner, where he 
 
4 r > "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 had been seated, and threw an armful of branches of 
 dry wood upon the flickering fire. As the light from 
 the flames made the features of the congregated ten- 
 ants visible, the cause of the patient silence of the 
 room was made plain. Hopelessness and despair was 
 stamped by the ruthless hand of poverty and misery, 
 upon every face. 
 
 Misfortune, servitude and disgrace are ever more 
 keenly felt by a race that inherits memories of a 
 glorious past, and within which is the inherited, in- 
 stinctive appreciation of all that is refined, ennobling 
 and glorious. Like the ancient Greeks when reduced 
 by Rome to a position of servility, the American farm- 
 class felt still, instinctively, its long half-forgotten 
 past glories, and its present hopeless humiliation was 
 the more terrible to bear. 
 
 The men were clothed with a kind of rough felt 
 cloth, dark and sombre in color, divided into two gar- 
 ments, a long blouse provided with a sort of hood, with 
 which they protected their heads from rain and sun, as 
 none of them wore any regular head covering like hats. 
 Short breeches reached just below the knee, the lower 
 leg being entirely bare. 
 
 Their feet, sockless, were thrust into roughly made 
 and clumsy wooden shoes. Their long untrimmed hair 
 and beard, together with the uncouth clothing worn by 
 them, gave to the men in the shifting shadows and 
 unsteady light, an aspect of a certain wildness. Still, 
 in spite of the mean surroundings, coarse clothing, un- 
 kept appearance, misery and hopelessness, the faces 
 bore evidence and trace of the race of freemen, whence 
 they came, painfully recalling the picture of the thor- 
 oughbred Arab steed degraded to dragging a plow. 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 47 
 
 An old man, whose white hair and long beard 
 seemed to declare him the patriarch of the tenants as- 
 sembled in the room, slowly walked to the place by the 
 hearth where the light was brightest, that all might see 
 him, and standing thus, like some Druid priest of old, 
 addressed the assembled men. 
 
 " You ask me to come among you to-night and 
 advise with you concerning the giving of ' Bonds of 
 Servitude,' to John Lawton, the Proprietor of the 
 District of Ohio. My countrymen, that you may 
 appreciate the wisdom of my advice, I must go back 
 more than a century in the history of our country and 
 relate the causes which lead me to the conclusion at 
 which I have arrived. I have lived nearly ninety 
 years, and in the long life God has given me, I have 
 experienced few joys and many sorrows. 
 
 " I have seen slowly, but surely, the glory of the 
 departed Great Republic fade away. Freedom slowly 
 but irresistibly vanish from our land. Tenants of one 
 district after another enter into ' Bonds of Servi- 
 tude.' 
 
 "Your lone fieht against fate here in the District 
 of Ohio has filled my heart with sorrow, for well I 
 knew from past experience that, in the end, with grief 
 and an increase of misery, you must succumb to the 
 inevitable fate of all the American tenantry. 
 
 " There are so few here who can read, even if books 
 were obtainable (for all of you were born since the 
 abolition of the public schools) that, to make you un- 
 derstand the condition of your lot in life, and the use- 
 lessness of prolonging the struggle against destiny, I 
 shall be obliged to go into many details which have led 
 to the present condition of the farm-class in America. 
 
48 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 " More than a hundred years ago, your ancestors 
 owned the soil you now till for John Lawton, the Pro- 
 prietor. All throughout America the cultivator owned 
 the land he farmed. The soil was new — exceedingly 
 fruitful. America produced immense crops of wheat, 
 cotton and corn — petroleum flowed from thousands of 
 wells— the whole world was the market in which our 
 forefathers sold the surplus produce. With improved 
 machinery for farming, and virgin soil rich beyond 
 comparison, the Americans outstripped all competitors. 
 
 Large crops. Good prices. Abundance, luxury, 
 and, alas! carelessness, thoughtlessness. The belief in 
 the eternity of the then existing flattering conditions. 
 
 The farmers, who were then three-fifths of the 
 population, permitted, yea, even helped to make 
 laws (for the farmer class voted a hundred years ago) 
 whereby they obliged themselves to buy everything 
 used by them only in America, restricting themselves 
 to one contracted market to buy in, but selling in the 
 markets of the universe." 
 
 A murmur of disapprobation went around the listen- 
 ing tenants. The old man paused, then continuing, 
 said : 
 
 "Nay, do not murmur and curse your ancestors. 
 They were beguiled by specious and sophistical argu- 
 ments. Being so happy, prosperous and contented, 
 they would not investigate and learn what is now so 
 plain to us all. 
 
 " Year after year the farmers would send their sur- 
 plus wheat, cotton and corn to Europe and sell 
 there, but — could not buy their coats, hats, crockery, 
 blankets, or anything else, in that, the cheapest mar- 
 ket for manufactured goods in the world, and bring 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 49 
 
 the goods home for their use, without paying an enor- 
 mous tax upon landing them in America — con- 
 sequently, by the very laws which they, the farmers, 
 had helped to make, they were obliged to purchase in 
 America where the manufacturers charged almost 
 double the price asked for manufactured goods in 
 Europe. 
 
 " For instance, three bushels of wheat would buy a 
 hat in England where the farmers sold most of their 
 surplus crops, but when the same hat was bought by 
 them in America it cost five bushels of wheat. But the 
 farmers were compelled to forego the advantage of 
 buying in the cheapest place to buy hats, because 
 after giving three bushels of wheat for a hat in Eng- 
 land, they would be taxed another three bushels of 
 wheat by the Government upon bringing it into this 
 country. 
 
 " Thus though the five bushels of wheat charged for a 
 hat in America, was entirely too much, it was cheaper 
 to contribute two bushels of their wheat to the Ameri- 
 can hat manufacturer, than to put three bushels into 
 the treasury of the Government. 
 
 "You see by these strange (and as we see in the light 
 of experience) utterly insane laws, the farmers abso- 
 lutely robbed themselves, not for the benefit of the 
 Government, but to enrich the manufacturers and con- 
 centrate wealth in the hands of a few. True, the other 
 two-fifths of the population, the mechanics and laborers, 
 received higher wages than the same kind of workmen 
 in Europe received, and they also were deluded by the 
 same kind of specious arguments as those used with 
 the farmers, and induced to continue the strange laws 
 in force by their votes. 
 
50 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 Laborers voted also in America, a hundred years 
 ago. But, in the end, it has proven the ruin of the 
 mechanics and laborers as well as that of the farmers. 
 
 " For by those strange laws the mechanics and laborers 
 also had to buy their blankets, coats, hats and all 
 other supplies in America. They also were obliged to 
 pay rents for the homes in which they lived. The 
 rents paid by them were high, in proportion to the 
 wages received by them ; so that, while apparently the 
 workingman received greater compensation in America 
 than in Europe for his labor, as a matter of fact, he 
 did not, for it was only a loan which he was obliged to 
 repay promptly in the shape of large profits to his 
 employers who manufactured the goods he used, and 
 owned the house in which he lived. 
 
 " No ; your forefathers were not fools. They were 
 led to believe that the extra two bushels of wheat went 
 to support and make happy and prosperous the other 
 two-fifths of their countrymen — the mechanics and 
 laborers — and by their patriotism and love of country, 
 they were ruined, and their descendants made slaves. 
 
 " The sacrifices made by the farmer for the benefit 
 of his fellow-countrymen who were mechanics and 
 laborers, when he voted for those insane laws, were 
 productive of no permanent beneficial results to those 
 for whom the sacrifices were made. Because the 
 additional price charged in America, said to be occa- 
 sioned by the high wages paid labor in this country, 
 as a matter of fact, only passed through the hands of 
 the laborer to find its way back at last to the owners 
 of factories and real estate in the manufacturing cen- 
 tres — leaving no permanent benefit with the two-fifths 
 of the laboring class, — thus the steady drain upon the 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 5 I 
 
 deluded farmers went on year after year, its continua- 
 tion assisted by the equally deluded mechanics and 
 laborers — the farmers, like the melting snows of the 
 mountains, furnishing the water — the mechanics, like 
 the river, carrying the water in a constant stream, to 
 its final repository, where, as in some lake or reservoir, 
 it fell into the coffers of owners of factories and real 
 estate in manufacturing localities. 
 
 "After many years, European nations becoming 
 weary of buying the American farmers' surplus crops 
 and being unable to sell them the goods manufactured 
 in Europe, sought and found new lands, where wheat, 
 cotton and corn could be grown, and new farmers with 
 whom they could trade, exchanging the goods manu- 
 factured in Europe for the wheat, cotton and corn 
 raised by the new farmers. 
 
 " European governments and capitalists, seeing the 
 prosperity and profit enjoyed by the American farmers, 
 began competition in the production of the great 
 staples of this country. 
 
 " They built canals in Egypt and flooded the deserts 
 of North Africa with the waters of the Nile, in 
 the soil thus made fruitful, planted wheat, cotton 
 and corn. They built railroads into the heart of Cen- 
 tral Africa, utilizing the virgin soil of that great conti- 
 nent for raising products to compete with the American 
 farmers. 
 
 The Russian serf (for that he is in fact if not in name) 
 was used for raising wheat, and from his hovel, with his 
 crust of black bread and cup of vodka, he smiled across 
 an ocean at the farmers of this country living in luxury, 
 knowing as the Russian did, that the American would 
 be brought to the level of the serf. 
 
52 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 " England, the foremost trading nation of the world, 
 poured her gold into South America until the Brazils 
 and Argentine were yellow in the summer sun with 
 wheat. The Empire of Great Britain was urged to the 
 utmost capacity of its vast territory, and from Mani- 
 toba to the banks of the Ganges, wheat, cotton and 
 corn Ave re forced to grow. 
 
 " The continent of Australia, the great island of New 
 Zealand, all joined in the race to drag the American 
 farmer from his high estate — oh, my children ! had 
 wisdom guided our ancestors the contest never had 
 occurred." 
 
 The old man paused and bowed his head as if the 
 sorrow of the coming story crushed him down. 
 
 "NoAVAvasthe beginning of the end of American 
 prosperity and independence," he continued. " The 
 European markets were flooded with Avheat, cotton and 
 corn — Russia even developed her vast petroleum 
 resources, making coal-oil a drug in the markets of all 
 the world, except in America. Prices of all farm prod- 
 ucts began to decline ; — Avheat, one dollar, ninety, 
 eighty, seventy, sixty, fifty cents ; — cotton, ten, nine, 
 eight, seven, six, five cents. 
 
 " You ask why? Because Europe Avas oversupplied. 
 But the home market, you suggest. Then, and only 
 then, did the farmers realize that the prices paid by 
 the consumers in this country, Avere made in Europe 
 by the price of the surplus. 
 
 " Europe had iioav a plentiful supply drawn from 
 Russia, Asia, Africa and South America, therefore the 
 prices made to the American farmer for his produce, 
 were made by the European buyers and depended upon 
 the prices they were obliged to pay for the wheat, cot- 
 
"UNCLE SAMV CABINS. 53 
 
 ton and corn produced by the Russian who dwelt in 
 the hovel ; the Egyptian slave ; the East Indian who 
 kept body and soul together upon one cup of rice a 
 day ; the unclothed African ; and pauper populated 
 South America — and the prices so made in Europe 
 with such farmer competition, made also the price of 
 produce paid by the home consumer. 
 
 " The farmers in America, from these causes receiving 
 less each year for their crops, to relieve their pressing 
 need for money, with which to pay taxes, educate their 
 children and to buy manufactured goods, placed mort- 
 gages upon their lands, thus drawing on the future the 
 draft their descendants are now paying. 
 
 " Your forefathers in the then hopeful American way 
 expected that something would occur, enabling them 
 to pay off the mortgages— a war in Europe perhaps ; a 
 failure of the crops abroad might happen. Science 
 made war so fatal that nations became peaceful ; 
 wheat, cotton and corn being planted in every section 
 of the globe, crops everywhere could only fail at the 
 same time when the Almighty decrees the death of 
 man on this earth. 
 
 " Even when thus brought face to face with an injury 
 which resulted in their lack of money, American far- 
 mers still refused to recognize their inability to buy the 
 manufactured goods they needed, in the cheapest 
 market, as the injury. They followed any mirage in 
 the political desert, but absolutely refused to believe 
 that the waters of prosperity were just beyond the wall 
 that they themselves had built around the country. 
 
 "The farmers now turned to that small part of the 
 population which owned and operated factories, and 
 owned and rented real estate— there they found money 
 
54 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 in plenty. True, in many instances, the name of the 
 factory and real estate owner had been changed — it 
 was now Land Company, Trust Company, Insurance 
 Company. However, the rose was still the rose, the 
 odor was the same. The farmers had found the reser- 
 voir in which was stored the money of the country, 
 which like the waters of the snow from the mountains, 
 they had furnished, and it had passed by way of 
 the mechanics and laborers, who, as a channel, had 
 carried and deposited it in the coffers of the manu- 
 facturers and landlords. 
 
 " Your ancestors, at this reservoir of cash, by giving 
 mortgages, the interest on which consumed the land as 
 will the lava of a volcano, obtained money to carry 
 them over until times were better. 
 
 " Things continued to get worse, never better — what 
 could make them better? — but the farmers would not 
 see where the whole trouble came from. Just kept on 
 hoping for a miracle, refusing to see the nearest and 
 easiest remedy which was before their very eyes. 
 
 " The torch was now burning at both ends for the 
 people in America of all classes. The farmers received 
 so little for their crops that it was a struggle for them 
 to pay their taxes and interest on their mortgages, con- 
 sequently they bought fewer manufactured goods each 
 year. They had now passed the stage of buying in the 
 cheapest market — they had no money with which to 
 buy anything, anywhere, at any price. Their pianos, 
 carpets, lace curtains wear out — they cannot replace 
 them ; their stoves wear out — they must cook in the 
 open fireplace. They must eat and live, educate their 
 children and clothe themselves as do those against 
 whom, they are obliged to compete in the sale of wheat 
 
"uncle sam's" cabins. 55 
 
 cotton and corn — Russian serfs, Egyptian slaves, 
 African savages, downtrodden East Indians and the 
 pauper labor imported into South America. 
 
 " The mechanics and laborers now appreciate that all 
 work done by them must be paid for by the American 
 farmers, because they alone created wealth in America — 
 then did the mechanics, factory hands and laborers see 
 that by the strange laws taxing everything — raw mate- 
 rials as well as manufactured goods, and paying high 
 rents — they were unable to manufacture anything in 
 this tax-bound country as cheaply as the mechanics, 
 factory hands and laborers of Europe — that the results 
 of their labor had been sold almost entirely to the 
 farmers, or rather the farmers paid the bill — that, of 
 the millions of dollars paid by Europe to America, 
 very few dollars were paid for, anything except the 
 farmers' produce and petroleum. 
 
 " The truth of the statement that the farmers paid the 
 bills, was demonstrated to the mechanics and laborers 
 by the fact that now as the farmers had no money to 
 buy manufactured goods at any price, the mechanics 
 and laborers had no work, no money, but as tramps 
 and vagrants roamed over the country. 
 
 " The owners of factories and real estate, under the 
 name of Land, Trust, and Insurance companies, hold- 
 ing- the mortgages on the farmers' land, now obtained 
 all the water of the melted snow, in the shape of inter- 
 est, and needed no such channel as the mechanics and 
 laborers to conduct the water to the reservoir. In im- 
 poverishing the farmers, to obtain high wages, which 
 were handed over by them to the real estate owners 
 and manufacturers, the mechanics and laborers had 
 killed the goose that laid the golden egg. 
 
56 "UNCLE SAM's" CABINS. 
 
 " My children, it is useless to go further into detail, 
 the thing was done and past. The farm-class be- 
 ing killed, now all that was to be done was to bury 
 the corpse. Now, events hurry so fast, one upon 
 another, that like an army of misfortune they seem a 
 ranked host. 
 
 " The mortgages on the farmers' land became due — 
 of course, the land cannot under these conditions be re- 
 deemed by the farmers — they are now poorer than 
 when they made the mortgages — foreclosures occur. 
 The land which the farmers owned passes (through 
 possibly, the circumlocution of a Land, Trust or Insur- 
 ance company) into the hands of the manufacturers 
 and real estate owners, who now become landlords, 
 and the farmer who formerly owned the land is re- 
 duced to a mere tenant. The landlords of America 
 spend the rents received, in Europe, as the English 
 landlords of Ireland spend their rents, in England. 
 
 "Yes, Rossmore, attempts were made to stem the 
 oncoming tide of wretchedness, but it was too late, 
 like an octopus, certain great combinations called 
 Trusts, enclosed the representatives of the people in 
 their terrible arms and submerged them beneath the 
 surface of that great reservoir of dollars, gathered 
 from the farmers, mechanics and laborers of the whole 
 country for years. 
 
 "Thus the few obstructed the will of the impover- 
 ished many, because the many waited too long, until 
 poverty held them in its chilling grasp. 
 
 "After some years a law was enacted that only those 
 who owned real estate could vote. Then laws were 
 passed abolishing the public schools. Then it being 
 easy, laws were made requiring ever)- voter to be able 
 
" Ux\ t cle sam's " cabins. 57 
 
 to read and write. Free and independent newspapers 
 were no longer published, for those who would have 
 liked such publications, had neither money to buy 
 them nor ability to read them. 
 
 " All State governments were then abolished, the 
 States becoming Districts of the Federal Government, 
 in which all power was concentrated for the greater 
 convenience of the landlords, now called Proprietors, — 
 thus vanished the old and dearly loved States of the 
 Union. 
 
 " No ; there was no rebellion, no revolution. The 
 Americans had such love for law, order and form — 
 such horror of mob-law, Anarchy, Socialism — that they 
 preferred to endure the ills they had than to fly to others 
 the) 7 knew not of. Besides, at the time these ills 
 became so apparent, certain bad men called Anarchists, 
 had, by their cruelty and lawlessness, made abhorrent 
 to even the mind of the humblest American, a resort 
 to any extraordinary measures. At any attempt to 
 right existing wrongs, it was only necessary for the 
 landlords to raise the cry of ' Anarchy,' and ' Social- 
 ism ' — and like frightened sheep, the farmer-class would 
 scamper away from attempted reformation. Every- 
 man bold enough in those days to speak for justice, 
 was dubbed a ' Demagogue.' 
 
 " The farmer-class nowhere held the land except as 
 tenants of wealthy individuals, or trust companies 
 controlled by wealthy individuals — to pay the rent of 
 the land (the prices of all farm products ever declining) 
 became yearly more difficult — the tenants ceased to ed- 
 ucate their children, one by one all the luxuries disap- 
 peared from their homes, then the comforts of life 
 passed away, and at last, the very necessities were 
 
53 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 reduced to what we have to-day — corn meal, bread, 
 coarse herbs, felt clothing, wooden shoes and mud 
 plastered houses. 
 
 " The mechanics and laborers of the land were in no 
 better position, for the farm-class having no money to 
 buy, there was no sale for the goods made by the me- 
 chanics — they were thrown out of work — their rents had 
 to be paid, so that lacking work, food and shelter, they 
 became outcasts and tramps. 
 
 " The farmer-class at last having given up land, edu- 
 cation, luxury, comfort, still being unable to pay and 
 live as freemen, rather than commit the sin of suicide — 
 for Christianity is deeply imprinted in the hearts of 
 the tillers of the soil — surrendered, to live, their last 
 possession, — Freedom, — and by ' Bonds of Servitude* 
 bound themselves and their children to the soil. 
 
 " The fate of all other tenants in America awaits you. 
 From the history of your class and country, you must 
 see that escape is impossible. The failure of last 
 year's crop has left you without even seed to plant. 
 John Lawton, the Proprietor, has refused to furnish 
 seed and supplies for next year's crop unless you give 
 the ' Bonds,' and unless you do plant the soil, you 
 are notified to leave the land. 
 
 " You ask my advice — then sign the ' Bonds of Servi- 
 tude.' The act is your only salvation from starvation 
 and death. Feel no added disgrace in giving the 
 ' Bonds.' The act is not yours but it is the act of 
 careless, thoughtless ancestors, done by them more 
 than a century ago, and which you are now called 
 upon to accept the punishment of." 
 
 The old man paused. A suppressed murmur, almost 
 a groan was the only sound heard for several minutes — 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 59 
 
 when from out of the shadow stepped a young man, 
 tall, thin, with long unkempt hair and beard, clothed 
 in felt as the other men, but with a face which would 
 have been positively handsome, had not the pinching 
 hand of poverty marked it with the indelible imprint 
 of its fingers — a wild, fierce, passionate light burned in 
 the dark haggard eyes, which glittered in the fire-light 
 like a cornered mountain cat's — the man's name was 
 George Hollister. 
 
 In a voice of pent-up wrath, he said, addressing the 
 old man who gazed upon him with eyes full of pity : 
 
 " William Anderson, do you advise me to make my 
 mother and sister, slaves?" 
 
 Not pausing for a reply, he turned to the men 
 around him and continued : " When my father lay 
 dying he made me swear, boy as I then was, to sign 
 no ' Bond of Servitude ' binding myself, family and 
 descendants as slaves to the soil. Five hundred of the 
 acres now tilled by you men had been the property of 
 my father's father — John Lawton's father acquired it 
 honestly, perhaps, but by means of those damnable 
 laws, William Anderson has described — the knowledge 
 of these facts embittered my father's whole life and it 
 was the suggestion of the ' Bonds of Servitude ' for 
 the impoverished and helpless tenantry that finally 
 broke his heart and killed him. For myself and family 
 I will sign no ' Bonds of Servitude ' — I, singly and 
 alone, if none join me, will rebel," and frantically 
 shaking his clenched hands above his head, he cried — 
 
 " I will fight and kill some of our masters, I can but 
 die ! '' and with that wild shout, rushed through the 
 amazed crowd of men out of the door into the dark- 
 ness beyond. The old man sprang after him to the 
 
Go "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 door, calling out, " For God's sake, George, think of 
 your mother and sister," but no answer came back out 
 of the darkness. 
 
 Then Anderson, looking at the men now clustered 
 around the door, in a voice broken by emotion, ex- 
 claimed : 
 
 " For the love of God, do nothing. Sign the bonds, 
 as a struggle at this late day, means death. You 
 would be obliged in the end to succumb. The Gov- 
 ernment, the army, the weapons, the money — all are 
 in the hands of the great Proprietors. 
 
 " Submit ; it is our heritage. 
 
 " Submission and Slavery." 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 After sending the hamper and note to Mary Hol- 
 lister, for several hours Jack Lawton remained locked 
 in his room, meditating upon how he should act and 
 what he could do, in this, the first trial of his strength 
 in the cause of his Master. He felt it his duty at any 
 cost to prevent any of the Hollisters from becoming 
 slaves. His gratitude and affection for the family were 
 sufficient to lead him to the determination to resort to 
 every expedient to avert that calamity, but aside 
 from that question, as a soldier of Christ, as a clergy- 
 man, he recognized that his post of duty was among 
 the heartbroken people of the District where he had 
 been born. 
 
 He knew that in the desperate frame of mind, arising 
 from the humilation of their recent increased degrada- 
 tion, the tenants might resort to violence of some 
 kind. He saw clearly that in the hour of their greatest 
 distress the people of the District would need a coun- 
 selor and friend — and that having been associated with 
 them and having won their confidence and friendship 
 as a boy, he would be able to serve his Master better 
 probably than a stranger, — even though the stranger 
 
62 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 might be an older, wiser and more experienced soldier 
 of the Cross. 
 
 He, for the sake of old days spent with the tenants, 
 would be admitted to the homes and inmost hearts of 
 the poor people, while they might hesitate before lay- 
 ing bare their suffering souls to one with whom they 
 were unfamiliar. He seemed to hear a voice saying — 
 "The disciple is not above his Master nor the servant 
 above his lord." 
 
 He had been offered a post in a fashionable parish 
 in New York city, because of the position and influ- 
 ence of his family, but now was recalled to him how 
 the Master dwelt among the lowly. 
 
 Opening his Bible, Jack read Christ's command to 
 his disciples, — " But go rather to the lost sheep of the 
 house of Israel." The words there printed, like the 
 bugle blast to the ear of a soldier, called him to his 
 post of duty. 
 
 That night, two letters left the Lawton mansion, 
 one going to New York refusing the flattering offer of 
 the fashionable church, the other, begging the Church 
 authorities of the District of Ohio, that he might be 
 assigned to missionary duty in the neighborhood 
 where he was born. Jack having written these two 
 letters and finally resolved upon a course of action, 
 went in search of his father and found him busily 
 engaged with his lawyer in the library. 
 
 John Lawton, Sr., looking up from the papers before 
 him when his son entered the room, said with a smile : 
 
 " Well, Jack, have you been gathering ammunition 
 and come back to renew the battle with Weaving?" 
 But seeing the serious and determined aspect of his 
 son's countenance, he changed his bantering tone and 
 added — "or is it something you wish to say to me?" 
 
UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 6 
 
 J 
 
 This father had always in spite of differences of opin- 
 ion with this son, held a rather queer idea of the possi- 
 bility of Jack doing anything, no matter how extraor- 
 dinary, whenever he observed the determined look 
 come into his eyes, and knew that the point where 
 further exercise of parental authority became danger- 
 ous had been reached — in fact, there was an element of 
 well-concealed fear in the father for this son, as there 
 had been in the husband for the mother, whom Jack 
 so vividly recalled, as drawing a chair close to his 
 father's side and placing one of his strong brown hands 
 over the fragile fingers of his father, he said : 
 
 " Will you allow me to interrupt you for a few 
 minutes? I wish particularly to talk with you before 
 I visit some friends. As the subject is entirely per- 
 sonal to myself and seriously concerns my future, will 
 you excuse Mr. Weaving ? " 
 
 Without waiting for the reply of Mr. Lawton, the 
 lawyer arose hurriedly, saying: "Certainly, Mr. Jack, 
 nothing that is urgent requires your father's atten- 
 tion," and left the room. 
 
 As the door closed behind Weaving, Mr. Lawton 
 with considerable uneasiness in his voice said : " What 
 is it Jack?" The son, without removing either his 
 hand from his father's, or the gaze of his dark earnest 
 eyes from the face of the older man, said slowly as if 
 each word were intended to be well considered by the 
 listener before the next word was uttered : 
 
 " Without waiting for me to request, you, sir, have 
 ever treated me with great generosity. My allowance 
 has always been exceedingly liberal, but I fear that I am 
 a bad manager, as I find myself utterly without means." 
 
 The father interrupted and in a tone of relief, said : 
 
64 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 " Bless my soul, boy, that is not a serious matter," and 
 reaching for his check-book, added, " How much?" as 
 he opened the book. 
 
 "Father," said Jack, "I had not finished what I 
 have to say. I am fully aware that the property of the 
 estate will all go to my brother, and that I am, as a 
 younger son, in no position to demand anything con- 
 cerning the property of the estate. I come, therefore, 
 to you, father, to most earnestly solicit a favor con- 
 cerning the leasing of part of the property." 
 
 Mr. Lawton's hand had slowly closed the check-book 
 and he looked with eyes of astonishment and anxiety 
 at the speaker, as his son continuing, said : 
 
 " I have writen to your kind friends in New York, 
 declining the splendid offer of the church, made by 
 them. I also have written, urging my appointment as 
 a missionary in this district, upon the Church authori- 
 ties — " Astonishment and annoyance kept the Pro- 
 prietor silent as Jack added, " I cannot live in the 
 mansion and be of the people as I can if living among 
 them, therefore I come to you to beg that you allow 
 me the use of the house occupied by your superin- 
 tendent, Johnson — and being, as I first remarked, with- 
 out money — to propose to you that in place of the 
 pension heretofore given me, you will give me the use 
 of the house I have mentioned, with a few acres of 
 land, free of rent for my life — and to enable me to 
 properly enter upon my duties and perform such acts 
 of charity as I deem necessary, that you give me the 
 sum of one thousand dollars." 
 
 At the impatient gesture of his father, Jack stopped, 
 but before he could be interrupted, continued : 
 
 " I am aware that I am asking a great deal, but I 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 65 
 
 don't think that you, or Henry after you, will miss 
 out of the many millions of dollars of the Lawton 
 estate, what I ask — " Here Mr. Lawton stopped 
 him by raising his hand with a deprecating motion, 
 saying : 
 
 " Now, Jack ; stop all that absurd talk about what 
 you ask being much in itself, it is absolutely nothing, 
 a mere trifle, but I will not allow you to sacrifice 
 yourself by remaining buried alive here, when you 
 could occupy a position in keeping with your name 
 and family by accepting the offer of my friends in 
 New York. No, Jack, no ! I will neither give you 
 the lease nor the money." 
 
 The young man without one word of reply, pushed 
 back his chair and walked to the door. This proceed- 
 ing was more alarming to his father than the most 
 violent language from Jack would have been, because 
 it was so unlike the usual behavior of his combative 
 son ; therefore Mr. Lawton, rising from his chair and 
 following Jack to the door, said, " Where are you 
 going ? " 
 
 The young clergyman turned and placing one 
 powerful hand on each of his father's shoulders, looking 
 down into his eyes, replied : " Up-stairs to pack my 
 trunk and leave your house, father, and seek shelter in 
 the hovels of your tenants, for I am determined to do 
 the work of my Divine Master among the poor and 
 oppressed of this district, if even like Him I serve, I 
 have nowhere to lay my head." 
 
 His father hesitated an instant, then seeing the 
 unshakable resolve of the man written in Jack's face, he 
 placed his arm around him and said, " Come, Jack, 
 I will do what you want ; but, my son, you are cutting 
 
66 " U.NXLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 yourself off from your family and all your associates in 
 your own sphere of life." 
 
 Together the father and son went arm in arm back- 
 to the desk, and Mr. Lawton opening the check-book, 
 filled out a check for a thousand dollars, saying : "I 
 will have Weaving make out the proper papers giving 
 you the house and land now occupied by Johnson, 
 without rent for your life." 
 
 Jack said, while warmly grasping his father's hand 
 as he arose to leave the room : " God bless you, sir! 
 you have made me a very happy man to-day— and I 
 beg that you instruct Weaving to prepare a final dis- 
 charge for you and my brother Henry from any further 
 claim of mine upon either of you." As Jack closed 
 the door after him, Mr. Lawton leaning back in his 
 chair speaking to himself, said with a sigh, " Just like 
 his mother, he would have gone to the huts of the ten- 
 ants. I saw the same look that his mother used to have, 
 and it was waste of time and words to argue the 
 question — he would have cared nothing for the disgrace 
 to our name — I did right." 
 
 As the Proprietor sat thinking, Weaving came into 
 the room and was informed of what had occurred. He 
 said : " That does not surprise me. In fact, I rather ex- 
 pected it and it happens rather conveniently, for in 
 case of trouble about these ' Bonds,' Mr. Jack's pres- 
 ence among the tenantry is more valuable than a 
 regiment of soldiers." 
 
 Lawton considered a few minutes and said, " Perhaps, 
 you are right, Weaving, but had I not seen the hope- 
 lessness of the task, I would have endeavored to have 
 him leave this District. However, " added Lawton, 
 " prepare the lease and notify Johnson to vacate that 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 67 
 
 house and occupy any other that he may fancy." 
 For some moments, Weaving seemed deeply buried in 
 thought, when suddenly looking up and finding Mr. 
 Lawton regarding him with some curiosity, he said : 
 
 " Why does not Mr. Henry get married ? In case of 
 the death of Mr. Henry without sons, Mr. Jack would 
 inherit the Lawton estate after you, sir, and. with his 
 peculiar opinions, especially now that he intends to 
 remain constantly with the tenants and become daily 
 more attached to them, it would be an exceedingly 
 unfortunate thing were he to become the Proprietor of 
 the District." 
 
 It was plain from the promptness with which the 
 question was answered, that the subject had been con- 
 sidered, discussed and settled by Mr. Lawton, for 
 almost before Weaving had ceased to speak, the Pro- 
 prietor said : 
 
 " Henry will marry Miss Ashton this coming autumn, 
 and I hope that the danger you speak of will be in 
 time, removed by the birth of a son. Henry absolutely 
 refused to marry before he became thirty-five years of 
 age, declaring that he wished to enjoy life before he 
 settled down, and even now I would have great diffi- 
 culty in bringing this marriage about were it not that 
 his medical adviser insists that he must lead a quiet 
 life, as his health is much injured by dissipation. At 
 last, I induced Henry to believe that a wife might 
 furnish some entertainment, now that a quiet life was 
 necessary, and pointing out the importance of per- 
 petuating our name by a proper representative, he has 
 consented." 
 
 Weaving merely remarked by way of reply : " I wish 
 Mr. Henry had more of his brother's strength," and 
 
68 "uncle sam's" cabins. 
 
 began the preparation of the lease, to Jack Lawton for 
 life, of the house where the Hollisters had lived so 
 many years, which was now occupied by the superin- 
 tendent, Johnson. 
 
 While Weaving was writing the lease for him, and 
 his father speculating upon the disaster in store for the 
 Lawton. estate, should Henry die without having a son 
 to inherit the property, Jack Lawton was striding 
 along the muddy road toward the humble home of the 
 Hollisters, with a heart full of happiness, little imagin- 
 ing that the possibility of his becoming the Proprietor 
 of the District could be a cause of thought to any one, 
 as he had never given, what he considered a very 
 remote probability, an instant of his attention. 
 
 Jack Lawton carried into the hovel of gloom and 
 darkness, such words of cheer and gladness that day, 
 as had not been heard by Mrs. Hollister and Mary for 
 years. He told them how he had secured their old 
 home, and that now Mrs. Hollister and Mary must 
 move there again and keep his house ; that George and 
 he would plant the land ; that now, not being tenants 
 of the Proprietor, they need dread no longer those 
 hateful " Bonds of Servitude." 
 
 He had come into a hovel, but by the hope, 
 light and happiness he brought, he dispelled the 
 dreariness of the place, as the coming sun dispels 
 the gloom of night. And as they sat around 
 the humble hearth waiting for George, they planned 
 the little church Jack would build with part of 
 his thousand dollars. What missionary work he 
 hoped to do, and when at last, it grew so late, that he 
 had to leave, he left many kind messages for George, 
 and bade them tell him to stay at home next da}' until 
 he came, that they together might go and examine 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 69 
 
 the old homestead, and playgrounds of George, Mary 
 and Jack. 
 
 In his dreams that night Jack seemed to see the 
 beautiful picture of his mother which hung in the 
 parlor, walk out of the canvas and come smiling to 
 him, push away the curls and kiss him on his forehead, 
 and lovingly lay her hand upon his head. 
 
 * * * •& * * 
 
 Mary and her mother, so overcome with the sudden 
 change from the dark misery of despair, to the happi- 
 ness of hope, slept none that night, but waited arid 
 watched for the coming of George, both anxious to 
 share their joy with the partner of their sorrows ; but 
 the night passed and George did not return home. 
 
 The morning light revealed in the faces of the 
 women no trace of their long watching — hope and 
 happiness had so altered the expression that no sleep- 
 lessness or weariness was visible in the countenance of 
 either mother or daughter. And when Jack called out 
 for George as he came to the door, and Mary came to 
 greet and tell him that George had not been home the 
 night before to hear the great good news, Jack looked 
 at her in surprise, and said : 
 
 " Why, Mollie, you look this morning like another 
 woman. What have you been doing ? " 
 
 The girl replied : " Mr. Jack, you are the magician 
 that has changed me, if there be a change, for you have 
 made me so happy ! " and Mrs. Hollister coming at 
 Jack's call to see the lease given him that morning, 
 whereby their old home was his, and therefore theirs, 
 without rent as long as he should live, he saw the same 
 change in her, ten years of age seeming to have been 
 taken away from her. And in his walk alone to 
 
JO " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 examine the premises he had known so well as a boy, 
 Jack's heart was full of thankfulness to God that he 
 had been made the instrument of the Almighty's 
 loving kindness to the two poor women in the hovel. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THOMAS JOHNSON, the superintendent of the Lawton 
 estate in the District of Ohio, had for the past five 
 years been almost undisputed master of the District, as 
 the Proprietor spent but little time on his property ; 
 indeed, rarely could Mr. Lawton be induced to leave 
 the comforts of his city clubs and the pleasures of New 
 York to immure himself in the gloomy, pauperized, 
 agricultural district of which he was Proprietor. John- 
 son, being thus left with no one to control his move- 
 ments, nor interfere with his autocratic power, had 
 given loose rein to his naturally surly temper, exer- 
 cising his arbitrary will whenever an opportunity pre- 
 sented itself, in a most merciless manner. 
 
 Upon the failure of the crop of the District for the 
 second year, it was Johnson who had devised the 
 scheme of refusing to furnish seed or supplies to the 
 tenants, for the purpose of planting the soil, unless 
 they would enter into " Bonds of Servitude." 
 
 The superintendent had urged the Proprietor to avail 
 himself of the advantage offered by the misfortunes of 
 the tenants, to end in the district the lingering remains 
 of freedom in the farm-class of America, insisting that 
 
J2 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 such a condition as had been arrived at by the failure of 
 two successive crops in the district might not recur in 
 a life-time, and that without slave labor, it was utterly 
 impossible to plant profitably in America. 
 
 Having finally prevailed upon the Proprietor to adopt 
 his scheme of enslaving the tenants, and having com- 
 mitted Mr. Lawton to the uncompromising position 
 occupied by him as Proprietor of the District, John- 
 son became so exultant over the bright prospect for 
 the exercise of the spirit of petty tyranny, which, in 
 the meanness of the soul, he possessed, that he' boastfully 
 proclaimed himself the author of the cruel measure 
 which would place the poor people of the district in 
 his power. For this reason more, than for the 
 cruel conduct of which he had been guilty for years, 
 Johnson was regarded as an object of intense hatred 
 by all of the tenants. Many had vowed vengeance, 
 but the spirit of the majority of the men was so 
 crushed and subdued by years of subordination, that 
 no overt act of retaliation had ever been attempted. 
 
 Johnson was the superintendent not only of the 
 section cultivated by those tenants who had assembled 
 at Rossmore's house, but of the entire District of Ohio, 
 having in each section, an overseer or head man, who 
 executed the orders of the superintendent. 
 
 Thomas Johnson's father had been the superintend- 
 ent of a criminal reformatory, and in the atmosphere 
 surrounding a prison, as a witness of the brutal punish- 
 ments there inflicted upon the helpless creatures com- 
 mitted to the tender mercies of his father, the son 
 had grown to manhood. He had entered the service 
 of the present Proprietor of the District some twenty 
 years before the date of this narrative, as an overseer 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 7 3 
 
 of a section of the territory, and upon the death of the 
 former superintendent, had been promoted to his 
 present position, because of the executive ability he 
 exhibited in the organization and operation of his sec- 
 tion as overseer. 
 
 Johnson was now about fifty years of age—the dark, 
 damp looking red hair which stood like bristles upon 
 his large square head, was sprinkled with white — the 
 keen shifty glance of the light blue eyes be- 
 neath the grizzly overhanging eyebrows, revealed the 
 active spirit of the man — thick, moist scarlet lips 
 marked with a blood-like line, upon the face of the 
 superintendent, the sign of sensuality. His large body 
 gave him the appearance of a tall man when seated, 
 but the impression was quickly dispelled when he 
 stood, supported by short, very much bowed legs. 
 
 Johnson had adopted the bluff, active manner of a 
 business man in his intercourse with the Proprietor, 
 concealing his truculency beneath the cloak of blunt, 
 unvarnished honesty, thus preventing the natural 
 coarseness of his character offending the refined sensi- 
 bilities of the well-bred Mr. Lawton. 
 
 The house now occupied by Johnson, and which, dur- 
 ing Jack's boyhood, had been the home of the Hollis- 
 ters, was a substantially built brick structure of two 
 stories, containing a dozen rooms, — verandas sur- 
 rounded the house, — a well-kept lawn stretched to the 
 road in front of the building, — a large fruit orchard in 
 which stood a commodious barn and other outbuild- 
 ings, occupied two or three acres of ground at the 
 back of the house. 
 
 Johnson was seated at a desk in the front room, 
 which he used as a kind of library or office, busily en- 
 
74 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 gaged in writing up the reports of the overseers of the 
 different sections, for the inspection of the Proprietor 
 and Weaving the lawyer of the estate, when the busy 
 man saw through the window, the tall clerical figure of 
 the Rev. Jack Lawton marching over the snow which 
 still lay upon the lawn, towards the house. It had 
 been several years since the superintendent had seen 
 Jack Lawton, but he had heard that the young clergy- 
 man was expected to return this spring from Europe, 
 so easily guessed who the unceremonious intruder was, 
 and hastened to the door to receive the visitor with 
 many expressions of welcome. 
 
 Johnson, who as overseer of the section had never 
 been a favorite of Jack's, regarded with considerable 
 interest, if not with something of fear, the muscular 
 proportions of the young man, who, sitting bolt upright 
 in the centre of the room, into which, Johnson had led 
 him, glanced around the apartment at the familiar 
 objects of his childhood, with stern, almost threatening 
 countenance. At last, having finished his silent exam- 
 ination of the room, his gaze fell upon the conciliating 
 creature before him, and catching the shifting glance of 
 the superintendent's blue eyes, Jack, without respond- 
 ing to the complimentary speeches of welcome which 
 Johnson had been making, said abruptly as he looked 
 at him steadily and sternly in the face : 
 
 " Johnson, these proposed ' Bonds of Servitude ' for 
 the tenants of the estate, are entirely unnecessary, and in 
 my opinion, a cowardly cruel advantage to take of the 
 misfortunes of men who are certainly as good, if not 
 better than many of those more fortunately situated. 
 I tell you, (for I have heard that you have persistently 
 advised my father to his present course of conduct 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 75 
 
 with regard to the ' Bonds') that only ill can come of 
 this, not only to this district, but to the whole country, 
 and while I have no evidence of any unworthy or dis- 
 honest motive actuating you, still, I insist that evil 
 will result both to you and to our family, from carry- 
 ing out the contemplated enslavement of the tenants, — 
 that even though you be honest in the matter, in your 
 advice to my father, you are proving yourself a danger- 
 ous enemy to every man of the Lawton name." 
 
