Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1884-1886, 1884-11-16
THE STORY OF LAPPIN.

nee county Jail from whence he flitted-if
the word fit can be applied to SO ponder
Gus body-so many years ago; back again,
and so tired that he fell asleep as soon as
he reached the shelter of his cell.
Lappin's case adds another to the million
illustrations of the truth, ''the way of the
transgressor is bard. He was "well fixed"
when he was the financial "boss" up in
Nemaha county. He was a big. gross, dull
eyed man, eager for money and hard-faced
IN its accumulation, but many people blind
y associate bowels with benevolence, and
in spite of his ferceness for money Lappin
enjoyed sort Of poplarity among his towns
meE. lie never did any real, pure, unselfsh
good that we have heard of, but he was an
"enterprising" citizen, which may signify,
after all, only very mean man who pushes
the public along before him as a
screen for his own covetousness; who dis
courses on railroads, court houses, and even
churches, because they are good for his own
town lots. If all the orthodox theologians
are not mistaken, there has accumulated by
this time great deal Of enterprise" in
he'll.
In time Lappin appeared in state con-
vention at Topeka MS candidate for state
treasurer. His face, and such little scraps
ty, ought to have warned the convention,
but il did not. He was nominated largely
through the efforts of man who was his d.
rect opposite in character; as big-hearted as
Lappin was narrow; as careless of money as
Lappin was tenacious about it; as much be-
loved as Lappin was disliked; as honest as
Lappin was. tricky. the late Nathan Price.
1t was big, broad-shouldered honest Price
making speech about "honest old Sam
Lappin" that nominated Lappin, a man of
ZION covered with tallow.
Lappin was hardly esconsced in office till
change WAS n ,ticeable in his appearance.
He became pre-occupied and sombre, and
one fine day il was discovered that "honest
old Sam Lappin" was forger.
They put him in jail-he who had been so
much of n man in Seneca, and had been en-
trusted by the state with her treasure-but
that Jail was nothing to what followed.
There chung to him in Jail and everywhere a
soldier, or rather child of fortune, whose
sketches of life in South America the read
ers of the Champion looked over not many
months ago, and to this man Lappin owed
the miserable gift of liberty. Better for him
had he gone through it all; the trial, the YER
dict of guilty, the standing up in the court
room, pierced by thousand eyes, to hear
the sentence of the judge. He fled
from comfort and shelter, even
with disgrace, to peril, wandering,
exile, forlornness, and disgrace still.
Guided by his faithful friend. he went
north, then to Duluth, through the long
chain Of the ''frcsh, unsalted seas" to Mon
trea, then to South America. He was
heard of in vague, unrealistic way, much
as we hear of the sea serpent, on the coast
of South America, where there is no rain,
where the earth shivers. hot rs it is, with
weekly earthquakes. Now he was in Lima,
then at Valparaiso, then he had gone to
Uruguay. always wandering. Of the pitiful
history of his family in these years we do
made miserable The only figure we regard
is the fugitive, wandering in deserts or An
dean SHOWS; thinking all the time of the
pleasant homes and the wide streets, and
the rows of maple trees, andt the court house
and the public square in Seneca.
He was safe enough in South America,
but he could not stay there, and SO in some
way he got away to the northward from be-
low the equator to above the tropic of Cam
Ger. He found himself in Washington ter
ritory, in his native country at least, where |
he could hear from his old home in a few
days and perhaps once in a while the Cour- |
Ter and the Tribune, wrinkled and greasy |
and worn in the mail bags, or from being |
blown about the streets, but still with |
enough legibe to show up the old familiar |
names in the legal notices and the advertise |
ments. He could not wear his own name ;
he called himself Richardson; and Richard |
son. it may be, stood in q group and heard |
some man from Kansas talk about the |
country. The story goes that he went |
,round and peddled books and pictures, and |
I may be that in some houses the women |
alked to him about their homes in sunny |
kansas which they LEFT to come to wxtery |
territory. Then he got up and |
eft the house and walked away, but be met
/ man from Kansas at last, by name Weiss
zach, once small politician out at Frank
ort, and who has gone to Washington terri
DRY, and with his office-seeking intellect had |
rot {, be mayor OF the little city of Tacoma. !
he saw Lappin, and hoping himself to get
oaid for trip back to Kansas, informed on |
he old wcather-beatcn wanderer, and 50 he
S back again where he started.
Kansas people are not "old Romans" by
my means. They are kind hearted as rule
nd know when man has got enough. They
10 not seem at all proud of Weissbach in
us great amateur detective act and actual
v seem to sympathise with poor old Lappin.
tter his twenty thousand miles Of Wander
ng. The money he filched was long ago re-
tored: the small hole he made in the treas
Try was stopped up again, the witnesses are
ead, gone away, or have become lost; JUS
ice had put up her old sword, and for all
nybody in Kansas cares, some kind hand
night leave the Jail door open so that lap
in could arise and depart without delay,
or longer see in "every bush an officer"