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Page 14
"And," I remarked, as he paused for a moment, "if we do not object to
the robbery of either the debtor or the creditor, one or the other."
"Not at all," he replied. "I assume that the change shall be fairly
made. I have said that it would be a very great inconvenience to the
world, and without any benefit; it would in fact be so great a task to
make the change in our money standard that it would be practically
impossible to make it. But we are off the track--we were not to talk of
primary money; it was of currency, or greenbacks, that you spoke. Now it
puzzles you as a man of sense to conceive by what process of thought
another man of sense can bring himself to advocate unlimited inflation
of our currency; and yet there is a very good reason why the most
sensible man may do that very thing. Of course, my dear sir, I am aware
that the only honest way for a government to issue unlimited currency is
to give the stuff away, and later to repudiate it. Now, sir, I need not
tell one like yourself, who has studied the lives of such English
statesmen as the puissant Burke, the sagacious Pitt, the astute
Palmerston, that ninety per cent, of the people--and it is so even in
this glorious land of free schools and liberty--are relatively to the
remaining ten per cent, either poor and dishonest, or poor and ignorant;
and that none of the hundred per cent, goes into sackcloth and ashes
when he gets something for nothing. I, sir, am--or I was until
recently--a Jeffersonian Democrat. But our party made a great mistake a
few years ago by sticking to the slave interest too long. I finally
became hopeless of success at the polls. Now, when I whisper in your
all-comprehending ear that the leaders of this Greenback Party are
anything but Republicans, you will grasp the point. I repeat, sir, I am
not an ass--if I do bray sometimes. All's fair in love and politics. But
let me say to you, that the printing presses of the United States will
never be leased by the United States Treasury, whatever party wins at
the polls."
As he closed, we entered the town. It may not be wholly lacking in
interest to the reader when I say that, some years later, as I one
morning sat in my library looking through the window at the far-distant
smoke of Newcastle, I had just laid aside a copy of the _Times_, in
which paper I had read of the results of a political contest in the
State of Illinois. The Republicans had won. The Greenbackers and the
Democrats had lost. Then my eye caught the name of Castleton! The doctor
had made the race for Governor--not on the Greenback ticket, however;
not on the Democratic ticket; but--of all things!--on the _anti-liquor
or Prohibition ticket!_
As we drew up in front of the Loomis House, Doctor Bainbridge stood on
the sidewalk as if awaiting our return. I smiled, then nodded an
affirmative to the question in his eyes; and stepping out of the buggy,
I linked his arm within my own, and, thanking Doctor Castleton for his
kindness, piloted the way to my room.
The FIFTH Chapter
On opening the door of my sitting-room, I found Arthur, the factotum,
sitting in my large easy-chair, with one of my volumes of Poe in his
hand. He had overheard part of the conversation of the preceding
evening, and was evidently interested in "The Narrative of A. Gordon
Pym." I observed also that a bottle of cognac which sat upon my table,
and which I could have sworn was not more than one-fourth emptied when I
left the hotel directly after dinner, was now quite empty. The
atmosphere of the room was pervaded with the odor of "dead" brandy; and
Arthur's eyes were unusually glassy and staring--for so early an hour as
5 P.M. Then he settled the matter, beyond the shadow of a doubt, with a
hiccough.
"Well, Arthur," I said, pleasantly, as he clumsily rose in part from his
seat--into which he dropped back, however, as he heard my kindly tone of
address, and knew there was to be no severity of reckoning--"well, my
boy; been enjoying yourself?"
"Yes, sir," he replied, in a fairly steady voice--the words that
followed, however, being rhythmically interrupted by an aldermanic and
most vociferous hiccough, which shall be omitted from this record--"been
reading about Pym and Barnard. Wasn't that awful when they saw the
shipful of dead corpses? Just think of that ship, full of dead men--not
one of them alive, and all dead--and the sails set, and the old ship
wabbling around the ocean just as things might please to happen! When
the ship got close up to their brig, and that scream came from among the
corpses, I just jumped, myself! But wasn't it terrible when that gull
pulled its bloody old beak out of the dead man's back, and then flew
over the brig and dropped the piece of human flesh at poor hungry
Parker's feet? Gee-whillikens, now! Why, it just made my blood sink in
my heart and lungs."
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