 As Jack spoke, the color mounted to the very roots 
 of the bristling red hair of the superintendent. The 
 fierce temper of the brutal man for one moment 
 flashed from his cat-like eyes upon the stern speaker, 
 but quickly recalling the fact that the man seated in 
 front of him was (even though not heir to the estate) 
 the son of the powerful Proprietor, as well as, perhaps, 
 some recollection of Jack's youthful courage and com- 
 bativeness, Johnson choked down his wrath, and with 
 the usual assumption of brusque honesty began to 
 explain and repeat parrot-like, the arguments of Weav- 
 ing, but he had not proceeded long enough with his 
 reply to fully regain his confident manner, before Jack, 
 raising his hand with a deprecating gesture, exclaimed : 
 
 " Oh, stop ! I have heard enough of that unfair 
 reasoning from Weaving," and without pausing to per- 
 mit Johnson to continue his harangue, Jack hurled 
 this inquiry like a dynamite bomb into the already 
 somewhat disarranged camp of Johnson's ideas : 
 " Why were the Hollisters forced to leave this, their 
 old home, and move to that hovel ? By whom, was 
 the order given ? " 
 
 Johnson, quite abashed, for he now remembered the 
 intimate association of his inquisitor with the unfortu- 
 
j6 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 nate family, who, by the orders of the superintendent, 
 had been dispossessed of a home made dear to the 
 man before him by childish memories, sought refuge 
 in that fort of security which, alas ! so often has 
 afforded safety to the cruel, cowardly and vindictive 
 of all ages and countries — duty. 
 
 Johnson replied that his duty to his employer com- 
 pelled him to have the Hollisters move off a piece of 
 property of the estate for which they were unable to 
 pay rent, and, with a great parade of virtue, said how 
 reluctantly he had been compelled to do an act which 
 was dictated solely by honesty in his management of 
 the property of the estate. That his own occupancy of 
 the place was due entirely to his inability to secure a 
 tenant who was in a position to take the responsibility 
 of planting and maintaining so large a holding of land. 
 
 Jack listened, with the incredulity which he felt, 
 plainly mirrored in his face. The flush of mingled in- 
 dignation and anger would have flamed into a danger- 
 ous fire of resentment resulting in the infliction of in- 
 stant punishment upon the knavish disciple of duty be- 
 fore him, had Jack known that the hoary sinner assum- 
 ing so much of the virtue of honesty, had been the 
 cause of constant misery to the whole Hollister family ; 
 that much of their suffering had been caused by the 
 machinations of this libidinous vampire, who, finding 
 himself repulsed with horror and contempt by Mary, 
 had resorted to every petty, mean measure of punish- 
 ment and revenge. 
 
 How he had taken advantage of his position to annoy 
 and insult Mary by his obnoxious attention ever since 
 she had become a woman ; how, by insisting upon the 
 most exact fulfillment of every condition of their ten- 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. JJ 
 
 ancy upon the estate, he had gradually brought the Hol- 
 lister family down to a condition almost unendurable, 
 hoping thus to secure the accomplishment of his fiend- 
 ish design upon the honor of Mary, thinking, that in 
 the very desperation of soul caused by want and mis- 
 ery of her mother, the daughter would throw herself a 
 willing sacrifice into his arms, as a last resort. 
 
 While the cause of much of their trouble was 
 understood by patient, suffering Mary, she meekly 
 aggravated the bitterness of her misery by concealing 
 from her mother and brother the origin thereof ; 
 knowing the almost insane rage which time seemed 
 only to increase within the bosom of her brother, she 
 feared the result of an explosion of temper which 
 would surely follow the revelation to him of the con- 
 tinued insults offered her. 
 
 Self-sacrificing Mary refused to add to the already 
 crushing load of humiliation and sorrow borne by her 
 mother, by telling her of that depth of degradation 
 which their unhappy family had reached, where a 
 daughter was subjected to the licentious attentions of 
 an aged and repulsive libertine. In silence and sor- 
 row, Mary had suffered from the persecutions of John- 
 son for four or five years. 
 
 Well, it was for you, man of bluff honesty and devo- 
 tion to duty, that this was all unknown to the splendid 
 specimen of manhood before you. For in the hour 
 that Jack Lawton had learned that the drooping head 
 — which, covered with shining baby curls, had rested 
 confidently upon his sturdy, boyish bosom years ago, 
 had been caused by your insulting words and gaze, 
 that the nervous, trembling hands (which, dimpled 
 white and soft, had patted his fresh youthful cheek 
 
;S •' UN( I.K SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 and called him in lisping prattle her "pretty Jack," 
 when as a boy he played her nurse) trembled from 
 fear of you — that those pale lips (which oft when 
 fresh with the heaven-born innocence of the babe, had 
 met his own in holy kisses) were blanched at your 
 horrible approach ; — yes, man of assumed virtue and 
 fidelity to duty — in that hour you would have been 
 dragged like a cringing cur, and with grip of iron forced 
 to your knees before the gentle creature you have tor- 
 mented — there to beg and whine for forgiveness, and 
 pray her intercession that you might be granted per- 
 mission to continue to pollute the pure air with your 
 contaminating presence. 
 
 Jack, all unconscious of the fact that the being 
 whom he addressed, was a moral cesspool of corrup- 
 tion, rising from his chair, drew from his pocket the 
 order from his father, the Proprietor, for Johnson to 
 vacate the premises, at the same time handing to him 
 for his perusal the lease executed by the Proprietor, 
 whereby the Rev. John Lawton became tenant of the 
 house and land attached thereto for his life, and said : 
 
 " Thank God, there is one wrong I can make right 
 by restoring the possession of the old home to the 
 Hollisters, and in the making right that wrong, I will 
 prevent the doing of another — George Hollister enter- 
 ing into ' Bonds of Servitude.' Now, Johnson, when 
 can you get out of here and give me possession?" 
 
 The amazement and chagrin depicted upon the 
 countenance of the thus defeated wretch who had 
 read the papers and heard Jack's words, was so acute 
 as to be almost pitiful, and was only terminated by 
 his complete collapse, as Jack added : 
 
 " I intend to occupy the house myself, as my resi- 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 79 
 
 dence in the district will be permanent, having applied 
 to the Church authorities for missionary work here 
 among the tenants of the estate, where I will strive to 
 alleviate as far as in my power lies, the sufferings and 
 sorrows of my old friends in their new and trying 
 position as slaves. Mrs. Hollister, who is almost my 
 foster mother, will take charge of the domestic 
 arrangement of my home." 
 
 Johnson had sunk into his chair at the desk as he re- 
 alized that, like a house of cards, his basely conceived 
 structure for the imprisonment and destruction of vir- 
 tue and honor was thus swept away by the practical 
 righteousness of the man who stood before him, a per- 
 fect type of material manhood in that flood tide of 
 life, when vigor and passion, physical power and moral 
 weakness, temptation and mental strength attend hand 
 in hand upon each other. The vivified doctrine of 
 Christianity — a living, breathing, feeling, tempted per- 
 sonification of every day religion. 
 
 Johnson, in wonder and amazement, watched the ex- 
 pression of satisfaction that shone from the fine face of 
 the young clergyman as he spoke of his determination 
 to devote his life to laboring for the poor. 
 
 At last the frustrated superintendent recovered him- 
 self sufficiently to appreciate the necessity of conciliat- 
 ing, by all means, a son of the Proprietor (even though 
 the younger one) who would constantly be a resident 
 of the District, and, consequently, in a position to do 
 the agent of the landlord, great injury if inimical to 
 him. Gathering his somewhat scattered senses with an 
 effort, Johnson said : 
 
 " I will vacate the premises to-morrow, so delighted 
 am I to have one of the sons of the Proprietor honor 
 
So "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 the district by becoming a resident of it, and favoring 
 me with his counsel and advice." 
 
 Jack, taking no notice of the conclusion of his re- 
 marks, turned and walking out of the house, said : 
 
 " Very good, I will move in to-morrow at noon, if 
 you have vacated the house," and without paying the 
 slightest attention to the extended hand of Johnson 
 who had followed him to the door, tramped away, fol- 
 lowed by the malignant, disappointed glance of the 
 beast of prey whom he had deprived of the oppor- 
 tunity to steal upon a defenceless victim. 
 
 As Jack disappeared behind the hill, Johnson struck 
 the table with his clenched fists and with a perfect 
 torrent of oaths, began to walk up and down the room. 
 Going to a sideboard he tore open the door, and seiz- 
 ing a decanter of brandy filled a goblet to the brim 
 with the fiery liquor, which he swallowed in one breath. 
 
 Then putting on a heavy coat, he hurried from the 
 house, and down the road in an opposite direction from 
 that taken by Jack, seemingly as if by violent exercise, 
 he desired to exhaust his temper and banish the feel- 
 ing of rage and disappointment filling his breast. 
 * •* * -x- ■x- * 
 
 George Hollister, when he rushed out of Rossmore's 
 house into the darkness, had, heedless of falls and 
 bruises, plunged onward as if pursued by a host of fu- 
 ries born of his own mad fancies. The very gloom 
 seemed to intoxicate his nervous, over-wrought system, 
 and in the intense transport of wretchedness and des- 
 pair, he wildly waved a cudgel which he carried, above 
 his head, striking at dimly seen objects in the darkness, 
 and with yells like a maniac, awakened the echoes of 
 the ravine up which he pantingiy made his way. 
 
" UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 8l 
 
 After hours of objectless wandering and racing 
 through the woods and fields, he fell exhausted and 
 breathless at the door of a cabin similar to the one 
 occupied by his mother. 
 
 There, at daylight, he was found by the two men 
 who occupied the hovel, and taken in to the fire, 
 before which he fell into a troubled sleep which 
 lasted several hours. When he awoke and had par- 
 taken of some hot corn meal porridge, he insisted upon 
 going home, knowing how anxious his mother and sis- 
 ter would be, because of his long absence. 
 
 The men who lived in the hut were tenants of the 
 estate and old friends of the Hollisters. Seeing his 
 weak and highly excited condition, they insisted upon 
 accompanying him to his home. Thus it was that 
 some demon of discord hovering over the district, 
 brought to pass the meeting of the disappointed and 
 infuriated superintendent and the desperate tenant, on 
 the road leading by the house of which, Jack Lawton 
 had secured the lease. 
 
 As Johnson hurried down the road, he saw approach- 
 ing the three men Hollister and his two companions. 
 
 In the frame of mind, Johnson was then in, he hailed 
 with delight, an opportunity to give vent with impun- 
 ity, to the wrath that was boiling within his bosom. 
 As the tenants saw the representative of their power- 
 ful landlord draw near, they respectfully and submis- 
 sively stepped aside, giving to him the whole road. Or- 
 dinarily, Johnson would have passed the men in surly 
 silence, but to-day, he was suffering from rage and dis- 
 appointment caused by those whom he dared not at- 
 tack, and when helpless victims opportunely presented 
 themselves, he gladly availed himself of the chance 
 
82 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 to relieve his breast surcharged with temper and 
 hatred. 
 
 He had not seen Hollister who stood behind his two 
 companions, leaning from weakness and fatigue 
 upon his cudgel. Johnson stopped opposite the men 
 and began pouring forth a flood of oaths and abuse 
 upon them. As he raged and worked his passion up to 
 the point of explosion, he said : 
 
 " You miserable hounds, you shall sign the ' Bonds ' 
 or starve, curse you ! I have waited and hoped for this 
 time, you lazy, impudent dogs ! when I can show you 
 the merits of the ' paddle ' as a medicine for idle, 
 would-be freemen." The superintendent paused for 
 an instant to regain breath, when the older of the two 
 men who accompanied Hollister replied : 
 
 " I don't see, Mr. Superintendent, why you abuse us 
 so violently. We tenants of the district have only 
 shown a very natural reluctance to surrender the free- 
 dom once common to all men in this country ; by no 
 crime of ours are we brought to our present condition ; 
 we simply inherit punishment for the mistakes of our 
 ancestors." 
 
 " Curse upon your infernal ancestors," yelled John- 
 son, his face red with rage. " I have heard more than 
 enough of the cant of Anderson and men of his kind. 
 When I get you where I want you, I'll tear every inch 
 of skin off of Anderson's back, for talking of the free- 
 dom of your cursed ancestors — that they ever were 
 anything but slaves was a mistaken kindness. It was a 
 blessing to the poor, ignorant earth-grubbers to be re. 
 lieved of the responsibility of freedom and wealth. The 
 only pity is that men of brains and wealth ever deemed 
 it necessary to resort to refined methods of sophistical 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 83 
 
 argument and fallacious doctrines to accomplish an 
 end, which, the rifles of our army should have quickly 
 brought about. Away with you, insolent clod-trampers 
 that you are ! " 
 
 As the two men meekly and silently hurried away, 
 Johnson recognized George Hollister, standing pale 
 and quivering with anger. The insulting language of 
 the enraged superintendent had electrified Hollister 
 with artificial strength and vigor. Johnson, seeing, as 
 he supposed a triumphant tenant, who, free from the 
 danger of the universal enslavement of the tenants of 
 the estate, was gloating over his (Johnson's) chagrin, 
 became blindly infuriated, and rushing across the road, 
 with threatening gestures, yelled : 
 
 "You impertinent puppy ! You dare stand and look 
 at me in triumph because you have escaped becoming 
 a slave. Young Lawton is welcome to his mistress. 
 She may be new to him, but — cursed wench ! — she is an 
 old enough plaything of the balance of the district. 
 Your canting, praying, hypocrite of a mother acts as 
 housekeeper to shield the clerical character of her 
 daughter's friend.— You hound ! — -You panderer ! " 
 
 Johnson, had he not been blinded by his fury, would 
 have seen that George Hollister remained petrified, not 
 with fear, but with immovable, speechless amazement, 
 at the words he heard, but Johnson, in his passion, 
 was heedless of the look of the man to whom he was say- 
 ing what would have nerved the arm of infancy or 
 age, raised his hand and struck Hollister in the face 
 — then it was as if the full meaning of Johnson's words 
 had just flashed upon his paralyzed senses. Hollister, 
 at the blow in the face, seemed to awake, and as some 
 mighty flood, suddenly unchained by the bursting of 
 
84 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 the restraining dam, springs resistlessly upon the help- 
 less valley, so the pent up passion breaking from the al- 
 most bursting heart of Hollister, seemed to give to his 
 frail form, miraculous power. 
 
 With a shriek of unearthly shrillness, he sprang upon 
 the burly superintendent and hurled him to the 
 ground — with cries in sound scarcely human, he began 
 to break in the skull of the prostrate man with the heavy 
 cudgel which he carried, nor did he cease to yell and 
 belabor the senseless mass at his feet until the crush- 
 ing blows were stopped by the two men, who, return- 
 ing, rushed upon Hollister from behind and seized the 
 club. 
 
 Hollister struggled from the grasp of his compan- 
 ions, and springing back to the still form, crushed now 
 out of all semblance of the man who so recently had 
 stood cursing and insulting him, the avenger bent over 
 him, and seeing that he was surely dead, sprang to his 
 feet, and with an exultant shout, crying out : " I have 
 killed a tyrant— I can but die ! " darted away down the 
 road and into the woods. 
 
 The two men gazed at each other in speechless hor- 
 ror, and then at the awful object lying in the road. At 
 last the terrible position in which they would be dis- 
 covered, should anyone come upon them, forced them 
 to action. Realizing that their only safety lay in as 
 quickly as possible, making the crime and the guilty 
 party known, they hastened away to the nearest bar- 
 rack of soldiers and made a statement of the whole 
 matter to the commanding officer. 
 
 Unfortunately for George Hollister, they were too 
 far away from Johnson when he made use of the in- 
 sulting language to Hollister — in which the name of 
 
'•UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 85 
 
 the Proprietor's son occurred — to hear what the dead 
 man had said hence the provocation for the killing was 
 unknown. 
 
 A party of soldiers with an ambulance, was imme- 
 diately dispatched to the scene of the murder, to bring 
 the body to the barracks — at the same time, searching 
 parties were ordered out in every direction to scour the 
 country and secure the murderer, the two witnesses 
 of the crime being confined to await investigation. 
 
 Hollister had not intended to flee from the conse- 
 quences of his act, when he ran away from the spot 
 where he had glutted his vengeance for the insult cast 
 upon him and his family by his fallen foe. This more 
 than half-crazed victim of a century old wrong, had in 
 the moment of excitement and insanity, sought in 
 flight, an antidote for the straining, throbbing nerves 
 which like red hot wires seemed to have pierced his 
 flesh and held his frame in torturing embrace. 
 
 When the first detachment of soldiers detailed to 
 capture the murderer, reached the gate of the enclosure 
 surrounding the barracks, they found leaning exhausted, 
 against the gatepost, a tattered, haggard man, from 
 whose sunken wild eyes the light of reason had fled. 
 In a hoarse and gasping whisper, he said : " I am George 
 Hollister. I killed the superintendent, he lies yonder 
 in the road. Now take and kill me, death will be more 
 welcome than slavery." 
 
 How quickly ! Oh, Jack, has your prophecy of the 
 evil fruit that would spring from the new weed of 
 slavery, been verified ! The same sun that looked upon 
 you when you uttered the warning, is still high in the 
 heavens, and yet so quickly has confirmation followed 
 upon the heels of prediction, that the man who heard 
 
86 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 your words only a few hours ago, then in lusty health 
 and vigorous activity, now lies a shapeless mass of 
 human flesh, cold and forever still in the adamantine 
 grasp of death. 
 
 Another, (your old playmate, Jack,) stands yonder 
 behind those iron bars, beneath the disgraceful shadow 
 of a gallows. 
 
 But the saddest picture yet is there beyond the hill, 
 where in the humble hovel, wait and watch two lonely 
 women, in ignorance of the coming crushing sorrow, 
 that shall dash the cup of new-found happiness and 
 hope from their lips. Anxiously they wait to share 
 their great joy with him who has shared their misery. 
 Alas! poor mother. Alas! gentle sister. 
 
 Whispering winds murmuring " Murder, Murder ! " 
 carry the awful tidings to that kind heart in yonder 
 mansion on the hill ! Up Jack, and away ! Speed on 
 the wings of mercy! Let your kind voice tell the ter- 
 rible story, and your loving arms, with tender care, sup- 
 port her, whom you name as " almost foster mother " — 
 tell the old, ever beautiful story of Him who suffered 
 and whom you serve, Jack, brave soldier, when in de- 
 spair the heart-broken sister shall cry in her sorrow, 
 " How long oh, Lord, how long ! " 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 At the Lawton mansion Jack had been busily en- 
 gaged in making preparations for his removal to his 
 new home. He had called to his assistance, his old 
 friend, the family butler, who, in his anxiety that Jack 
 should begin housekeeping in a creditable manner, and 
 determined that the " Parsonage," as he already dubbed 
 the house leased by the young parson, should lack none 
 of the comforts of the later years of the twentieth 
 century, had gathered together a great assortment of 
 household furniture. 
 
 Since early morning, the butler and his assistants 
 had been collecting and carrying to the barn, ready for 
 transportation to the " Parsonage," bedding and linen, 
 carpets, curtains, crockery-ware, cooking utensils, stoves, 
 cutlery and such household fittings as in the nine- 
 teenth century had been easily procurable at the shops 
 of any village in the United States. To the great 
 heap of such articles as named, was added a variety of 
 all kinds of provision, refined sugar, coffee, tea, wheat 
 flour, cured meats and canned goods. 
 
 It was well for young Lawton, that his old friend was 
 so thoughtful and anxious for his material welfare, else 
 
88 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 poor Jack, even though well supplied with money, had 
 been no better provided with the comforts (or as for- 
 merly called, the necessities) of life, than the poorest 
 tenant on the estate, as there was no shop or store 
 nearer than the city of Cincinnati on the one side, or 
 the city of Cleveland on the other, within the district, 
 where such goods could be purchased. 
 
 With the increasing poverty in the agricultural 
 sections of the country, the inability of the farmers to 
 buy any but the very poorest and cheapest articles, had 
 banished from the village shops, everything, except the 
 felt garments and the wooden shoes worn by the men, 
 and the coarse woolen stuff of which the women made 
 their gowns. 
 
 For a country merchant to lay in a stock of 
 goods for sale in the rural districts, similar to the 
 assortment carried by all village storekeepers in the 
 nineteenth century, would have been as absurd, 
 (surrounded as they were by, and catering to the needs 
 of a population of paupers), as it would have been, back 
 a hundred years ago, for a London merchant to open a 
 branch shop in the back country district of Australia, 
 and offer diamonds and laces to the naked, grub-worm 
 eating, black barbarian of that continent. With, as 
 much reason, would the good trader in the latter part 
 of the twentieth century carry in stock, white blank- 
 ets, leather shoes, china, glassware and goods of like 
 nature for the farm-class, as in the nineteenth century, 
 a merchant would have sought to sell pianos to the 
 natives of Central Africa. 
 
 In the few large cities of America, might still be 
 found at the few shops which the diminished trade man- 
 aged to sustain, many of the articles which had been in 
 common use among the mass of the people in the 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 89 
 
 past ; but the demand even in the largest cities, where 
 almost the entire wealth of the country was centralized, 
 had become so exceedingly limited, that, except by 
 reason of some sudden and unexpected need, the land- 
 lords and other wealthy citizens never patronized the 
 domestic shopman, but purchased all of their manufac- 
 tured supplies in England, where a larger variety of- 
 fered greater opportunity for selection. 
 
 This buying in Europe was rendered all the more 
 customary and usual, by reason of the fact that annu- 
 ally, all the people of position and consequence owning 
 property in America, passed many months in their 
 English homes or Continental villas, where they had 
 leisure and opportunity to provide themselves with 
 such articles of luxury or comfort, as they would re- 
 quire during their brief visits to their American estates. 
 
 Of course, having jewelers, tailors, dressmakers, 
 mercers and haberdashers in Europe, whom, with the 
 increased rapidity of transportation across the ocean, 
 they could reach by letter or in person, within four 
 days, it was decidedly more desirable to secure goods 
 for their use there, as in variety, quality and price, the 
 American dealers were unable to compete with their 
 more prosperous competitors. 
 
 With the gradual decay of the prosperity of the far- 
 mers, (consequently of three-fifths of the people of 
 America,) brought about as it had been, by the neces- 
 sity of selling the product of the land in competition 
 with every nation on earth, at the low prices which 
 necessarily followed such competition, and, at the same 
 time, preserving the obligation under which the whole 
 American people rested, to foster and build up the 
 manufacturing interest of the United States, by guard- 
 
90 "uncle sam's" cabins. 
 
 ing it from the competition, which farmers experienced 
 in the sale of the product of their labor, the people 
 engaged or directly dependent upon the fruits of the 
 soil in farming (that is, the three-fifths of the whole 
 population) became so impoverished and reduced in 
 the attempt of the government to guard and protect 
 manufacturing in America, that finally, the farmers, or 
 three-fifths, had no money nor anything else, to ex- 
 change for the articles or goods manufactured in 
 America. Hence the village stores had no demand for 
 anything except the very commonest and cheapest 
 goods, and therefore the country shopkeepers were 
 obliged to cease buying from the merchants in the large 
 towns scattered over the once States of the Union. 
 
 As trade ceased in the villages, gradually the build- 
 ings and stores became tenantless and fell into a 
 decayed and ruinous condition. As the village store- 
 keepers could buy nothing from the larger towns, such 
 as Columbus of the former State of Ohio, and Peoria 
 of the almost forgotten State of Illinois had been, those 
 towns became deserted by all of the wealthy class — 
 landlords, capitalists and the like — who sought naturally 
 the great centres of wealth, where the comforts of life 
 could be obtained, because with the absence of the 
 trade of the village storekeepers and the farmers of the 
 surrounding section, the merchants of the larger towns 
 were no longer able to supply the tastes of those few 
 who had money to spend. 
 
 With the decadence of the farmer-class, the village 
 store, and country village, came the rapid destruction 
 of the prosperity of the larger towns. 
 
 While the metropolitan cities of New York, Chicago 
 and a few others still retained lingering evidences of 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 91 
 
 their departing grandeur, and some opportunities for 
 the gratification of cultivated tastes, still, these once 
 magnificent cities had suffered almost as markedly as 
 villages and towns. 
 
 The laws made for the purpose of fostering the manu- 
 facturing interests in America, had. caused the erection 
 of a large number of factories in or near the metro- 
 politan cities, as at the great centres, better facilities 
 for transportation were offered than elsewhere. 
 
 Naturally the metropolitan cities became the places 
 of residence for the wealthy owners of the factories, 
 who were enabled to indulge their cultivated tastes, in 
 the purchase of comforts and luxuries, which greatly 
 benefitted the traders in the large cities — the large 
 profits accruing to manufacturers in America, resulting 
 from the monopoly held by them in all manufactured 
 articles consumed in the country, furnished immense 
 incomes. 
 
 When, by reason of poverty, the farmers ceased to 
 purchase from the village storekeepers — the village 
 storekeepers could no longer buy from the jobbers in 
 the larger towns of the former States, then the jobbers 
 in the towns no longer bought of the jobbers and 
 manufacturers' agents in the metropolitan cities. 
 
 With no longer a demand from metropolitan job- 
 bers and their own agents, the owners of the factories 
 were obliged to suspend operations, and cease manu- 
 facturing goods which no longer had a sale. 
 
 Thus the operation of the very laws, in the making 
 of which, the owners of factories had put forth their 
 most strenuous efforts, was to kill the goose which laid 
 the golden eggs. 
 
 True, many men of intelligence engaged in manu- 
 
cj2 '-UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 facturing goods in America, had, at the time of the 
 enactment of the laws which imposed a tribute upon 
 the agriculturists of the country for the benefit of the 
 manufacturers, recognized the disastrous tendency of 
 such laws, but upon every agitation for the repeal of 
 the prosperity-killing legislation, they had zealously 
 opposed reformation, hoping either to secure enough 
 in shape of salvage out of the wreck of the Ship of 
 State and the destruction of its crew of producers, from 
 the soil, to insure their own safety on that desert 
 island of ruin towards which, the good ship was rapidly 
 drifting — or else, in the selfishness of their souls, they 
 had said in the language of a profligate French king: 
 " It will last my time." 
 
 A few men (and for the honor of the American name, 
 be it said the number was exceedingly small), seeing the 
 coming degradation to serfdom of the farmers, had pro- 
 claimed in their pride of wealth and power : " A toiler 
 in the earth is of the earth, earthy, and deserves no 
 better than the dirt upon which we tread and spit." 
 
 The linked chain of disaster reached at last the 
 manufacturers and the large cities, in which, their 
 factories were located, and where they had residences, 
 for, with the stoppages of the large profits from the 
 sale of the products of factories, came the end of the 
 tremendous incomes, for which, America was famous in 
 the latter part of the nineteenth century. 
 
 A great part of these large incomes had been used 
 to gratify all kinds of luxurious and expensive tastes, 
 " fads" and artificial needs — in the gratification of 
 which, a host of non-producers had been supported in 
 the metropolitan cities, where magnificent structures 
 raised their imposing grandeur to the sky, occupied by 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 93 
 
 dealers in all manner of extravagant and luxurious 
 wares, beside which, the stock of the panderers to the 
 wildly dissolute habits and tastes of the the nobles of 
 Roman Empire just prior to the fall of that nation, 
 would have seemed insignificant. 
 
 Grand edifices, were seen in every direction, in the 
 great cities, in which were found the palatial apartments 
 of the manicure, chiropodist, riding-master, portrait 
 painter, musician, dancing-master, mesmerist, and a host 
 of men and women engaged in all imaginable useless 
 and non-productive occupations. They were supported 
 by the money derived from the profits made upon the 
 home consumption of guarded manufactured goods, 
 large sums of money being spent by the fortunate 
 possessors of the immense incomes resulting annually 
 from monopolies, in their efforts to dispel the distress- 
 ing idleness and ennui which oppressed them. 
 
 When, however, the goose (the farmer) was killed 
 that laid the golden eggs — the orange sucked dry and 
 only the skin remained — the large incomes ceased to 
 materialize, the " magnificent structures and grand edi- 
 fices lost their tenants for lack of patronage, resulting in 
 lack of money, with which to pay rent. Hence in the 
 metropolitan cities, vacant sky piercing buildings reared 
 their heads as monuments only, of the blindness of the 
 promoters, of the poverty of the nation. 
 
 With the end of the demand for manufactured 
 goods from the poverty-stricken, non-manufacturing, un- 
 guarded agriculturists, came the closing of the factories, 
 and armies of unemployed mechanics, mill operators 
 artisans and laborers were let loose upon the commu- 
 nity. 
 
 This, (strange as it now appears), was the most 
 
94 " UNCLE SAM S " ( A.BINS. 
 
 astonishing and unexpected result of the laws made, 
 for the benefit of the American laborers, mechanics 
 and artisans — the very men cast out of work by the 
 poverty of the farm-class. The now unemployed labor- 
 ers and mechanics, in absolute misery, distress and 
 destitution, unfit to produce anything from the soil 
 (not having any experience in farm life,) were more 
 amazed than any other class of sufferers at realizing 
 that the laws, to maintain which, they had been, so 
 persistently and selfishly, voting and working, had 
 resulted in killing the only customer or purchaser, they 
 had for the products of their labor. 
 
 The laws which had secured them the monopoly of 
 that one customer's trade and eventually killed even that 
 one, had also absolutely prevented the possibility of their 
 securing any but the one customer — -because by raising 
 the price of every material or article used by laborers, 
 mechanics and artisans, in the manufacture of the prod- 
 ucts of their labor, to prevent farmers from buying 
 from any other laborers, mechanics and artisans — they 
 had so burdened with increased cost everything 
 they produced, that they could not compete in the 
 sale of manufactured goods with the laborers, mechan- 
 ics and artisans of other nations. 
 
 The American laborers and mechanics were 
 obliged to pay such enormous prices for the supplies 
 used by themselves, and such exorbitant rents for their 
 homes — in their struggle to keep beyond the reach of 
 the people of America, the supplies offered by the me- 
 chanics and laborers of other countries — that the Amer- 
 ican mechanics were unable to work for the low wages 
 of European workmen — they were forced to demand 
 high wages to be able to live in America. But, even 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 95 
 
 during the time of the gradually bleeding to death of 
 the American farmers, when the laborers and mechan- 
 ics obtained the high wages, they were unable to save 
 anything. It all had to be returned to landlords and 
 manufacturers in form of rents and profits on manu- 
 factured supplies. 
 
 When the demand from the American agriculturists 
 ceased — the process of bleeding having finally ex- 
 hausted all the blood of the subject, his very skeleton 
 being denuded of every atom of factory-sustaining 
 flesh — then the laborers and mechanics in their frantic 
 and unthinking efforts, like a drowning man grasping 
 at a straw, sought to seize the trade in manufactured 
 goods of the English laborers and mechanics, who 
 were busy, prosperous and happy, making goods for 
 the South American, African and Asiatic markets. 
 
 Then were the American laborers and mechanics con- 
 fronted with the practical absurdity and fallacy of the 
 theory upon which they had hoped to build their own 
 selfish prosperity, — the Englishmen were amused and 
 ignored their puerile attempts at competition in other 
 than the markets of the United States — the cost to the 
 American to produce anything manufactured was so 
 great that it was out of the question to compete with 
 the English. 
 
 From the coal to heat the furnace in the factory to 
 the sugar in the cup of coffee at breakfast, every item 
 of cost in manufacturing and living, was dearer in the 
 United States. In killing, bleeding to death by mo- 
 nopolies, their one class of customers — the American 
 farmers — the laborers and mechanics saw, when at 
 last, idle, homeless and starving, and too late — that 
 they had destroyed themselves, for they had created a 
 
Q6 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 condition that prevented the securing of any other 
 purchasers for the product of their labor. 
 
 By reason of this idleness and poverty of the la- 
 borers and mechanics, vast numbers of tenement 
 houses, buildings and shops, occupied and supported in 
 the metropolitan cities by the laborers and mechanics, 
 were now vacant and in ruins, deserted by all save 
 half starved rats and other vermin. Large districts of 
 New York city, Chicago and other once splendid Amer- 
 ican cities were now as silent and deserted as grave- 
 yards, affording only dens for tramps, robbers and 
 night-prowlers. 
 
 The depreciation and total loss of value in such real 
 estate, the collapse of the manufacturing interests in 
 the United States, the disappearance of capital in- 
 vested in factories, and industrial enterprises, the al- 
 most total abandonment of many railroads, and the 
 general termination of business and prosperity in 
 America, together with the ever-increasing concen- 
 tration of the wealth remaining, into fewer hands, by 
 reason of the (now recognized by law) Family Com- 
 pact, had so reduced the ranks of possible purchasers 
 of anything, but the most coarse and crude articles of 
 convenience and sustenance, that even in the large 
 American cities, it would have been a difficult matter, 
 as we have said before, — to obtain a collection of 
 useful and luxurious articles, such as the Proprietor's 
 butler had gathered for Jack's use in his future resi- 
 dence. 
 
 As the young clergyman inspected the vast mass of 
 goods with which the barn floor was covered, his face 
 fairly beamed with delightful anticipation of the pleas- 
 ure, it would afford Mary and her mother to be sur- 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 97 
 
 rounded by so many comforts. The old butler stood 
 by, enjoying the triumph of his efforts, in seeing the 
 happiness of the favorite son of the Lawton family, 
 as Jack — in the exuberance of the boyish spirit which 
 he had not outgrown, and which would break forth in 
 his intercourse with his old friends of boyhood days — 
 threw his arms around the thoroughly delighted old 
 man, — and hugging him in his bear-like embrace, 
 giving many roughly affectionate pats upon the old 
 fellow's back, exclaimed 
 
 " Bless my soul ! You old jewel of a provider ! I 
 won't require to send to England for anything in ten 
 years. But, you dear old rascal, I believe that you 
 have cleared the mansion of everything in it. Have 
 you left my father and Henry anything to eat, drink, 
 wear or sleep upon, in the house ? " 
 
 With many jolly explosions of laughter, in which 
 Jack joined with the hearty happiness of a schoolboy, 
 the old butler protested his honesty, and vowed that 
 he had exercised great moderation, as at one time, he 
 had seriously contemplated removing the highly prized 
 and exclusive dressing-case of the Proprietor himself, 
 and that he really deserved great credit for the for- 
 bearance he had exhibited in leaving the family plate 
 and portraits in the mansion. 
 
 While thus engaged in examining his stores and 
 joking with the old servant who had trotted him on 
 his knee, many a journey to " Banbury Cross," when 
 he was a baby, Jack caught the sound of horse's hoofs 
 coming at a furious pace down the road. Both he 
 and the butler ran out of the barn, and saw dashing up 
 the avenue to the front door of the mansion, a mounted 
 soldier, riding at the top speed of his horse. 
 
98 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 Jack hurried to meet him, as he knew, unless 
 something very unusual had happened, the command- 
 ing officer of the troops in the district would not have 
 disturbed in such an unceremonious manner, the tran- 
 quillity of the home of the great Proprietor. As the 
 soldier dashed up to the door and dismounted, Jack 
 reached his side and asked : 
 
 " What is the matter? Why such haste ? " 
 
 The trooper, taking an envelope from his pocket, said 
 that he was ordered to deliver it as quickly as his horse 
 could carry him, to the Proprietor. The butler by 
 this time having reached Jack's side, said to the sol- 
 dier, whom he had met before, that he would conduct 
 him to the Proprietor, and as they mounted the stairs, 
 followed by the young clergyman, the old man added 
 — " the gentleman who asked the reason of so much 
 haste, is a son of the Proprietor." 
 
 The trooper, half way up the steps, turned and said 
 to Jack : 
 
 " I beg your pardon, sir. I can tell you this much 
 without disobeying my order. The superintendent 
 has been murdered and we have his murderer locked 
 up. His name is Hollister and he is one " 
 
 Jack had not waited for the balance of the messen- 
 ger's news. With the exclamation — " Merciful God, — 
 help Mollie ! " he sprang down the stairs in one leap, and 
 as he vaulted into the saddle just left by the bearer of 
 the ill tidings, he called out to the surprised butler: 
 " Jackson, give the soldier my horse!" Driving his 
 heels into the sides of the soldier's steed, he rode down 
 the avenue at racing speed. 
 
 The trooper, struck dumb for a moment by this sud- 
 den action, at last recovered sufficiently to say : " Well, 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 99 
 
 that's cool ! Running away with my horse and getting 
 me into a lot of trouble at headquarters." 
 
 Jackson watched in silence the fast disappearing 
 steed and rider, until he saw them turn down the road 
 toward the cabin where lived Mary Hollister ; then he 
 said half aloud, as if uttering what he had been think- 
 ing: "Yes, I knew it," and addressing the mili- 
 tary figure beside him, said : " My friend, the man who 
 took your horse is the Reverend Jack Lawton, the best 
 and truest man on earth. The man who killed the su- 
 perintendent is an old playmate of his when he was a 
 boy, and that noble fellow seized your horse, to hurry 
 to the widowed mother and sister of Hollister, to pre- 
 vent the news of their trouble coming unkindly and 
 harshly to them. Such a man is not apt to let you suffer 
 for his act." 
 
 The soldier looked at old Johnson for a moment and 
 said : " I'm willing to take my chances on him, old fel- 
 low, he is welcome to the horse. By Jove ! how he 
 does ride ! He would have made a great cavalry sol- 
 dier." 
 
 Yes. — Man of the uniform, in time of war, Jack 
 Lawton would have proven himself a grand soldier, for 
 he never would have said " Go " where, he was unwilling 
 to lead — where blows were the thickest, there would 
 have been his place in war — as now where trouble and 
 sorrow are greatest, as a soldier of the Cross, he deems 
 that, his post of duty. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 AFTER racing along for a mile or two, Jack pulled his 
 horse down to a gentle trot, and at last, when in sight 
 of the hovel occupied by the Hollisters, to a walk, and 
 thus approached the doorway, where he was welcomed 
 by Mary and her mother, their happiness at the pros- 
 pect of an early and permanent removal to their old 
 home, marred only by the long unexplained absence 
 of George. 
 
 Jack Lawton was probably the poorest actor on the 
 face of the earth, and his woeful failure in trying to 
 play the hypocritical part, in his cheerful greeting of 
 Mary and Mrs. Hollister, was apparent at once to both 
 
 women. 
 
 As he entered the poor place and looked around 
 at the miserable surroundings of the women, and 
 thought of the years of hopelessness and misery 
 they had already endured, and then of what additional 
 trials were in the future for them, he was unable to sup- 
 press the groan that arose from his heart to his lips. He 
 still held the hand that Mrs. Hollister had given him 
 when he dismounted at the door. Picking up one of the 
 stools he placed it close to another and said : 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. IOI 
 
 " Sit down, my kind old friend, I want to sit close 
 beside you ; Mollie, come over and join us. I feel 
 rather blue to-day and I want to do as we used to 
 when we were little chaps and in trouble — all get close 
 around your mother's knee for comfort and support." 
 
 Mary Hollister — to whom, as a child, any of Jack's 
 most trivial troubles were really immense affairs, had 
 now that she was a woman, lost none of the keen sym- 
 pathy for the man, which she had felt as a child, for 
 the boy, believing that anything that could trouble 
 him was of a most serious nature — came quickly and 
 seated herself close to her mother. 
 
 Mrs. Hollister, notwithstanding a feeling of appre- 
 hension at Jack's sober manner, could not restrain the 
 smile which lighted up her poor wan face, as she re- 
 called the rosy boy, who came with some bruise or cut, 
 clamoring for help to her, now transformed into the 
 splendid man holding her hand and repeating the sen- 
 timent of the little motherless fellow years ago. 
 
 "You know," said Jack, " when I was a little shaver, 
 I used to call you ' Mother, my dear,' because I heard 
 George and Mollie do so, and you treated me just as 
 you did them, so that I think I shall resume my old 
 name for you, dear mother, as I find myself a good 
 deal of a boy still, and I want you to love me just the 
 same as you did when I was really a boy." 
 
 " Well, Jack," said Mrs. Hollister, " I do love you 
 as one of my own children, and I am proud and happy 
 to have you say that time has not diminished your af- 
 fection for me. God knows how grateful I am for 
 your great kindness, my dear boy, and how I pray that 
 He will bless you." 
 
 " Mother," said Jack, interrupting the speaker, 
 
102 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 " when I was a small boy, you taught me my prayers, 
 along with George and Mollie ; feeling as I do to-day, 
 I want you to hear me say prayers again, now that I 
 am a man, and the God to whom my prayers will be 
 addressed, knows how heartfelt they are." 
 
 The color had gradually left Mary's face, as she lis- 
 tened and looked at Jack's earnest eyes, until it had 
 become as white as the bosom of a swan, when she 
 said, slipping from the stool upon which she was seated, 
 to her knees : 
 
 " Yes, mother, let us join Mr. Jack once again, as of 
 old, in addressing the Throne of God." 
 
 The most beautiful music ever heard, is the music of 
 a strong, melodious, masculine voice addressing the Al- 
 mighty Maker of mankind, and Jack Lawton's voice 
 was fashioned to fit the man, each tone filled as it was 
 with the deep devotion of his soul. His prayer to the 
 God of all mercies, rang out in sonorous notes, and 
 echoed in the dimly lighted hovel, surpassing the swell- 
 ing sound of the grandest organ in the vaulted dome 
 of the greatest cathedral. 
 
 The words of his prayer were taught by no book, 
 nor ruled by any form ; his heart was his prayer-book, 
 and sympathy alone controlled each figure of speech. 
 He prayed for strength for all in trouble. He pleaded 
 for mercy for those who had suffered much, and long. 
 Oh, Jack ! God heard you, for he softened the blow that 
 must fall upon those, for whom you pray, by putting 
 words into your mouth which prepared them for the 
 coming stroke. 
 
 And when at last the prayer was ended, and the women 
 arose with white and tear-stained faces, and the trem- 
 bling mother asks, — " What is it that George has done ? " 
 
'•UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. I03 
 
 — it was that same ever-watchful God, dear Jack, who 
 taught you how to help that heartbroken mother to 
 sustain the heavy burden of calamity placed upon her. 
 You whispered words of consolation, hope and faith in 
 the goodness of God to her. Your arms supported her 
 when, at last, overburdened nature succumbed, and she 
 would have fallen to the earthen floor of the cabin. 
 
 Jack carried Mrs. Hollister to the rude shelf which 
 she had used as a bed, and with the assistance of the 
 weeping Mary, revived her from the deathlike swoon 
 into which she had fallen. While thus engaged, the 
 tramp of horses was heard by them, and a heavy blow 
 upon the door, announced a visitor of peremptory char- 
 acter. Jack, upon opening the door, found himself in 
 the presence of an officer and a file of soldiers. The 
 officer, seeing a clergyman, and evidently a gentle- 
 man, said : 
 
 " I am ordered to search this hovel, sir, to find if 
 there exists any evidence of a plot for an insurrection. 
 The killing of the superintendent has aroused a suspi- 
 cion in the minds of those in authority that the mur- 
 der was only one step in a plot, concerning which, evi- 
 dence could be found by an examination of this hut." 
 
 Jack, going out to the officer, said : " Lieutenant, (for 
 that I judge to be your rank,) that you are a gentleman I 
 know from your manner ; then, I wish, as one gentleman 
 addressing himself to another, to beg a favor. My name 
 is John Lawton. I am the youngest son of the Proprie- 
 tor, and am a clergyman. The man who killed Johnson 
 was my old playmate ; the women in this cabin are my 
 dearest friends ; the mother of Hollister lies, I fear, 
 dying, as the result of this terrible act of her son. 
 To intrude now, upon the suffering woman by search- 
 
104 "UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 
 
 ing the premises, would probably mean death for her. 
 Will you, as a favor, defer this search until to-morrow 
 morning, leaving a guard to see that nothing is re- 
 moved, except the two women and their clothing, 
 these I desire to take to my own house, but, with 
 whom, I pledge my sacred word of honor, nothing 
 shall leave the house that would in any way, be con- 
 nected with a plot? " 
 
 " Well," replied the officer, after some hesitation, 
 " while my orders were to examine into the matter and, 
 make a thorough investigation, I think I can oblige 
 you, Mr. Lawton," saying which, he gave the necessary 
 orders, and leaving one man as a guard, rode away with 
 his detachment. 
 
 Jack, seeing a tenant's lad passing along the road, 
 called to him, and dispatched a note to Jackson, the old 
 butler, asking him to harness a team to a carriage 
 and drive it himself to the hut of the Hollisters. While 
 Jack waited for the coming of the carriage, he instructed 
 Mary to get all of the things which she desired to carry 
 to their new home ready, and explained to her the 
 necessity for removing her mother. 
 
 When the carriage arrived it was late in the night, 
 but so anxious was Jack that Mrs. Hollister should be 
 taken away from the scene of so much misery to her, 
 that he insisted upon an instant moving to the house 
 of which he held the lease. With Jackson's assistance 
 the hut was soon stripped of all that would be of use to 
 Mary and her mother, and Mrs. Hollister placed in the 
 carriage with Mary, Jack preceding them, riding the 
 horse he had seized, as related. 
 
 When morning came it found Mrs. Hollister resting 
 in her old room, in the old home, endeared to her by 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. I05 
 
 memories of the past. Mary seemed to soar upon the 
 wings of each new sorrow to greater heights of self- 
 sacrifice and unselfishness. For her mother's sake, she 
 had crushed down her own heartache and grief, and 
 was intent only upon the relief and comfort of her 
 almost dying parent. 
 
 Jack Lawton, with the old butler helping him, col- 
 lected all of the papers and property of Johnson, the 
 dead superintendent, and stored them away in one 
 room, out of the sight of the women, to whom any- 
 thing belonging to the dead man, would recall the 
 painful fact of the tragedy by which, they had been 
 hurled from the pinnacle of their newly found happi- 
 ness to the depths of despair. 
 
 ■& 'Jf •$%■ 7T ■& "X" 
 
 When the tenants first learned of the murder of the 
 superintendent by George Hollister, the fear of being 
 connected in some manner with a crime, which they 
 knew that the policy of the landed Proprietors all over 
 the land, would follow with condign punishment, kept 
 them away from the poor mother and sister ; however, 
 the hearts of the tenants were filled with that sym- 
 pathy that is ever found among the poor, for the 
 suffering and sorrow of those among them in the hour 
 of affliction. 
 
 When the Rossmores heard, as they did during 
 the night, that Jack Lawton, the Proprietor's own 
 son, had not deserted the family of the accused, but 
 like a champion of the weak in the days of chivalry, 
 offered the protection of his name, influence and home 
 to the forlorn women, they hastened to express to the 
 sufferers their sympathy, and with the first rays of the 
 morning sun, went to the " Parsonage " to offer any 
 assistance in their power. 
 
io6 "UNcle sam's" cabins. 
 
 Rossmore and his wife were both old acquaintances 
 of Jack's and he gave them a hearty welcome, ex- 
 plaining the necessity of his at once seeing George 
 Hollister, and the commander of the Federal 
 soldiers in the district, to explain the seizure of the 
 trooper's horse, and how reluctant he had been to 
 leave the helpless women alone and unprotected, as 
 he had sent Jackson to the mansion to hurry the tran- 
 sportation of the property selected by the good old 
 servant for Jack's use in the home, he had secured. 
 Rossmore and his wife gladly volunteered to stay and 
 take charge of the house, doing such things as the cir- 
 cumstances suggested during Jack's absence, who, as 
 he mounted the cavalryman's steed, said : 
 
 " Rossmore, I will stand between you and harm, in 
 anything you may do to prevent rude intrusion upon 
 the sorrow of those I leave in your care." 
 
 When Jack arrived at the barracks, he gave his name, 
 and urged the officer of the guard to take his card at 
 once to the commandant of the post, who promptly 
 requested him to join the officers in the mess-room. 
 Jack explained the capture of the soldier's horse, exon- 
 erating the man from all blame in the matter. His par- 
 don was easily obtained, as the Proprietor of a District 
 was of such a commanding position in the administra- 
 tion of the now thoroughly centralized Federal govern- 
 ment, that Federal army officers would become blind 
 to almost any infraction of discipline, or even law, to 
 win a claim upon the favorable consideration of a pow- 
 erful Proprietor, and, as the commandant looked over 
 Jack's gigantic proportions, he said with a smile : 
 
 " My orderly was unarmed and I don't see how he 
 could have prevented your talcing his horse, anyhow." 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. IO/ 
 
 Lawton then told how the chief object of his visit 
 was to see the prisoner, relating to the group of offi- 
 cers ; how as boys, he and the accused man had lived 
 almost as brothers, and his deep and affectionate 
 interest in the prisoner's fate. Permission was readily 
 granted, accompanied though by the remark : " Your 
 brother, Mr. Lawton, does not seem to share your 
 kindly sentiments, as he has urged me in a manner I 
 cannot ignore, to investigate and sift this crime to its 
 origin — believing, as he writes me, that some more 
 powerful influence is at work to arouse the indignation 
 and resentment of the tenantry against those placed 
 above them, than mere personal hatred, which is the 
 outward cause of this murder." 
 
 Jack, full of wonder at the position taken by his 
 brother, walked thoughtfully towards the iron cage, 
 wherein was confined the poor remnant of the boy, 
 with whom he had romped in the sunshine on the hills 
 of Ohio, when in the thoughtless years of youth, they 
 roamed together through woods and fields. 
 
 As Jack neared the iron bars of the cell in which, he 
 knew Hollister was held, he was horrified to see lean- 
 ing upon the door of the cell, the man he was seeking, 
 wildly gesticulating, and talking excitedly to himself. 
 Lawton said to the guard that accompanied him : 
 " Friend, in the name of God, unlock the door and let 
 me get near enough to my old playmate to put my 
 hand on him." 
 
 " You had better be careful, sir," said the soldier 
 unlocking the door. Jack only gave him one glance of 
 his fearless eyes, and entered the cell, closing the door 
 with a clangor as the bolts shot back into their fasten- 
 ings. Then grasping Hollister by both hands and 
 
I08 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 looking him intently in the eyes, he said : " George, 
 old chum, it's Jack come to talk with you — to hear all 
 about your trouble, and help you as we used always to 
 help each other." 
 
 The fast flying reason of the wreck of manhood, 
 whose hand, Jack held in friendly grasp, seemed to 
 pause and falter in its flight for an instant, and the rays of 
 recollection beamed from his haggard eyes as he said ; 
 " Yes, Jack, we always helped each other," and then 
 the wandering spirit of reason started on a mad flight 
 of fancy, and he whispered, dragging Jack toward the 
 narrow barred window : " Come, Jack, let us climb out. 
 We can chase the rabbits — come, the sun is shining! 
 Oh, hurry, Jack, push me up." 
 
 Great God ! Of all the sights horrible to the eyes of 
 affection, the most superlative is the madness of a 
 loved one. Spare thy servant, that, oh, Master ! 
 
 The young minister, with the accent of agonizing 
 sobs sounding in each tone of his voice, grasped the 
 now thoroughly insane man around the body, and 
 almost carrying him to the stone slab which served 
 as a bed for occupants of the cell, said, " George, 
 be quiet, — softly, — so, — we will go directly. Tell me 
 all the trouble for mother's sake,— for Mollie, our 
 baby " 
 
 With the screech of a wounded tiger, Hollister, at the 
 mention of Mary's name, tore himself away from the 
 strong grasp of the athletic clergyman, hurling him 
 back against the wall, with the strength born of mad- 
 ness, yelling in a fearful voice : " Damn him. He said 
 Mollie was Lawton's mistress ! " and rushing wildly 
 against the iron bars, careless of the blood which ran 
 over his face from the wounds inflicted by his heedless 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. IOQ 
 
 plunges against the door, he screamed : " Where is he ? 
 — where is the club ? I am an American — I am a free 
 man ! " 
 
 Jack sprang upon him and exerting all the power of 
 his mighty frame, held the maniac helpless in his arms. 
 While thus locked close together, poor George almost 
 fainting after the furious fit of madness, gasping for 
 breath, exhausted, lying on the bosom of the man — who 
 suffering in sympathy with kindly restraining force — 
 held him, said, as if suddenly a ray of light had broken 
 through the clouds that darkened his mind : 
 
 "Your name is Lawton. God's curse upon you!" 
 and fastened his teeth in the flesh of Jack's neck. 
 With a quick motion, Jack jerked himself away from 
 the grip of the madman's teeth, and with the blood 
 from the wound upon his neck pouring down upon 
 them both, said with the expression of Him, who cen. 
 turies before in far Palestine had prayed — " God for- 
 give them for they know not what they do," — " George, 
 my friend, my playfellow, do you want to hurt me ? 
 My name is Jack, your partner Jack," and with soothing 
 words sought to calm the excitement of the now help- 
 less maniac whom he at last lulled to sleep. 
 
 Oh ! wandering spirits of the departed citizens of the 
 United States, who lived and made laws one hundred 
 years ago — to degrade and impoverish future genera- 
 tions of your descendants, hover over this cell of in- 
 sanity and Christianity ! 
 
 Gaze ! spirits of long forgotten Hollisters, upon the 
 ruin wrought by your infatuation with mistaken 
 ideas of patriotism and transient prosperity ! Spir- 
 its of that host of laborers and mechanics, starved and 
 dead, passing over ruined factories and workshops 
 
HO "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 from Maine to Texas, pause and contemplate this 
 scene ! 
 
 And, oh, ye spirits of the humble progenitors of the 
 race of Proprietors and Sugar Kings, rejoice that in 
 the hour of thy great need you may point to this 
 one descendant of your name and blood, and proclaim 
 this fearless, duty-loving example of the Christian 
 clergyman, in the divine words of the Creator, " My son 
 in whom I am well pleased " ! 
 
 George Hollister, worn out by the strain which his 
 insanity had caused upon his physical strength, fell 
 into a swoon-like sleep. Jack, with gentle care, placed 
 him upon the hard prison couch, arranging the meagre 
 bedding as best he could, for the comfort of the 
 pitiable sleeper, hurried out of the barracks, and has- 
 tened to the Lawton mansion, much disturbed by the 
 information that his brother Henry was interested in 
 the punishment of Hollister, and the investigation of a 
 suspected revolt of the laboring people. 
 
 When Jack entered the library, where he was told 
 by Jackson he would find his father, his brother Henry 
 and Weaving the lawyer, Jack, was shocked by the ap- 
 pearance of his father, who met him as he entered 
 the room. It was evident that the sudden and vio- 
 lent death of Johnson, or some other powerful cause 
 had created the change so noticeable in his father. 
 
 As the Proprietor grasped his younger son's hand, 
 he said : " Jack, I am glad that you have come. Some- 
 how, I have been so upset by this sudden taking off of 
 a man in full health, so closely connected with my 
 affairs, that I am feeling quite weak and ill, and the 
 sight of your great health and strength is absolutely a 
 tonic." This was such a new and unexpected recep- 
 
''UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. Ill 
 
 tion from his father that Jack was too much disconcerted 
 to be able to enter into the subject of Henry's resent- 
 ment, which had occupied his thoughts on the way to 
 the mansion. Sitting down by his father's side, he 
 said, with a newly discovered tenderness for his father 
 filling his heart : 
 
 " I am glad that my superabundance of size and 
 strength has, at last, been found of benefit to some 
 one, and especially to you, sir. I think, sometimes, 
 that I was intended for a blacksmith." 
 
 For a few minutes the men sat talking about trivial 
 affairs, seemingly by common consent, avoiding any re- 
 ference to the crime which all knew, was filling the minds 
 of all present. When luncheon was announced, the Pro- 
 prietor in such a pointed manner selected Jack's arm 
 to lean upon, as they went toward the dining-room, 
 that Henry Lawton with a sneer, turned to Weaving 
 and said : " It is certainly an advantage to possess the 
 strength of a blacksmith, even when accompanied with 
 the tastes of a rural clown." 
 
 After the meal was finished, which was partaken of 
 in silence, the Proprietor expressed the desire to lie 
 down, as he was suddenly oppressed by some trouble 
 in the region of his heart, and added, " Jack, my son, 
 help me up-stairs to my room," and leaning on the 
 stalwart arm of his much neglected younger son, Mr. 
 Lawton left the room, followed by the astonished look 
 of the lawyer, who had been accustomed to see Henry 
 ever preferred by the father of the two men. 
 
 When Mr. Lawton reached his chamber, he cast 
 himself upon his bed, and still holding Jack's hand, 
 which he had clasped, drew him down into a chair by 
 the bedside, saying : 
 
112 "UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 
 
 "Jack, my boy! lam really feeling quite ill and 
 have sent to the barracks for the surgeon. Ever since 
 I heard of the terrible crime of that Hollister boy, I 
 have been nervous and afflicted with a painful sensa- 
 tion around my heart. It seems but yesterday that I 
 was a young man, and knew the father of the mur- 
 derer, as a tenant of my father. At that time, the ten- 
 ants had not arrived at the depths of poverty to which 
 they have since fallen, I have been thinking of 
 what you said the other morning, my son, since the 
 commission of this murder, and I am not so clear that 
 if I live, I will not attempt the institution of a change 
 in the laws by which serfdom is forced upon the farm- 
 class. Anyhow, I shall defer the enslavement of my 
 tenants, and give orders to have seed, and supplies issued 
 to them, as soon as I appoint a new superintendent." 
 
 To Jack's reply of " God will bless you sir! It will 
 be with happiness that I can announce the good news 
 to your tenants. I am proud to call myself your son, 
 sir," his father with a suspicious moisture in his eyes, 
 said : " How like his mother ! " and turning his face 
 toward the wall, added, " Leave me, Jack. I will try 
 and get some sleep, as I was awake all of last night." 
 
 When Jack returned to the dining-room, thinking to 
 find Henry and obtain some explanation of his interest 
 in the murder of Johnson, he ascertained that his 
 brother and Weaving had gone with the carriage to 
 the barracks, as they had expressed a wish to confer 
 with the commandant of the post. 
 
 Jack ordered his horse and rode away to the " Parso- 
 nage " for the purpose of arranging the goods selected 
 by Jackson for use by him, in making his home com- 
 fortable, and which had been sent away from the barn 
 
" UNCLE SAMS CABINS. I 1 3 
 
 at the mansion, early in the morning by the faithful 
 butler, and were by this time unloaded at the " Par- 
 sonage." 
 
 Rossmore and his wife had taken charge of every- 
 thing in the absence of Jack, and he found much to his 
 satisfaction, that all traces of the late occupant of the 
 house had vanished, that the furniture and stores 
 sent from the mansion had been properly arranged in 
 the house, giving: to it an air of cheerfulness and com- 
 fort, which, in his then, almost exhausted, condition 
 from loss of sleep, excitement and the exercise of the 
 past twenty-four hours, was exceedingly welcome. 
 
 Mrs. Hollister had fallen into a fitful, feverish sleep, 
 but Mary came to him to learn what he had found out 
 concerning the crime of which her brother was accused. 
 Jack told her that he had been to see George at the 
 barracks, but as George was ill, he had not pressed for 
 a statement from him with regard to the crime for which 
 he was arrested ; that he had been to the mansion to 
 see his father, and had found him also far from well ; that 
 from all he had seen and heard, he believed that 
 George could not be held accountable for the killing 
 of Johnson ; that he had written to a lawyer in Cleve- 
 land, engaging him to defend George; and that he was 
 convinced, a trial would result in the speedy acquittal 
 of her brother. 
 
 Jack would not tell Mary of the mental wreck of her 
 brother, and that it was upon this defense he relied to 
 secure an acquittal, deeming it better for the effects of 
 the great shock already received, to wear away before 
 presenting the sorrowful reason for his faith, in the 
 early discharge of the prisoner. 
 
 Mary, greatly encouraged by Jack's confident man 
 
114 "UNCLE SAMS CABIN'S. 
 
 ner, took his hand and raised it to her lips, saying : 
 " Jack, how good you are ! " As she lifted her eyes, 
 she saw the strips of court-plaster with which the sur- 
 geon at the barracks had covered the wound made by 
 teeth of the poor madman, George, upon Jack's neck. 
 The eyes of affection and gratitude had quickly discov- 
 ered that which had escaped entirely the notice of any- 
 one, except old Jackson, at the Mansion. In a star- 
 tled voice, Mary exclaimed : 
 
 '• Why, Mr. Jack, you are wounded, hurt. How did 
 it happen ?" 
 
 The young man quickly turned his head to conceal 
 the wound, saying, with a blush mantling his cheek : 
 " Oh ! it is a mere scratch made by the limb of a tree as 
 I rode to the barracks." 
 
 What! A lie, Jack, and you a clergyman! Yes! 
 and such lies need call no blush of shame to your hon- 
 est face, Jack, for of such lies are made golden keys to 
 open the gates of heaven, where bright recording an- 
 gels smile to enter in the Book of Fate such lies. Lies 
 like thine, Jack, make easier stepping-stones to mount 
 to eternal happiness than many cold, hard, heartless, 
 cruel truths. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 WHEN Henry Lavvton and Weaving, accompanied by 
 the surgeon from the barracks, arrived at the mansion, 
 Henry summoned his father's valet, and instructed him 
 to inform his master of their arrival. The valet sug- 
 gested that his master was apparently asleep, and that 
 he hesitated to arouse him, but receiving a peremptory 
 command to do so, immediately, left the apartment, 
 but hastily returned, with white and trembling lips, 
 saying he was unable to awaken the proprietor, and 
 that he believed his master was — dead. 
 
 Unfortunately for the tenants of the District of 
 Ohio, the fears of the valet proved well founded, as 
 Henry Lawton, Weaving and the surgeon ascertained, 
 when they gathered around the bed, where lay the 
 body of the man who, so recently had promised Jack, 
 to delay, or possibly entirely abandon the idea of 
 enslaving his fellow-countrymen. 
 
 John Lawton had died from what the surgeon pro- 
 nounced, heart failure. 
 
 By operation of the "Law of Family Compact," 
 Henry Lawton, the eldest son, now became possessed of 
 all the real, and personal property of the estate, as well as 
 
Il6 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 by succession, Proprietor of the District of Ohio. Jack- 
 son the butler, was immediately summoned and com- 
 manded by Henry to find his brother Jack, and bring 
 him to the mansion. At the same time, messengers 
 were dispatched to Cleveland, and New York, to secure 
 the attendance of embalmers and undertakers, and 
 make the customary preparation for the entombment 
 of a great Proprietor, in the Westminster of America — 
 Trinity Church, in New York city. 
 
 Weaving, as the representative of the family, left 
 immediately for Washington city, to place before the 
 executive of the government, a statement of the death 
 of the old Proprietor, and to obtain recognition of the 
 succession to office of his eldest son, Henry. 
 
 Since the decay of trade and commercial prosperity, 
 resulting from the pauperism of the agricultural class, 
 it had proven unnecessary, and useless expenditure 
 of money, for the Federal government to maintain reg- 
 ular mail service, hence post-offices had been abandoned 
 in all places, except the few large cities, where the cor- 
 respondence and business of the wealthy landlords 
 still sufficed to partially sustain postal facilities. 
 
 Therefore, Henry Lawton had been obliged to send 
 couriers to Cleveland and New York, with instructions 
 for the funeral arrangements, as well as his special mes- 
 senger, Mr. Weaving, to the Federal government, and 
 until the arrival of surgeons from the metropolis, the new 
 Proprietor was obliged to rest satisfied with the opinion 
 of the surgeon of the troops on duty in the section, with 
 regard to the cause of his father's death, as long since, the 
 country doctor had disappeared, together with the 
 apothecary, from the rural districts. Their places were 
 filled as nearly as circumstances would permit, by the 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 11/ 
 
 aged and experienced women of the tenantry, who relied 
 for medicine upon the virtues of native herbs and roots. 
 
 Henry Lawton having performed what, he had been in- 
 structed by his legal adviser, was of primary importance, 
 and required the utmost promptness, sat gloomily think- 
 ing of the departed father, who, from earliest infancy, had 
 showered upon him every evidence of affection, and 
 favor, within the power of man to bestow. Henry Law- 
 ton was neither better, nor worse, than the average man 
 of the twentieth century similarly situated. 
 
 That he possessed selfishness in a marked manner, was 
 but the logical and natural outgrowth of a system of 
 selfishness that pervaded the whole atmosphere through 
 which he had come to manhood, from the government 
 at Washington, controlled as it was, by the concentrated 
 capital of the country, to the author of his being, who 
 saw in him, as the babe in the cradle, the means for the 
 perpetuation of the policy that had built up the family 
 fortune of the Lawtons upon the ruins of the hope and 
 happiness of many thousands of American citizens. 
 
 The character of Henry Lawton had been moulded by 
 the pattern made, through the operation of more than a 
 century, of the deception, selfishness, cupidity and ar- 
 rogance in the ancestors from whom he derived his be- 
 ing. 
 
 Individually, the man who now succeeded to the title 
 of Proprietor was no worse than the human product of 
 like conditions, of every age and country since the 
 world began. He had been dissolute and had indulged 
 in all kinds of dissipation, but such has been the usual 
 conduct of the inheritors of unearned wealth, from days 
 far earlier than those of the glory of Babylon, with its 
 hosts of scarlet women. 
 
1 1 8 "Uncle sa.m's" cabins. 
 
 Possession of great wealth acquired by inheritance, 
 begets idleness, which is often followed by indulgence in 
 vices ; from no inherent wickedness of the individual, but 
 simply as a natural consequence of idleness, and the de- 
 sire for entertainment. 
 
 Henry Lawton received his brother Jack, (who had 
 been found by Jackson, who came with the message 
 from Henry, fast asleep in a large armchair, worn out 
 by his emotions and labor of the past night and day,) 
 with manner more kindly than had been customary 
 with him ever before, in his intercourse with his younger 
 brother. Doubtless the death of one, whom in common, 
 they called father had impressed Henry ; also the fact, 
 that he was now the head of the Lawton family, and in 
 that position should exercise paternal forbearance, and 
 patience. 
 
 Jack, who upon entering the mansion had been 
 conducted to his father's room, where the body of the 
 dead Proprietor still lay, had cast himself upon his 
 knees by the bedside of his father, and offered up the 
 silent prayers which filled his heart, (with more filial 
 affection than might under the circumstances have been 
 expected,) to his Heavenly Father. He remained in 
 the chamber of death, for some time, giving evidence 
 of no more grief than he felt, but even, so much as he 
 actually experienced so far exceeded what the old 
 servants of the mansion knew, was due, that whenever 
 any of them entered the room, they were surprised to 
 find Jack with cheeks wet with tears. 
 
 Seeking his brother, to whom he wished to offer fra- 
 ternal consolation, Jack came into the library, where 
 Henry was seated, who cordially welcomed the inter- 
 ruption to his gloomy thoughts. The two brothers 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S CABINS. II9 
 
 sat and talked in a more friendly manner than they 
 had ever in their lives, done before. 
 
 Henry informed Jack of what he had already done, 
 and what he intended doing concerning the funeral and 
 entombment of their father's body — of his sending 
 Weaving to Washington, and his prompt entrance upon 
 the duties of the office of Proprietor of the District. At 
 this point of the conversation, Jack informed Henry of 
 the statement made by his father to him, in their last 
 interview, and that he supposed, Henry would follow the 
 line of policy suggested by the old Proprietor while 
 lying upon what had proven his deathbed. 
 
 To Jack's utmost astonishment, Henry calmly replied, 
 that while he did not doubt Jack's statement concern- 
 ing the conversation with his father, as some suggestion 
 of such being old Mr. Lawton's policy, had been made 
 both to Weaving and himself, still inasmuch as it was 
 contrary to the policy of the founders of the family, 
 adopted more than a century before, and as he, Henry, 
 inherited the fortune of the family arising from a con- 
 tinuance of the policy of the founders of it, burdened 
 with no condition except only such as was created by 
 the operation of the Law of Family Compact, he 
 would disregard entirely his father's recent conversion 
 to the Quixotic doctrine, that all men should be free 
 and equal ; that, as Proprietor of the District, and owner 
 of the estate, he would still insist that the tenants 
 should enter into Bonds of Servitude, and become at- 
 tached as serfs to the soil ; that intending to crush any 
 opposition by the tenantry before it could become for- 
 midable, he would exercise all the power and influence 
 of his position to make the murderer of the late su- 
 perintendent, such a terrifying example to the other 
 
120 "uncle sam's" cabins. 
 
 tenants, of the consequences of violence or rebellion 
 against that, which fate, and their forefathers, had pre- 
 pared for them, that they would accept quietly their 
 new position — that of slaves — which was but the natu- 
 ral sequence, following the policy pursued, by which, 
 tribute was exacted from the toilers of the fields in 
 America, by manufacturers, landlords and inheritors of 
 wealth ; that the Ohio District was the only one in 
 America where the tenants had not been enslaved for 
 years, and that other proprietors in the country were, 
 by use of slave labor, enabled to derive large profits 
 from planting their land and enjoy immense incomes, 
 as more than a century ago the owners of the land in 
 the then Southern States had done as the result of 
 negro slave labor. 
 
 Henry Lawton, seeing the indignant fire flashing in 
 Jack's eyes, still red from the tears shed by the death- 
 bed of the father of this man who quietly and calmly 
 proposed to disregard, and ignore, the last expressed in- 
 tention of that dead father, and desiring to stem the 
 rising tide of Jack's indignation, added : 
 
 " Well, Jack, anyway, there is very little in a name. 
 For all practical purposes the farming people have 
 been slaves in America long before there was such a 
 thing as a Proprietor. You need not become so much 
 excited about it. Your friends, the farmers, willingly 
 put their necks into the yoke and became slaves in all 
 but name, when they delegated to men of my position — 
 who, at that time, were manufacturers in America — the 
 right to force them to buy articles which, to sustain 
 life the farmers were obliged to have, only, from those 
 manufacturers and at their prices, while the revenue 
 derived by the farmers from the land and their own 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 121 
 
 labor, they had to procure at random from whom and 
 upon such terms, as the competition of all the farmers 
 of the world made possible. 
 
 The man who is obliged to buy what — to sustain life 
 against the attacks of cold and hunger — he must have, 
 where I command, and at the price I command — is my 
 slave, or else he dies of cold and hunger ; no matter 
 whether I obtained the power over him by his assent or 
 not, and whether I call him slave or freeman ; and the 
 most charitable construction to put upon the action of 
 any man who, having an income depending solely upon 
 the competition he receives, permits another to say 
 what shall be his expenses to sustain life, is, that the man 
 is insane, and is properly restrained and controlled by 
 the one of sense and reason. 
 
 You must admit that Bonds of Servitude but give a 
 name to the policy pursued by men of my class for 
 more than a century, and it alters but in name the posi- 
 tion of those who, for years, have served us and paid 
 any tribute we thought them capable of paying." 
 
 When Henry had finished, Jack, fairly bursting with 
 wrath, exclaimed hotly: "All of that has nothing to 
 do with the matter. It was the (then unsuspected) 
 dying wish of our father, that the tenants of the Lawton 
 estate should not be enslaved, in name anyway, and 
 respect for his memory should compel you gladly to 
 comply with that expressed wish." 
 
 "Well, to have an end to any discussion, " replied 
 Henry, doggedly, " I do not intend to be bound by any 
 wish, expressed or not, by my predecessor. These peo- 
 ple whom I will force into slavery, deserve only to be 
 slaves. Fools make slaves of themselves, and their chil- 
 dren. The forefathers of these tenants, helped by their 
 
122 "UNCLE SAM'S" cabins. 
 
 votes to make the laws putting chains upon themselves 
 and their descendants — while it was not policy for 
 years to let it be known that they were in chains — 1 
 find the opportunity now, in safety, to rivet upon these 
 tenants, chains created by their own ancestors, and I 
 am going to take the same advantage of my position, 
 as other Proprietors have already done, of theirs." 
 
 " But," replied Jack, " I will not allow you to end 
 the discussion in any such manner. You know the 
 history of this country. You are well aware of the 
 means used to secure the passage of those laws you 
 refer to. You are an educated man, and have read how 
 an appeal was made to the people's patriotism. The 
 farmers were asked to tax themselves to support infant 
 industries, long after infant industries had grown to be 
 all-devouring vultures of monopolies, devouring the 
 body politic. 
 
 The farmers were deluded into the belief that by so 
 doing they were aiding the mechanics and artisans 
 of the land — and the mechanics and artisans were 
 beguiled by the high wages handed to them by the 
 right hand of the manufacturer, and snatched instantly 
 away from them by the left hand of the same manu- 
 facturer, under the pretext that it was due for rent, and 
 the supplies used by the mechanics and artisans. 
 
 You — (now because the opportunity presents itself,) 
 clad in the impregnable armor of gold, against which the 
 lance of poverty, in the hands of the most virtuous and 
 valiant, flies into splinters, — turn upon the descendants 
 of those farmers, mechanics and artisans, from whom, 
 by respectable plausible fraud and deceit, under color 
 of infernal laws, the very gold in which you stand 
 arrayed invulnerable, was filched— would rivet upon 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 123 
 
 these powerless defenseless people, the infamous chains 
 of slavery, forged by the trustfulness and credulity of 
 their ancestors. In that — you would take advantage of 
 the power given you by the ill-gotton gold of our crafty, 
 deceitful ancestors, to inflict chains of bondage upon 
 the weak and helpless. You are a coward ! " 
 
 Henry Lawton sprang from his chair, pale with 
 passion, but Jack, extending his hand with a repulsing 
 gesture, continued : " Don't start now ! I am not 
 through. That you would follow the man who, — driven 
 mad by the degradation to which he had fallen, where he, 
 an American, could be compelled to become a slave, — 
 killed an instrument which his lordly Proprietor had 
 made use of to bring him to that depth of despair, in 
 which sanity and reason had left him, you are a cruel 
 coward ! And if, (in the wild ravings of the madman, 
 whom you would make a terrifying example,) there is 
 one atom of truth connecting our name with an 
 attempt upon the honor of his sister — you are, an in- 
 famous scoundrel ! In disregarding the known wish of 
 our father, now lying dead over our heads, you are — 
 a disloyal, ungrateful son, to a father, so kind and gen- 
 erous to you as should win your gratitude and loyalty, 
 even though you were the cruel, cowardly, infamous 
 scoundrel, I declare you ! " 
 
 As Jack finished speaking, he arose, flushed and 
 defiant, not knowing what to expect from his brother, 
 who had resumed his seat, and now white with anger 
 regarded him with unwinking eyes. " Have you made 
 an end?" were the first words that came from the 
 white drawn lips of Henry Lawton ; " for if so," he 
 continued, " leave my house, and never put your foot 
 within its doors again so long as you live. Before you 
 go, for the satisfaction it gives me to exhibit the result 
 
124 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 of your folly, — I will tell you, that the Lawton, your 
 mad murderer referred to, was your very clerical self. — 
 Now leave ! " 
 
 He arose, and pointed toward the door, but Jack, 
 heedless of the motion of the new Proprietor's 
 hand, and his accompanying command, stepped 
 toward his brother, and stopping close in front of him, 
 in the determined tone of one, who was careless of con- 
 sequences, said : " This is your house, but as long as 
 my father's body lies in it, I shall come here. I shall 
 be present at the service, when held in the Lawton 
 house in New York, and at the church, and if any one 
 seek to prevent my presence, there will be that done 
 which you will long remember." 
 
 Henry, curbing his temper, for he knew that his 
 brother would hesitate at nothing if he were deter- 
 mined upon a course of action said : " Knowing that 
 you have little respect for the position that we 
 occupy, that you would not be at all reluctant to make 
 our name ridiculous, I amend my command until after 
 the funeral of my father— but now and forever, I dis- 
 own you as brother of mine. Never address another 
 word to me as long as you live," saying which, Henry 
 Lawton walked out of the room, leaving Jack standing, 
 flushed and hot, in the centre of the apartment. 
 
 When left alone, Jack threw himself into a chair 
 and endeavored to arrange in his mind the order of 
 the events of the last two days. The most inexpli- 
 cable thing — and that which filled him with wonder, 
 even more than the sudden death of his father, — was 
 the fact that the words used by George Hollister in 
 his ravings, could refer to him. How in any way to 
 connect his name, with the cause of Hollister's murder 
 of Johnson, seemed impossible, and thus he sat and 
 pondere 1 far into the night. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE wreath of flowers placed by Jack upon the tomb 
 of his father, in that imposing edifice in New York 
 city, where the body of the Proprietor of the District 
 of Ohio had been laid, among the great and powerful 
 of America, who had preceded him to America's West- 
 minster Abbey, Trinity Church, had become dry and 
 withered, for a month had passed since the tomb closed 
 over all that was mortal of John Lawton. A new su- 
 perintendent had been selected quickly to succeed John- 
 son, by Henry Lawton, as the new Proprietor wished 
 to remain in New York city, and avoid the gloom and 
 discomfort of a return to the district over which he ruled. 
 Instructions had been given by the proprietor that as 
 soon as practicable the tenants of the estate should 
 be notified to appear at the courthouses in their respec- 
 tive sections and execute the " Bonds of Servitude." 
 
 On this bright May morning, while every tree and 
 bush was putting forth the joyous signs of spring, in 
 tender buds and opening leaves — when kindly, gener- 
 ous Nature spread an emerald carpet over every 
 hill, making a velvet-covered dancing hall, of all the 
 hills and hollows, for merry meetings of the coming 
 
126 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 songsters of the spring, who soon would arouse echoes 
 in every ravine, and forest with songs of gladness, and 
 freedom — the tenants of the District of Ohio were ex- 
 pected by the officers appointed to receive the sur- 
 render of their last possession except life itself. This 
 was the day fixed by order of the Proprietor for the 
 tenants to give up — Freedom. 
 
 As the grey figures trudged, sadly, and wearily, tow- 
 ard the once prosperous, but now almost deserted 
 town of Carlton, where the courthouse was located for 
 the section of the district in which the Lawson man- 
 sion stood, and where the Rev. Jack Lawton labored, 
 the very smiles of Nature seemed to mock them in 
 their misery. The robins seemed to swell out their 
 red breasts with the pride of freedom, as they hopped 
 out of the path of the dejected men, tramping sorrow- 
 fully through the unfolding scenes of the gayest drama 
 of the seasons, awakening Spring. 
 
 Man ! Man alone was miserable, for only man was 
 vile, cruel and unkind. On this fair stage of Nature's 
 kind creation, the only shadow of aught save gladness, 
 was the silent, sorrowing beings called, Men. 
 
 As the tenants painfully dragged along the heavy 
 wooden shoes, to which the clayey soil of the roads 
 clung, as if the very earth would hold -them back from 
 their disgrace, they drew the hoods of their blouses far 
 down over their eyes, as if to shut out the scene of 
 happiness spread around them. 
 
 Through the neglected streets of the once busy town 
 of Carlton, pushing aside the rank weeds which filled 
 the roadways of what were years before, the principal 
 business streets of the town — empty, shutterless, door- 
 less buildings, standing half hidden by the interlaced 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. \2J 
 
 weeds and underbrush on either side, like gravestones 
 marking the burial place of prosperity — the tenants 
 made their way to the courthouse. 
 
 The ruined buildings, unpainted and unkept, like 
 hideous hags of hell's creation — their sashless windows, 
 like gloating, cavernous eyes ; their doorways, like 
 mocking, toothless mouths stretched wide with fiend- 
 ish joy, seemed to taunt the tenants as they hurried 
 along — even the soft breezes of the May morning, as 
 they sounded in the deserted houses, seemed to give 
 voice to the hags of their fancy, who, jeering them on 
 their hateful journey, in sounds which seemed to say : 
 " Noble descendants of worthy ancestors ! Go to the 
 shame prepared for you by your forefathers. They 
 stole our brightness from us ! What Tarquin was to 
 Lucretia, your ancestors were to us — ravishers, who 
 committed rape upon the commerce of their country. 
 We laugh, and shout good speed to your footsteps" 
 
 Collected on a cleared spot of ground which had 
 formerly been a park of considerable size, in front 
 of the courthouse, were about a hundred men. A 
 glance would have sufficed for anyone to become sat- 
 isfied that it was a gathering of the toilers of the fields. 
 Their legs, bare from just below the knees, were cov- 
 ered with the mud and clay of the miry roads of the 
 spring — the heavy dark garments which they wore, 
 were as unpleasant to the eye as the garb of the con- 
 victs in the nineteenth century. A ghost from the past, 
 would have wondered that from such a number of men, 
 no tobacco smoke was seen to rise, but time and want 
 had robbed the farming class in America, of even the 
 use of that native American plant. 
 
 The men neither joked nor laughed, as when a num- 
 
128 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 ber of neighbors meet in the farming district of a 
 happy country. One unaware of the customary man- 
 ners of the tenants of America in the twentieth century, 
 would have said that the object of the meeting of these 
 men was to attend a funeral, and upon this occasion, 
 the opinion would have been correct — they had met to 
 attend the funeral of their Freedom. But, as a matter 
 of fact, mirth had so long departed that the usual man- 
 ner of a farmer, was funereal. 
 
 The men before the courthouse stood huddled close 
 together, as cattle will stand at the approach of a storm, 
 seeking that support in contact with others of their 
 kind, which simply their individual courage will not give 
 in the hour of danger. 
 
 The door of the courthouse opened and an officer of 
 the law made his way across the cleared ground to the 
 spot, where the cowering men were standing. The 
 officer was clothed in the uniform of the Federal gov- 
 ernment, even though he was what once had been called, 
 sheriff — a uniform being deemed necessary in even 
 the most insignificant position, in the grand scheme of 
 centralization. The officer ordered the men to form in 
 line, and, as their names were called to march into the 
 courthouse. 
 
 In the courtroom of the building sat the new 
 superintendent of the district — at his right hand, sat 
 Weaving, before whom lay ready prepared for execution, 
 a package of " Bonds of Servitude." At the left of 
 the superintendent, gay in all the trappings of the 
 uniform of a colonel in the Federal army, sat the 
 commandant of the military force stationed in the 
 section. 
 
 As each tenant's name was called by the officer 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 129 
 
 before whom the men had formed themselves into a 
 line, the man would answer, and step out of the line, 
 and make his way into the courthouse, where he would 
 be conducted by a uniformed deputy into the presence 
 of the tribunal in the courtroom. Here, he was 
 ordered to throw back his hood, and thus, uncovered 
 approach the table, behind which were seated the 
 representatives of all the power in the land. The 
 commandant, as representing the benign, protecting, 
 ever-watchful Federal government, anxious to insure 
 the security of every citizen, (as all military govern- 
 ments have ever been,) asked the trembling wretch : 
 
 " Do you voluntarily desire to surrender your rights 
 as a free citizen and secure the support and protection 
 of the Proprietor of the District of Ohio ? " to which 
 the half-starved creature would answer, " I do." Then 
 the paternal Federal government, speaking by its 
 mouthpiece, would ask : " Do you willingly bind your- 
 self, your wife and your children born in future, as well 
 as your children now in being, to the Proprietor of the 
 District of Ohio, and his successors in office, to pass 
 with the land as chattels attached thereto ? — Before 
 you answer, I wish to warn you that if you answer in 
 the affirmative, the Proprietor of your district may 
 exercise the whole power of the Federal government 
 to enforce his claim upon you and your descendants 
 forever, and in return, the Proprietor is obligated by 
 the Federal laws to feed, clothe and furnish you a 
 hovel to shelter you." 
 
 Then the heartbroken, freeborn American, would 
 gasp out an almost inaudible " Yes " — and the last 
 spark of manhood and pride was gone. He had given 
 Freedom for the means of merely living. This would be 
 
130 "UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 
 
 followed by signing the "Bonds of Servitude," which was 
 done in every instance by the serf making an " X> as 
 none of the tenants who signed, could either read or 
 write. After the bond was signed, each newly-made serf 
 would be obliged to kneel at the feet of the superin- 
 tendent, who as the special delegate of the Proprietor, 
 appointed to receive the oath of the serf, accepted the 
 submission of the slave. 
 
 When the name of Rossmore was called, he darted 
 from the line of men, as if impelled by a doubt of his 
 strength to pass through the ordeal, unless he rushed 
 ahead while nerved by desperation to do the deed. 
 When asked the question he could utter no word, and 
 only bowed his head in token of assent ; his mouth 
 moved when the oath of allegiance was administered, 
 but no sound escaped from his parched lips. 
 
 As he arose from his knees, and tottered from the room 
 a hoarse cry of agony was heard, so horrible, as to startle 
 even the callous commandant. Rossmore fell as he 
 reached the group of those who had already become 
 serfs by signing the bonds, but springing to his feet 
 again, with foam flecking the dark garment which he 
 wore, as it came from his drawn and distorted mouth, 
 said, in straining, cracking tones, as he raised his 
 clenched hands on high and shook his fist toward the 
 heavens : 
 
 "Now, Almighty God, I call upon you for jus- 
 tice ! Hurl down to the bottommost pits of hell, the 
 departed spirit of the ancestors of every man made a 
 slave this day ! Curse them, and cast them out ! Curse 
 them, as I do, for that folly by which a few men were 
 enabled to enslave millions of others ! Curse them, if 
 thou be a God of — " 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 131 
 
 A strong hand is placed upon his lips to hold back 
 the intended blasphemy ; a voice strong and full of 
 sympathy, cries : " Hold, wretched man, blaspheme 
 not your Maker ! " 
 
 Then Jack Lawton, (for it was no other than that 
 young clergyman, who, detained by his preparations 
 for the trial of George Hollister, which would take 
 place on the next day, had addressed Rossmore,) 
 turning to the men around him, said such words as 
 angels whisper in the ear of the condemned sinner 
 out from the gates of Paradise. 
 
 As he listened Rossmore burst into tears, and would 
 have fallen again, but Jack clasped him to his bosom, 
 and holding him thus, told the story of how in ages 
 long ago, a bright light coming out of Nazareth had dis- 
 pelled the darkness in the lives of the slaves of Rome — 
 how the King of Kings had humbled himself to dwell 
 among the lowly, that he might show them the way to 
 that haven where the first shall be last, where the 
 lowly shall be exalted. 
 
 Jack spoke in simple language, but with the elo- 
 quence that can only come with sublime faith and sin- 
 cerity. The voice of the earnest preacher rang out in 
 rhythmic measure like the clarion's notes, and sank into 
 the gentle cadence of sympathy as the murmuring 
 breezes of heaven. 
 
 With sweeping gestures the occasion-created orator, 
 told of the might of Jesus, who had made humble fish- 
 ermen, leaders among men and high priests in heaven, 
 and when the weeping Rossmore cried out in the 
 angush of his soul," Oh, it is bitter, bitter hard ! " the 
 minister comforted him in his suffering, and told of the 
 suffering of One who, dying nailed to a cross on Cal- 
 vary, had saved mankind. 
 
\$2 " UNI It SAM S CABINS. 
 
 The declining sun saw a sight acceptable to the Lord 
 of Hosts, for gathered around the young Soldier of the 
 Cross were a hundred sorrowful souls, clinging like ship- 
 wrecked sailors to that everlasting Rock of Ages, 
 refuge of the down-trodden of all time and every 
 country. 
 
 The superintendent, Weaving, and the commandant, 
 paused as they emerged from the courthouse, and 
 gazed with amazement upon the strange spectacle pre- 
 sented before them, for, on his knees in the dirt and 
 the mud of the roadway was the brother of the 
 Proprietor, praying fervently, surrounded by the coarsely 
 clad slaves of his mother's son. 
 
 Smile, crafty Weaving. Be shocked, subservient 
 superintendent. Let outraged class distinction fill your 
 eyes with indignation, brave commandant. 
 
 The mother looking down from heaven upon 
 her two sons — one in his mansion in New York, 
 the other on his knees in the mire, surrounded by the 
 slaves of a forlorn country section — will not disown 
 the one you criticise. And when these new-made slaves 
 in the evening shadows, stealing homeward, as if 
 ashamed to face the world, even though veiled in dark- 
 ness, bless the name of Jack and call him, 710b le, brave 
 and godly, a mother's spirit beyond the realm of sin 
 and sorrow, will waft to earth a sweet Amen ! 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 FOR several days after his father's funeral, Jack Law- 
 ton had sought to secure the attendance of an expert 
 in cases of insanity, to be present and testify at the 
 approaching trial of George Hollister, but to his great 
 surprise, was unsuccessful in his search. By some 
 miraculous set of circumstances, all of the prominent 
 physicians of the metropolis seemed to be suddenly 
 occupied in most pressing cases, requiring their indi- 
 vidual and constant attention. 
 
 So many years had passed since Jack had lived in 
 America — or rather, ever since he had been of 
 sufficient age to appreciate the condition of society 
 in his native country, he had been in Europe 
 studying for the ministry — that he was unconscious 
 of that degree of fear inspired in every walk of 
 life by the danger of offending a powerful Pro- 
 prietor or owner of the concentrated capital of the 
 country. Not, of course, was there any apprehension 
 of bodily harm, but the dread of the loss of prestige, 
 and ostracism from the ranks of the recipients of the 
 patronage of the only class in a position to support the 
 members of the liberal professions, proved more preg- 
 
134 "UNCLE sam's" cabins. 
 
 nant with terror, — than any fear of bodily harm would 
 have been — and consequently more efficacious (as a 
 restraint upon the conduct of even the most indepen- 
 dent, who fearing for the consequences to their families, 
 generally dependent for support, entirely upon the 
 remuneration received from the wealthy for profes- 
 sional services), than the danger of death itself could 
 have been. 
 
 Such is human nature, as developed by civilization, 
 that men who bravely and untremblingly face death at 
 the cannon's mouth, will shake with very terror at the 
 bare idea of the possibility of offending the meanest 
 manikin, who is the chance possessor of wealth. So 
 dire and dreadful is the punishment within the power 
 of those, who control the money of the country, to in- 
 flict upon an offender, — and that, too, while still keep- 
 ing within the bounds of man's most carefully written 
 Law, — that the most fearlessly independent man, 
 environed by the thousand bands of affection, and 
 responsibility of civilization and society, will fall weak 
 and trembling at the slightest nod of brazen Mammon's 
 golden head. 
 
 At last, reluctantly, Jack was forced to abandon the 
 effort to procure the assistance of a metropolitan sur- 
 geon, as notwithstanding the tempting fees offered, he 
 had only met with refusal in every quarter. Finally, 
 trusting that the lawyer at Cleveland, to whom he had 
 written and retained to defend Hollister, might possess 
 sufficient knowledge of medical jurisprudence, — to- 
 gether with the obvious insanity of the accused, — to 
 procure an acquittal, he left New York, his departure 
 hastened by the thought of Mary and her mother. 
 
 Mrs. Hollister had never seemed to recover from the 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 1 35 
 
 first effects of the shock she had experienced, but 
 gradually appeared to be sinking beneath the sea of 
 trouble which had so long surged around her. Every 
 effort to revive the strength of the unfortunate woman 
 was futile, the sands of life seemed fast running 
 out. 
 
 When the clergyman returned to the " Parsonage," 
 it was to be met with another most distressing disap- 
 pointment, for he found awaiting him a letter from the 
 Cleveland lawyer, returning the retainer sent to him. 
 with a polite but positive declination to serve, in 
 defending a tenant charged with the crime of the mur- 
 der of a superintendent of a district. 
 
 Lawyers, had Jack but considered the history of the 
 passed-away but beloved Republic, had ever in America 
 been more susceptable to the influence of the capitalists 
 and monopolists than any other body of professional 
 men. Being familiar with debate, they were greedy for 
 political preferment, using it when obtained as a 
 pedestal to raise themselves into prominence. In the 
 old days of the Republic, when the people elected re- 
 presentatives, lawyers struggled for the mighty aid of 
 corporations and capitalists, to help them in their race 
 to gain a goal which insured them an opportunity, to 
 secure safety for themselves and families against the 
 wolves of want ever hovering around the impecunious 
 professional man. 
 
 In the fight for political eminence, it was so well 
 recognized in the palmiest days of the represen- 
 tative government that opposition from corpora- 
 tions and capitalists meant defeat, that the most 
 hardy adventurer upon the sea of politics would aban- 
 don the race and fly with every sail of speed set for the 
 
I36 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 only port of safety — retirement, if opposed by corpora- 
 tions and capitalists. 
 
 After having achieved the goal by an election to the 
 legislative halls, it was asking too much of human 
 nature to expect the lawyer, thus with the golden ap- 
 ple of ambition fairly within his grasp, to cast it aside, 
 by refusing to listen to the advice of corporations 
 and capitalists thereby losing their friendship and 
 future patronage. From corporations and capitalists 
 came all the large fees into the successful lawyer's 
 coffer. To secure a clientele composed of that class, was 
 the consummation of every ambitious lawyer's most 
 rosy dream, even in those virtuous days of America's 
 bright season of political purity, — the latter part of the 
 nineteenth century. 
 
 Thus, early in his labors, Jack found that history 
 ever repeats itself, that as in the Dark Ages, the 
 priest, to properly fill his mission must be not only 
 the fountain of spiritual knowledge, but also the 
 safe keeper and repository for the treasures of all 
 knowledge, in that age of darkness, where the thriv- 
 ing furies of ignorance, lay in wait to steal or sub- 
 merge all learning, beneath the lava flowing from the 
 volcano of Forgetfulness. 
 
 Lawton therefore endeavored in the brief time yet 
 left to him before the trial, to acquire some knowledge 
 of the forms to be observed in the defence of an accused 
 man — and trusting in God and the justice of the defence, 
 insanity, awaited the day of the trial. 
 
 The trammels of society surrounding the pro- 
 fessions in the highly civilized state then existing, 
 had so strongly impressed the zealous worker for the 
 welfare of the poor people, that he immediately sent to 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 137 
 
 New York, to procure such primary works upon the 
 subjects of Medicine and Law, as could be quickly 
 mastered, and determined to devote a portion of his 
 time to the study of those subjects, finding as he had 
 already, that the clergyman must be the physician 
 and lawyer as well as spiritual adviser of, his flock. 
 
 Mary Hollister, as soon as her mother's condition 
 would permit, (which was during Lavvton's absence in 
 New York,) had visited her brother confined in the jail 
 at the military post, and fortunately, finding him in a 
 brief and rational condition of mind, told him the 
 story, of Jack Lawton's great kindness and generosity, 
 which, the reader will recall was all unknown to George. 
 
 The old brave spirit of that race whence came this in- 
 sane scion, reasserted itself, and forever sealed George 
 Hollister's lips even in his maddest ravings, concerning 
 the immediate cause of his attack upon Johnson ; Hol- 
 lister refusing, though accused of the gravest crime 
 known to the law, to give breath to a vile scandal, which 
 necessitated the use of his sister's name, but which, if 
 told, might serve to diminish the punishment for the 
 deed. 
 
 The same old courageous spirit, which had supported 
 the American farmer in his onward march across the wil- 
 derness and desert of this continent, contending boldly 
 and vanquishing finally, not only savage inhabitants 
 and wild beasts, but also every difficulty and obstacle 
 of nature itself, leaving the trail of his journey in 
 fair fields and prosperous cities, was reawakened in this 
 wretched remnant of America's free farmers in the Dis- 
 trict of Ohio, and he determined to die, rather than 
 disclose the base, false charge made by the dead man 
 against those nearest and dearest to him. 
 
138 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 In the Federal court building, in the city of Cleve- 
 land was to be tried this day a cause of unusual inter- 
 est, for it was the first trial which had occurred of a 
 man, in America, for more than fifty years, where the 
 accused stood charged with daring to raise his hand 
 against the representative of the class, in which was 
 confined all the intelligence, refinement and wealth of 
 the country. 
 
 On the bench, at one end of the spacious hall 
 in which the court was assembled, raised above the 
 heads of the other occupants of the courtroom, sit 
 the three judges who will decide the fate of George 
 Hollister. Their heads are covered with wigs after the 
 fashion of the British judges, all wear long silken 
 gowns. The evidences of refinement, as well as intelli- 
 gence, are seen in the countenances of the men who are 
 to try the accused man. Of course, appointments to 
 the Bench are only given to those having the endorse- 
 ment of the all-powerful Proprietors. Juries some- 
 times proving obstinate and inconvenient, have long 
 since been abolished in America. The three men 
 upon the bench are not only judges of the law in the 
 trial of Hollister, but also the facts in the case. 
 
 The officers of the court all wear uniforms — the mar- 
 shal is resplendent in trappings which would well 
 become the costume of a chamberlain of an imperial 
 court. The two witnesses of the crime, closely guarded 
 by a file of soldiers, are half concealed by the raised box 
 or kind of pulpit in which the prisoner will soon appear. 
 At the long counsel table on the right and in front of 
 the bench, sit the Federal attorney and his assistants, 
 all clothed in their long gowns of office, and like the 
 judges, wearing wigs. 
 
"UNCLE SAMS' CABINS. I39 
 
 The only ununiformed figures within the enclosing 
 railing, which divides the audience from the court 
 proper, except the two witnesses, are the two figures 
 (man and woman) clothed in black, who are seated 
 close together at the table opposite the attorneys for 
 the government — and even the man seated close 
 by the woman's side, with his hand placed upon 
 the arm of her chair as if to give confidence to 
 his weaker companion, wears the uniform of the clergy 
 — for it is the Rev. Jack Lawton, who, by the favor of 
 the court appears in behalf of the accused. Mary 
 Hollister, who insisted upon being present, is clothed 
 entirely in black, the material having been brought 
 from New York by Jack upon his return from that city. 
 
 The veil, which is thrown back, leaves the pale 
 face exposed, which, with its whiteness and beauty, in 
 the black setting formed by folds of the encircling veil, 
 shows like a pure pearl rising through a foam of 
 jet; the light of its lustre enhanced by its inky setting. 
 Attorneys across the table, the audience and even the 
 stern judges on the bench, gazed with admiration upon 
 this (the once common but now almost unknown) 
 highest type of womanly loveliness that the world ever 
 knew — a beautiful American woman. 
 
 At last the prisoner for whom the court waited, was 
 brought in, and placed in the box. By the thoughtful- 
 ness of Jack, he was habited in a suit of clothing, supe- 
 rior to that worn by tenants, but the care that had 
 provided respectable attire, and the neat arrangement 
 of hair and beard, could not restore that absent light 
 of reason to the wild eyes which glared around upon 
 those assembled in the hall, as the prisoner stood up in 
 the box. 
 
I40 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 The trial began by the prosecuting officer reading 
 the charge upon which the prisoner was held, (indict- 
 ments of course, had followed grand juries into banish- 
 ment,) and called the witnesses for the government. 
 The only cross-examination given the two men who 
 were Hollister's companions on the fateful morning 
 when he met Johnson, was to ask what Johnson had 
 said or done to the accused before the assault was 
 made upon the dead man. They had heard nothing, 
 having walked rapidly away when ordered to do so, 
 and as they had quickly obeyed the order, the two 
 men had seen and heard nothing of what had preceded 
 the killing. 
 
 Anderson, with tears falling like rain upon the 
 railing of the witness stand, was forced to tes- 
 tify to the expression " I will kill " made use of 
 by Hollister, as he rushed from Rossmore's house 
 the night of the meeting of tenants. 
 
 Rossmore, himself, had to corroborate Anderson's evi- 
 dence, but being a serf was not allowed to testify by 
 swearing to the truth of his testimony — he simply made 
 a statement. When the government rested its case, 
 the only possible chance for aught but conviction was 
 the plea of insanity which Jack had filed. 
 
 The young clergyman arose and stated in an 
 unaffected way the facts in the case as far as he knew 
 them, and then offered himself as a witness. When he 
 was sworn, he testified concerning the experience he had, 
 when he called upon Hollister in his cell at the military 
 post in the section, and then, with his face red at the 
 recollection of the lie he had told Mary, who now 
 watched his every motion, and before whom for the 
 sake of its bearing upon the insanity of her brother, he 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 141 
 
 must stand a self-confessed liar, he told of the struggle 
 and how the prisoner had bit him, his old friend, as 
 he held him in his arms. O men, can you never 
 realize the sympathetic intuition of the souls of women ! 
 The listening woman's eyes filled with tears as she 
 looked, now only at the floor, for intuitively she knew 
 the anguish of the truthful heart beating in the breast 
 of the man, who, to shield her from pain had told a 
 lie, and now to aid the cause of her brother, was con- 
 fessing it. She would not look at him, but loved 
 and honored Jack more highly, if that were possible, 
 for the lie. 
 
 The name of Lawton, had so much magic in it 
 that Jack was not inconvenienced by any questions 
 from the government's representative ; and even 
 when Mary gave her testimony, and told of all the 
 strange actions of her brother, the judges looked 
 with kindly eyes upon her, the prosecuting officer re- 
 fused to cross-examine, saying, " I believe the testi- 
 mony is true." When all that could be told to 
 substantiate the statement that Hollister was insane 
 when he killed Johnson, had been given in the testi- 
 mony for the defence, then there was handed to the 
 judges by the Federal attorney, the report of the com- 
 mittee "of surgeons, certifying to the sanity of Hollis- 
 ter. This testimony was exempt from cross-examina- 
 tion by the then established rule of evidence. 
 
 Alas ! small hope, poor prisoner, is there for you in the 
 evidence before the court, unless those three silent, 
 stern and thoughtful men sitting to judge your cause, be 
 moved by the eloquence born of the heartfelt emotion 
 of your advocate, your doom is sealed ! 
 
 In the evolution of centralization, the administra- 
 
142 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 tion of justice still retained that feature of the old pro- 
 cedure which had ever borne hardest on the cause of 
 the accused, for the prosecution still retained the closing 
 argument ; and now, as of old, the judges left their bench 
 to agree upon their decision, with the unanswered asser- 
 tions, and the (often unfair) construction placed by the 
 prosecuting officer upon the evidence, still ringing in 
 their ears, just as formerly the juries in America went to 
 the jury-room to form their^verdicts. 
 
 The reverend advocate for Hollister arose to plead for 
 pity and mercy for his old playfellow. In simple, 
 straightforward language, Jack Lawton set forth the 
 facts concerning his efforts to secure properly trained 
 counsel and skilled experts in cases of insanity, for the 
 defence. Instead of blaming the professional men for 
 lack of independence, he offered as a most reasonable 
 excuse, the reason, so well known to all within the 
 sound of his voice — the dread of offending the Pro- 
 prietor of the District. 
 
 In extenuation for his own shortcomings in the 
 trial, he frankly stated that he was ignorant of law and 
 court proceedings. " But," and as he said it, throwing 
 back his leonine head and with a sweeping, majestic gest- 
 ure, pointing to the prisoner, in an attitude recalling 
 old pictures of godlike Daniel Webster, he asked, 
 " When my old comrade stood there naked and defence- 
 less before the piercing blasts of prosecution, could I 
 do less than thrust myself before him — the memory of 
 boyhood's happy days and mutual joys from the grave- 
 yard of the past ringing in my heart, called me ?" A 
 tremor thrilled his hearers, and even the hearts of the 
 stern judges silently responded, " You, brave spirit, 
 could not do less ! " 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 143 
 
 There is a magic power in nobility of nature, that 
 sways the most unsympathetic souls. Jack Lawton's 
 audience (adverse as it was to the sentiments he ut- 
 tered) watched him with unwavering attention and 
 open admiration, as the speaker taking from the 
 table a history of the United States, and holding it 
 aloft, like the torch of truth, told the story of the cause 
 of the crime : — How an American farmer more than a 
 century before, in a nation-killing, freezing winter season 
 of Civil War, had found a half-frozen, harmless looking 
 animal, and thinking it a rabbit, had placed it in his 
 bosom, had warmed it into life by the heat of his la- 
 bor, had nurtured it by his food, his clothing, tools, and 
 even the shelter of the shingles over him ; and how that 
 harmless rabbit, waxing strong and lusty on the farmer's 
 substance, became an all-devouring wolf of Monopoly, 
 eating into the very vitals of the farmer ; and how the 
 agonized farmer, in his self-created pain and suffering, 
 sought to conceal the cause of his increasing weakness 
 and illness by drawing over the fiend feeding upon his 
 vitals, a shirt of patchwork, made of the many colors of 
 an unstable Currency— thus striving to conceal his 
 pangs of agony by hiding the cause with this flimsy 
 covering, as did the thieving Spartan boy of ancient 
 Greece, when pressing the gnawing wolf closer to 
 his disemboweled body, seek to conceal the cause that 
 was killing him by hiding the wolf. 
 
 How at last the farmer sick unto death and tot- 
 tering, in falling, had dragged down to death 
 the mechanic with him in his fall — and how when 
 at last the two bodies, stripped of flesh, lay bare skel- 
 etons in the potter's field of the graveyard of nations, 
 Monopoly, swollen, but still an insatiate beast, stalking 
 
144 "UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 
 
 over the skeletons had been stung by the serpent, 
 Murder, which was born within the fleshless frames of 
 the dead farmer and mechanic — that now they were 
 there to try that " Murder " — that the all-devour- 
 ing dealer of death to farmer and mechanic — that 
 beast and brute, was called Monopoly, fiend-begotten 
 child of Importation Taxation, and against its charac- 
 ter he called the evidence of the ages. 
 
 And then the retrospective speaker calling America, 
 " A wheat field, covered thick with the snows of that 
 winter season of Civil War, around which, Patriotism 
 a wall had builded, was swept by a chance wind called 
 Opportunity, which blew the drifting snow into one 
 corner, forming there a ball called Capital, which roll- 
 ing, ever growing in the circular currents called Com- 
 merce, ever gathering the wheat-protecting snow 
 which lay upon the field of prosperity, crushing and 
 consuming the snow confined within the high wall of 
 Patriotic Law by which the field was surrounded, until 
 at last, the snow all gone or clinging to the all-absorb- 
 ing ball, Concentrated Capital, left'bare the field — thus 
 leaving exposed and unprotected each germinating 
 seed of industry, until at last before the bitter blasts 
 of despair, the seed died, and in their decay made the 
 soil fertile for the production of the imported thistle, 
 Anarchy, and another weed, found universally where 
 the winds of despair sweep over a nation, called 
 " Murder." 
 
 Then in pleading tones he begged that ere the 
 serpent-weed be ruthlessly destroyed, that the cir- 
 cumstances causing its creation be'eonsidered, and asked 
 mercy for the intuitive act of insanity caused by the 
 desperation of the doer. Then as he told the history 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. I45 
 
 of the prisoner, the tones of his voice grew tender : — 
 How as lads they had been comrades, shared each 
 other's joys and sorrows ; of the true and loving heart 
 of the boy, who now as a prisoner stood before them — 
 deftly painted with glowing words, pictures of youth- 
 ful deeds of kindness, generosity and valor done by 
 the prisoner — how they had vied with each other in 
 tenderness toward the baby damsel, and for the honor 
 of her innocent baby smiles and favor ; how no more 
 dutiful son to a worn and lonely widow had ever been 
 born of woman — how that poor mother now lay broken, 
 almost dying. 
 
 He paused at a cry from Mary, who, sitting near to 
 him with her head bowed, her frame shaking with sobs 
 of sorrow, had listened to his word painting, every 
 line and color in the picture accentuated by recollec- 
 tion and association, until finally unable to restrain her 
 grief, the sound had escaped from her lips. 
 
 The momentary silence which succeeded Mary's 
 cry, was broken by these words coming from the 
 prisoner, who leaning forward and reaching out his 
 arms toward the man who was fighting for him, 
 shouted: " Stop, Jack, stop ! Little Mollie is crying. 
 Stop, you're too rough, you will hurt the baby!" 
 " Silence, silence ! " cried the marshal, and the guard 
 at his bidding, rushed toward the prisoner. But 
 all the marshals ever made, could not quiet the 
 thoughts of the madman, who in fevered fancy, once 
 again with Jack was playing nurse for "Little Mollie." 
 
 When order was restored, Lawton, in whom, what 
 had taken place, had aroused a perfect storm of emo- 
 tion, striding down close to the bench on which sat the 
 judges, and flinging prudence to the winds, raised his 
 
146 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 hands toward the heavens, and thundered forth — as did 
 of old the prophet of God, when telling Israel of the 
 wrath to come, a warning to those who fattened and 
 grown strong upon the fruits of crime, would now punish 
 with merciless hand, the evil deeds committed, as the di- 
 rect result of their own wrong-doing, by those credulous 
 tools, who had, in raising them, sunk into the mire of 
 desperation and misery, saying as he closed his speech : 
 
 "The God of Eternal Justice weighs in nice balance, 
 crime and its cause, holding him who created the 
 cause, none the less guilty because man's laws permit 
 him to escape punishment." 
 
 As Lawton sat down, something like a sigh came 
 from the overwrought hearts of his hearers. None 
 could fail to do homage to the boldness of the man who 
 thus struggled against the tide of the times and the 
 adverse current of public opinion, created and con- 
 trolled by concentrated capital for more than a cen- 
 tury. The Federal attorney rising to reply, cast a 
 look of admiration towards the man who unlearned in 
 law but strong in the heaven-born gift of eloquence, 
 had shaken even his conviction in the justice of the 
 cause of the government. 
 
 In a brief speech (for anything oratorical would 
 have fallen flat after Jack's argument) the prosecuting 
 officer reviewed the crime and evidence, dealing fairly 
 and honestly with the facts, in conclusion asking for the 
 conviction of the prisoner under the law, of the crime 
 of murder. The judges withdrew for consultation, the 
 waiting audience became restless, a stifled buzz and 
 murmur drowned Jack's whispered words of hope and 
 consolation to Mary. 
 
 At last the door behind the bench is opened and the 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. I47 
 
 three judges reappear. Their solemn faces fill Jack's 
 heart with apprehension. The marshal orders silence. 
 The presiding judge announces the decision — Guilty! 
 
 Alas, the fraility of human nature ! Before the might 
 of the money, wrung from your forefathers, poor pris 
 oner, the valiant arm wielding the brand of eloquence 
 and justice is powerless in your defense ! The Proprietor 
 of the District had let it be known that he wished con- 
 viction, as an example to his serfs of recent creation. 
 How useless, opposition ! — A scream, and Mary fallen 
 to the floor, is raised in those arms which bore her as 
 a babe in many merry frolics, and carried unconscious 
 from the courtroom. 
 
 The presiding judge rising, calls to the guards to 
 bring the convicted man forward for his sentence. 
 Within two weeks, for so the sentence says," Hanged by 
 the neck until you are dead." 
 
 Ring out ye bells until the iron tongues shall crack 
 your brazen throats ! Sound the tidings of the might 
 of money! Pull the bell-rope! Shout ye Serfs! un- 
 til thy mouldering ancestors, more than a hundred 
 years dead, shall awake and join in the merry-making 
 of their origination ! 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE scene between Henry Lawton and his brother 
 and Jack's angry words of accusation, had neither been 
 forgotten nor forgiven by the now fully installed Pro- 
 prietor of the District of Ohio. Henry Lawton had 
 not found it necessary to do more than merely indi- 
 cate that the conviction of the tenant who had mur- 
 dered the superintendent of his estate would not be 
 displeasing, to insure the fulfillment of his assertion to 
 Jack that he would make a terrifying example of Hol- 
 lister for the purpose of awing the newly-made serfs. 
 The thought, however, that in case of his death with- 
 out a son, Jack would succeed to the title of Proprie- 
 tor and the property of the estate, was a continuing 
 torture to Henry Lawton. During Jack's childhood, 
 Henry had regarded his very existence with absolute 
 indifference, it being a matter of little concern to him 
 whether Jack lived or died. During the brief visits 
 which Jack paid to his father at their mansion in New 
 York city, while the younger son was studying at 
 Yale, Henry had seen little of him, being little inter- 
 ested in him. Tales of some of Jack's idiosyncracies 
 would reach him from clubmen, along with accounts 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S ' CABINS. 1 49 
 
 of his prowess on the football field or at the oar, but as 
 they amused his friends, Henry paid slight attention to 
 the evidence of the development of a character, which 
 now caused him great annoyance and concern. As a 
 graduate and young man entering the arena of life, 
 Jack had awakened an envious, jealous spirit in his 
 brother's bosom. His physical strength, as well as 
 those mental qualities which raised him above the level 
 of the time-serving man of the world, his brother, were 
 not calculated to endear him to Henry. 
 
 It is ever the case, that those possessing virtue are 
 hated by all, who, while forced unwillingly to admit the 
 advantage of its possession, will not strive to attain it. 
 
 At the time of the death of John Lawton, when the 
 two brothers met in the library, Henry no doubt in- 
 tended that peace and cordiality should in future ex- 
 ist between his brother and himself ; but he had lost 
 sight of the fact that one, in whom every thought 
 and opinion was diametrically opposed to his own, 
 would hardly be able to render himself a cordial com- 
 panion or even a frank friend of the new Proprietor, 
 without continually offending. 
 
 Jack Lawton had certainly gone too far in his 
 almost brutal frankness to his brother in their last 
 interview, and that Henry should be filled with 
 a feeling of resentment was but natural. How- 
 ever, that feeling was not apparent during the time 
 between the death and entombment of the old 
 Proprietor, except that the brothers held no com- 
 munication with each other. Jack, in accordance 
 with what he had said to Henry when they parted in 
 the library the day of their quarrel, not only remained 
 in the mansion in Ohio, but also in the city residence 
 
150 "UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 
 
 of the Lawton family in New York, until the body of 
 his father was taken to its final resting-place, Trinity 
 Church. 
 
 Henry Lawton determined to use every precaution 
 to prevent such a calamity as his brother Jack becom- 
 ing Proprietor, and sought in an early marriage to the 
 lady who had been selected by his father for him, an es- 
 cape from a possibility so distasteful, as Jack's ownership 
 of the estate was to him. So impatient, was he for the 
 consummation of the marriage that his own reluctance, 
 to forsake the pleasures of bachelor life had heretofore 
 delayed, that he hardly waited until the flowers upon 
 his father's tomb had faded, before insisting that the' 
 marriage should take place. 
 
 The lady whom he destined to honor by making her 
 the Proprietress of the district of Ohio, was the 
 daughter of the man who had succeeded to the owner- 
 ship of the coal monopoly in America. Of course the 
 monopoly had been created years before by the impo- 
 sition of a heavy taxation upon all coal imported into 
 the country. At the time the law was enacted, it was 
 alleged to be in the interest of coal miners, who would 
 obtain higher wages if not obliged to compete with 
 the cheap labor of other countries. 
 
 The farmers and mechanics joined heartily in the 
 plan of benefitting the miners, and paid willingly an 
 increased price to the American mine owners for the 
 coal used by them, and also that used in the 
 manufacture of goods used by farmers and mechan- 
 ics, believing that the miners would derive large 
 and permanent benefits which would add greatly 
 to the prosperity of the country. As a matter 
 of fact, however, the ancestors of the present 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 1 5 1 
 
 owner of the monopoly, whose daughter was to be the 
 wife of Henry Lawton, owning the lands and houses 
 near the mines and furnishing the supplies to the miners, 
 while paying truly high wages, promptly reacquired the 
 money so paid in high rents and high prices, for sup- 
 plies furnished to the miners. 
 
 By this simple process, the increased price paid 
 by the farmers and mechanics for coal, sifted 
 through the miners' hands like water through a 
 sieve, and fell into the pockets of those controlling 
 the monopoly. In course of time this aggregation of 
 pennies — taken a few from each citizen, and unfelt at 
 the time by farmers or mechanics — amassed themselves 
 into many millions of dollars, which, growing through 
 no effort of succeeding generations, but simply by the 
 accretion of interest, came into the hands of their pres- 
 ent possessor by the mere accident of birth. 
 
 Margaret Ashton, the daughter, whom it was agreed 
 between John Lawton and her father Horace Ashton, 
 should marry Henry, was of the not unusual type of 
 woman found where wealth has continued for 
 many generations in one family. Without pos- 
 sessing beauty, her face was refined and intelli- 
 gent, but lacked the vivacity which formerly made 
 famous the beauty of the American women. 
 
 However, the air of languor was so universally seen 
 in the faces and manners of the female descendants 
 of the monopoly kings, and the brutalizing effects 
 of poverty and destitution in the faces and forms of 
 all other women, that the portraits of the fair American 
 women of the nineteenth century, were regarded by 
 their descendants as mere images of the painter's 
 imagination. 
 
152 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 Margaret Ashton was perfectly satisfied with the 
 arrangement, between her father and the old Pro- 
 prietor, that she should marry Henry Lawton. He 
 was in no way objectionable. He was well born, well 
 educated, of high position, great estate and a polished 
 gentleman — what more could the daughter of a dozen 
 millionaires wish in the man she was to marry? 
 Hence the terms of the marriage contract were easily 
 settled, the dowry arranged, and with the first flowers 
 of the year, Henry Lawton, his hopes high for a 
 speedy end to the dreaded possibility of Jack becom- 
 ing Proprietor, was married to the lady of his father's 
 choice. A brilliant ceremony, stately forms, grand 
 reception, magnificent gifts, and — it is over. 
 
 In their palatial home in the metropolis, surrounded 
 by every luxury that the skill of European artificers 
 can produce, they hold their semi-regal court. If there 
 be less demonstration of affection than formerly was 
 customary between American men and women bear- 
 ing their relations to each other, it is not because 
 the couple were mismated, but because, in the refining 
 process of many generations, the spontaneous out- 
 bursts of the love which is natural between husband 
 and wife in a crude state of society, were now consid- 
 ered " bad form " and no longer permitted between 
 the married people of refined and gentle breeding in 
 America. 
 
 Notwithstanding, however, fidelity and virtue were 
 as much the rule among those possessing wealth as 
 it is the inclination of the vulgar mind — to doubt 
 the congruity of wealth and virtue. 
 
 It is ever the habit of those lewd in mind, to 
 imagine that all mankind are only restrained from 
 
"uncle sam's" cabins. 153 
 
 indulgence in immorality by the lack of opportunity; 
 and reflecting the lewdness of their own minds, believe 
 the wealthy, having time and means, consequently, 
 opportunity, must of necessity be vicious — knowing, as 
 those of only vulgar minds do — that had they the 
 opportunities of the wealthy, they would indulge their 
 vicious propensities. 
 
 Society, in which the Proprietor and his wife were 
 prominent figures, was simply inane, in fact, lacked the 
 vigor to be violently vicious or virtuous. Surrounded 
 by every comfort and luxury which the unspendable in- 
 comes derived from the interest accruing from the vast 
 sum of money inherited by them — procured, with no 
 incentive to exercise their natural gifts of mind or body 
 — men of the class which the Proprietor of Ohio orna- 
 mented, deteriorated in each succeeding generation, 
 mentally and physically. 
 
 America gradually lost its prestige for original- 
 ity, invention and enterprise. To Henry, the ac- 
 count of the trial of Hollister furnished a sensa- 
 tion, and therefore, a pleasure. A sensation, too, of 
 satisfaction unalloyed by any indication of his brother's 
 statement of the causes which led to the crime, and the 
 arraingment of men of his class and ancestry for — read- 
 ing the account as he did in a metropolitan newspaper, 
 one of the few daily newspapers still published in 
 America, which had, struggling, survived the disasters 
 that submerged the commerce of the country, 
 all mention of aught calculated to offend him and his 
 class, had been carefully eliminated. 
 
 For it was now the law, that all accounts of court 
 proceedings must be submitted before publication, to 
 an officer of the court, who erased, corrected and inter- 
 
154 "UNCLE SAMS" CABINS. 
 
 jected as he saw proper, until the matter assumed such 
 shape, as was most expedient to place before the 
 public. 
 
 However, little exercise of law on the subject was 
 ever required, as the prevalence of poverty had so 
 decreased possible purchasers of independent newspa- 
 pers, and the dearth of trade had so diminished that 
 support for publications formerly procured from adver- 
 tisers, that the period of great journals like the " Her- 
 ald," " World, " " Sun," and " Tribune " of New York 
 in the nineteenth century, had long since come to a 
 close. 
 
 A free press, for many years prior to the passage of 
 the law referred to, had existed in name only, because 
 dependent as every publisher was for patronage solely 
 upon the only class having money to spend, the press, 
 like the shopkeepers, farmers and mechanics, became 
 subservient, moulding itself upon a model pleasing to 
 its patrons. 
 
 Henry Lawton, at the same time that he received the 
 satisfactory intelligence of the conviction of Hollister, 
 also learned of the successful enslavement of the 
 tenants of the district of which he was Proprietor. 
 Visions of increased profits resulting from slave labor 
 in the farming operations of the estate filled his mind 
 with pleasurable anticipations of a largely increased in- 
 come — for only by utilizing the labor of slaves could 
 the American landowner successfully compete with 
 those favored countries where cheaper supplies pro- 
 duced cheaper crops of cereals and cotton. 
 
 The conduct of Jack Lawton in banishing himself 
 to the realm of gloom and poverty over which Henry 
 exercised the authority of Proprietor, only filled the 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 1 55 
 
 great man's soul with contempt and annoyance. He 
 regarded the action of his brother as purely quixotic, 
 insane, or the seeking after notoriety. It was impos- 
 sible to reconcile such conduct in the mind of Henry 
 with any sense of duty in one born, educated and sur- 
 rounded as Jack had been, and he would have dis- 
 missed the subject from his thoughts entirely, had it 
 not been for the constant recurrence of it, forced upon 
 his attention, by actions of the irrepressible young 
 clergyman bearing the same name and being brother 
 of the Proprietor. 
 
 . Soon after reading the published account of the trial 
 of Hollister, Henry Lawton met at one of his clubs in 
 New York, the Federal attorney who had prosecuted 
 the case, who, intent upon ingratiating himself into 
 the good graces of the new Proprietor and unaware 
 that Jack was in disfavor with his powerful brother, 
 said : " I had, recently, the honor of being opposed in 
 the forensic field by your Excellency's brother, in the 
 trial of the Hollister case at Cleveland. Had he 
 devoted his magnificent mind to the study of juris- 
 prudence he would have no peer in America. His 
 eloquence and the grandeur of his gestures recall 
 stories told of the mighty Webster, Clay, Calhoun, 
 Blaine and Conkling during the debates in Congress in 
 the first century of the Republic." 
 
 Henry Lawton's repugnance to the idea of enter- 
 ing upon the explanation of a difference existing 
 between himself and brother, as well as courtesy, 
 compelled him to assume an interest which he was 
 far from feeling, in what the Federal attorney 
 had said. This delighted official, congratulating 
 himself upon the successful attempt to win favor 
 
156 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 in the eyes of his " Excellency," entered more 
 fully into detail, concluding his narrative with the 
 remark: " Were he not bound by birth, and con- 
 sanguinity to the landlords, he would be an exceed- 
 ingly dangerous orator for tenants or serfs to listen to, 
 as a man of so much personal magnetism might arouse 
 an insurrection, which his evident courage would make 
 formidable " — and added the elated seeker for influence : 
 11 Were he not your Excellency's brother and therefore 
 safely to be trusted, I should feel it my duty to rec- 
 ommend to the authorities his immediate restraint, 
 either by incarceration in some Federal prison or ban- 
 ishment. You see, your excellency, how constantly 
 watchful an official must be of the interests of the Pro- 
 prietors, for there still lies dormant within the farm-class 
 a spirit, which if once aroused, and led by a man of your 
 brother's eloquence and courage, could only be ar- 
 rested by death at the cannon's mouth." 
 
 Thus Henry Lawton had the fact of Jack's existence 
 and continued quixoticism thrust again upon him ; had 
 the self-gratified attorney for the government been 
 aware of the displeasure with which the smiling Proprie- 
 tor listened to his revelation of this new phase of Jack's 
 incomprehensible conduct, he would have felt less 
 delighted with what he deemed " a hit, a palpable 
 hit " in the way of winning political preferment. 
 
 As the irritated landlord related the circumstances 
 to the inane wife of his bosom (who had never seen 
 Jack and therefore knew nothing of his marked perso- 
 nality) that evening, and bewailed the fact that he was 
 cursed with a brother so utterly indifferent and blind 
 to the dignity and high position which the system 
 which he attacked, had enabled the Lawton family to 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 157 
 
 attain, Mr. Weaving was announced, who, in the capa- 
 city of family solicitor, (the name designating the pro- 
 fessional man, formerly known as lawyer or attorney,) 
 was privileged to call uninvited at any hour upon the 
 head of the family. 
 
 Upon this occasion he was especially welcome, 
 as he came to report the facts concerning the 
 successful enslavement of the Lawton tenants. As 
 an evidence of high favor he was honored with a 
 presentation to her ladyship, the Proprietress, and re- 
 quested to proceed with his report in her presence, as 
 the account of the affair might afford her some enter- 
 tainment. How fearful are the rich, and idle, of ennui ! 
 
 Weaving narrated all the details concerning the exe- 
 cution of the " Bonds " with strict fidelity to the facts, 
 eliciting from his employer when he had finished, 
 an emphatic " Well, thank the Lord, it is over ! Now 
 there are no cursed tenants who are freemen in Amer- 
 ica ! " 
 
 Weaving interrupted the satisfactory tenor of his 
 thoughts, however, by saying: "Before finishing, I 
 feel it my duty to communicate the extraordinary con- 
 duct of your brother." 
 
 Henry raised his hands as if to wave back a 
 subject which, like Banquo's ghost, refused to re- 
 main hidden, but the lawyer insisting, said : " I 
 think it important that you should know what seems 
 evidence of insanity in Mr. Jack. When we left 
 the courthouse at Carlton, imagine our horror at 
 seeing your father's son kneeling in the dirt of the 
 roadway, fervently praying, surrounded by the herd of 
 slaves which we had just created after years of prepar- 
 ation and endeavor, with the eyes of every one of the 
 
I So "UNCLE SAMS CABINS, 
 
 new-made chattels turned upon him with the fanatical 
 faith which would lead them to commit any deed at 
 his mere bidding ; and that was not the worst of his 
 performance, for I learned afterward, that he had 
 stood among them that day (' the day of their sor- 
 row ' as he called it) bidding them ' hope, be of good 
 cheer and trust in the mercy of God, who would raise 
 up a Moses to lead them out of bondage, and be 
 a mighty salvation for them,' and talking thus, had 
 held a slave clasped in his arms ; and he, a Lawton, call- 
 ing him, the serf, ' brother American ' thus blowing 
 upon the dying embers of that pride and that abomi- 
 nable idea of the equality of all men, which we have 
 striven so hard to extinguish, and in which, I had 
 hoped, we were at last successful." 
 
 Henry Lawton heard this with frowning brow and 
 threatening eyes, and when his Lady with a languid 
 silvery laugh, exclaimed, as the story was finished : 
 "My brother-in-law is mad, evidently absolutely mad. 
 Henry, I had never married a Lawton had I known in- 
 sanity was apt to occur in members of the family." The 
 Proprietor smoothing his frowning face with an effort, 
 and addressinghis wife with a genteel grimace whichdid 
 duty as a smile said — " I am quite sure, my Lady, that 
 our Lawton ancestors were not cursed with the pecul- 
 iar form of mania found in my brother, else I am 
 equally sure we never could have aspired to the 
 honor of having you bear our name." 
 
 Then saying to Weaving," My brother is positively a 
 madman, Weaving, a dangerous madman, as any coun- 
 cil of gentlemen in America will readily certify, upon 
 being made acquainted with his actions." He paused 
 and muttered while meditating " What is to be done," 
 
"uncle sam's" cabins. 159 
 
 "What shall I do?" then as if resolved, said "Weav- 
 ing, you are diplomatic and resourceful, I give it in 
 charge to you to end this disgraceful nuisance in some 
 plausible manner. Keep my name as much as possible 
 in the background. Take no hasty steps. Make no 
 scandal. Remember that the man's name is Lawton, 
 and he has many friends in England where he studied. 
 Above all make no mistakes in coming in contact with 
 him, remember he is a lion's cub and will use claws 
 and fangs to the death in a fight." 
 
 " The subject has many and grave difficulties to be 
 surmounted, sir— I must have time, and will consider 
 the matter in all its phases." 
 
 While his brother and his solicitor cogitate upon some 
 speedy method of securing the safety and seclusion of 
 the madman ; what new, wild, insane ravings is the 
 madman indulging in? What mad act is he committ- 
 ing ? What violence and injury to himself or others is 
 his mad fancy meditating ? 
 
 Down in the dark and dismal back country of Ohio, 
 in the section where we have wandered, on yonder 
 hillside — in the orchard beneath the trees, where the air 
 is fragrant with the perfume of the apple blossoms, a 
 grave is making. In yonder house all silent, save the 
 sobbing of a daughter mourning for the loss of her 
 mother, stands the madman ! — He has, stooping, kissed 
 thecold browof the motherof the weeping woman whose 
 hand he clasps and whom he comforts, leaving on the 
 wan face so sweetly beautiful and still in death, a tear — 
 the dead woman was "almost foster mother" to the 
 man — he is mad ! Hopelessly mad ! The dead woman 
 had been wife and widow of a tenant — Another of a man 
 convicted of murder ! Mad ; Of course the Man is Mad / 
 
iGo " L'N'CLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 Mary Hollister, had struggled heroically to hide 
 from her mother the hard truth concerning the convic- 
 tion and sentence of her brother. When still far from 
 home she had mastered her emotion, and nerved her- 
 self by Jack's help for the meeting with her mother, 
 but concealment was impossible, her efforts were in 
 vain. A mother's eye, accustomed as it is to see 
 mirrored in a daughter's innocent face, each fleeting 
 reflection of sorrow from babyhood, is hard to deceive, 
 even when the deception is born of a daughter's love. 
 Mrs. Hollister, as Mary entered her room after her 
 return from Cleveland, for one moment gazed into her 
 daughter's eyes, and uttering a moan which came from 
 her breaking heart, turned her head and hid her face 
 in the pillows, crying " Oh, God, My son ! my son ! 
 and thus moaning and crying, clasped in her weeping 
 daughter's close embrace, with the almost transparent 
 hand, which she extended toward him, held by Jack, 
 her spirit passed beyond the realm of pain and sorrow, 
 — beyond a sea of suffering, — on toward that shore 
 resplendent with light and glory, where slaves may 
 shine as saints, and the lowly be exalted to high 
 places. 
 
 Amid a group of serfs, with simple prayers, they 
 laid the poor worn-out body in the gentle embrace of 
 ever kindly, gentle mother earth, who, when life's fever 
 ended, takes again the child to her bosom. " Dust 
 thou art, to dust thou shalt return." With loving 
 hand, Jack placed fresh flowers upon the new-made 
 grave (Mad ! Oh, such Madness). Among the other 
 tributes of affection from the serfs — old friends, old 
 neighbors of the woman they had buried. 
 
 And when parting with Mary at the door of his 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. l6l 
 
 " Parsonage " (for Jack had asked Rossmore's wife to 
 remain for the present with Mary, while he forsook 
 his comfortable home to take lodging in the hovel of 
 the serf Rossmore, fearing that his presence might 
 compromise Mary ; — this delicacy of feeling for a 
 tenant's daughter ; — Verily ! A violent raging lunatic, 
 this Madman — Jack pressing Mary's hand had urged 
 her to take courage, and not to feel alone nor forsaken, 
 that God would watch over her, and by gentle words and 
 brotherly manner tried to reanimate her drooping spirit. 
 Mary looking up, her patient face in all its beauty, 
 stained with tears and wet with weeping, with eyes full 
 of trust and faith, said softly " No, I will not feel for- 
 saken, for I have God, and — , you, Jack, kindest friend 
 beside me " and the gentle maiden took his hand and 
 kissed it. 
 
 Stars look down in wonder on this strange Madman 
 as he wends his way to yonder mean hovel, leaving far 
 his comfortable home behind him — And all for 
 delicacy of feeling! Madness? Oh ! Strange Madness, 
 'twas the same strange madness that made men stand 
 'mid mangling beasts in Rome's arena, when the Light 
 first came shining through the darkness of idolatry — 
 in the early morning of the day of Christ's religion. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE rising summer sun folding back the clouds of 
 morning in the eastern sky, cast long shadows from 
 every blade of grass on Ohio's hills. One shadow 
 casting its gruesome shade upon the velvet green, wet 
 with morning dew, which, sparkling in the sun- 
 shine, stretched a jeweled emerald cloak over every 
 field, marred with its sickening pestilential presence, a 
 scene resplendent in the glory of the coming day, echo- 
 ing with the music of the morning, poured forth from 
 the swelling throats of nature's feathered choir, welcom- 
 ing with gladsome shouts of joyous melody the coming 
 beams of the life-creating monarch of the heavens. 
 The tree — its limbs magnified into gigantic, awful pro- 
 portions in the shadow, which marred, and made gloom 
 with darkening visage, come to all its surroundings, 
 robbing the grass of all its jeweled splendor as it stole 
 upon it, — came from no seed cast to earth by Nature, 
 but growing from the seeds of Sin sent by Satan, 
 planted first in Eden's fair garden, had produced its 
 fruit in due season — Crime. Its ripened fruit would 
 hang upon it — a Gallows Tree. 
 
 This was the day fixed by the sentence of the court 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 163 
 
 for George Hollister to die, the gallows had been 
 erected near the spot where the deed for which he was 
 to die was done. By instructions received from the 
 Proprietor, all of the serfs in the section had been 
 summoned to attend the execution, in furtherance of 
 that idea expressed to his brother by Henry Lawton, of 
 making Hollister's punishment a horrifying example to 
 the tenants, now so recently become slaves. On one 
 side of the gallows, pursuant to orders were gathered 
 the gray clad crowd of Lawton's bondsmen, their 
 dingy clothing as they stood close together making a 
 dark and dirty blotch upon the green sheen of the 
 field in which the instrument of death had been raised. 
 Between the group of cowering men, who, abashed 
 and full of shame at their so recent degradation with 
 lowered heads looked upon the ground, was drawn up 
 in line a platoon of Federal soldiers, their rifles with 
 fixed bayonets brightly gleaming in the sunlight, mak- 
 ing a silvery band of steel across the space between 
 the serfs, and the place where so soon one who was 
 formerly of their number as tenants of Lawton, would 
 pay the death penalty for his crime. The officer in 
 command, in the dry, metallic tone of those who com- 
 mand trained soldiers, gave the order to load — and the 
 sharp clicking of the mechanism of the breech-loading 
 rifles, as the cartridges were slipped into the chambers 
 of the pieces, was heard by those for whom it was in- 
 tended ; warning the bondsmen of the hurricane of 
 death preparing for them, should opposition to the ex- 
 ecution of the sentence be offered, or rescue, be at- 
 tempted ; as the command was given to the soldiers to 
 resume the position in which they were before loading, 
 a line of sheriff's officers appeared near the steps at 
 the back of the scaffold, leading to the platform above. 
 
164 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 At the head of the line came George Hollister, the 
 prisoner to be executed. On the left side walked 
 the sheriff in all the pomp and importance of his 
 office, the many brass buttons of his uniform glitter- 
 ing in the sun as he turned to give the bound man as- 
 sistance to mount the steps to the platform, but 
 another arm had more quickly passed around the pale 
 prisoner, — an arm clothed in black, and stalwart, — for 
 Jack Lawton walking on the right side of the con- 
 demned man, clasped him around the shoulders, help- 
 ing and supporting him as he ascended the steps, down 
 which he would never come again in life. Jack Law- 
 ton, — his white face, above his black robes of office as 
 God's soldier, set and fixed, in every line, the iron 
 jaws clamped together with determination to go 
 on with his sad duty without a tremor — walked with 
 his arm still around the prisoner, upon the trap of 
 death at the front of the platform, repeating the 
 prayers of his office, and speaking words of hope to his 
 old friend, the prisoner. 
 
 As they bound Hollister's feet together (the noose 
 was hanging around his neck), he said, turning to the 
 sheriff " Can I say a few words to my old neighbors 
 before I die?" The sheriff, seeing as did Jack and all 
 those near to him, that with the approach of death's 
 grim presence, reason had reasserted its sway in Hol- 
 lister determined to hold dominion, if only for a few 
 minutes, over the mind which so soon would be still, 
 no more disturbed by thoughts of wounded pride, the 
 past glory of America's freedom, or present misery 
 and degradation, answered " Yes, but be quick about 
 it." Hollister, standing on the trap, his arms and legs 
 fast bound by the ropes with which the hangman had 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 165 
 
 tied him, could only move his head. Around his neck 
 was the rope, the end of the halter swaying with his 
 motions seemed a serpent coiling about his victim. 
 Looking about over the scene so familiar to him in the 
 rambles of his boyhood, gazing on the land fair and 
 rich with the verdure of early summer. Land, which as 
 part of the State of Ohio had been one of the fairest 
 spots by God created ! land owned and tilled by free- 
 men ! Hollister, in the fast fleeting moments of his 
 life seemed to recall all the sad story of his country's 
 ruin, for raising his eyes to Heaven, with a sigh more 
 for the land of his birth, than for himself, he whispered 
 " God have mercy ! " Then looking over the line of 
 soldiers to where, like beaten hounds, the bondmen 
 stood in awe-struck silence, except when some almost 
 inaudible whimper torn from a sympathetic heart 
 broke the deathlike quiet of the slaves, who, with eyes 
 fixed in terror, gazed at that white face turned toward 
 them, which so soon shall take on a still more ghastly 
 pallor; at those eyes now glittering with intensity of 
 emotion as he speaks to them, which shall be so soon 
 closed forever in that dreamless sleep from which 
 there is no awakening. 
 
 In a voice as steady as the tide is, without a shake 
 or quiver, Hollister said, " Old friends, old neighbors ! 
 Before the falling of the trap on which I stand, I wish 
 you to hear, that in the tumultuous memories of the 
 past few weeks, I cannot recall to mind the deed for 
 which I die, except the shadowy recollection of some 
 words which when spoken, I resented with a blow ! If 
 my weak memory be correct in what it tells me those 
 words were, so small is my regret for the blow I gave, 
 that standing on this fatal trap unbound, and any vil- 
 
l66 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 lain repeat those words, I would strike him down — 
 In plain truth, not in the hope of mercy, I say to you, 
 that I have been indeed mad, insane ! the wandering 
 phantoms of my mind, frozen by the cold of near ap- 
 proaching death now are still, and in that peace which 
 comes with stillness, I know surely that I have been 
 mad. — If in that madness I have done aught to merit 
 death upon this hateful tree, the cause of that mad- 
 ness which drove reason from its seat should stand 
 here, not me. — That is the criminal in place of whom I 
 die. Look at these fields which mile on mile, on every 
 hand, stretch out, until the oceans East and West carry 
 their undulations, in imitating billows far out to sea. 
 Once, all this land was owned by freemen, who rich in 
 the abundant stores of freedom left by their sires, sang 
 as they followed the plow which brought smiling pros- 
 perity to our shores. Look upon these same lands to- 
 day ! still fair, still fertile, but Alas ! tilled now by 
 slaves attached to the soil which they till, are, bowed 
 by grief and shame, silent as the beast dragging the plow 
 they follow; misery, despair, insanity, death on every 
 hand. Whatever brought this great change, my old 
 friends is the grand criminal in the place of whom I die. 
 What is the cause? In telling the Cause you name the 
 Criminal. 
 
 "Tell your children, when they ask you to name the 
 Cause of the great change in this fair land, go seek in 
 their ancestral graveyards, and tearing from the tombs, 
 the bones of mouldering ancestors long since dead, call 
 in the brainless skulls for answers from the fleshless 
 jaws, to the questions — Why did you tax your children, 
 into poverty misery, despair, madness, slavery and 
 crime? — Why did you, in taxing yourself and children 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 1 67 
 
 make laws by which a few, acquiring all the wealth, 
 acquired the power to make your children slaves ? If 
 those poor brainless skulls, so deaf in life to reason 
 will listen, those fleshless jaws so silent in life will 
 answer, then will your children, in learning the Cause of 
 this great change in our country, learn the name of that 
 Grand Crime conceived more than a century ago, for 
 which I die, to-day. Neighbors this day, upon this 
 awful tree, I pay the penalty not of a crime'committed 
 by me, but, meet dishonorable death for the crimes of 
 blindness, deafness and dumbness in the ancestors of 
 those who are America's serfs, this day — Bonds of Servi- 
 tude were prepared for us by our ancestors, a century 
 ago." — And here, the impatient sheriff seeing a motion 
 in the crowd of bondmen, and hearing an ominous mur- 
 mur coming from them, as they moved nearer to the line 
 of soldiers, waved his hand to the hangman, who 
 promptly stepping forward, began to draw over Hollis- 
 ter's head that covering, which forever eclipses all 
 light in the world, for the wretch standing on the 
 scaffold. 
 
 Hollister whispered — " Father, to Thee, I come un- 
 stained by bondage, if stained with blood." 
 
 With a sharp click, the bolt was withdrawn and 
 Hollister shot downward out of Jack Lawton's sup- 
 porting arm, into Eternity. With the click of the bolt, 
 the leash which had held back the serfs, as hounds 
 held by leather thongs, parted — with a cry of rage and 
 despair, they darted forward, hurled by common im- 
 pulse toward the gallows and soldiers. For what pur- 
 pose and for what reason, other than becoming excited 
 by the scene, and Hollister's speech, they were over- 
 powered by emotions making action involuntary, will 
 
l68 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 never be known. Without even a stick or stone, with 
 only their bare hands as weapons of offense, they 
 rushed toward the bristling line between them and the 
 quivering body suspended in the air. The officer in 
 command of the troops was young and nervous, the 
 whole occasion had been a trying one, and his nerves 
 were not equal to the strain placed upon them. Not 
 (in charity let us believe it) realizing in the excitement, 
 that the bayonets of his men were more than enough 
 to meet the charge of the unarmed, unorganized mob, 
 that with cries and wild gesticulations came madly 
 towards his line — he gave the order — 
 
 " Fire ! Fire at will ! ! — 
 
 Flames darted from the shining rifles. Like a field 
 of ripened wheat beneath a gust of wind, the on-com- 
 ing mob bent to the ground before the discharge, some 
 never to rise again. The deadly rifles had cut gaps in 
 the crowding mass of men at the close range at which 
 the rifles were fired ; the serfs staggered, paused, the 
 clicking of the chamber mechanism of the rifles told its 
 own story ; again the rifles began to flame. Jack Law- 
 ton, his black robes flying about him like the wings of 
 some huge bird, sprang from the end of the scaffold, and 
 rushed down in front of the line of flaming rifles, be- 
 tween them and the poor bondmen who, stopped in 
 their onward charge by the first discharge of fire, 
 stood still as if stupefied, not knowing whether to 
 flee or go forward. Lawton's strong voice rang out 
 like some war captain or hero on the field of battle, 
 crying " Go back, lie down ! " The slaves cast them- 
 selves flat to the earth, or turning, ran back as his 
 command reached them. 
 
 Jack turned and faced the line of rifles which still 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 169 
 
 spurted death among the unarmed men, who crawling, 
 fleeing, dying, sought safety in flight only. " For 
 shame, for shame ! — Brave soldiers, stop firing " he 
 called, as with arms extended he ran toward the flash- 
 ing rifles. He stumbles, totters, reels, falls, but spring- 
 ing up once again to his feet, reeling as he runs, with 
 arms extended, the long gown and wide sleeves making 
 his figure herculean, he almost reaches the line of sol- 
 diers, grasping out before him as if he would gather 
 the death dealing muzzles of their muskets and in his 
 own bosom hide danger from the people — he falls 
 downward at the soldiers' feet shot through the leg 
 and breast. 
 
 There is a point beyond which iron discipline can- 
 not carry a soldier, no matter what may be his blood, 
 race, or nation. That hard taskmaster the great 
 Frederic, had to bend his iron rod of discipline when he 
 heard his army singing, the Prussian hymn con- 
 trary to his orders, praising God for victory over the 
 Austrians. So with soldiers of every clime and coun- 
 try, there's a strain too great for the steel rod of disci- 
 pline to stand ; the strain had snapped the steel in the 
 line of soldiers before which Jack had fallen. The 
 age of chivalry will never die as long as man lives on 
 this atom of the universe. In different form and man- 
 ner, deeds of chivalry will be done and applauded so 
 long as the hearts of men are warm with love and 
 courage. A knightly deed done in no stronger armor 
 than the black robes worn by Jack as he lay shot and 
 bleeding, will move men's hearts with the same emo- 
 tion, as when such deeds were done by brave knights 
 clad in shining steel armor. 
 
 The men, casting down their rifles as if by mutual 
 
i;o "UNCLE SAM'S*' CABINS. 
 
 consent, moved by one feeling, admiration ; breaking 
 their ranks, gathered around the body of the black- 
 gowned clergyman ; an old sergeant, assuming as if by 
 right of experience, the lead, ordered the men who 
 pressed forward to move back and give more air, and 
 kneeling by the prostrate figure, turned it over and 
 began a search for the wounds. As he raised Jack's 
 head, the eyes opened and looked up, and seeing a sol- 
 dier, the motion of the lips more than the voice said, 
 " Stop fir — " and once more, the eyes closed and the 
 lips were still. As the grizzled old sergeant staunched 
 the blood flowing from the unconscious man's bosom, 
 he muttered to those nearest to him, who, peering over 
 his shoulder, watched with anxious eyes, the operation 
 — " He's not dead yet, small thanks to us." 
 
 The commanding officer who now made his way 
 through the circle surrounding the wounded clergy- 
 man came close to the sergeant and said softly to him, 
 " Is he dead ? " " No, sir," replied the old soldier, " but 
 badly hurt." " It is awfully unfortunate," said the offi- 
 cer, "because he is the Rev. Mr. Lawton, brother of 
 the Proprietor." " I don't care a — Beg your pardon, 
 sir. I mean no matter whose brother he is, he is the 
 bravest man I ever saw. Why sir, he tried to make 
 himself as big as he could by stretching out those 
 black wings he has on, so the balls would hit him and 
 not reach the cattle who charged us! We men all 
 feel bad about killing him, sir. A man who is ready 
 to catch a ball in his own body to save a comrade, 
 much more to save only that scum, is too good to be 
 shot like this" said the soldier, as he rose, disci- 
 pline reasserting itself, and saluted his officer. "Four 
 men form your muskets into a stretcher," said 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 171 
 
 the officer " and sergeant take command of the party 
 and carry Mr. Lawton to the barracks as carefully as 
 possible," — and addressing the men he said, " Now fall 
 in men, it's all right," — speaking of their leaving the 
 ranks. The young officer felt as keenly as the men, 
 great regret for the shooting of the clergyman, brother 
 or not of the Proprietor — and as he added " we all feel 
 badly," the men took up their rifles and formed into 
 line, with gloomy faces and many side-long glances at 
 the party of soldiers bearing the still form of Jack tow- 
 ard the barracks. 
 
 Had the bearers of the wounded man been carrying 
 the frailest wounded child or woman they could not 
 have been more gentle. At the slightest jolt or stum- 
 ble of a carrier or at a groan from the now reviving 
 Jack, the profane but good-hearted sergeant was growl- 
 ing at his squad. Had each man had a hundred eyes, 
 they would all have been well cursed before the jour- 
 ney was ended, for the old non-commissioned officer 
 was around the litter like a hawk hovering over a 
 brood of chickens, grumbling in the hoarse tones com- 
 mon with old troopers, half to himself and half for those 
 whom he commanded. 
 
 "If these chaplain chaps have such good stuff 
 
 as this is among them, I'm if I don't go to their 
 
 preaching shops on Sundays." Then he would mutter 
 to himself and parts of sentences would come gruffly 
 from his tobacco-stained, old lips " Die for other chaps 
 — " " Was just a-doin' — " Wonder if our chaplain — 
 Chest white as wo — Whip any man in — That's the 
 stuff, a-doin, not a-talkin — He— lead a charge to — and 
 over it — " and then breaking out at one of the men 
 
 who stumbled and Jack groaned " Where in the 
 
 are your eyes." 
 
172 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 By the time the men carrying the clergyman upon 
 the improvised stretcher had gone one mile of the 
 road toward the barracks, the news of his being hurt 
 seemed to have been carried by the very wind to 
 every humble hovel of the section ; for across every 
 field came men, women and children ; fear of the sol- 
 diers who so lately had fired upon them seemed to 
 have no effect upon them, even though the marching 
 detachment of soldiers was but a few rods ahead of 
 the litter. The people would press up near to the 
 burden which the soldiers were carrying, and in spite 
 of the sergeant's frowning face and oaths, insist 
 upon knowing how badly Jack was hurt, and if he were 
 dead. The sergeant with dire threats and gestures, 
 ordered them back, rumbling in surly tones " He is 
 
 too good to be killed for you. Get back or I'll 
 
 stick a bayonet into you." Then the people formed 
 themselves into a perfect procession augmented at 
 every by-path by new-comers, and followed the man 
 who had been shot while trying to save them, to the 
 gates of the barracks, and loitering around, they would 
 question every soldier coming near the gateway as to 
 Jack's wounds and condition and ask "What did the 
 surgeon say?" 
 
 When night came, many still remained watching 
 around the barracks hoping to hear something definite. 
 And this was the party of serfs who saw the figure of 
 a woman clad all in black run across a field and up the 
 road until she came to the barracks, saw her as she 
 spoke long and earnestly with the sentinel on duty, 
 after seemingly much urging and persuasion, heard him 
 call the officer of the guard, saw the woman as with 
 earnest gestures she talked with the officer. Saw him 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 173 
 
 — leave her standing at the gate and waiting — go away 
 and soon returning, raise his hat with grave dignity, 
 salute the waiting woman. Saw the guard "present 
 arms " with respect, and the officer conduct her with 
 great kindness through the gateway. As she turned 
 to enter the barrracks, the party that was waiting saw 
 a pale face in the moonlight, and they murmured a 
 thanksgiving, for they knew Jack could lack no nurs- 
 ing, when the gentle hand of Mary Hollister was near 
 his pillow. 
 
 ****** 
 
 After the firing had ceased and the serfs scattered, 
 the hangman by order of the sheriff took down the 
 rigid body of George Hollister and was preparing to 
 take it away with him, when Rossmore careless, of the 
 risk he ran, came forward out of the bushes where he 
 had been hiding and begged the sheriff for permission 
 to bury the body. That officer glad to be rid of the 
 trouble of burying it, said — " You may have it, it can 
 do no more harm in this world — ." Rossmore laid the 
 body on the grass of the field, over which, the poor 
 still feet had often raced with shouts of glee to catch 
 the prettiest butterflies for " Baby Mollie — " Here 
 with Jack as the horse, he now lying cold, had played 
 coachman for the chariot of the household queen — 
 "The baby." Now, watched only by a serf, his body 
 lies alone upon the field of so many happy hours of 
 boyhood. 
 
 Ja^k Lawton had promised Mary when he left, that 
 awful morning, that he would take charge of his old 
 playmate's body and would bury it in the orchard 
 beside her mother. Poor Mary had become so weak 
 and broken by the host of sorrows coming on her that 
 
i; j. '• UNCI E SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 at the last act of this drama of death, she, completely 
 crushed, had fallen into a semi-unconscious state- 
 where utterly unable to move from the bed on which 
 he placed her, with Rossmore's wife watching her, 
 Jack had left to be with George in the closing scene 
 of all, to his poor old comrade. But by the shooting 
 of Jack all the plans made for the burial, were dis- 
 arranged, however Jack had asked Rossmore to assist 
 him in the matter, telling the serf what he intended 
 doinc, so when Tack was shot down, Rossmore, faithful 
 fellow, determined to risk the danger and carry out 
 what the clergyman had intended. 
 
 Rossmore, when he came to the scaffold, overheard 
 a soldier tell the sheriff that Jack while badly wounded 
 was not dead — as the soldiers left the field followed 
 by the sheriff's deputies, the serfs hidden behind the 
 bushes and in the ditches which skirted the field, came 
 out of their concealment, seeking for their friends and 
 kinsmen — for the field was filled with the bodies of 
 dead men and many lying there not dead, were so 
 badly wounded as to be unable to do more than cry 
 with anguish. Mingling with the cries of agony com- 
 ing from the wounded, came the sound of weeping 
 and moaning as the women and children came run- 
 ning to the scene of slaughter, called hither by the 
 discharges of the soldier's rifles. To draw the picture 
 even in words, or try to tell the story of that day 
 of death among the slaves would be too horrible 
 for pen or pencil guided by any hand of flesh and 
 blood. 
 
 From the shambles of that field of death, those who 
 had dead, weeping, carried the bodies to their cabins; 
 there to sit and weep awhile beside the dead loved 
 
"UNCLE SAMS ' CABINS. 175 
 
 one with no eyes but God's to see them. Those who had 
 wounded ones to help, made stretchers of the branches 
 fallen from trees in the near forest, and taking off 
 their coarse blouses, covered the hard wood of the 
 rude litters with them, by the help of friends^and neigh- 
 bors more fortunate than themselves in having neither 
 dead nor wounded, who gladly offered assistance to 
 their suffering brethren, they carried away their suffering 
 ones. That night from many rude cabins came groans, 
 from the lips of the maimed and shattered serfs, which, 
 together with the wailing of the weeping women, crying 
 for their dead, arose as a paean to the souls of their 
 dead forefathers, sounding the advent of that strong 
 central government, so prayed for by ancestors of 
 those serfs now suffering, dead and dying. 
 
 Rossmore waited by the body until those who living, 
 wounded, needed most prompt attention. As the 
 shades of evening fell upon the landscape, he gathered 
 around the body, those of his neighbors not engaged 
 in sadder duties, and formed them into a line of 
 mourners who silent with sincerest grief, followed, in 
 the gathering gloom of night, the body of the man 
 who died upon the gallows, to the grave prepared in 
 the orchard by the side of the mother who had gone 
 before him. Solemnly they placed in the coffin pro- 
 vided by Jack's orders, the body of Hollister ; before 
 the lid was closed, forever hiding from all mortal sight, 
 the man made mad and criminal by the credulity and 
 blindness of his sires ; Mary, the poor sister of the dead 
 madman, leaning heavily in her weakness on the kindly 
 bosom of the serf, wife of Rossmore, came to the grave- 
 side to imprint a parting kiss upon the brow of her dead 
 brother. In her helplessness, missing the supporting 
 
176 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 hand, the comforting voice of one, who lately had been 
 ever near her in her trouble, seeing Rossmore cast the 
 sod from the new-made grave down on the coffin that 
 friendly hands had lowered upon the final couch of all 
 mankind, and hearing " Dust thou art, to dust thou 
 shalt return," uttered by another voice than Jack's, 
 Mary asked of those about her, where the friend who 
 had so stoutly stood by the enslaved people, was — Not 
 accepting the well-intended, evasive answers of those 
 who sympathizing with the broken-hearted woman, 
 sought to save her from new grief and sorrow she learned 
 the terrible truths concerning that field of slaughter, 
 where her brother had died to answer for the crimes 
 of others. How Jack with arms around him, stood 
 upon the gallows with her lost brother, how from Jack's 
 very arms he had fallen to his untimely death — Then 
 they told her of the crazed charge of the unarmed serfs 
 upon the soldiers, of the scene of death and slaughter, 
 how springing from the scaffold, Jack had stayed the 
 battle, and how in doing it, he had fallen badly hurt, 
 giving, as had done the Master whom he followed with 
 knightly courage, his best blood to save the people. 
 
 Long before the story was ended, Mary, tender, 
 grateful, loving woman had recovered from all signs of 
 weakness. In the wounding of Jack, her helper, succor 
 — the staff of strength in her great trials — new life and 
 courage came to the almost fainting woman. When 
 she learned where he was lying — wounded and suffer- 
 ing — needing help — perhaps, was dying, all her weak- 
 ness departed, he, her only friend might need her. 
 Heedless of advice and warning, caring nothing for 
 appearances, with all the speed of her newly-discovered 
 vigor, with one farewell look of sorrow on the newly- 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 1 77 
 
 covered grave of one of her loving friend in childhood 
 — a brother, — she hastened to the bedside of another. 
 Vaunt not thy strength and courage, ye mighty men ! 
 Within the weak frame of the frailest woman, there 
 beats a heart, inherited from the first woman, so full 
 of love, that in the hour of trial for the object of its 
 affection — that frame (so full of weakness in its hours of 
 ease) can become so strong so firm as to put to 
 blush, the faltering, trembling man, who strutting 
 boastfully has proclaimed his strength. Oh woman ! 
 woman. — 
 
 — When pain and anguish wring the brow 
 A ministering angel, thou." 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Mr. Weaving, unlike the great majority of his 
 clients, did not intend to go to London for the " Sea- 
 son " — whither the Proprietor of Ohio and his Lady 
 would soon hasten, to join all the other Proprietors 
 of America and the majority of the American 
 Landlords, who, while visiting annually their es- 
 tates in the once, United States, had their permanent 
 residences, of course, in Europe ; however, Mr. Weav- 
 ing did not intend to follow his clients in their jour- 
 ney across the Atlantic this Summer — while the 
 solicitor had accumulated a large fortune from the pat- 
 ronage of the wealthy class of America, indeed a for- 
 tune amply sufficient to enable him to retire from the 
 practice of his profession, even had his tastes been 
 greatly more expensive than they were, he still labored 
 in the cause of his clients jis if his daily bread depended 
 upon his practice. Being an unmarried man with no 
 family to provide for, it was a matter of wonder with 
 his indolent clients, the zeal and application exhibited 
 by the lawyer — When, in reply to the condescending 
 invitation, extended by Henry Lawton to his solicitor, 
 that he visit him this summer either at the Proprietor's 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 1 79 
 
 home in London or his villa in Switzerland, Mr. Weav- 
 ing said " I feel greatly honored by your kind invita- 
 tion, sir, but shall be obliged to deny myself the honor 
 of being the guest of the most condescending of Pro- 
 prietors, my professional duties imperatively demand 
 my constant presence in America this summer. " 
 
 Lawton with a quizzical smile rejoined, " Weaving, 
 I really believe that you are a miser/as I heard the Pro- 
 prietor of Iowa declare the other evening at the " Ex- 
 clusion Club " and he said ' That man must be a 
 Hebrew, to work so hard for money which he does 
 not spend!' How is it, Weaving? Are you a Shy- 
 lock in disguise ? ' " 
 
 Weaving, who thoroughly enjoyed the mystery of 
 his continued application to business, in an age and 
 country where only paupers and slaves labored, with a 
 knowing, confidential kind of twinkle in his deep 
 sunken eyes replied " Well, I think some of the present 
 Proprietors of the country, might be able to explain 
 where some of my money went to when they were only 
 heirs, and not Proprietors of their present estates, and 
 how convenient it was that I had saved money." At 
 this speech, which Henry Lawton seemed to under- 
 stand, he laughed (for him) heartily, the lawyer adding 
 "As for being a Hebrew, I am ineligible for member- 
 ship in the Exclusion Club anyhow, being a working- 
 man, and I do not intend to send in an application for 
 membership, so the race whence I come is no matter." 
 
 Then assuming his habitual tone of seriousness, 
 Weaving said, — " As an illustration of what imperative 
 affairs will compel my constant attention this year, in 
 which you, sir, yourself are deeply interested, — There is 
 the adjustment of the interest of the Lawton Estate in 
 
l8o "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 the assets of the Immutable Mutual Life Insurance 
 Company. The property to be divided is exceedingly 
 large, the successful'termination of our efforts to secure 
 the surrender of all outstanding claims and policies, 
 has placed such an immense amount of valuable 
 assets in the possession of the Association of Proprie- 
 tors that it furnishes temptation, to the very highest, 
 to be unfair in the division of the spoils, besides I 
 must be present at all meetings of the adjusters 
 of the different interests of Proprietors, to insist upon 
 the justice of assigning the property in the District 
 of Ohio, obtained by means of mortgages given to the 
 dissolved Company, to the Lawton estate. 
 
 Now, sir, that piece of imperative duty is item num- 
 ber one, and that small item means an addition to the 
 Lawton estate, of buildings in Cincinnati, Cleveland 
 and other cities in the district, of the value of two mill- 
 ions of dollars. As there are one hundred millions to 
 be apportioned I think by constant attention to the 
 interest of the estate during the adjustment, that I can 
 secure the Ohio property for you, sir,' " and with a 
 sarcastic grin, added — " Pretty good sum too for an 
 ' Entirely Mutual ' Insurance Company to earn in the 
 past century and a half for the benefit of the Landlords 
 of America" — then twirling his gold rimmed glass by 
 the silken cord, around his finger, he continued, — 
 
 "Item number two which only adds one million to 
 the estate, is the final settlement of the affairs of the 
 Justice Insurance Company, which being only an ordi- 
 nary stock company of the nineteenth century would 
 require little attention, were it not our wish to obtain 
 for the estate, the office buildings in New York city 
 upon which the old company hold mortgages" — say- 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. l8l 
 
 ing partly to himself meditatively — " What a pity that 
 one hundred years ago when the old thread manufac- 
 turer bought those few shares of stock out of the prof- 
 its of the thread business (in which he made a million 
 by holding the monopoly), he had not bought ten 
 times the number of shares ; he ought to have seen 
 what a profit-producer, Insurance and Money Lending 
 would be in a country rich in credulity, as well as natu- 
 ral wealth, and comparatively innocent and ignorant of 
 the schemes of the concentrators of capital." 
 
 Drawing his chair close to the Proprietor, who had 
 been listening with obvious satisfaction to the account 
 of the solicitor's items of duty for the summer, Weav- 
 ing almost whispered, " Item three is the execution of 
 some plan, not yet formed, for the suppression of the 
 reverend brother of the Proprietor. It is necessary 
 and calls for the promptest action, consistent with 
 safety 'and regard for the high position held by the 
 Lawton family. Why I am so earnest in what I say 
 of the latter item, is, because of things said coming to 
 my ears which never reach yours, in your high office 
 as Proprietor. 
 
 For instance, one of the spies in the employ of the 
 " Combined Proprietors' Club," whom I ordered to join 
 that villainous secret society which we have tried so 
 hard, and thus far ineffectually to break up — I mean 
 the Order of Washington — reported to me only yes- 
 terday that at a council of the leaders of the order 
 throughout the country, held here in New York under 
 our very noses, a full account of your brother's speech 
 in the trial of Johnson's murderer, was presented by 
 a delegate from the State of Ohio, (as they call it) 
 who had heard the speech made in open court in 
 
1 82 "uncle sam's" cabins. 
 
 Cleveland — a speech that would have sent any one less 
 highly connected to a Federal prison the day it was 
 delivered. This council of rebels and traitors, upon 
 hearing Mr. Jack's speech repeated, broke into a per- 
 fect transport of enthusiasm, cheered, blessed his name, 
 voted him a patriot ! — and God knows what of such rot 
 — but, they did likewise a very dangerous thing for us, 
 as it shows them to be less ignorant than we thought 
 them. They passed a resolution to seek and obtain by 
 every means within their power, Jack Lawton's consent 
 to go as their representative to republican France and 
 to the ever-friendly court of Russia. To plead with 
 France again to give that help, which Frenchmen gave 
 in the first struggle for American freedom — that help 
 which made the name of France dear to every patriotic 
 American heart — (These are the very words of the 
 resolution passed on the subject) — to plead to the 
 great, free and happy French republic in the name of 
 ' Liberty, fraternity and equality,' for aid to raise a 
 sunken sister republic from the mire of oligarchy where 
 she now is lying. To pray to the imperial ruler of 
 Russia, in the name of the friendship once existing be- 
 ween the two nations, to extend his powerful aid to 
 those who would struggle for the national existence of 
 the republic, as his noble ancestor in the past, when 
 danger threatened the nation, had done, thereby win- 
 ning for Russia the lasting gratitude of the once great 
 republic of America." 
 
 Weaving paused as he saw the look of anger which 
 had taken the place of the satisfaction evinced by the 
 Proprietor, when he heard of the millions resulting to 
 him from items one and two, of Weaving' s explanation 
 of what causes would keep him in dismal America, all 
 summer. 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 1S3 
 
 Lawton exclaimed, " By heavens! I will have a dis- 
 turber of my District put in prison if he be ten times 
 my brother — he is an infernal Socialist ' an Anarchist ! " 
 " Softly, softly ! my dear sir," said the cool, calculating 
 solicitor. " It does no good to call men names which 
 have no meaning a — century ago, men and measures 
 needed only to be dubbed Socialistic, Anarchistic, by 
 men of your class, to frighten the timid voters of the 
 country into voting in the way your class wished them 
 to do. — But to-day there are no voters, the mass of the 
 people are too poor to fear Socialism and Anarchism 
 any' longer, and the experience of a hundred years has 
 proven that there never existed anything in the old cry, 
 except a means to prevent the people from having too 
 much freedom. Socialism was an excellent name to 
 use in ridding us of opposition once, but the scare-crow 
 istoo dilapidated now to be used as a means of imprison- 
 ing a man of your name ; besides (and here is the 
 gravest trouble) Jack Lawton became acquainted with 
 too many men in high places, in Europe while he was 
 studying theology in England, to be safely arrested on 
 the charge of anarchism, for expressing the opinions 
 held by every student of political economy in Europe. 
 It would occasion an awful scandal — and unless I 
 mistake your brother's character, such a course would 
 drive him to heading a revolution, if the attempt at 
 imprisoning him on the charge of anarchism for any 
 reason should be abandoned or fail." 
 
 The Proprietor somewhat calmed by Weaving's 
 reasoning said "Well, what can you suggest to put an 
 end to the actions of one bearing my name, which are 
 making me ridiculous as a man of position and con- 
 temptible as a Proprietor in the eyes of other rulers of 
 
I 84 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 districts?" Weaving replied " I have given this mat- 
 ter much thought ; I will stay here all summer and 
 strive to find means to end this annoyance, and possi- 
 bly, a danger to the estate. Mr. Jack is developing 
 new and surprising qualities. This eloquence recently 
 discovered in your brother is unquestionably an un- 
 pleasant piece of news. I knew that he was a hand- 
 some manly man, full of courage and firmly established 
 in the honesty of his convictions, but — eloquent as a 
 speaker, I never suspected him of being. He must not 
 be allowed to visit Europe in behalf of that rebellious 
 society — the Order of Washington — Under any circum- 
 stances stopped he must be, if he accept the offer of 
 the rebels — chance may help us." 
 
 As the words were spoken, there came a modest tap 
 at the door of Mr. Weaving's consultation-room, in 
 which, Mr. Lawton and the solicitor were sitting dur- 
 ing this conversation. In response to Weaving's per- 
 mission to enter, the old clerk of the lawyer opened 
 the door, saying — " Beg pardon, sir, but a messenger 
 has arrived in haste from the Ohio District, failing to 
 find the Proprietor at his mansion, he came here — 
 "Well," interrupted Henry Lawton, "Send him in, 
 man ; never mind to talk so much about it " and turn- 
 ing to Weaving, Lawton said impatiently, " Some 
 more of my dear brother's doings, I suppose — ." 
 
 The messenger was ushered into the room and 
 recognizing the Proprietor, presented the packet of 
 dispatches to him. Henry Lawton tore off the cover 
 of the package and hastily glancing over the letter 
 from Wilson (that was the name of the man appointed 
 superintendent of the District after the death of John- 
 son), told the courier to wait in the outer office for 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 185 
 
 further orders, and, when he left the room exclaimed 
 to the expectant Weaving — " Chance came nearly sav- 
 ing us from further trouble from that madman, my 
 brother ! He was accidentally shot in his chest and leg 
 in a fight which occurred between the serfs and sol- 
 diers at the execution of the murderer Hollister ; but as 
 Wilson writes, who waited until the surgeon made an 
 examination of the wounds received by my brother, 
 before sending off the courier ; the bullet that struck 
 that young blacksmith of a brother of mine, glanced 
 along his iron-like ribs, making only a flesh wound ; 
 the ball striking the leg, passed through the thigh with- 
 out breaking a single bone," and handing the letter to 
 
 his solicitor, said " But you had better read the 
 
 whole letter. A center shot from one of those dogs, 
 we hire to fight our battles for us, would have saved 
 lots of trouble — of course, being a civilized man, I 
 would not have such a thing occur except by acci- 
 dent." The lawyer who carefully read the whole con- 
 tents of the letter before speaking, at last said — " Bad, 
 Mr. Lawton ! Very bad ! — by reading between the 
 lines I perceive what Wilson does not plainly write for 
 fear of offending you. Your brother rushed between 
 the soldiers and the serfs to prevent further bloodshed, 
 and by doing so and getting shot in the effort, he has 
 become a hero in the eyes of the whole district, as in 
 some mysterious way, news travels among the slaves 
 all over the country." 
 
 The wily man of law remained silent a few moments 
 considering something that had suddenly occurred to 
 him, then with an exclamation of relief, said — " I have 
 it, your Lady first suggested the possibility and now I 
 see my way; give me the authority to act and I can 
 
186 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 free the district from the disturber; Listen, Mr. Law- 
 ton — while your brother lies helpless and ill, I will go 
 to him saying that you have sent me to tender to him, 
 the use of your mansion in New York while you are in 
 Europe, learning with regret of the unfortunate acci- 
 dent to him — You will go immediately to Europe — I 
 will persuade him that he needs rest from excitement, 
 and that he can secure better medical attention in 
 New York than at a military post in Ohio. When I 
 get him in my possession, helpless from his wounds, 
 surrounded by the men I will take with me to Ohio, I 
 can quietly furnish enough evidence of insanity in him, 
 to get friends of mine who are reputable physicians, to 
 sign a certificate and recommendation that will place 
 him safely in an asylum, where he will remain until you 
 wish him released — what do you say to the plan?" 
 asked Weaving — "Splendid," said Lawton, "That will 
 settle the whole affair, for you can readily explain my 
 desire to have the fact of my brother's insanity kept 
 quiet, to physicians, keepers, law officers and all who 
 are obliged to know anything about the matter. It 
 will appear so entirely natural for me to be reluctant 
 about publishing my brother's misfortune, that no pry- 
 ing investigations will be made by his friends, beside 
 the transfer to the asylum can take place when I am 
 absent from the country and no blame can attach to 
 me in any event if you are willing to personally assume 
 the responsibility of the whole affair." " The only fear 
 of failure in the scheme," said the solicitor, " is that 
 Mr. Jack may become suspicious and refuse the invita- 
 tion. To use force with him wounded and almost help- 
 less, might be dangerous, as they say he is the very 
 devil when aroused, and the use of force might in any 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 187 
 
 event create awkward investigation — " " Ah, clever 
 as you are, Weaving," said the Proprietor, with a smile 
 of contempt, at the recollection of his brother's nature, 
 stealing over his sneering countenance, "You have 
 not read my brother's character aright, if you fear any 
 suspicion occurring to his mind — he is the frankest fool 
 himself, in the world and therefore the least suspicious, 
 beside being himself forgiving, it will be natural for 
 him to imagine that I am also and sincere in my 
 invitation to him to occupy my house in New York- 
 city ; if that be the only difficulty be perfectly easy, my 
 clever friend." 
 
 Weaving then said " I must secure his admission 
 into some insane asylum beyond the borders of the 
 Ohio District — I dare not leave him in a place sur- 
 rounded by a lot of men (serfs true enough) who 
 worship him as their hero, but I think that can easily 
 be arranged — Now, Mr. Lawton, as quickly as possible 
 have steam gotten up on your yacht and put the At- 
 lantic between you and your brother " — Lawton rising, 
 his face beaming with exultation and relief, said as he 
 clasped the extended hand of his lawyer, " Weaving 
 you are an invaluable fellow ! I don't know what 
 some of our class would do without you ! I will sail 
 for England to-morrow ; I leave every thing absolutely 
 to your discretion, and to-night, thanks to your ingen- 
 iously devised scheme, shall sleep tranquilly." Weav- 
 ing conducted the Proprietor to the office door, with 
 many expressions of thankfulness for the good opin- 
 ion expressed by his powerful patron. 
 
 In Weaving' s character there existed qualities recall- 
 ing the bee or silk worm, he labored to collect honey 
 for the use of others as the bee does, only Weaving's 
 
1 88 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 labor was not to lay up a store for the future use of 
 himself, of which, like the bee, others robbed him ; — 
 The reward, for which Weaving so continuously ap- 
 plied himself to his labors to obtain, was the unadul- 
 terated delight it gave him to be successful in a scheme, 
 — The fruits of an enterprise or undertaking might 
 fall into the lap of another, it was the success with 
 which the tree was shaken and forced to yield its fruit 
 that furnished Weaving his reward — As the silkworm 
 spins the thread for others to wear the garment when 
 woven, so Weaving was willing to spin a plot, inter- 
 ested only in the accomplishment of the object to be 
 attained, — securing his own reward in the successful 
 operation of his plans, willing that others should en- 
 joy the material benefits of them. 
 
 Weaving had organized the Proprietors of the differ- 
 ent districts in America into an association called the 
 Association of Proprietors. The intent of the organiza- 
 tion was to accomplish, by the combination of a 
 large amount of capital with a large amount of 
 influence, objects for the benefit of those compos- 
 ing the association, which would have been utterly 
 impossible of attainment by the individual efforts 
 of any single member of the association, no matter 
 how influential or wealthy he might be. — 
 
 The operations of the association recalled those re- 
 markably gigantic enterprises, recorded in the files of old 
 newspapers, as successfully undertaken by an organiza- 
 tion of the nineteenth century, which, by gaining the 
 monopoly of the sale of coal oil in the (then) United 
 States, accumulated millions of dollars — and became so 
 powerful that at its command the light of the poor man's 
 lamp throughout America cost him one cent per- 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 189 
 
 hour, or ten cents per minute, or was extinguished 
 entirely. By the vast amount of money it com- 
 manded, this tremendous combination of a century 
 and a quarter ago, actually controlled the enactment 
 of laws affecting its interests and that too, (strange as 
 it may now seem) when every man in the country 
 voted for the law makers. The continued existence of 
 this old combination, called the Standard Oil Company, 
 for many years, is but another instance of the delirium 
 that was prevalent in the minds of the citizens voting 
 in America in the latter part of the past century ; its 
 existence, monopoly and operations, are verified by 
 hundreds of records. Amazing as it may to-day seem, 
 citizens of the United States, free and untrammeled 
 by serfdom, actually voted to tax themselves that this 
 organization might amass an immense amount of 
 money, and the individuals composing it or their de- 
 scendants, by the use of that vast accumulation, en- 
 slave the citizens voting or their descendants. It is 
 one of the strangest phenomena in that the most phe- 
 nomenal century in America's history. Weaving had 
 moulded his organization upon the model furnished 
 by the Standard Oil Company, now so long dead, 
 but with whose record he had made himself familiar 
 by reading. 
 
 His first undertaking after the organization of the 
 new association was to obtain control of the immense 
 amount of assets of the Immutable Mutual Life Insur- 
 ance Company, which, for many years, during the 
 prosperity of America, had deluded the people into be- 
 lieving, that all who insured their lives with the Immu- 
 table Company, were mutally benefitted by the profits 
 made in the insurance and money lending business 
 
190 " I'M I 1 SAM S CABINS. 
 
 conducted by the company — as a matter of fact, the 
 countless millions paid in shape of premiums on the 
 policies of the Immutable, into the coffers of the com- 
 pany were absolutely controlled by a few rich men, 
 who securing a sufficent number of votes in a compact 
 form, elected themselves to office without regard to 
 the vast number of other policyholders, who, while 
 being the majority of the whole, having no organiza- 
 tion, never voted — thus, and even with the constant 
 espionage of commissioners appointed by the different 
 states then existing, a few men controlled the millions 
 of the many. Lending where and to whom the few 
 saw fit, the money of many. Voting such salaries 
 to themselves as they might think necessary to sup- 
 port their expensive establishments, (of course) it 
 would be unreasonable to expect a poor commissioner 
 of a state to be too exacting, in dealing with men con- 
 trolling millions while his own compensation was 
 trifling, and when his needs might compel him to ask 
 favors at any time. 
 
 Weaving had ascertained that the Immutable had 
 been compelled to buy in a large amount of the prop- 
 erty in America under the mortgages upon which the 
 company had loaned the money of the people, to the 
 people. With the decay of the American farming in- 
 terest and the resulting death of the American manu- 
 facturing interest, borrowers of money from the 
 Immutable Mutual were unable to pay interest or 
 principal — whether the collaterals for the loan obtained, 
 were real estate, farming land (city property) railroad 
 bonds or municipal bonds — the hide had gone with the 
 hair. Policyholders and claimants being impovished 
 by the general wreck of the commerce of the country, 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 191 
 
 needed money. Then it was, that Weaving with his 
 association stepped in, and by securing, votes sufficient 
 to elect a board of directors who would follow instruc- 
 tions, began by frightening policyholders and claimants 
 with pessimistic statements of the company's affairs, to 
 depreciate the value of the policies, upon which, im- 
 mense premiums had been paid for years. It required 
 some time to acquire absolute control of the policies 
 issued by the Immutable Mutual, but by money and 
 influence, it was finally accomplished, and Weaving 
 enjoyed the reward of his efforts, in the success of the 
 scheme, by which the Proprietors obtained even the 
 benefit of the premiums paid by heartbreaking depriva- 
 tion, on policies of life insurance held in a so-called 
 mutual company. 
 
 Of course, the Justice Insurance Company was a 
 simple affair, a story illustrated in every snow ball 
 made, the larger it grew the faster it grew. Having 
 sucked dry, the orange, (the people of America) of all 
 the juice (ability to pay premiums and interest) the 
 Justice Company closing the iron claw of its accumu- 
 lated capital upon the collaterals placed with it to secure 
 long overdue loans, soared away as a vulture with the 
 plunder obtained from the bleeding flock of sheep. In 
 this case, Weaving fought only to secure certain ad- 
 vantages for Lawton, in gaining which, he would have 
 the happiness afforded by beating the solicitors of other 
 Proprietors. 
 
 Mr. Weaving entertained no feeling of animosity 
 against Jack Lawton, except such as arose from his 
 conduct being opposed to the attainment of the object 
 for which the lawyer had labored so persistently for 
 many years — that was the complete subjugation of the 
 
IQ2 "UNCLE SAMS" CABINS. 
 
 inhabitants of America to the domination of a few 
 men, — Proprietors and Landlords. 
 
 Weaving had early in his professional career recog- 
 nized that freedom and liberty were but empty names 
 to men, where their very existence depended upon the 
 caprice of a few, who owning all the money or wealth 
 of the country, were enabled to enforce obedience to 
 their mandates by a threat of that, which, with Ameri- 
 can men has ever proved more efficacious than the use 
 of firearms or physical force, — " Want coming to their 
 wives and children." The same terror inspired in the 
 American's heart by the danger of want threatening his 
 loved ones, cannot be created by all the cannon of 
 earth combined with all the Jovian thunders of an 
 angry Heaven. 
 
 Blessed be the name ! American husband ! father ! — 
 in all ages, to all women and children ! His peer never 
 lived on Earth ! He joyfully labors. By deprivation, 
 strain and the sweat of his brow does he purchase the 
 comforts of life for those he loves, and is still unsatis- 
 fied, but would pour forth, with happiness, the best 
 blood of his heart — nor call its giving, a sacrifice — to 
 procure needless luxuries, and view with satisfaction, 
 the pleasure given to his dear ones, all forgetful of 
 the agony that he himself was suffering ! 
 
 Have America's fair daughters appreciated the price- 
 less jewels in their possession ? In the bosom of the 
 plain, uncultured, half-educated American man of 
 unknown lineage, there beats a heart so full of loyal, 
 honest love for woman, so full of courage and willing- 
 ness to fight, labor and suffer for the mistress of his 
 affections, that in real knightliness of character, Ama- 
 dis of Gaul and Bayard sink into insignificance beside 
 
"UNCLE SAMS ' CABINS. 1 93 
 
 him. Beside this domestic knight and hero of two 
 hemispheres, rough, uncouth, uncultivated though he 
 be, in the eyes of all thinking, loving, grateful Ameri- 
 can women — clothed as he is with the splendor of his 
 lore and loyalty, a scion of a hundred kings, long lines 
 of Vere de Veres and Montmorencies ; refined, edu- 
 cated, cultivated, his breast sparkling with countless 
 orders, — should seem mean, small, over-shadowed by 
 the greatness of the plain American. 
 
 Weaving by studying the records of the past century 
 had learned with what invariable success, the Concen- 
 trators of Capital and Monopolists, had utilized this 
 enormous strength of the American men's love for their 
 families — finding in this, the strongest, blindest element 
 in their characters — the means of enslaving them, in all 
 the years of the past century during the time when the 
 franchise was universally held by the citizens of the 
 then United States. 
 
 Upon every occasion, whenever the Ship of State, 
 sailing ever nearer and nearer, blown by bewildering 
 foggy winds of delusive prosperity, came in sight of 
 the hideous rocks of slavery, and some brave captain, 
 calling to the horrified crew (the people) cried Danger! 
 About Ship ! — Down helm — Tack ! — 
 
 The crew rushing to save the good vessel letting go 
 all sheet lines, putting down the helm, making for the 
 moment therefore, the white sails of Commerce shiver 
 and flutter, then it was— while the ship shivering in 
 wind lay helpless, and before the calm, clear and steady 
 wind of permanent prosperity, could fill the sails of fair 
 Commerce, on the new tack, which would carry the 
 vessel clear of the shoals of slavery — that the Concen- 
 trators of Capital and Monopolists, like a band of 
 
194 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 heartless wreckers, lighted false beacon-fires to beguile 
 the crew and captain, calling through the fog: 
 
 " Look out for the rock of Ruin lying in the track 
 of the tack you are taking " — calling the crew's atten- 
 tion to the false beacon lights created by the bucca- 
 neers of the nineteenth century. While thus the crew 
 filled with fear, doubt and confusion, hesitating, left the 
 good ship shivering between the good and evil breezes, 
 then these buccaneers and wreckers pounced upon it 
 — whirling the hot shot of "Want," "Starvation," 
 "Suffering for families," "Misery for your women" 
 through the bulwarks of the drifting vessel and into 
 that, the weakest spot in the armor, of the crew- 
 Americans. Double shotted the Cannon of Capital 
 poured grape upon confused crew and captain. 
 
 " Depleted Treasury," " Lack of Stability of Cur- 
 rency," "Withdrawal of gold," " Lack of confidence," 
 " Dearth of Trade," " Financial Disaster," " Closing 
 Factories," " Lack of Employment," " Reduction of 
 Wages," " Idleness," " Starvation." 
 
 These were the bombshells moulded, created and 
 exploded upon the deck of the hesitating Ship of 
 State, by the Concentrators of Capital, Monopolists— 
 the buccaneers of civilization, — all made of the material, 
 — money, dollars amassed, accumulated, by years of 
 successful plundering. 
 
 At this cannonade there never failed to follow sur- 
 render, unconditionally, of captain, crew and ship, all 
 wounded, hurt, demoralized in the spot the weakest 
 in the American structure — love of family. Weaving 
 had learned well the lesson taught by the records of 
 the life of the country for a century, clever disciple of 
 Machiavelli that he was. 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 195 
 
 Of course, long before the advent of Weaving and 
 the Association of Proprietors upon the field of Ameri- 
 can affairs, anything like effective opposition to the 
 continued concentration of capital had been eliminated 
 from the range of possibilities in American politics. 
 
 The nation made drunk by the poisonous drug 
 of artificial prosperity during the epoch succeeding the 
 great American civil war, had so long allowed the 
 trade-killing, happiness-consuming liquor to take the 
 place of the natural strength-giving food of unrestricted 
 commerce, that delirium had long since seized it. 
 Like the poor drunkard, the people of America 
 had many times, realizing their condition, re- 
 solved to abandon the artificial stimulant, but in the 
 brief period after abstinence, finding the poor ener- 
 vated body of the nation shaking and quivering like 
 the miserable drunkard, who, for a few days is de- 
 prived of his usual dram — which kills as it temporarily 
 creates a feeling of exhilaration — would rush franti- 
 cally back to the poisonous prosperity-consuming stim- 
 ulant of laws restricting trade ; not waiting for 
 abstinence and healthy food to furnish natural and 
 permanent strength to take the place of the fiery spirits 
 which were leading the country to that asylum of all 
 delirious and intoxicated nations — Slavery or Anarchy. 
 
 The weak and wavering nation enfeebled by the 
 tremendous love of home and family, and fearing 
 want and misery for dear ones, was quickly and 
 easily lured upon the rocks of destruction by the siren 
 songs of Concentrated Capital and Monopoly. Weav- 
 ing found the way all prepared for the triumphant 
 march of his clients, the Proprietors and Landlords, 
 over the decaying bones of liberty, to thrones of power 
 
196 "uncle sam's" cabins. 
 
 resting upon a foundation laid in the enslavement of the 
 people, and the final extinguishment of freedom in the 
 land once the bright home of the freest people on earth. 
 Jack Lawton presented himself as an obstacle 
 in Weaving's pathway to the complete realization of 
 his dreams of success, power and position as Prime 
 Minister in an imperial government and as such an im- 
 pediment only, was Jack objectionable, and necessary 
 to be crushed and obliterated. Therefore, to accom- 
 plish that end did Weaving bring all his energies and 
 efforts to bear. 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 WHEN the commandant of the post in the section 
 of the Ohio district, where the execution of Hollister 
 had taken place, learned from the message — which the 
 officer in charge of the detachment of soldiers present 
 at his execution, and engaged subsequently in firing 
 upon the infuriated serfs, had sent him by a mounted 
 orderly ahead of the advancing squad carrying the in- 
 animate body of Jack — that the brother of the Proprie- 
 tor had been accidentally shot in the endeavor to 
 prevent a battle between the soldiers and the serfs ; 
 that the officer of the troops engaged had thought it 
 best to have the wounded man brought to the bar- 
 racks, knowing that there he would secure the prompt- 
 est, and in fact, the only medical attention procurable in 
 the section. 
 
 The commandant gave instant orders to have 
 his own quarters prepared for the reception of the 
 wounded clergyman. He felt not only regret for 
 the unfortunate affair, but also considerable apprehen- 
 sion concerning the possibly unfavorable view that the 
 influential local magnate, the Proprietor of the District, 
 might take of the wounding of his brother by the sol- 
 
198 "uncle sam's" cabins. 
 
 diers quartered in his province. Not knowing, as none 
 of the officers at the military post there did, of any 
 disagreement between the two brothers, Weaving hav- 
 ing wisely concluded — when comment was made to him 
 at the time of the execution of the " Bonds of Servi- 
 tude " by the tenants, concerning the unconventional 
 conduct of the Reverend Mr. Lawton — to say nothing 
 of any differences existing between members of his 
 patron's family. 
 
 The surgeon of the post hastened to meet the com- 
 ing procession, and giving directions concerning the 
 more comfortable carriage of the suffering man, ordered 
 him, taken at once to the commandant's quarters, hav- 
 ing the old sergeant detailed to assist in caring for 
 the patient. After Jack was deposited by his bearers 
 upon a bed, in the commandant's room and restora- 
 tives administered, consciousness soon returned, he be- 
 came aware of his surroundings and with what had 
 transpired. The surgeon upon an examination of the 
 wounds, ascertained at once, that while they were 
 serious and the patient weak from an enormous loss of 
 blood, no fatal result was to be anticipated from the 
 bullets received in the chest and leg; the ball which 
 had struck Jack on the right side of the breast bone, 
 had glanced along a rib and made its exit below the 
 shoulder-blade, causing much loss of blood but nothing 
 of a serious nature. The other bullet had passed 
 through the fleshy part of the thigh, making a large 
 orifice in the limb but as neither a bone was fractured 
 nor an important artery severed, the rapid recovery of 
 the use of the leg, might reasonably be expected. 
 
 Lawton, to whom the unaccustomed stimulants had 
 brought almost instantaneous reanimation, before ask- 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S CABIN'S. 199 
 
 ing concerning his own condition, made anxious inqui- 
 ries as to the welfare of the poor serfs, who had so 
 impetuously and absurdly charged upon the soldiery. 
 When being informed, that after his own fall, no further 
 discharge of the rifles had been made into the demoral- 
 ized mass of poor people, the clergyman seemed more 
 relieved than even when the surgeon told him, that he 
 should congratulate himself upon the narrow escape 
 he had made from death, or at least, from permanent 
 injury — telling him that the wounds found, were while 
 painful, not dangerous, and that he might hope to be 
 confined to his bed only for a short time. 
 
 The commandant too, came to render any assistance 
 in his power, having heard from the officer in charge 
 of the soldiers who had fired the shots which had 
 struck Jack, — how he had fearlessly rushed between 
 the soldiers and serfs, and even after falling once, from 
 a wound received, had arisen and still advanced to the 
 very muzzles of the death-dealing rifles. 
 
 The commandant said " It is a great pity, Mr. Law- 
 ton that a man of your fearless disposition had not 
 adopted my uniform and entered the Army instead of 
 the Church." To which complimentary remark, Jack 
 responded though his voice had lost some of its 
 strength, still, quite stoutly, " Well, Colonel, of the 
 two uniforms I think my present one carried me, in 
 the discharge of my duty, into far more danger than 
 the uniform of the Federal soldiers did, who fired upon 
 a mob of unarmed wretched men to-day." 
 
 " I grant that to be the case to-day, and in this 
 instance, but I hardly think all the men of your uni. 
 form would have felt called upon to do what you 
 did, or even if recognizing it to be their duty, would 
 
200 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 have had the courage to face the blazing line of rifles. 
 You see, sir,, you are a Lawton," said the politic com- 
 mandant — " and blood will tell," — referring to Jack's 
 ancestors who had been sugar kings, Proprietors and 
 Landlords for several generations. But the wounded 
 man in whom death alone could kill the democracy of 
 his nature, replied somewhat slyly with a smile as he 
 thanked the colonel for the compliment. 
 
 " May be so,— I have read a story that the first 
 Lawton of my family, who was noticeable, by reason 
 of his becoming rich as the result of his attention to 
 business in the cheap cook shop which he kept in 
 Philadelphia, even though crippled, wished to enlist 
 and fight as a soldier when the nation's life was in 
 danger, perhaps, I derive my disregard for bullets when 
 called by duty, from the old Lawton who was a cook, 
 I certainly never heard of any great evidence of the 
 courage of any other of my ancestors." The com- 
 mandant laughed at this sally of the sick man, and left 
 the room thinking of Jack as an utterly incorrigible 
 democrat. 
 
 After adjusting the bandages and making his patient 
 as comfortable as his wounds would permit, the sur- 
 geon ordered the old sergeant to remain and watch by 
 the clergyman, bidding Jack keep quiet, prepared to 
 leave the room but was called back by the wounded 
 man who said: 
 
 " Surgeon, either take that old chap (referring to 
 the sergeant) out of here or let him smoke, knowing 
 he is deprived of his pipe will make me nervous." 
 
 The surgeon highly amused gave the desired permis- 
 sion, and related the story with great glee, that even- 
 ing in the officers' mess-room, as another evidence of 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 201 
 
 the originality of his Excellency, the Proprietor's 
 brother. 
 
 Another place where the story was told, was in the 
 quarters of the private soldiers, where the scarred and 
 surly old warrior, the sergeant said — 
 
 " I'm blessed if it didn't beat my time, to hear him 
 talk to the colonel about an old cook being his grand- 
 daddy, as if he was proud of it — And lyin' there 
 (shot maybe by my very bullet, a sufferin') yet a-think- 
 
 in' of my pipe and when I lit her, I'm if he didn't 
 
 just tip me a queerlike wink." 
 
 It would have been a difficult matter to decide where 
 Jack had the greater popularity — among the serfs in 
 the section or among the soldiers at the barracks. The 
 latter had all heard of Jack's courage and conduct, and 
 
 the stories of his kindness of heart and having " No 
 
 airs about him, just a bein' a man every bloomin' inch 
 of him " — and in the language of the camp, he was 
 unanimously voted — " The right stuff if he did wear a 
 black coat." 
 
 When the officer of the guard soon after dark came 
 to the room of the wounded man who was feverishly 
 tossing as much as his injuries permitted him to, upon 
 the commandant's bed, and reported — that a young 
 woman who absolutely refused to leave until she had 
 been admitted to where Mr. Lawton was, and had 
 insisted upon his reporting to the sufferer that 
 " Mollie " wanted to be allowed to come to him, apolo- 
 gizing at the same time for intruding upon the clergy- 
 man — Jack starting up gave such a glad cry that even 
 though followed by a groan as the pain caused by the 
 movement forced him to lie down again, the officer 
 knew that the visitor was welcome, and that he had 
 
202 " UNCI. E SAMS' CABINS. 
 
 made no mistake in notifying Mr. Lawton of her com- 
 ing. As soon as the twitch of pain occasioned by his 
 starting up had passed, Jack said. 
 
 " Show the lady up here immediately, Lieutenant 
 if you please, it is one who is almost a sister to me.' 
 As the officer disappeared in haste to conduct Mary 
 Hollister to him, Jack murmured "God bless her! I 
 might have known, she would forget her own sorrow, 
 so soon as she heard of the need of her help by 
 another." 
 
 When Sergeant Manuel (that was the name of the 
 old soldier) related in the quarters about the visit of 
 the lady, he said. 
 
 " I didn't know the name of her, but she looked 
 
 as she came in the room, like one of them pictures 
 
 of God's mother, a-holdin' of God when he was er 
 
 baby, — and when she came softly over to the bed 
 
 and kneels down and takes his hand and begins to 
 
 cry and kiss it, — I just think them stars need lookin' 
 
 after — and I goes to the wind'er at the far end of the 
 
 room and looks out. — What the has an old dog like 
 
 me to do a-listenin' to the talks of sich as her? The 
 
 you would. Well^I'd a'busted your ear for you ! " 
 
 This to a young soldier who said he would have 
 
 listened to find out, who she was. 
 
 ****** 
 
 Mr. Weaving arrived at the barracks within the 
 week that Jack was shot, accompanied by two trained 
 nurses from New York. Men, whom he said, would 
 prove far superior to Sergeant Manuel and Mary Hol- 
 lister, in attending to the wants of the wounded man. 
 But, he was somewhat shocked by the sergeant who 
 had heard him make the remark, coming close up to 
 
" UNCLE SAM S " CABINS. 203 
 
 him, as he left the room and whispering in his ear — 
 
 " The they will, you black snake " — and then 
 
 facing about and standing with his hand raised in salute 
 to his cap, as if made of stone. 
 
 Mary Hollister came every morning and remained 
 by the bedside of the sufferer all day, then going to her 
 home at the Parsonage where Rossmore's wife still kept 
 her from a feeling of loneliness. 
 
 Sergeant Manuel was with Jack at night. Many 
 and long were the talks they had on all kinds of 
 subjects during the long night watches — some snatches 
 of conversation floating through the night wind might 
 tell that Jack had not entirely forgotten his steward- 
 ship, even though wounded, for words like : 
 
 " A private has got'ter believe in his officer." Them 
 chaplain ducks say — go — but — if they've got the nerve 
 to lead, it's tough goin' " — " What's the matter with 
 bein' a man if a chap is a chaplain ? — no use to be an old 
 woman " — and then a somewhat altered but familiar 
 voice saying " Jesus was the bravest soldier," — Man 
 need not be a milksop, comrade, to be a Christian — 
 Christ's soldiers need to be men of courage, — "You 
 say I would make a good fighter in your army, come ! 
 join my army and let us make one campaign together." 
 
 These sentences came to the night wind, as it 
 peeped into the window and saw the old war-worn 
 soldier, around whose head wreaths of tobacco smoke 
 were floating, issuing in great columns from the hard 
 old lips, holding the short black pipe his dearest treas- 
 ure. Leaning propped up with pillows on a bed, 
 the night wind saw a man pale, somewhat wasted, — 
 every gesture of his one unconfined arm, full of the 
 earnestness of his soul as he talked to a comrade, of 
 
204 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 his great cause: His words were more than mere words 
 to his listener, for the listener had seen him " a-doin' 
 not a-talkin', " — and he believed in him and his story. 
 
 Is it fair to tell of the daytime? What was said, 
 when gentle Mary smoothing every wrinkle from the 
 pillows, leaned down close to our hero as he lay there, 
 gazing with new light in those honest eyes of his, into 
 that face which in his illness he had found put on a new 
 c< >lor. Jack had discovered — as she sat patient, sweet and 
 good as he had known her, when a laughing baby, — 
 somehow, a new light coming in the window, made a 
 new kind of halo around her. Hours and hours he 
 had sought to name the change that had come over 
 her — what it was that made him regard her with a new, 
 strange and tender interest. 
 
 One day Jack had been dreaming and in his sleep, 
 he saw his " almost sister " at the altar, and himself in 
 his robes of office prepared to perform the marriage 
 ceremony, only no bridegroom seemed to stand before 
 him. Suddenly the dream — vanished — he awoke to 
 find her standing by the bedside with her soothing hand 
 upon his forehead. In one moment, all the new light, 
 new interest, new feeling, flashed, revealed upon him. 
 He no longer loved his " almost sister " for remem- 
 brances of the baby whom he had nursed and petted. — 
 It was the woman good, true and gentle, that he loved, 
 and — 
 
 But what nonsense ! Poets of passion wrote in the 
 nineteenth century, wrote all kinds of unearthly moon- 
 shine about how men kneeled, wept, cried and fairly 
 wallowed, when they told women that they loved 
 them. Great tomes written by half-crazed creatures in 
 the moonlight, would teach us that our ancestors in 
 
" UNCLE SAM S ' CABINS. 205 
 
 the nineteenth century were asmad when in love with 
 our good grand-dames, as they were in business mat- 
 ters. 
 
 It is not fair to tell of Jack's wooing, for there 
 was not the least bit of the heroics uttered. Jack 
 was only a plain every-day, manly man, who had 
 suddenly realized that he loved a woman whom he had 
 petted as a baby : that a love he had thought born 
 only of old childhood's association, was in fact the 
 love of the man's heart for the woman ; Jack's pro- 
 posal was not the least romantic, as those passed poets 
 of passion would have made it. As he clasped the 
 hand resting on his forehead and brought it to his lips 
 and kissed it, he said : 
 
 " Mollie, will you have me for a husband ? " and as 
 the face above became red with blushes, he added : 
 "Often you have played Jack's wife when as little 
 chaps, we did housekeeping. Can you love the man as 
 you did your little husband ? " And the answer ! — 
 Well, maidens ! Don't learn how to answer such a 
 question from a story of the twentieth century ! Seek- 
 some realistic writer of the century of delirium — in his 
 wild pages read what lunatics, women became when 
 courted in the nineteenth century ! 
 
 Mary being only a woman, not an insane being 
 filled with " sobbing, clinging passion " simply stooping 
 down to the pale face of her lover, placed her hands 
 over his eyes, and full on the lips, she kissed him say- 
 ing, " Jack, how I love you ! " 
 
 Maidens ! let the summer breezes — that stopped to 
 catch her answer, humming, fleeing away to carry the 
 story (wicked breezes) to the forest flowers — whisper 
 in the pretty ears of America's winsome lassies, " Only 
 
206 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 answer with your lips the man you love and words are 
 useless." 
 
 Weaving, ignorant of the new tie that now bound 
 Jack's heart to the section, where he had been 
 wounded, had tendered the invitation in the name of the 
 Proprietor, to the man whom he sought to remove and 
 obliterate, and had been met by such a prompt, positive 
 and at the same time frank refusal, that it had left him 
 no possible opportunity to argue the question or per- 
 suade the patient. 
 
 In this emergency, he had taken the commandant 
 sufficiently into his confidence to suggest in the unset- 
 tled condition of the mind of the Rev. Mr. Lawton, 
 the desirability of quietly removing him to some se- 
 cluded spot for a much-needed rest. Inasmuch as it 
 seemed likely that the ill man would refuse to go will- 
 ingly, force might be required, and Mr. Weaving hoped 
 he might be able to report to the Proprietor of the 
 District, that the commandant had greatly assisted him, 
 in the execution of what would be deemed by the 
 absent Proprietor, an act, to shield his name from the 
 scandal of his brother's insanity. 
 
 The commandant, while anxious to secure the politi- 
 cal support of such a powerful person as a Proprietor, 
 was still a soldier graduated at West Point, and beneath 
 the anxiety to stand well with the powers at Washing- 
 ton, was a man of honor. He replied to the solicitor 
 that he would consider how he could be of the most, 
 service to all concerned in the matter and inform him 
 of his conclusion later. 
 
 The two men whom Weaving had brought with him 
 from New York had been assigned quarters in that 
 portion of the barracks, in which, were the private 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 2QJ 
 
 soldiers' rooms. The New York nurses had brought 
 a plentiful supply of liquor with them, which they 
 used with no unstinted hand. The result was, that they 
 became communicative while half-intoxicated the day 
 upon which Weaving had the interview — the New 
 Yorkers spoke openly of the intention of Mr. Weaving 
 to place the Rev. Mr. Lawton in a private insane 
 asylum, of which, they were two guards, and that, if 
 necessary, they would remove the wounded man by 
 force — this story was promptly carried to old Manuel, 
 who had just gotten out of bed after his morning 
 sleep — (he had been up all the previous night with Jack). 
 
 The old sergeant listened in silence to what was 
 told him, and then, the curb placed by the clergy- 
 man's night-talk gave way — the recording angel was 
 kept very busy for a time — he turned to the soldiers 
 seated about the mess-room and asked : 
 
 " Are you so mean as to let them take him to a 
 
 madhouse while wounded by your bullets ? " 
 
 A kind of growl was the only reply but the sergeant 
 seemed to understand, as he continued, " Now get 
 around and tell the men, if they try to carry him away, 
 we takes him away from them ! " and with that he 
 snatched up his cap and hurried out of the room to tell 
 Jack of the plot. 
 
 Manuel found Mary reading to the half-dozing, 
 wounded man when he came in, he had hardly begun 
 his story however, before Jack was all aroused and 
 struggling to a sitting position, said : " Well, I cannot 
 believe this of Henry Lawton, it is some of Weaving's 
 work. Now, Manuel, old chap, get me a revolver. 
 Mollie, get pen and paper and write some letters for 
 me, I must sign them if it kill me." 
 
2o3 '■ UNCLL SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 When Weaving, in response to a request from the 
 commandant, entered the room in which he found 
 that officer pacing the floor, he was surprised to be 
 taken by the arm and led to the window by the 
 colonel, looking out upon the parade-ground, the 
 commandant said to him : " Do you see those soldiers 
 gathered there ? Well, I am informed by the man 
 who acts as my servant that the men have learned of 
 your intention to take that brave fellow who lies 
 wounded, out of the barracks, by force and place him 
 in an insane asylum — they swear that you shall not do 
 it." The colonel regarding Weaving with eyes in which 
 shone the old, gallant, honest fire of the West Point 
 cadet, before age and lack of promotion has dimmed 
 its lustre, continued, " My honor is at stake in the 
 matter, the wounded man is under my protection and 
 until he fully recover from the effect of his wounds he 
 must not be disturbed by force. As much as I value 
 his Excellency's favor, I cannot forget that I am a gen- 
 tleman as well as a soldier, and in addition, Mr. Weav- 
 ing, I want no mutiny in my command — as surely as 
 you attempt any act of force with Mr. Jack Lawton — 
 I and every one of my officers will lose our lives 
 endeavoring to enforce our orders, for those men with 
 old Manuel at their head, will mutiny." 
 
 Weaving loath to admit defeat in his well-conceived 
 scheme, finding the lion's skin too short, sought to 
 patch it with the fox's, so he proposed that together, 
 the commandant and he should visit Jack, and seek to 
 obtain his consent to being moved from the post and 
 taken by the solicitor to New York. As they entered 
 Jack's room, they found him propped up with pillows 
 looking pale but stern with suppressed anger. 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 2CX) 
 
 Mary left the bedside and went to the window while 
 Manuel who, (it now being nearly dark) had just 
 entered the room, stepped aside, his hand going up to 
 his cap in salute as his commander passed him. 
 
 Weaving proceeded to draw a chair to the bedside, 
 when he was arrested by Jack's saying : " Weaving, 
 don't you sit in the same room with me ! " as the 
 solicitor paused, Jack continued in a voice in which 
 there was no sign of weakness, — " Don't open your 
 lying lips until I have finished ! — Your plot was to 
 induce me to accept your deceitfully kind invitation 
 purporting to come from my brother, (which for my 
 dead father's honor I believe to be a lie), and then 
 when you had me powerless, to incarcerate me in 
 a madhouse. Now, hear my determination ! I am 
 aware of your designs upon my liberty, but I consent 
 to go with you peacefully until beyond the barracks 
 and out of the district, then our truce is ended ! 
 Learn well my reason for going ! It would be ill 
 return — for the kindness shown me by the commanding 
 officer of this post, who stands beside you, and to the 
 soldiers who regretting the bullets which they fired 
 and which reached my body though not intended for 
 it, have expressed a determination to mutiny, rather 
 than to allow me to be taken hence by force, — to pre- 
 cipitate a riot which would result in the loss of gallant 
 lives, hence I will go willingly with you, but remem- 
 ber, on my honor as an American, when once beyond 
 the limits of the district where live my poor enslaved 
 friends, I shall feel justified in scattering your schem- 
 ing brains over the soil which has been cursed by your 
 plots and the plots of others like you." 
 
 This unexpected language brought Mary from the 
 
JIO "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 window, and Sergeant Manuel with a sidling motion 
 nearer to the bedside, the commandant stepped forward, 
 his face flushed, but Jack raised his hand, saying : " No, 
 Colonel, please say nothing, there are those in power 
 who will visit their displeasure upon you, if you utter 
 the generous impulses of your soldier heart ! 
 
 Now, Weaving, hear further : My old professors at 
 Yale and other learned professors at Harvard, who, 
 rich in the store of knowledge gleaned from every 
 learned writer upon the subject of Political Economy, 
 believe as I do. These men are not mad ! To them, 
 I have written telling them of my threatened incar- 
 ceration, these letters I have given to a trusty mes- 
 senger and when the prison bars close on me for 
 expressing ideas taught by every learned man in 
 America, then those letters will be delivered. Also I 
 have written to men in high places in Europe, telling 
 them how truth is considered madness in America, and 
 how, by the expression of doctrines which ages have 
 demonstrated as Truths beyond contradiction, a man 
 in once free America may be imprisoned, charged with 
 madness. These letters will be delivered and in every 
 civilized Court of Europe, the name ' American Pro- 
 prietor ' will be uttered with derision, as synonymous 
 with Ignorance and Imposition." 
 
 The now thoroughly alarmed solicitor, fearing more 
 the consequences of Jack's letters reaching men in 
 Europe, who were in a position to make the name of 
 "American Proprietor " odious in the society courted 
 by the rich people of America, than the acts and criti- 
 cism of the most learned men in America, the profes- 
 sors at the great universities, said, " Mr. Jack, you 
 misunderstand me; it is my fault only, do nothing to 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 211 
 
 injure your brother, the Proprietor. I would not for 
 one instant think of resorting to force to compel you 
 to accept your brother's invitation — and as I am mis- 
 understood, I will withdraw, with earnest wishes for 
 your recovery," and as the smiling knight of Machia- 
 velli withdrew, bowing, from the room, he was followed 
 by the words, " Go, you traitor ! " hurled after him by 
 Jack, who leaning forward, shook his finger at his 
 retreating figure. 
 
 That evening, as the baffled lawyer bade adieu to the 
 commandant (who forgot to shake hands with him) 
 and the officers of the post, accompanied by his New 
 York nurses went out of the barracks enclosure, the 
 men standing about led by old Manuel, crowded upon 
 them, muttering strange camp curses on an infernal 
 traitor and saying — how they would enjoy a talk with 
 the party beyond the barrack walls — all in words not 
 pretty to overnice ears but — Well ! There is lots of 
 talk God hears, and may be, pardons, for the goodness 
 that's behind it. 
 
 When the harvest had been gathered and the dron- 
 ing bees of late summer made the very air seem 
 drowsy, through the stillness came in well remem- 
 bered accent " The Lord is in His holy Temple " as 
 Jack Lawton now almost entirely recovered, began the 
 morning service, on the bright Sunday which marked 
 the opening of the chapel built by him in the section. 
 
 Close beside the speaker sat the post-chaplain, 
 and before him all a-glitter with brass buttons was 
 the post commandant and his officers. Back behind 
 the officers, are gathered, sitting side by side, serfs 
 and soldiers, until no seat is vacant and late comers 
 
212 "UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 
 
 stand listening as the speaker moving forward, 
 resting on his crutch, raises his hand, saying " Dearly 
 beloved Brethren." One old sergeant glares upon a 
 late comer who stumbles as he comes nearer — one 
 sweet face all radiant with blushes watches every 
 movement of the crutch of the speaker, anxious lest it 
 slip and fail him. Then there followed Jack's sermon, 
 just a talk in a manly human fashion, a sermon such as 
 could be expected from the man who preached it — at 
 its close, coming forward, his face all beaming full of 
 joy and gladness the preacher said : " Friends, I 
 invite you all to remain and see me married ! " Strange 
 where all the flowers came from ! every serf and every 
 soldier had somewhere hidden, great bunches of 
 blossoms. Soon the chapel was one huge nosegay. 
 
 As the commandant leading forward, gentle lovely 
 Mary, who came to place her hand in Jack's, who, stand- 
 ing near the chancel had limped down a step to meet 
 them, and the post-chaplain with his book of prayer 
 before him, stood smiling and waiting to unite the 
 handsome couple, serfs and soldiers mingling together, 
 crowded forward, all anxious to witness Jack's happi- 
 ness. — And the chaplain ! How he rolled his R's and 
 astonished his messmates by his reading of the mar- 
 riage service. — And the officers who came forward to 
 congratulate Jack and Mary. Then the aisle all 
 stewn with flowers, cast by loving hands of serfs and 
 soldiers before them as they left the chapel ; — and 
 Jack's cheery words, as old Manuel saluted " Well 
 comrade," and to Rossmore's kind wishes, " Thank 
 you, brother ! " 
 
 Such was Jack and Mary's wedding, very humble 
 but, may God send many such to America ! From the 
 
" UNCLE SAMV CABINS. 213 
 
 hearts of serfs and soldiers standing yet about the door 
 of the chapel, watching the figures of the newly wedded 
 couple as they slowly moved across the lawn before 
 the " Parsonage," there arose a heartfelt " God bless 
 them ! " 
 
CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 TRUTH covered, crushed and hidden, germinates in 
 seclusion from the light and air of heaven, sending 
 forth permeating tendrils which pierce the heap of 
 rubbish lying above it, shams, frauds and sophistry 
 defying, comes to light, and rises above the heap of 
 nonsense ; (all this is borrowed from the Sage of Chel- 
 sea. How the newspaper critics of the latter part of 
 the nineteenth century would have slammed and mauled 
 the crusty Scotchman — for his unfamiliar rhetoric !) 
 
 Jack's history, words and actions had in some mysteri- 
 ous manner (perhaps the Federal officers told it) 
 reached every institution of learning in America and 
 been wafted in some psychic fashion across the Atlan- 
 tic, until every philosopher in Europe knew of him 
 and his mad (?) doctrines. Queer, but many learned 
 professors at Yale, Princeton, Harvard and other great 
 American colleges agreed with him. In Europe polit- 
 ical economists were amazed that any American would 
 (not could) understand the unquestioned truths of a 
 science demonstrated by centuries of commerce. To 
 the " Parsonage" in the back, dismal dark and dreary 
 section of America, came great hampers and boxes 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 21 5 
 
 filled with books, works written by men learned in 
 medicine, law, agriculture — packages of drugs and use- 
 ful articles for the clergyman, who striving to fill all 
 positions that might be useful, found himself lacking. 
 These parcels came from Berlin, Paris, Vienna and 
 London as well as from New Haven, Boston and 
 Trenton. 
 
 One evening, in the autumn of the year of Jack's 
 wedding, when sitting in his library at the " Parson- 
 age," surrounded by the contents of recently unpacked 
 cases of goods, received from insane (?) sympathizers, 
 discussing with his dear " Mollie," — wife, but ever to 
 him — " the baby," all the uses to which the welcome 
 gifts could be dedicated, happy, smiling and compatible, 
 (how it must have shocked the senses of the ghosts of 
 the dead divorce lawyers who laid their cankerous 
 claws upon the domestic life of the nation in the 
 nineteenth century to see it) contented ; each radiant 
 with the reflected love of the other, (love makes its 
 own image in the reproducing reflection of its own 
 glances). There came a knocking at the ever-unlocked 
 door of the " Parsonage " and Mary ushering in the 
 visitors, disclosed in the lamplight, three strange faces 
 — faces, which with a backward flash of thought recall 
 the figure of the gaunt, determined, forward form seen 
 in old indistinctly remembered pictures of the "Spirit 
 of 1776" — to Jack who came forward, with an ever 
 open hand of welcome for all comers. For several 
 minutes the visitors regard with unusual scrutiny, the 
 man who stood before them, and Jack with ill-con- 
 cealed impatience, flushing, silently awaits the ending 
 of the examination, at last the oldest man of the new- 
 comers, steps before his companions and says : 
 
2l6 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 " Sir, expiring America has sent us, in the name of 
 him, who loved of old by every patriot, is still remem- 
 bered, we seek your aid as sons of Washington — our 
 country long torn by the discussions of political parties, 
 lies bleeding, almost expiring, will you help us save it ? 
 For, sir, our good mother country cries in her agony 
 for her children to come to her succor. 
 
 Years of contention has she witnessed between the 
 sections of the Union, all governed by the selfish 
 greed of political parties, who, for selfish aims, call up 
 old animosities and appeal to local prejudices. Now 
 she lies bleeding ! In the past century no man would 
 save her! hushed would be the voice of the most in- 
 dependent in the Senate of the nation. What, with 
 fear of loss of prestige, patronage and local popularity, 
 could be expected, but subservience to selfish, unpat- 
 riotic measures ! 
 
 Will you help your country who now seeks the aid 
 of foreign nations in the struggle for existence as a 
 Republic? " 
 
 Jack Lawton, awed by the language of Liberty which 
 nature had given to the leader of the party, calling as 
 of old in the words of Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga 
 " In the Name of Jehovah and the Continental Con- 
 gress," was silent for several minutes after his 
 visitor's speech was finished, then he said, and stand- 
 ing in the lamplight, firm and true and honest, he 
 carried conviction with the words he uttered — 
 
 " I am unwilling to seek in Europe aid for America, 
 for the history of my country tells me in all the 
 years when brave patriots in America battled to bring 
 light to the nation, the deceitful deluding tongues 
 of the enemies of freedom, the monopolists, ever 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 2\J 
 
 raised a howl of ' advantage to the English manufac- 
 turer,' which resounding in ears familiar with the 
 echoes of the thunder of Bunker Hill, they grew appre- 
 hensive, alarmed and fleeing, gave aid to the enemies of 
 freedom. No, here at home, seek aid and wisdom, I 
 will not go abroad to find it. Fully am I with you in 
 every measure and God helping me, will help you but 
 at home, we must fight our battles, winning the minds 
 and hearts of Americans, my countrymen. And in 
 secret I will have naught to do with your order — 
 Skulking Crime, Anarchy and assassination lurk in 
 secret conclaves. Out, before the world, talk of your 
 ideas of government ; when men descend to secret 
 paths in their journey to better government or freeer 
 exercise of the right of education or religion, then do 
 men put a premium on secret crimes and acts of 
 violence. Secret paths make secret foes. No, I will 
 not be with you nor aid, even for my dear land's sake, a 
 secret society. Frankly, plainly give your ideas to the 
 world winds and I am with you." 
 
 Late in the night they talked together, Mary sitting 
 close beside her husband, listening to his every utter- 
 ance with wrapt attention, as if each word was inspired 
 and of divine origin ; and when the visitors, the com- 
 mittee of " the Order of Washington " departed, they 
 convinced, took with them, Jack's words of wisdom and 
 courage — " Keep alive the torch of Freedom in 
 America, but do so in the light and sunshine where 
 every man may see you. Have faith and patience for 
 God will raise up a mighty salvation for you ! " 
 ****** 
 
 Years go drifting along Time's highway, leaving 
 traces of their passage in the snow that they have 
 
2l8 "UNCLE SAMS ' CABINS. 
 
 sprinkled on Jack's glossy curly head and from Mary's 
 blonde tresses, peep the marks of Time's wintry kisses, 
 until ten times the sweet summer coming, has recorded 
 on life's dial, the years that Jack and Mary have been 
 married. All this time Jack standing as a giant guide- 
 post, has been pointing out the pathway to the Eternal 
 haven — standing ever firm, unshaking on Time's high- 
 way in the coldest blasts of the winter winds of desola- 
 tion, amid the tempest of despair and destitution — there 
 ever faithfully undaunted, stood the brave guidepost 
 pointing to the way straight and narrow which leads to 
 a realm that knows no winter. 
 
 God saw fit to send no children to bless the union 
 of Jack and Mary , perhaps in His divine wisdom see- 
 ing that all children in the section would need their 
 care, He gave them none of their own, that all others 
 might be theirs. Every little ragged urchin, every wee 
 barefooted maiden in the section, idolized " Miss 
 Mary " (that is what all the children called her) — and 
 in the log cabin where she taught all the mysteries of 
 crooked letters, twisted S's and bow-legged B's, no 
 switches were needed — every little, restless, impatient 
 scholar listening to the songs of birds coming through 
 the windows in summer, or seeing heaps of slidemaking 
 snow in winter, immediately became still and studious 
 at one of " Miss Mary's " gentle glances. 
 
 The introduction of a school in the section created 
 comment, throughout the district, some few old men 
 remembered when schoolhouses were common, but that 
 time was long before the advents of " Districts " and 
 " Proprietors." And when at Christmas, the serfs 
 would gather in the log cabin, " Miss Mary's School- 
 house" to hear tales, from advanced pupils, of Washing- 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 21Q 
 
 ton the Patriot, Jefferson and Lincoln, men loved by the 
 common people ; Grant and Lee, brave American sol- 
 diers; Blaine, most magnificent man of the past century; 
 Cleveland, who had the confidence of the people ; they 
 would sit and listen in breathless silence at the stories 
 of the past glories of the Great Republic, (God ever 
 bless it) and go to their humble hovels feeling better, 
 in the reflected light of the grandeur of the greatest 
 Nation on Time's eternal highway. 
 
 In every scene of sickness and sorrow would the 
 figure of " Miss Mary " stand resplendent, shedding 
 light of hope around it, making blessed a name held 
 holy in all regions where the tale of the Bethlehem 
 manger, makes the name of Mary, sacred. Ten years 
 had passed over the heads of Jack and " his baby " — 
 in all those days of suffering — where ever sank a 
 woman there was Mary's ready hand to help her. All 
 through the section the fame of Mary's nursing and 
 her kind and gentle attention to the little ones who 
 suffered, made her name talismanic to conjure away 
 the spirit of sickness — and Jack; — pastor, physician, 
 friend, farmer, filling every station — welcomed in mud 
 cabins, the brother of the serf's bosom ; in the tent, the 
 comrade of the surliest soldier — carrying with him, 
 cheerfulness, hope and courage, ever followed by the 
 grim figure of an old wornout sergeant, who long 
 since, refusing re-enlistment in the Federal army, had 
 chosen Jack as his commander and enlisted in quite a 
 different army — for life, the term is — that's old 
 Manuel's last enlistment, five years have passed but he 
 is still on duty. 
 
 All that summer, alarm bells had been ringing in 
 America ; an insidious invasion was pending, against 
 
220 " UN'CLE SAM'S " CABIN'S. 
 
 which all precautions seemed futile. Forth from that 
 pestilential hotbed of horror, India, there stalked a spec- 
 tre. Before its blighting breath the land of shamrock, 
 rose and thistle withered : it had left its footprints in 
 ghastly corpses across continental Europe, and it came, 
 elastic-treading on the billows across the Atlantic — con- 
 quering, invading America with its horrifying presence. 
 Proudest Landlords and Proprietors stood trembling in 
 terror in the midst of the universal horror created by 
 its coming. The plague ! 
 
 First, New York is stricken, in spite of all quarantine 
 and regulation of the Federal government ; then, its 
 onward march unstaying, it moves ever westward, as 
 if following the ever-endless marches of the sun's 
 movements ; and America giving to the flames of 
 disease the fuel made by want, destitution and insuffi- 
 cient nourishment, furnishes new material for it to 
 feast on. 
 
 When the plague made its appearance in that section 
 of Ohio where Jack was pastor, friend and doctor, he 
 called all his friends about him, made a speech in the 
 chapel to them and organized three watches, who 
 should visit all sufferers in the section. 
 
 One with " my dear wife for captain," " Sergeant 
 Manuel, my comrade, will lead another," and " My 
 friend and brother Rossmore will, for my sake, head 
 the other." Each watch was given eight hours of the 
 twenty-four on duty. Jack ! Well, he always was on 
 duty — at all hours, night or day, it made no matter — 
 the pastor, " Mr. Jack " was always ready. When he 
 slept was a mystery to suffering serfs and soldiers. 
 
 Often in the stilly darkness of that dreadful winter, 
 when the bitter winds of midnight swept over bleak 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 221 
 
 fields and highways, through cold and inky darkness 
 would come tramping a majestic figure, knocking at 
 the door of some hovel, singing out to the fever-dis- 
 tracted occupant, " What word, my brother?" That 
 was Jack! Christ's soldier. And then bringing needed 
 medicine to the sufferer, he would sit and watch beside 
 the bed, talking in a human fashion. Yes, that was 
 Jack. Not talking differences of creeds and cere- 
 monies to poor dying wretches, but " a-makin' of por- 
 ridge, makin' the fire to burn more brightly, jist 
 a-cheerin' and comfortin' poor creatures, jist a-doin', 
 not talkin'. " Surely, old sergeant, surly Manuel, that's 
 " Mr. Jack " you are describing. 
 
 Don't tell the secret, but the spying stars have told 
 a story of a bearer of a plague-polluted body, who, at 
 midnight, depositing the fear-creating carcass on the 
 shroud-like snow of the graveyard, dug through the 
 frozen ground, making a grave for it, and when the 
 grave was finished, all alone with God, night and 
 silence, solemnly reading the burial service. Don't 
 tell it ; but — well, Jack was in that section of Ohio, 
 and the martial figure, as the stars saw it, patting 
 down the enshrouding snow above the grave of the 
 
 pauper serf, seemed familiar. 
 
 ****** 
 
 Henry Lawton, the Proprietor of the district of Ohio, 
 had hailed with triumphant joy the arrival of an heir 
 who would save the estate from the horrible possibility 
 of his brother Jack being Proprietor. Poor mother ! 
 my lady, plant of hot-house culture, she had only lived 
 to press her pallid lips upon the brow of the weakly 
 mite of humanity she left behind her. False educa- 
 tion, too much culture, had robbed my lady of all vi- 
 
222 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 tality, and left the poor inane body all unfitted for the 
 duties of maternity. This was a heritage of the grand 
 dames of the past century. Poor America ! foreign 
 women must give birth to your citizens ! 
 
 Around the weakly heir of the vast property amassed 
 in the course of more than a century of unfair legisla- 
 tion, Henry Lawton placed every barrier that wealth 
 could furnish, to save the weakly offspring of the old 
 Philadelphia restaurant keeper's blood from that disre- 
 spectfully, uncompromising enemy of the children of 
 men in spite of all the gold that ever glittered — 
 Death. Old Jackson was summoned from the Law- 
 ton mansion in Ohio — bringing with him to New York 
 Jack's old nurses, superannuated retainers of the Pro- 
 prietor's family. Under their watchfulness and con- 
 stant attention, the little Proprietor grew apace and 
 flourished in a sickly, horticultural kind of fashion. 
 Still, though weak and feeble (recalling little Paul 
 Dombey) he gave evidence in his actions and temper 
 of a kinship with the preacher down in Ohio, and 
 proclaimed the heritage left by the " Sugar King's " 
 daughter, his grandmother. 
 
 He was born in the year succeeding Jack's wedding, 
 while his father made merry over Jack's mating with a 
 mud-sill, a clod-hopper. These were the names the 
 proud Proprietor called Jack's " Mollie " gentle Mary. 
 When young Henry (he had been named for his father) 
 was only six years of age, he one morning made his 
 way into the library, where he found his father and 
 said ; " Father, why don't Uncle Jack come to see 
 me ? You have lots of gentlemen come here to visit. 
 Why not Uncle Jack?" and when the surprised 
 Proprietor said ; 
 
"uncle sam's" cabins. 223 
 
 " Oh, nonsense ! You have no Uncle Jack. Who 
 has told you such foolish stories ? Run away and play 
 with Lucille," — the sturdy spirit of the youngster, all 
 despite physical weakness, stood firmly, and nothing 
 daunted by his father's answer to his question, he 
 replied : 
 
 " But, father, old Jackson and my nurse have told 
 me of a boy that they cared for years ago, a fine, manly 
 fellow, who could ride all kinds of horses ; who could 
 fight, but still was gentle ; who was strong and rosy 
 when a little chap like me, sir." 
 
 Then the little fellow coming closer, and laying his 
 thin, white hand upon his father's shoulder, said : 
 "And they say, sir, he's alive, the bravest and best of 
 gentlemen, and their eyes get wet when they say ' our 
 boy,' just as when they tell me how Jesus suffered. I 
 want to see him, bring him here. Old Jackson says, 
 and cries when he says it, ' Mr. Jack is giving his life 
 for other people.' He's brave and good. I want to 
 see him." 
 
 When, onward in its march of terror, the Plague had 
 driven the Proprietor and his motherless son from 
 Europe, then as it stepped with gaunt strides across 
 the Atlantic and forced the great Proprietor to flee 
 from the seaboard, until at last overtaken by the 
 dreaded fever, little Henry lay gasping, burning, dying 
 in Cleveland, calling out in the delirium of the fever to 
 his almost broken-hearted father, who with fearful 
 glances watched him, and to Jackson, Jack's old friend 
 the butler. 
 
 " Send for Uncle Jack ! He can whip the fever .' 
 He will save me ! Oh ! my head ! Good God, I am 
 such a small chap, pit)' me ! Uncle Jack, you are 
 
224 "UNCLE SAM'S CABINS. 
 
 not afraid, come here and fight the fever," — old 
 Jackson, infirm and aged but with that heart of gold 
 found in old servants, restless hears the ravings of the 
 little fellow, until no longer can the old heart stand it. 
 Going over to his master, he says half stifled with emo- 
 tion : 
 
 "Sir, I can't stand it, that baby will get comfort 
 by seeing his uncle ; it's all the fault of my stories 
 and old as I am, I'm going for him," and Henry Law- 
 ton taking in his lordly hand, the hand of his servant, 
 said " I thank you ! Say to Jack to forgive me, that my 
 boy lies dying, that I ask him as my mother's son to 
 forget and come to me, the lad has heard of him and 
 his great courage and believes that he could save him. 
 Will he come, Jackson ? " 
 
 "My God! Mr. Henry, why ask me? Mr. Jack! 
 Our boy ! I shall only tell him that a little chap 
 here wishes to see him, may be dying, cries for him 
 to come to him. Oh ! Mr. Henry ! My old master's 
 son ! You don't know your brother, into the gates of 
 hell would go Mr. Jack to help the weak. Oh ! Mr. 
 Henry, Mr. Henry, God forgive you ! " 
 
 Down in that lonely " Parsonage " when Jack came 
 home from, oh! such dreadful duties, he found Mary 
 worn out from watching, asleep in his armchair, wait- 
 ing for that one meeting with her lover (laugh, fools, 
 and slaves of passion, but men are always lovers 
 when rightly mated) that they had agreed on, 
 should take place each day, during this awful visita- 
 tion, when both were so busy with their respective 
 labors. As Jack gazed upon the sleeping figure and 
 noted the dark shade surrounding the tired eyes now 
 closed in slumber, there came a rapping at the door of 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 225 
 
 the " Parsonage " which aroused the sleeper. Springing 
 up and snatching one kiss from the pale but smiling lips 
 of her husband, Mary hurried to admit the newcomer. 
 All, the humblest, were ever welcome at the" Parson- 
 age." Into the firelight came old Jackson, aged, white 
 and bending with the load of years resting on his 
 faithful head. 
 
 And when great-hearted Jack coming forward, threw 
 his stalwart arms around him and clasped him to his 
 grateful bosom where beat a heart filled with grati- 
 tude for long past acts of kindness done by the old 
 butler, for the little lonely boy in the grand old Law- 
 ton mansion, — Old Jackson touched by such kindly 
 welcome (old men appreciate attention from the young 
 and vigorous) bowed his white head on Jack's broad 
 bosom saying, 
 
 " Mr. Jack come with me, save a little fellow, who 
 recalls pictures from the past, to my old heart in 
 every word and action, of another little fellow whom 
 I watched and tended in by-gone years in yonder 
 mansion." 
 
 Then the old butler told Jack of his brother's 
 message, and of the little heir who lay dying. 
 Remembrance bringing back Jack's own neglected, 
 lonely childhood, caused a heaving of the broad 
 breast of the clergyman, and there glistened in his 
 brave eyes a suspicious moisture, as Mary coming 
 closer, said ; " Go, Jack my husband, to the poor baby, 
 who learning from your old nurses, of your courage, 
 believes that you can fight and conquer his fever." 
 
 Close to his heart pressing his sweet counsellor, Jack 
 said: "Wait a minute, I must think not only of my 
 natural inclination to help my little kinsman, but of 
 
225 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 my duty as Christ's soldier on the field of battle. 
 Years ago, more than a century, when a fatal, fearful 
 fever came destroying all before it, to one of America's 
 fair cities, making of Memphis, a graveyard, priests of 
 that old Roman Church, all ties of kinship forgetting ; 
 every danger incurring ; in God alone trusting ; has- 
 tened to the stricken city and by their devotion to 
 their duty as God's soldiers, won eternal glory for 
 themselves and Master, and the church in which they 
 worshipped," and pausing in his meditating, pacing 
 back and forth before the fire, Jack continued : " It's 
 in times of trial, like these, that men judge Christ's 
 cause, His church and clergy, and the sincerity of the 
 creed they follow. 
 
 No ! Jackson, I'm the only doctor in the section. 
 Much as my heart goes out to my little nephew, go 
 back to Cleveland, with my deputy, my wife, my 
 Mary, who will whisper to the baby sufferer that 
 his uncle is on duty, keeping, God helping him, 
 watch and ward for his dear Commander, who left 
 orders that his soldiers should watch and attend the 
 poor and lowly ; that the best love of his heart he sends 
 him with his gentle deputy. These poor serfs and 
 dying soldiers at the barracks need me more, my old 
 friend and comrade, than the heir of the family of 
 Lawton, to whom, poor baby, all my heart goes out in 
 his agony." 
 
 Thus it was that Mary, " mud-sill," " clod-hopper," 
 held upon her heart the dying heir of the Lawtons, 
 who murmured, dying : " Aunt Mary, tell my uncle that 
 when I get to God I'll tell Him all about the brave and 
 loyal trooper I have left behind me, who 'midst danger 
 and death is fighting in the Army of Christ, his Com- 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 227 
 
 mander;" and when at last the grim visitor touched 
 with his deadly breath the cheek of the proud Proprie- 
 tor, Henry Lawton, it was Mary's soothing hands that 
 clasped the burning palms of the lordly landlord. 
 When she delivered Jack's fraternal message, full of 
 frankness and forgiveness and heartfelt sorrow for him 
 in his trouble, Henry Lawton's eyes, dimming with the 
 involuntary moisture that came unbidden, forced by the 
 noble soul and sincerity of his brother, who in his life 
 and actions wrote the story of his faith and courage, 
 said : " It is like him." 
 
 And when at last Death, coming with impera- 
 tive gesture, tapped the powerful Proprietor upon the 
 bosom, calling, " Come, I want you." In faint words he 
 whispered : " Tell my brother I leave him, unregret- 
 ting, the property — in his hands it will wrong no man — 
 that in life his doctrines may seem strange, erratic, 
 but in death, one seeing clearer, envies him the glori- 
 ous possession of such a record." 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 The great Plague of the twenty-first century, in sol- 
 emn, deathly majesty, swept across the American Con- 
 tinent, sweeping with the folds of its pestilential gar- 
 ments the population of the almost deserted cities and 
 serf-tilled fields of the country into potter's plots and 
 ditches, leaving a wide track of desolation and solitude 
 behind it. 
 
 As the fires on the great American prairies sweep 
 away the dry and decaying traces of the summer vege- 
 tation by their hot breath of consumption, thus pre- 
 paring the soil with a coating of fertilizing ashes for 
 spring's advent and the birth of a newer, richer verdure, 
 so the plague of America in the twenty-first century, 
 by its population-consuming visitation, made ready the 
 land for the spring-time of a new freedom, which would 
 cover once more the country with its blooming blossoms 
 of permanent happiness, growing beneath the shade of 
 the stately, sturdy oak of national prosperity, whose 
 wide-spreading roots and feeders stretching forth, re- 
 ceived the life-giving moisture of nature's clear foun- 
 tains, uncontaminated with the artificial strength and 
 stimulant of restricted trade and unjust legislation. 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 229 
 
 The Reverend John Lawton, now become Proprietor 
 of the District of Ohio, pursuant to the operation 
 of the law of " Family Compact," (Henry dying soon 
 after his son and heir at Cleveland,) assumed a strange 
 and unfamiliar manner to all who knew him as the 
 " Fighting Parson." 
 
 Even Mary was astonished at the change created 
 by the newly assumed position — Proprietor of the 
 District. Her easy, jovial, good-hearted husband had 
 put on with his dignity of Proprietor a certain 
 sternness, a restless thoughtfulness, as if deeply meditat- 
 ing and anxious. Was her hero, her Jack, changing ? 
 Was this alteration of manner caused by the curse of gold 
 falling on her husband ? These thoughts came invol- 
 untarily to the mind of Mary, and were discarded with 
 indignation by her loyal heart as unworthy. Still, he 
 seemed so strange and different, even to the wife of 
 his bosom, that she was filled with apprehension ; and 
 the wink and petting that accompanied the words, 
 " I will make you the greatest lady in America," only 
 served to increase her wonderment at Jack's actions. 
 
 He had sent for old Weaving and all the overseers 
 of sections, calling them together with the superinten- 
 dent of the district, at a meeting held in the old man- 
 sion, and said, 
 
 " Weaving, I want a concatenated statement showing 
 every transaction of my ancestors, as far back as you 
 know them ; an accurate statement of every debtor, the 
 debt, amount, and what it came from. I am a lawyer — 
 necessity has taught me. Give me an itemized state- 
 ment, and how much money the estate owes you for 
 sundry services, (and the item covers multitudinous 
 misdoings). I need no Prime Minister — I alone will be 
 Proprietor." 
 
230 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 The sternness of the face of the speaker, terrified 
 gentle Mary, knowing as she did the man's strong na- 
 ture. 
 
 "You, Mr. Wilson — I'll not rule the district by sub- 
 stitution — I hire you and pay you. Bring tome each 
 new order before transmission to the serfs who till the 
 soil, my tenants, the bondsmen of my brother," and 
 " his Mollie " looked up in surprise at the hard grating 
 voice in which he said it. 
 
 " Overseers, I alone am master in this District, obey 
 my orders or leave my Province. Do you understand 
 me? I want a statement showing every man and wo- 
 man on my land in the District ; what children, their 
 ages, and, hear well ! what will they need in supplies to 
 carry them to the new harvest ; and I say again — re- 
 member I am here in Ohio, and master. Do my bid- 
 ding ! " And somehow all who heard him knew that 
 he was and ought to be master. 
 
 Striding over to the surprised lawyer, who, accus- 
 tomed like a long since departed German statesman, 
 Bismarck, to diplomacy and policy, listened in dumb 
 silence— Jack, the new Proprietor said, " I want cash, 
 gold, ready money, that will buy goods in any country, 
 and I want a great deal of it ! Now your charge is to 
 see that all of the Lawton property not invested in 
 land or the lives of my countrymen, is turned into 
 money, universally accepted dollars— bring your state- 
 ment in one month here to me. To this meeting, 
 Overseers, at my expense, bring every serf in each sec- 
 tion, until the old Lawton mansion shall by a million 
 men be surrounded. Now this meeting is adjourned, 
 you have my orders, obey them ! " 
 
 " No, Weaving, I have no time nor inclination for 
 
"UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 23I 
 
 whispered consultation." This remark made to the 
 lawyer came hard and cold from the lips of the Pro- 
 prietor whom the obsequious solicitor was striving to 
 retain for secret consultation. But Jack rather hesi- 
 tated as the old butler leaning on his staff, weak and 
 faltering, came forward, saying : 
 
 " Your Excellency, the apartments are prepared for 
 your occupancy, will you be served in any manner?" 
 
 Coming to where the bent and aged servitor was 
 standing, the clergyman clasping the wrinkled hand 
 resting on the staff, that old hand which so often in 
 babyhood had guided his tottering footsteps, said, 
 " Dear old friend, be patient — I love you but I have a 
 surprise in store for you, don't rob me of the pleas- 
 ure." 
 
 Old Jackson sniffling now and somewhat snuffy, 
 turned triumphant to the other attendants and said, as 
 if he knew Jack's secret, " His Excellency will not oc- 
 cupy the Mansion at present ; " and as Jack and Mary 
 walked out of the grand doorway of the mansion, 
 Weaving again touching Jack's elbow, begged to have 
 a few moments of the Proprietor's time for a most im- 
 portant matter, Jack responded with impatience : 
 
 " Weaving, man ! I have told you that there is no 
 occasion for secrets with me, — I have no partners in my 
 ideas of policy. Now, go, man ! I will not stay 
 another moment beneath the roof of my ancestors un- 
 til the serfs and slaves created by your machinations, 
 hear the orders of the new Proprietor from my own 
 lips, given here on the front steps of my mansion. 
 Now, man, begone, and come to me with your state- 
 ment one month hence," and jerking with some show 
 of temper from the restraining touch of the lawyer, 
 
232 "UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 
 
 Jack with Mary walked out across the fields toward 
 the " Parsonage." 
 
 Along the way the early, cold and frosty spring 
 breezes listening, told it, that Jack all worn and his 
 great strength wasted by a winter of toil and watch- 
 ing, while the dread plague had been present in the 
 country — when out of sight of all others, would drop 
 Mary's hand, jump on a snow bank and whoop! like a 
 schoolboy — dance about doing all kinds of unclerical, 
 undignified manoeuvres — would bound back to the 
 side of the wondering Mary, with his lined and care- 
 worn face all wreathed with laughter, clasping to his 
 honest heart his, " Mollie " — would cry "Oh! howl 
 will surprise them ! You, my baby, shall be first lady 
 of America " — and the twinkling stars say (but don't 
 you tell it) that they saw (Oh ! shocking) dancing, 
 actually dancing over the late fields of snow lying be- 
 tween the mansion and the " Parsonage " two figures, 
 just as a boy and girl would, and the stars, those big 
 scandal-mongers, whisper that the figures were no 
 other than our big, brave clergyman — the new Pro- 
 prietor and — Dame Grundy, lift your hands in holy 
 horror ! — his lady — and further some keen-eared stars 
 way up in Heaven have reported — Oh ! impossible — 
 that they heard sounds recalling an old negro melody 
 of the nineteenth century : " Oh ! dem golden slippers 
 we are gwin' to wear when we tread dem golden 
 streets — " as the figures of the minister and wife 
 danced homeward. If true, how horrible ! So uncon- 
 ventional — but that Jack always was a democratic hea- 
 then, and his wife — oh ! she is a mud-sill, a clod-hopper. 
 
 When Jack had given his dead brother, the custo- 
 mary funeral of dead Proprietors, interring his body 
 
" UNCLE SAMS CABINS. 233 
 
 with the due amount of ostentatious obsequies, in 
 Trinity Church in New York, whither he had taken 
 the remains as soon as the plague had disappeared 
 from the district of which he was now Proprietor — 
 he applied himself to the important duties thrust so 
 unexpectedly upon him by the sudden deaths of his 
 brother and nephew. 
 
 He had promptly notified the Federal government 
 at Washington of his accession to power in the prov- 
 ince of Ohio- — and after the meeting which he had 
 ordered to take place at the Lawton mansion in 
 Ohio, a description of which, has been given, Jack 
 set out for a personal examination into the con- 
 dition of the different Sections of his District, to see 
 the extent of the desolation caused by the recent visi- 
 tation of the plague upon an already impoverished and 
 almost depopulated agricultural district. 
 
 America had passed through a period, prior to the 
 plague, of an emigration of all those possibly able to 
 leave the country, as great as the historical immigra- 
 tion which took place in the nineteenth century to 
 America. The causes which had operated to impover- 
 ish Ireland, (absentee landlordism, and the constant 
 drains upon the tillers of the soil,) which resulted in 
 the enormous immigration to the United States of Irish 
 people, a century before, had turned the course of the 
 tide away from America and toward more favorably 
 conditioned continents — such as Africa and South 
 America — while the United States had been busily and 
 blindly eating up the principal of its capital, Public 
 Lands, and not hoarding the wealth annually pro- 
 duced in the crops, the interest, — America offered a 
 very Mecca for emigrants from Europe, but now that 
 
234 ''UNCLE sam's" cabins. 
 
 like the Prodigal Son, the Government of the Federal 
 Union had spent its substance in the riotous living in 
 the much vaunted artificial, delirious prosperity of a few 
 decades following the great American Civil War and 
 become reduced to a condition of existing like swine 
 upon husks, emigrants avoided the United States, 
 moving, their columns augmented by vast numbers of 
 American mechanics and farm laborers, toward other 
 continents still lying with land unconsumed. 
 
 Jack, by his self-ostracism, had dwelt in intimate 
 association for years with want and misery, but 
 even so, he found himself unprepared for the sights 
 presented to him in the wretchedness of the other sec- 
 tions of the district, of which he was Proprietor. He 
 had failed to appreciate how much the labor of him- 
 self and good wife, had alleviated the sufferings of the 
 serfs in his own section, where as pastor, friend and 
 doctor, he had dwelt, with Mary as nurse, teacher and 
 helper in every humble hovel of that quarter of his 
 district. 
 
 Wilson, the superintendent, who for ten years had 
 filled the place of Johnson who was killed by George 
 Hollister, accompanied Jack in his tour of investigation, 
 was in no respect, a man lacking in kindly feeling or 
 knowledge concerning the administration of affairs in 
 Jack's province. Early in Wilson's acquaintance with 
 the then young clergyman, Wilson had learned to re- 
 spect and admire Jack's sincerity and sterling qualities, 
 and in many ways had assisted in ameliorating the new 
 condition of serfdom forced upon the tenants. 
 
 Wilson, under favorable conditions, would simply 
 have been a good man of business, but in the deformed 
 disarranged natural order of trade and commerce in 
 
" UNCLE SAM S ' CABINS. 235 
 
 America, after the existence for more than a century 
 of the iniquitous laws regulating importations, was 
 glad to serve in the capacity of superintendent for a 
 powerful Proprietor. 
 
 The impossibility of winning success in mercantile 
 life without patronage and protection from a Proprie- 
 tor had so crushed out all hope in the American bosom, 
 naturally, by instinct of climatic creation, mercantile, — 
 that America had been robbed of the existence of that 
 class of merchants who so amazingly assisted in build- 
 ing up the prosperity of the young country long before 
 the Civil War. Wilson was essentially a good mer- 
 chant by instinct and would have proven himself an 
 ornament to the old Boards ofTrade of Boston, New 
 York or Chicago. 
 
 During their days of travel over the District, Jack 
 obtained many valuable suggestions from his superin- 
 tendent, as to the speediest method of making the de- 
 vastated, depopulated district productive of revenue. 
 
 As Jack expressed it, he felt like Frederick, the great 
 Prussian monarch, on returning to Brandenberg after the 
 seven years of hostility with France, Austria and Rus- 
 sia, he entered everywhere upon scenes of waste land, 
 devastation and ruin, where every still surviving, poor 
 and dispirited inhabitant, regarded him with filial feel- 
 ing, having no reliance in their own exertions. Oh ! 
 the blessing of Paternalism in Governments ! 
 
 Jack, — in his round of visits to the cabins of the de- 
 scendants of Uncle Sam's (so, affectionately, the people 
 called the Federal government in the nineteenth cen- 
 tury) farmers, now inhabited by serfs and ignorant 
 plodders, was struck by the total absence of every arti- 
 cle, requiring the trained skill of artisan or mechanic. 
 
236 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 Furniture the most meagre coarse and crude, was of 
 home construction ; garments made -of home-woven 
 cheap rough texture ; no comforts, luxuries had been 
 so long gone as to be forgotten — turning to Wilson, 
 the new Proprietor would say and fifty times resay it — 
 
 " Is it not a wonder, how in the name of all the 
 madness of the past century, artisans, laborers, me- 
 chanics could have expected to sell their products, 
 while every day, they were killing by importation 
 taxes, their only customer ? Look at this, not a car- 
 pet, clock or curtain, too impoverished to purchase 
 such luxuries. Now where in the name of their wild 
 delirium did the laborers of New England expect to sell 
 their products, after by prohibitory taxes cutting off 
 cheap raw material, fuel, labor, thus preventing cheap 
 manufacturing in this country and sale of their goods 
 in markets of competition ? Wilson, this evidence of 
 the insanity of American ancestors surpasses the wild- 
 est tales told of the Mississippi fever of the Regent's 
 reign in France or England's mania during the South 
 Sea Bubble." 
 
 Then as Jack would gaze on some unfenced field he 
 would say, " There is now no need for barbed wire, 
 for there is nothing on the deserted land to protect 
 from intrusion. Oh! wise manufacturers! By the 
 crippled legs of the Philadelphia cook, my good fore- 
 father, who enjoyed a tribute paid by every needle 
 of the nation, I will be obliged to return to the honest 
 occupation of being a steward for the hungry soldiers 
 of the Federal government" — and again Jack would 
 joke the absolutely nonplussed superintendent about 
 his schemes to get fat out of the dry bones of the 
 farmers, saying : 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 237 
 
 "A magnificent property my ancestors have left me, 
 a land so poor that every New York, Cincinnati, Cleve- 
 land building is tenantless and vacant, every acre of 
 ground, an encumbrance, for I must pay taxes to sup- 
 port the government, so grand, so central ! Well, 
 Wilson, how like you this picture? This District, 
 once the State of Ohio with nearly five million popula- 
 tion, (now, my poor starved serfs scarcely number one- 
 tenth of the figure ) was once the home of the Napo- 
 leons of Political Economy in America. They used to 
 quarrel and make long, eloquent rage-creating speeches 
 about taxation on wool, growing on the backs oFsheep 
 in Ohio. Poor Napoleons: return and find me but 
 one wool-bearing animal in this tax-consumed district, 
 and I will forgive your past conduct and call it, at 
 least, honest but as time has shown it, mad and dan- 
 gerously destructive to the nation." 
 
 Jack's mystifying manner and speeches kept the 
 poor superintendent in a constant state of confusion. 
 Jack would insist In disregarding all the reports of the 
 overseers and visiting in person, cabins along the 
 highway and asking of men, women and children such 
 strange questions, some of these are samples — " Who 
 was 'Abraham Lincoln?" "What was the result of 
 slavery in the Southern States ? " and one day when 
 a great hulking lad said that : 
 
 " Lincoln was the friend of the common people and 
 was an honest man," the strong pastor, now lordly 
 Proprietor, grabbed the lumbering, awkward serf boy 
 and lifting the astonished peasant clear from the 
 earthen floor he stood on, clasped him to his brawny 
 bosom saying : 
 
 " I'll kiss you, boy, remember Lincoln, he was a 
 
238 *' UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 man of the people and never intended that by the obli- 
 teration of negro slavery, he should create conditions 
 which have been used by designing men for more 
 than a century to rob and enslave Anglo-Saxons' — 
 and kissing the booby fellow on the cheek and calling 
 him " brother," gave him five dollars to buy a history 
 of America, as the farm boy said he had learned to 
 read — and in another cabin where a young woman 
 answering his questions about the history of Ohio, 
 said : 
 
 " Two brothers named Sherman in the old days 
 were men that the state had been proud of, one a 
 great soldier, the other a sound and safe financier and 
 statesman " and at the proprietor's quick approval 
 had added out of deference for his class and position 
 (women in every stage of civilization are arch flatter- 
 ers) — "And the great McKinley was from Ohio" — the 
 attentive questioner, patted her on the head saying : 
 
 " As you cannot read, here is a coin to purchase an 
 imported looking-glass, in which you will see reflected 
 when you look at it, a picture made by the perspicacity 
 of your ancestors who believed in the doctrines of 
 Ohio's great statesman McKinley." But, somehow 
 while smiling kindly at the maiden, the fatherly pastor 
 and Proprietor forgot to kiss the young admirer of the 
 mad theories of past generations. 
 
 When Jack had finished his personal inspection of 
 each Section of his District and seated cosily by the 
 great hearth in the " Parsonage " holding his wife's hand 
 clasped in his own said, as he gazed at the ghostly fig- 
 ures made by the smoke rolling up the chimney, 
 
 " Mollie, I wonder if spirits wander over scenes famil- 
 iar to the body while they dwelt here ? " and if so, did 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINb. 239 
 
 any of the deluded citizens of the departed State of 
 Ohio, go with me on my trip, through their once 
 happy, much taxed country? " 
 
 And Mary, nestling close to her recently returned 
 husband, laying her head on his stout shoulder said, 
 "Well, Jack, if they did, they were in wiser company 
 than they kept in their political association while on 
 earth and citizens of the State of Ohio, a hundred years 
 ago," and when Mary half complaining of Jack's 
 altered manner and having a secret from her, urged him 
 for an explanation, he, for reply kissed her and smiling 
 with boyish exultation, exclaimed, 
 
 " Wait Mollie, until to-morrow, when you shall hear 
 my secret told from the steps of the Lawton mansion, 
 by my own lips to gathered solicitor, superintendent, 
 overseers, serfs and bondmen. And the secret shall re- 
 verberate over America, in the ears of every Proprietor 
 throughout the country. Wait, Mollie darling, a few 
 hours longer. Oh, how I will surprise them with your 
 Jack's secret ! " 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 STANDING flushed and triumphant on the steps of 
 the Lawton mansion, his face beaming with the happi- 
 ness within him was Jack Lawton. As boy, man, pas- 
 tor or Proprietor he was known to every grey-clad serf 
 who stood before him all attention listening for orders 
 from their new master. Around him all expectant, 
 awaiting some surprising sensation, were clustered, — 
 nearest to him, " My Lady " — (did it make her better 
 than when called " that woman " ? ) , Mary. The anx- 
 ious solicitor, standing, leaning on a pillar of the wide 
 piazza, whispering as his wont was, to the superintend- 
 ent in whom, a dazed condition had long taken sway over 
 his mind's early surprise at the conduct and opinions of 
 his new employer. In the background, the old butler 
 surrounded by servitors, overseers and lots of Lawton 
 flunkies, was resting on the staff he carried. 
 
 When the hour of noon tolled from the tower on the 
 mansion, the Reverend John Lawton, Proprietor of the 
 District of Ohio, raised his hand as if calling heaven 
 to witness, and exclaimed, with exultation marking 
 every accent, in a voice resounding through the long 
 avenues and echoing down the green arches of the bud- 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 24I 
 
 ding boughs of the elm and maple in the park of the 
 Lavvton mansion, carrying his message t to all the mass of 
 anxious bondmen — 
 
 " There are now no serfs in the District of Ohio ! " 
 The sands of time have recorded the footprints of 
 another, before whom in silence, a world had stood, 
 transformed by sudden admiration momentarily, into 
 mute, seemingly unappreciative spectators, until 
 the soul of civilization awakening, sent an electric 
 thrill of 'applause throughout creation, for the man, 
 plain and honest, in all his awkward grandeur, who — 
 " with malice toward none and charity for all " — had set 
 free a race of bondmen, As the wondering world did 
 then, so did the astonished audience to whom Jack 
 made the announcement. 
 
 Mary first recovered from the surprise occasioned 
 by her husband casting away the bonds that held in 
 bondage to him, thousands of slaves — once free Ameri- 
 cans — coming to her husband, she with her face reflec- 
 ting all the glow and joy of his happiness, took his 
 hand and pressed it to her bosom, saying, " Jack, my 
 husband, I am the proudest woman in America, and 
 by right, first lady, being honored by your love," and 
 whispering, added, " My darling!" Vanished is the 
 occupation of the divorce lawyer when American wives 
 make such speeches to their husbands after ten years of 
 life with them. Poets may write verses, artists make 
 beautiful pictures of Love's first mission to some fair 
 maiden, but to the man of mature and experienced ideas, 
 the loving matron past thirty, giving evidence of the 
 existence of the love light of her maiden fancy for her 
 husband, is the prettiest poem-picture ever yet crea- 
 ted ; somehow recalling even to the minds of the most 
 
243 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 cynical, scenes of Mother, Father, home and, — (well, it's 
 nearly heaven, in the purity, it will put into the hearts 
 of the basest sinners). Ere Jack could respond to his 
 Mollie's caresses, the trance created by his proclama- 
 tion, was broken. 
 
 Once more American hills and valleys reverberated 
 with the same old shouts of freemen, heard at Bunker 
 Hill and Yorktown, heard by Perry's foes on Lake 
 Erie ; re-echoed from the bayous of Louisiana, where 
 Jackson contended commanding untrained militia 
 against Wellington's famed veterans ; booming on the 
 evening air at Buena Vista ; coming, — Oh the pity of 
 it ! — on the wintry wind of Virginia, where Burnside 
 charged those deadly hills of Fredericksburg ; and 
 echoed back from Pennsylvania where Pickett led his 
 fiery legion. 
 
 Serfs and slaves no longer ! Men throw back their 
 hoods and in God's free air awake the very echoes of 
 the heavens with their shouts of freedom. Did you 
 ever hear ten thousand men shout in unison? If so, 
 that cry was but weakly, to the sound ascending as 
 incense to the Great Emancipator who gave his life to 
 free " all people." Jack — (and who would deprive him 
 of it) stood and drank in one moment of transcendent 
 happiness and glory — one moment of such feeling 
 would pay for a multitude of years passed in pain and 
 sorrow. 
 
 Old Jackson, old servitors of the Lawton family, 
 overseers and even Wilson the superintendent (thanks 
 to the American blood which he inherited) could no 
 longer restrain their desire to be near Jack, who like 
 some great magnet, seemed to attract men to him ; 
 pressing close about the man, who by nature, was firsf 
 
" UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 243 
 
 in all that multitude, they sought to touch his plain 
 and somewhat threadbare garments. 
 
 Old Weaving, pale and quivering with ill-concealed 
 anger and emotion, pushing by the servants, came for- 
 ward saying : 
 
 " But, sir, legal complications, — your heirs — the 
 Family Compact." The hero of the occasion flashed 
 one angry glanced at the wrinkled crafty face beside 
 him and said sternly. 
 
 " Sir Machiavelli, I am the last of the Lawtons, 
 God has seen fit to send me no children, that all these 
 people before me should seem my descendants, — and 
 Sir Solicitor, the curse of my country has been law- 
 yers, as under the Valois and Bourbons of France, 
 the Church was, — but in me, you see no Thirteenth 
 Louis and your glass will not reflect a Richelieu.'' 
 With a wave of his hand he dismissed a type of the 
 disturber in all conventions of the Nineteenth 
 Century. 
 
 Turning now to the sea of hatless heads before him, 
 in tones resounding through the newly green bedecked 
 avenues and alley. May the words with ceaseless 
 sounding, echo through all ages ! 
 
 To be perched on a pyramid is a solitary position. 
 Lands of pyramids and palaces are filled with potters' 
 plots and paupers' hovels, even the life of a Pharoah 
 must have been depressing when not engaged in the 
 amiable relaxation of cutting off the heads of a few 
 subjects. 
 
 It is a difficult matter for a single individual to enjoy 
 his solitary happiness, purchased by the groans of all 
 other people of his realm — the association of such a 
 magnate with his subjects can afford no greater enter- 
 
244 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 tainment than could be found by a lion, with his stern 
 joy in combat, having a mouse as an opponent. I am 
 giving altogether my selfish reasons for the emancipa- 
 tion of the serfs of this district. Robinson Crusoe 
 famed in Defoe's great story would have gladly given 
 nine-tenths of his island to others, — his equals, — and 
 been richer in possessing only the remaining one-tenth, 
 than when sole "proprietor of the kingdom of his soli- 
 tude, surrounded by slaves and animals only. His- 
 tory has shown the truth of my statement in the 
 rapidly increased wealth of the Southern States of 
 America, after the freeing of the negroes. 
 
 I will give in fee-simple to each family all the land 
 that they can cultivate, attached to the deeds of gift, 
 are certain conditions, which the experiences of the 
 United States Government, that gave away the land of 
 the people, has taught me, are necessary, to prevent a 
 return to your present position. This gift of land is 
 for the same selfish reason on my part as that which 
 formerly emanated in the desire of the Federal Union 
 to increase the wealth and population of the country, 
 the same that Robinson Crusoe's selfish human nature 
 taught him. 
 
 In this giving of my property, I wish practically 
 to refute a prevalent idea growing up in the minds 
 of unthinking people by the constant reiterated 
 phrases " Divide, and in a short time the wealth would 
 all again be concentrated in the hands of a few, and 
 again division would become necessary." By a parity 
 of reasoning, why feed the starving beggar? He will 
 become again, hungry. Why feed or bathe ? We will 
 all again become hungry and soiled. If this oft- 
 repeated sentence admits of no contradiction, — let the 
 
"UNCLE SAMS" CABINS. 245 
 
 beggar starve, — let us all ourselves go unwashed and 
 hungry. ' Laissez /aire' is the only true doctrine of 
 creation. If when you hand the starving beggar, food, 
 you slip handcuffs on him to prevent his using the 
 strength derived from the food contributed, how can 
 you blame him when again hungry, for having naught 
 with which to satisfy his appetite ? 
 
 The old United States gave of the people's land to 
 the starving European emigrants who came by mill- 
 ions, in the three decades succeeding the Civil War, 
 to the shores of this country, like the starving beggars 
 flocking to the doors of the rich and liberal. As fast 
 as they came, they were given land and homes but 
 how ? With unseen manacles fastened on the tillers 
 of God's richest soil, America. These unseen and 
 enslaving fetters, taxes, preventing free exchange of 
 products, made in the interest of so-called infant indus- 
 tries, have filled the land with slaves and paupers. 
 The Government giving of its store of bread laid up 
 for the nation, made itself poor, and then locked up the 
 prisoners of its bounty, to labor in the blinding glare 
 of a false prosperity, for the few, the vast minority, 
 who owned those cherished " Infant Industries." 
 
 Now to obstruct the recurrence of the present con- 
 dition and secure the beggar against the pangs of 
 returning starvation, I have incorporated in my deeds 
 of gift of land to the people of the District, these 
 conditions : 
 
 You shall utilize the gift, enriched by bounteous Na- 
 ture, raising crops of grain and other natural products 
 upon the land given ; selling the fruits of the soil yielded 
 as the result of freemen's labor where ever the greatest 
 price will be paid for it ; taking your pay in money 
 
246 " uncle sam's " cabins. 
 
 such as is held good the world over ; taking in exchange 
 only money, hoarding it up ; doing without all manu- 
 factured articles of luxury and comfort as now you do, 
 forced to economy by poverty — until such time 
 shall come that you can freely barter in the world's 
 markets where you sell your products for your needed 
 manufactured luxuries and comforts. 
 
 Thus will the wealth taken from the soil, which I now 
 give you, (as once gave the Federal government, land 
 to all comers) remain in possession of the makers of the 
 wealth of a nation — the people — not concentrated — by 
 means of trading laws and taxes, creating trusts, mon- 
 opolies — into the hands of secret enslavers, who by in- 
 nocent looking laws of Importation Taxes, have become 
 owners and masters of America, — welcoming each 
 newly arriving emigrant as an additional tribute-payer 
 who, for the monopolist and his descendants, will " take 
 up " Uncle Sam's land, till it and labor on a property 
 that must eventually come to be the Capitalists' and 
 Monopolists.' 
 
 You will raise wheat and corn in the District of Ohio 
 not oranges and Arctic mosses — Your flocks will be 
 sheep, cows and horses, not polar bears, monkeys and 
 ostriches — Your common sense will indicate such 
 products as are natural in this latitude and condition 
 of climate — If you endeavor to raise oranges or Arc 
 tic mosses — one must be kept warm by hothouses, the 
 other frozen by artificial snow and ice, — who will pay 
 the expenses of all these additional devices when you 
 go to sell your oranges and mosses? The consumers? 
 
 Not as long as they can buy in Bermuda, Florida or 
 the Arctic regions — and there are no Federal laws to pro- 
 hibit the use of these articles when raised in other coun- 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S CABINS. 247 
 
 tries and thus to foster your insane cultivation of 
 unnatural fruits and products. Take the lessons taught 
 by oranges raised in Ohio — Until you can purchase the 
 needed manufactured articles in the cheapest place of 
 production, buy none of them. 
 
 Keep the wealth of the land I give you — unlike Uncle 
 Sam of the last century, there is not the condition at- 
 tached to the deed of gift, that you shall labor and pay 
 tribute to the manufacturers of my district — I now am 
 like the generous Federal government one hundred 
 years ago, poor in land but have provided by the con- 
 ditions of my gift, that wealth shall be scattered all 
 around me, not concentrated into the hands of a few 
 recipients of the benefit of Federal legislation to be 
 turned into gold and taken by them to Europe " — and 
 then Jack bowing to the shout, that saluted this 
 speech, — by their slavery and experience, well under- 
 stood by every recent bondman, — taking Mary's hand, 
 said — 
 
 " Now I feel that I may enter this mansion, purified 
 somewhat from the stifling vapors of oppression, rising 
 from the putrefaction engendered in [the mad crimes, 
 injustices and vices of a past century." 
 
 And Jack's heart filled to overflowing with the pride 
 of well doing, led " Mollie " before the picture of his 
 good mother saying " There is one, who up in Heaven, 
 agrees with us, my darling, even though she was a 
 ' sugar king's' daughter.' " 
 
 Draw down the curtain, hide Jack's scene of triumph 
 — Don't tell of the long line of grey-clad men, who 
 came, with restored liberty shining in their faces, press- 
 ing forward to look at him." (Men of Anglo-Saxon 
 blood are poor speakers when they most feel) Don't tell 
 
248 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 anything of honest, manly noble sentiment, Don't tell 
 of truth, honor and virtue, God or Mother, because 
 some mad ghost of the delirious Nineteenth Century, 
 fed for years on jokes, abnormal sensuality in literature, 
 with insane contempt for nobility of character, as de- 
 picted by the old " Cranks " of past ages of literature, 
 will arise, yelling in derision " Oh, Rats." — " You're 
 guying ! " — " Come off, don't be quixotic ! " 
 
 Shades of Homer, Shakespeare and Milton forgive 
 that learned doctor (who were his patients except capi- 
 talists, cooks, conventions and corporations? is not re- 
 corded and his very name is not remembered ; a 
 " guyer's " name does not often outlive his century) 
 who set the example of joking about and making triv- 
 ial the best sentiments of the American people, in the 
 Nineteenth Century. 
 
 ****** 
 
 Obedient to the orders that he had received from the 
 new Proprietor, Mr. Weaving had, as rapidly as pos- 
 sible, by the sale of such personal property of the 
 estate as he could find purchasers for, who possessed 
 ready money, collected cash, which, together with the 
 past stored accumulations of the estate, Lawton im- 
 mediately began to expend for the usual agricultural 
 implements formerly used in America. These he pro- 
 cured in England, — cheap slave labor and the poverty 
 of the farmers of America, had caused the use of im- 
 proved tools to be abandoned, and of course, the cheaper 
 manufacturing cost in countries where iron and fuel 
 paid no taxes, gave all African, Asiatic and South 
 American trade in farming implements to England, 
 thereby closing American factories — These he gave to 
 the emancipated serfs, with cattle such as horses, cows, 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 249 
 
 hogs and sheep to stock their new possessions — the 
 cattle he imported from Australia, as practically domes- 
 tic cattle had long since disappeared with the buffaloes 
 from America, gone in clouds of interest on mortgages, 
 eaten up by profits paid monopolists on manufactured 
 articles, drowned and washed away in the deluge of 
 State and Federal taxes — Having provided the people 
 with necessary supplies to support them until their 
 first harvest, their former master gave them this part- 
 ing admonition — 
 
 " My gifts will amount to no permanent benefit to 
 you, having no monopoly of the world's grain and 
 cattle market, if you foster the establishment of monop- 
 olies by dealing with infant industries and giving to 
 the monopolists the substance of the soil and your 
 labor, under the guise of shelter for exotic plants, the 
 cultivation of oranges in Ohio hothouses, arctic mosses 
 in refrigerators. Do without the oranges and mosses 
 until the law permits you to buy them, where raised 
 cheapest, upon the same terms as you sell the products 
 of the soil you cultivate. Those industries and factor- 
 ies which, by the laws of trade, belong to a country, will 
 grow up in it without shelter even in spite of the fierc- 
 est storms of competition." 
 
 The Reverend Mr. Lawton (he objected always to 
 the title of Proprietor) heedless of the comments made 
 by others of his class and station, absolutely refused to 
 live in the grand mansion but continued to occupy his 
 modest home, the " Parsonage." Spending most of 
 his time in tours of inspection over the District of Ohio, 
 always accompanied by his faithful wife, helper in his 
 labors — always insisting that the farmers should buy 
 nothing with the money received from the world's 
 
250 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 market, for the crops raised by them unless they were 
 permitted by law to purchase where what they needed 
 was sold cheapest. 
 
 Thus it happened that two years after the emanci- 
 pation of the serfs of the District, the steady undiver- 
 ted tide of dollars flowing from Europe into Ohio, 
 placed so much money at the disposal of the farm- 
 ers, that it attracted the attention of the idle me- 
 chanics who were starving all over America, thrown 
 out of employment by the lack of demand for the pro- 
 ducts of their labor, caused by the poverty of all other 
 farming districts. Then it was that mechanics peti- 
 tioned the Federal government, that all importation 
 taxes be removed on goods shipped into the District 
 of Ohio, alleging that they were willing to compete 
 with European workmen, as the farmers who raised 
 wheat in Ohio had to compete with the South Ameri- 
 can farmers— saying that it was impossible that the 
 mechanics of the country could be injured by the 
 removal of the embargo, as already, except in the re- 
 cently become prosperous District of Ohio, the consum- 
 ers of the country were too poor to purchase at any 
 prices. That further continuance of the embargo would 
 benefit no one, not even Capitalists, Monopolists nor 
 factory owners. They already had secured all the 
 wealth of the nation by years of taxation, making of 
 America a land of slaves and paupers. Further say- 
 ing that even should the farmers of Ohio, forgetful of 
 their promises to Lawton, finally adopt again the sys- 
 tem of buying what they needed at prices made by 
 monopolies, they would only furnish brief employment 
 for American mechanics, during the short period of the 
 devouring process by the monopolies, who only used 
 
" un'cle sam's" cabins. 251 
 
 the mechanics as furnaces to fry all the fat of the 
 farmers — casting aside the furnaces when their well- 
 cooked food was finished. 
 
 Lawton joined in the appeal of the mechanics, and 
 finally, finding the farmers of Ohio not forgetful of 
 their promises to Lawton and their own sad experience 
 in the past, the Federal government relented and re- 
 moved the embargo on articles bought in the cheapest 
 markets and brought into Ohio — Then the Ohio 
 farmers led by Lawton, invited the mechanics to come 
 and live in Ohio, where cheap land and homes could 
 be had, saying that the mechanics in Ohio would, of 
 course, also be exempt from taxation on their fuel, 
 iron and all other material used by them, and would 
 pay no taxes upon their food nor clothing in that 
 district — that being nearer to the consumers of the 
 product of the mechanics' labor, having the price paid 
 for the transportation of imported articles in their 
 favor, being Americans and more clever artisans, with 
 no great Trusts and combinations to contend with in 
 Ohio District — they would have the whole trade of the 
 province for the reason that they would be enabled to 
 furnish at home in Ohio, the cheapest market in which 
 to buy the kinds of goods made by them. 
 
 With each succeeding year, came added necessaries, 
 comforts and luxuries to the farmers of Ohio, who, en- 
 joying the full benefit of the competition of a world 
 of manufacturers, found that the money received by 
 them for their crops — even though meeting the world 
 in competition when they sold their products, — 
 went so much further, that it satisfied all their 
 needs and left a margin for saving — and the mechanics 
 of Ohio having cheap homes, fuel, material made 
 
252 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 goods for the farmers of Ohio, cheaper and better 
 than the European workmen could supply them. 
 
 Having a steady demand from prosperous farmers, 
 the mechanics had constant employment, and were 
 astonished at rinding themselves more independent, 
 surrounded by more home comforts, and richer in 
 savings than even in those fabled days of false pros- 
 perity when the mechanics were the furnaces for fry- 
 ing fat from the farmers. 
 
 The universal prosperity and happiness of all the 
 inhabitants of the District of Ohio, farmers and 
 mechanics, laborers and merchants, finally, after ten 
 years of practical demonstration of the feasibility of 
 Jack Lawton's mad(?) theories, attracted much atten- 
 tion, and at last forced unwillingly, a profound admira- 
 tion from even the Proprietors of America. 
 
 At last the Proprietors and the Federal government 
 seeing the ever-increasing woe and misery of all the 
 other Districts, and the blooming prosperity of Ohio, 
 where Lawton's ideas of trade had been adopted 
 (Strange, that Americans of the Nineteenth Century, 
 could not find England on the world's map) resolved 
 that the laws of Importation Taxation should be re- 
 formed, and for that purpose called a convention at 
 which they asked the Rev. Mr. Lawton to be present, 
 an invitation hailed with joy by the practical and 
 patient reformer, after long years of waiting. 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 In the grand old Senate chamber, where once thun- 
 dered the eloquence of intellectual giants, United States 
 Senators, — men who in a past age had exhibited the 
 greatest flashes of insane mental lightning ever wit- 
 nessed in the panorama of time, — were seated all the 
 Proprietors of America in convention. Long had they 
 meditated and wrangled, each intent upon his own 
 profit; each urging the others to be magnanimous; 
 each anxious to be the only recipient of the profits of 
 monopoly, for all recognized the fallacy of a continuance 
 of a system that, by general adoption, had resulted in 
 ruin for the country. At last despairing of any agree- 
 ment, unanimously they invited the mad man ? from 
 Ohio to address them. 
 
 Christ was crucified, but the truth of his religion will 
 live forever, Huss was tortured, Luther persecuted, 
 Galileo imprisoned, Columbus chained, Washington 
 called a rebel, Peel abused, Fulton laughed at. But 
 why keep on with the list. Truth often has a harder 
 battle than the flimsiest falsehood encounters, but 
 at last, Truth wins and wins forever. 
 
 Jack Lawton, with the added weight of twenty years 
 
254 " UNCLE SAM S CABINS. 
 
 since we first met him in this story, resting on his 
 shoulders, rose to address them, saying : " Hope is so 
 strongly entrenched in man's nature, that the most dif- 
 ficult task ever undertaken is that of making men sur- 
 render it. To-day, you are surrounded by such con- 
 vincing proofs of the folly and crime of a long-used 
 system, that argument would seem superfluous were it 
 not for the strong entrenchment of hope in the human 
 bosom. 
 
 That we may not be deluded by phantoms of hope, 
 let us review briefly the past record of our country. 
 
 In 1894 when it first began to be whispered that the 
 Nation had consumed all of its good farming land, and 
 that the tide of emigration had turned, and that the 
 American farmers had been made so poor by years of 
 tribute-paying that they no longer had money to buy 
 even the cheapest articles of domestic manufacture, 
 and more surely no money with which to purchase im- 
 ported goods on which taxes were collected, the law- 
 makers of the Nation observing the decrease in the 
 revenue, and fearing that the government would not 
 have sufficient revenue to defray the expenses of the 
 Nation, became alarmed at the impending deficit, and 
 finding no other means of raising revenue for the na- 
 tion, were obliged to levy an income tax, (a tax which 
 circumstances have forced you all to recognize as now 
 the only means of raising revenue to sustain the govern- 
 ment) this tax created a perfect storm of indignation 
 from the monied classes when first enacted. It was re- 
 pealed. 
 
 The same mysterious madness, which wielded 
 hypnotic influence over the minds of American voters 
 in the nineteenth century, again made itself evident. 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 255 
 
 The nation thinking that there must be a mistake, and 
 that the willing slaves and tribute-payers of three de- 
 cades, the farmers, could not possibly yet be exhausted, 
 increased the importation taxes and repealed the income 
 tax. Great was the shouting. Here was the solution 
 of the whole matter. Men shook hands and congratu- 
 lated each other. 
 
 But lo ! No customers came to buy imported goods 
 and pay the expenses of the government. The farmers 
 were getting fifty cents for wheat, and five cents for 
 cotton. They had no money — bought no goods, do- 
 mestic or foreign. There were no importation taxes 
 collected ; the government had no money, railroads did 
 no business ; dividends were decreased, and then 
 abandoned. No traffic ; farmers not buying. Make 
 the price high by import taxes, or cheap by absolutely 
 free admission into the country of foreign goods, it 
 made no matter. The farmers could not buy at any 
 price — they had no money. This was a condition, 
 hard to realize, and Americans absolutely closed their 
 eyes to it. Railroad stocks kept on declining. Bonds, 
 even of the Federal Government, grew cheaper. 
 Foreign holders of our securities sold their holdings 
 and wanted their money in gold. Down fell the 
 treasury reserve of the precious metal. 
 
 In this dilemma, attempts were made to increase the 
 amount of wealth by tampering with the currency (as 
 if money could make wealth or value, it being merely 
 a vehicle of exchange — a medium of circulating values). 
 Then incomes fell off, and the income tax became less 
 obnoxious, and finally, of necessity, was advocated by 
 its worst opponents. The farmers are no longer fac- 
 tors. Impoverished and pauperized by tribute-paying, 
 
256 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 they are exhausted. The weight of the expenses of the 
 nation fell upon the monied classes — and they, with 
 incomes curtailed and shortened, ever growing smaller, 
 as the farmer-class passed from land-owners to tenants. 
 
 Thus, as early as 1894, the ancestors of the present 
 Proprietors of America were threatened with the en- 
 tire weight of the expenses of the nation by reason of 
 the poverty of the farmers. 
 
 The mechanics and artisans engaged in manufactur- 
 ing, were practically erased from the blackboard on 
 which was placed the sources and sums of the Nation's 
 receipts and expenses, — when by taxes on fuel, mate- 
 rial and everything used in daily life, the cost of goods 
 manufactured in America was so tremendously raised 
 above the cost of similar products of the labor of 
 mechanics in other countries, that American manufac- 
 turers were shut out of all foreign markets. Mechan- 
 ics only existed by reason of the demand from the 
 American farmers for the high priced goods made 
 by American mechanics, no one else would pay their 
 prices, when they could buy much cheaper in England 
 or other European countries. Therefore as soon as 
 the American farmers were eaten up, and exhausted 
 American mechanics ceased to exist. 
 
 Really what a small factor as wealth producers, 
 American mechanics were (I am not speaking of the 
 mechanics now as wealth accumulators, from Ameri- 
 can farmers, for American monopolies who used the 
 mechanics as cats to pull chestnuts out of the fire for 
 the Monopolists) even as far back as 1890 to 1894, 
 it is only necessary to glance at the exports which 
 brought money annually into the country, to learn out 
 of exports amounting to the sum of $600,000,000, the 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 257 
 
 amount paid to America, manufactured exports, or 
 rather the value of the mechanic class as wealth pro- 
 ducers to America, was $42,000,000. Farmers, miners 
 and workers in or on the land produced the balance 
 $558,000,000. 
 
 That the American people in the nineteenth cen- 
 tury could have been hypnotized, in the face of these 
 figures into impoverishing and enslaving their great 
 wealth producers, by the enactment of laws creating 
 importation taxation, at the waving of hypnotic politi- 
 cal hands, seems a perfect miracle in mesmerism. 
 
 It is impossible to believe our ancestors sane when 
 we glance at these unquestioned figures — a few men 
 may have been insincere, and only raised the cry of 
 ' Caring for American Infant Industries ' for the pur- 
 pose of carrying some section where mechanics were 
 in the majority, at political elections. But the vast 
 majority of our ancestors were not insincere, they 
 were simply mad, drunk, demented as was the old 
 nobility of France before the Revolution — a most 
 cursory glance at the records of France, at that period 
 causes the exclamation, ' Mad ! Mad ! ' 
 
 The American mechanic, lies dead in the same grave 
 with the American farmer, buried beneath the ruins 
 of Infant Industries, the spot marked by a headstone, 
 on which is chiseled by the hand of Time ' Killed by 
 the Hot-house walls of Importation Taxation.' 
 
 It is useless for us to sit weeping upon the ashes of 
 the old days which were made bright and happy for 
 the ancestors of the present Proprietors of America by 
 the consumption of the farming land of the nation, 
 and the reduction of the farmer class to slavery. There 
 are no more public lands to consume, no more farmers 
 
258 "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 to enslave, and it were folly to waste time upon the 
 record of a mad century did it not serve as a guide to 
 show us what not to do, in our efforts to secure enough 
 revenue to defray the expenses of the Government, 
 which now falling entirely upon the Proprietors, have 
 to be paid by an ever-increasing Income Tax ; We 
 learn from the record of America what the people did 
 a century ago, let us avoid doing what they did. Let 
 us not close our eyes obstinately to facts because the 
 facts are unpleasant, as the American people did, one 
 hundred years ago. 
 
 We to-day are confronted with the obligation to 
 pay the entire expenses of the government as the log- 
 ical result of the continuance of a policy of concentra- 
 tion whereby we Proprietors became possessed of all 
 the wealth in the country. 
 
 Looking back to 1894, we find the people of Amer- 
 ica struggling against commercial disaster, vainly seek- 
 ing for the cause of the then existing conditions, but 
 failing to find it in what we see so plainly now, caused 
 the entire disarrangement of business in 1894, namely : 
 
 The wealth of the Nation which in i860 had been 
 distributed among and owned by 90 per cent, of the 
 population, had, by Importation Taxation and conse- 
 quent monopolies, become concentrated to such an 
 extent that in 1890, ten per cent, of the population 
 owned ninety per cent, of the Nation's wealth — while 
 the wealth of the Nation was immensely greater in 1890 
 than in i860, it was concentrated in the hands of such 
 a few that the vast majority of the population were 
 practically paupers — we have seen the result of this con- 
 centration in the last hundred years until now we Pro- 
 prietors own the entire wealth of America and are so 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 259 
 
 few in number that our needs must, from purely- 
 physical reasons, be too small to require the labor of 
 millions of people, to satisfy them. 
 
 This fact alone ought to have been sufficient to 
 explain the business depression of 1894. The ances- 
 tors of your serfs could not see anything in the United 
 States Census of 1890, which was so plain that it ought 
 to have taught to infants, the cause of the depression. 
 The ancestors of your serfs voted to increase monopo- 
 lies and the consequent concentration of wealth, by 
 increasing Importation Taxation — believing that, to be 
 the solution of the business troubles. 
 
 The prices of all farm products had been brought by 
 the competition of other continents, down until in 
 1894 the crops were marketed at only two-thirds of 
 the prices obtained during nearly the whole of the 
 period between i860 and 1890. Thus, practically the 
 only source whence money came into the United 
 States was cut off by fully one-third, for while a few 
 manufactured articles were exported the amount by 
 comparison was trifling. 
 
 When I call your attention to the fact, that news- 
 papers containing comparative prices of grain and 
 cotton for several years, were read daily by millions 
 of people, and therefore it was well known that the 
 farmers and earth workers from whom originated 
 almost all the wealth of the nation, were one-third 
 poorer in 1894 than before, even as poverty stricken as 
 the laws had already made them. When you recall 
 that the poverty of the mass of the people was plainly 
 reflected in the constantly published reports of 
 decreased earnings by all transportation corporations, 
 the consequent decline in the value of the shares of 
 
26o "UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 stock in such corporations. It is hard, very hard to 
 believe that such a plain exhibit of the true causes of 
 business depression in 1894 was unseen, even granting 
 the truth of the then often repeated and somewhat 
 idiotic expression, "There is just as much wealth in 
 the country and it will come out when confidence is 
 restored." 
 
 In 1894 the reduction in the prices obtained for the 
 annually produced wealth from the ground, undoubt- 
 edly accounted for the lack of wealth distributed among 
 the masses. It was the annually produced wealth 
 which made the business of the country in its passage 
 from the ground to the coffers of the Monopolists, where 
 it became accumulation. This wealth reduced one-third 
 ought to have been plainly seen to be immediate cause 
 of the trouble in that period. 
 
 Instead however of looking the facts squarely in the 
 face and saying" We cannot raise the price of our ex- 
 ported products, — competition in the world's markets 
 fixes that, we cannot tax that price up, our income be- 
 comes smaller each year as competition increases, and 
 we have let the accumulation of the years when we 
 had no competition to bring down the prices of our 
 exports, by laws creating monopolies, get into the hands 
 of a few monopolists. We are plainly without savings 
 from past years, we must reduce expenses and seek 
 new business." The people shouted ! ( Do not laugh, 
 gentlemen, it is really pitiable not ridiculous) 
 
 " Restore confidence in the fact that Taxes on Im- 
 ports shall be unchanged, money will then come out, 
 business will be good, factories will " start," and they 
 ought to have added, ' Never mind about the monopo- 
 lies who have swallowed our profits for thirty years — our 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 261 
 
 descendants may be slaves, but let us eat, drink and be 
 merry to-day for to-morrow we die.' 
 
 The laws placing taxes on imports were left un- 
 changed, confidence was restored concerning that fact 
 but money did not come out — when the stock broker 
 asked a wealthy monopolist to buy railroad stocks, he 
 was answered " But the earnings of the road show a 
 decrease, there is no money in the farming district to 
 pay freight on goods, even if manufactured goods were 
 shipped as gifts — Where will dividends on your shares 
 of stock come from." When the mechanic went to the 
 manufacturer and asked for work, now that ' Confidence 
 was restored,' he was told — " We cannot sell even the 
 goods already made, the farmers are too poor to buy 
 at any price ' and the money did not come out — The en- 
 gine that set all the machinery in motion had no steam 
 in the boiler. 
 
 The farmer in 1894 was very weak, faint and ill, 
 as he reeled toward the grave in which he now lies 
 — slavery — he had already, even then, grasped the me- 
 chanic, and together they began staggering toward 
 their grave. 
 
 Forced to recognize that ' Confidence restored ' did 
 not make wealth, and not daring to see the truth, the 
 American people struck a new idea 'Confidence ' not 
 furnishing them wealth, they determined to make money 
 for themselves and call that wealth — Well ! they split up 
 and cut in two, and pulled about their money trying 
 to make wealth, but only making themselves ridicu- 
 lous — for change it about as they pleased it did not 
 increase the wealth of the people, the value of a 
 nation's money is fixed by the world, and no single na- 
 tion doing business with the world, can value its 
 
262 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 
 
 money at any price except that, at which the world 
 will accept it when doing business with the nation — a 
 nation like an individual may pass a false note or coin 
 for a little while on other unsuspecting nations, but 
 the inexorable trade laws of the world force it in the 
 end to make the false note or coin good, or punish the 
 defrauding nation by banishment from the world's 
 trade relationship. 
 
 As a result of the people of America refusing to 
 admit the true cause of trouble which had already in 
 1894 become apparent, and still with eyes closed, 
 clinging to the old system of bleeding themselves for 
 the benefit of monopolies, by means of Import Taxes 
 — and without reason or thought, by trusting blindly, 
 that somehow, something would turn up to help them 
 — God alone knows what they could have expected, 
 only one thing could have saved them at that period ; 
 — The American people became as you are fully 
 aware, slaves and paupers, and you, Gentlemen, their 
 masters and the powerful Proprietors of the whole 
 country ; to-day, as sole owners of the realm, you find 
 yourselves like Robinson Crusoe, poorer than if your 
 property were divided with others. You want my 
 advice, knowing my experience in the District of Ohio, 
 and wishing to free yourselves of part of the National 
 expenses which now fall entirely upon you — 
 
 First, Emancipate your serfs and abolish your stand- 
 ing army, for after emancipation an army will be 
 unnecessary — I dare not suggest a division of your 
 real estate with the emancipated serfs, for then I would 
 be charged with advocating socialism, but I can suggest 
 making them long leases of all the land that they can 
 cultivate at insignificant rentals, there being now no 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 263 
 
 public lands for them to cultivate — At your next step, 
 be warned by the folly of the American people a cen- 
 tury ago when confronted by National disaster and 
 universal business depression — instead of doing as they 
 then did, when seeking relief, experiment with their 
 money, and add to the load of the already exhausted 
 wealth-producers by increasing power of monopolies 
 and consequently the burden of the wealth-makers. 
 
 Let your money be honestly what it represents 
 upon its face — it's impossible to improve the financial 
 condition of a country by bringing opprobrium and 
 suspicion upon your currency. 
 
 And most important, take off the load of monopolies 
 and high prices from the crushed farm-class, at best it 
 will require years for them to recuperate, as it would 
 have done in 1894, even with the benefit of the free use 
 of the cheapest markets in the world, in which to secure 
 their manufactured supplies ; pet and protect your 
 farmers as they are now truly in second infancy and a 
 worthy example of ' Infant Industries ' — 
 
 When you roll away the stone of importation taxes 
 from the tomb where lies the dead farmer, as he again 
 emerges into light and life, with him will come the me- 
 chanic— with cheaper fuel, material, food and clothing, 
 the mechanic can manufacture goods in America as 
 cheaply they now do elsewhere. For several years, the 
 mechanic will be obliged to sell the products of his labor 
 in Asia, Africa and South America, but upon even 
 terms of cost of production, we can trust the American 
 mechanic to outdistance his European competitors. By 
 selling his wares in foreign countries the mechanic be- 
 comes a wealth-producer, bringing wealth into the na- 
 tion, instead of, as formerly, being only a vehicle of 
 
264 " UNCLE SAM'S " CABIN'S. 
 
 accumulation for American monopolists, leaving the 
 creation of the wealth coming into the country, for his 
 brother, the Earth-grubber. As the farm-class of this 
 Country becomes stronger and less oppressed by pov- 
 erty, it will purchase more of mechanics' wares, and as a 
 matter of convenience and proximity will of course buy 
 from the mechanic at home who is enabled to sell as 
 cheaply as any foreign mechanic. — 
 
 If you will follow my advice, heeding the lessons 
 taught by the folly of the past generations of Ameri- 
 cans, in a few years you will see America, blossom 
 with happiness, distribute wealth and prosperity, like a 
 fertile garden in summer; then will your railroads pay 
 dividends : then your land and accumulated wealth re- 
 turn an adequate revenue : then will your incomes from 
 your accumulated wealth become so great that a 
 smaller percentage of Income Tax will be sufficient to 
 defray the expenses of government — at last, the In- 
 come Tax well entirely disappear, and the government 
 be supported by internal revenue taxes. 
 
 Thus, you, the wealthy, will in the end be most bene- 
 fitted by the obliteration of the old ruinous system of 
 taxation : if you leave the fetters of that taxation on 
 the now starving beggar it is useless to feed him, for 
 again will he become hungry and have naught with 
 which to satisfy his hunger. Leave on the importation 
 taxes and it is useless to free the serfs even if you give 
 them land, instead of renting it to them, for it will only 
 be a short time by means of ' Infant Industries ' created 
 by that system of taxation, before the farmers are again 
 serfs ; the mechanic's occupation like Othello's, gone, 
 the mechanics, idle tramps and vagrants , the ownership 
 of the land and all the wealth created by its products 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 265 
 
 again concentrated and accumulated into your 
 hands." 
 
 As the Ohio magnate sat down after closing his long 
 address of advice and warning, silence reigned in the 
 Senate chamber for several minutes, until suddenly the 
 stillness was broken by the unanimous acclamation of 
 the entire number of Proprietors and owners of Amer. 
 ica there assembled, crying. 
 
 " Let us accept the advice of the Reverend Proprie- 
 tor of Ohio. Let us adopt the course he has suggested 
 to us. Let us be warned by the experience and folly of 
 past generations of Americans. Let us do away with 
 the monopoly-creating, men-enslaving, Import-Taxes. 
 Make America a Free Trade Nation, it is the only road 
 to National safety now as it ought to have been clear 
 to every American that it was in 1894. Best for the 
 owners of accumulated wealth, the farmers, mechanics 
 and laborers." 
 
 In the hour of universal destruction, men will forget 
 their petty strifes, ambitions and enmities. The lion 
 and the lamb will lie down together. At the approach 
 of the flood of ruin from the pent-up reservoir of a cen- 
 tury of folly, injustice and error, the Proprietors of the 
 different districts crouched down like panther and deer 
 in peace together upon the single island of safety re- 
 maining to them. 
 
 Forgotten are old differences, old struggles for local 
 " Infant Industries " — Sectional Monopolies — Class 
 legislation. They gazed in mutual terror at the awful 
 flood, by folly created. 
 
 Speedily laws were enacted emancipating all the 
 serfs in America — Giving again to all Americans, the 
 right of voting — Re-establishing State governments 
 
266 "UNCLE SAM's" CABINS. 
 
 — Fixing the rental of land used for agricultural 
 purposes. And an Amendment was added to 
 the Constitution eternally prohibiting the passage 
 of laws placing a tax on importations. 
 
 All this was finished in a session of one month's 
 duration, rather faster than the work of the old 
 United States Senate, but of course the Proprietors 
 were neither mad, blind, working for political prefer- 
 ment, local or personal advantages or (I had almost 
 written — money) to confound a President — and then 
 the danger was more imminent. 
 
 When a nomination to the office of President of the 
 recreated Republic was called for, the position was 
 tendered unanimously to our hero, Jack Lawton — but 
 while highly pleased and complimented by the offered 
 honor — Jack was too familiar with the history of the old 
 American Republic to accept the nomination which 
 was equivalent to an Election, saying as he refused the 
 great honor — " I never could hope to escape that abuse 
 which would cause a blush of indignation to cover the 
 brow of a pickpocket or murderer, and yet must be ex- 
 pected by the occupant of the Presidential Chair in 
 the American Republic — Washington, Jefferson, Lin- 
 coln and all others, justly and unjustly, had to bear it." 
 
 Soon after the selection of some other to occupy 
 the onerous, difficult and disagreeable office of Presi- 
 dent of the Republic, Jack (for so we will fondly call 
 him) bidding farewell to the assembled proprietors, 
 with heartfelt expressions of gratitude for their ac- 
 tions, and commending the exhibition of wisdom 
 displayed by them, hurried with the joyful tidings to 
 Ohio and his waiting " Mollie." 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 TWENTY times has the snow upon Ohio's hills and 
 fields been replaced by waving wheat and corn, since 
 the inauguration of the regenerated Republic. Twenty 
 crops yielded by the generous soil, untaxed by mono- 
 polies, have returned to the tillers of the land, remun- 
 eration exempt from payment of blackmail. Farmers, 
 miners, mechanics and laborers as free and indepen- 
 dent citizens have for twenty years enjoyed the full 
 fruits of their toil, by tribute formerly paid to the 
 American monopolists. 
 
 America blooms in the fair sunshine of permanent 
 and true prosperity, like what it is, God's fairest gar- 
 den. The land is dotted once again with comfortable 
 cottages, farm-houses, barns ; the fields are fenced, 
 the highways paved. Accumulated wealth is earning 
 its fair and just revenue. The Income Tax, yearly 
 decreased until the unpopular measure has finally dis- 
 appeared entirely. 
 
 The tenants, farmers, mechanics, laborers shout 
 their joy and thankfulness, the landlords, old Proprie- 
 tors and capitalists once again receiving dividends 
 from their investments, are complacently contented. 
 
268 "UNCLE SAM'S" CABINS. 
 
 The hovels and their accompanying poverty are no 
 more seen in the regenerated United States. The 
 nation stands as God grant it ever shall, foremost in 
 enlightenment, religion, civilization, wisdom and also, 
 in wealth — among all the nations of the earth. 
 
 This change had been brought about entirely by the 
 adoption of the suggestions of a madman ! — a vision- 
 ary theorist ! — a man who had only read books upon 
 the subject of political economy, and observed intelli- 
 gently the commerce of the nation, taking a broad 
 view of the entire country, considering the welfare of 
 the majority of the people, not blinded nor his range 
 of vision narrowed by selfish interest nor prejudiced 
 personal experience ; — Jack Lawton had never kept a 
 shop, factory, bank, nor been a member of a stock-ex- 
 change, but neither had Adam Smith, John Stuart 
 Mill, Robert Peel and others who were once considered 
 to possess some respectable knowledge upon the sub- 
 ject of the Wealth of Nations. 
 
 In the nineteenth century, during the period of at- 
 tempted reformation of unjust taxation, the judgment 
 and opinion on the subject of the nation's commer- 
 cial condition, of every insignificant shopkeeper, clerk 
 or tailor, based only upon his narrow limited personal 
 experience, was held more worthy of consideration 
 than the matured judgment, after thorough investiga- 
 tion and research, of the greatest scholar, even though 
 he offer unanswerable arguments in support of his 
 opinion. Business men were supposed to have the 
 only correct ideas of Commerce in that mad century, 
 when every butcher, baker and bar-keeper was called 
 a business man, to distinguish him from the much rid- 
 iculed and despised theorist and schoolman. 
 
" UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 269 
 
 In that inconsistent century, men when ill would 
 seek the advice of a physician, when in legal difficul- 
 ties they sought the council of a lawyer, never asking 
 if the physician had himself experienced the pains 
 from which they suffered ; never demanding of the 
 lawyer before engaging his services that he should 
 himself have had similar difficulties — in such matters 
 as required knowledge of Law or Medicine, men 
 of the nineteenth century had great respect for 
 knowledge of science derived from books and intelli- 
 gent observation, but in matters appertaining to the 
 science of Political Economy, any ignoramus, petty 
 shopkeeper or peddler, so that he had some personal 
 experience of actual trade, no matter how limited, was 
 preferred above the profoundest scholar. This, how- 
 ever, was only in keeping with many other strange 
 ideas of that peculiar period. 
 
 * * * * -x- # 
 
 Mr. Weaving has long since appeared before that 
 Great Court of Last Resort, where deceit is useless 
 and eloquence availeth not — Jackson the old butler 
 too has passed beyond the earth's jarring noises. In 
 the last hour when he heard the Master calling, 
 Jack Lawton, was beside him and held the old white 
 head upon his bosom, until the portals of Heaven 
 opened to receive the soul of the faithful old servant. 
 
 Around the " Parsonage" for so many years that all 
 have forgotten anything about his coming, is constantly 
 seen a wrinkled old man, of hard visage, doing a kind 
 of sentinel duty, and trying in spite of age to carry 
 himself right soldierly. He is not a servant, but 
 what his position is, no one knows as he is rather a 
 hot tempered old fellow and no one dares ask him. 
 
2JO "UNCLE SAM'S" CABIN'S. 
 
 The only name he is known by is "sergeant " that is 
 what the pastor calls him — and there is a whisper 
 among the young farmers that he can use words if 
 angered, hardly in keeping with the conduct of the 
 friend of a clergyman, but old men and women tell 
 such stories of the "sergeant's nursing" during [the 
 Plague that all (I rather think the pastor too) wink 
 and seem not to hear, when the old " sergeant's " 
 tongue slips. When he salutes with military precision 
 the pastor, he says " Commandant," — if the pastor be 
 absent from home, and a visitor have courage to ask 
 the sergeant where the clergyman is or what he is 
 doing, the answer is sure to be. " He's just a-doin' 
 good not a-talkin." 
 
 Whom have we here ? This fine looking couple even 
 though their heads are white with the snows of 
 many winters. Did man ever see a better type of the 
 military hero ? Is he some renowned veteran leader of 
 great armies? Has that commanding figure been 
 seen in the front of charging hosts of armed men lead- 
 ing them in battle ? Firmly and erect he carries his 
 magnificent figure, as if the storms of life had found 
 him unshakable, and passed by gently. He is devoted 
 to the dignified and gentle matron who smiles so 
 sweetly at his gallant speeches, that one loses sight of 
 the trace of sorrows endured, on her kindly face. 
 
 The splendid old warrior's attention to the lady, the 
 quiet motherly manner of the gentle woman, as she 
 returns the greeting of some passing youth or maiden 
 — make a picture so beautiful that the Stranger in 
 America is curious to know the names of the two hand- 
 some people. He notices that urchins, girls, youths, 
 maidens, men and women, all strive for the honor of 
 recognition from this couple, men all speak with heads 
 
"UNCLE SAM'S " CABINS. 2/1 
 
 uncovered as the pair pass by them, urchins cut across 
 fields to doff their caps to them — and the Stranger 
 hears such sentences from those who greet the couple 
 as ! " God bless them ! " — " God keep him ! " — " God 
 bless America's friend ! " — at last, no longer able to re- 
 strain his curiosity, the Stranger asked a native of the 
 country : " What is the name of that veteran soldier to 
 whom all pay such great honor ? " 
 
 The native of the country looking at the Stranger with 
 mingled surprise and indignation, answered : " You are 
 not an American, or you would know that the man all, 
 in this section love to honor is Christ's Veteran Soldier, 
 Our Pastor, and that he is the same man that all Ameri- 
 cans honor, as the best and truest friend of the Nation. 
 The man who just passed us, walking with his good 
 wife, is named John Lawton, we Americans call him 
 the ' Salvation of the Nation ' " — and the Stranger knew 
 then that he had seen the man who had banished 
 misery slavery and cabins from the territory of the 
 Great Republic. 
 
 Coming centuries witness patriotic pilgrims making 
 two journeys. One; to Mount Vernon, there to stand 
 uncovered at the spot where lies the body of the 
 " Father of the Country." The other to a quiet church 
 yard in Ohio, where side by side in an humble tomb, lie 
 Jack and "his Mollie," — nearby a grateful country has 
 raised a giant shaft of granite, on which is chiseled 
 words not easily forgotten. 
 
 IN HONOR OF 
 
 JOHN LAWTON, 
 
 WHO REMOVED THE 
 
 SECOND STAIN OF SLAVERY FROM 
 
 THE NATION. AMEN. 
 
HUH 
 
 ^ 
 
 Irani IHH 
 
 ISilll