Idaho County free press. [volume] (Grangeville, Idaho Territory) 1886-current, 1890-10-03
SINGLE TAX DEPARTMENT
UNDER THE WHEEL.
uamlin Gariand's New PIay-The Single
Tax Idea In the Drama.

into the house. Reeves walks about
CHANGING keenly at all points of the
pialn.) So this is the reality Of the en-
igrants dream! The homestead in the
free West the house beside the river
empowered in trees!
wide dun land where the fierce suns smite.
Ana the wind is a furnace breath;
"here the beautiful sky has u sinister light,
And the earth lies dread and dry as death:
where the sod lies scorching, and the wan
| grass signs.
And the hot, red morning has no birds
My God! what place for my beautiful
girl-for anybody's girl-a wide walled
grave.
(Alice enters with a glass, which she
nils and hands to him. He drinks, saw
1ng): In land like this the gift of
water must mean as it does with the
Arabs, the highest hospitality.
Alice-I can't say how much I've
shall
Reeves Quitting his arm about her)
Don't try. If l. had only known your
real feelings-but how could l from
those letters? looking off left. What
In the world is that girl doingP She's
unhitching my team! I'll stop her. lex.
1, talking)
Alice walking about)-How can let
him go again? Have / the strength?
But l must, Unjust! l can't leave father
now, at the height of his terrible strug-
gle. / must stay
ing her by the hands)-I suppose this is
Linnie-anybow the little witch was
unhitching my team; another minute
and she might have had a runaway.
Linnie nfully)-Runaway moth
ing! What do you take me for? Allie
and l hitch up the horses and go out in
the fields-we pillow, and drive the har-
vester-and we help shock the wheat
don't we, Allie?
Reeves (surprised) do you do that?
With this hand, that used to love to
watch on the piano? o horrorsl (Strokes
IT, Poor bruised little hand. Kisses it. J
Linnie (goes off in mock disgust
Girls like me don't count NM hand can
get we'll itself FIR all you care. Vain
so 1T goes. Goes into the house,
Reeves-And you live there? point
ing at the house.)
Alice-Yes, with my people.
Reeves - Through your horrible
winters?
Alice (quietly)-Yes, and there are
days when that hut, poor as it is, seems
like palace. Last winter it seemed as
II the snow would never tire of sliding to
and fro on the plains. Days and 1ays
we were shut up here.
Reeves deeply affected Heavens
what prison! And yet l saw dozens not
80 good as l came along.
Alice (quietly)-We lived in that sod
shanty year.
Reeves Qifting his head And this
Is the free and glorious west! Oh, it
makes me wild to think of you living
there-it's worse than the tenement
house.
Alice (firmly but sweetly) -T@ere was
no other way. They couldn't have lived
without me. My little teaching !. as
kept us in groceries, and beside, then.
have been days when father was too
lame to work and have worked in tho
fields, and taken care of the cattle liz
the barn
Reeves (seizing her hands)-Don'tt IL
me any more-Tll rage-Ill swear.
Alice-We must bear it.
Reeves (savagely)-Bear it, won't
bear 1T. I'll expose the whole Internal
matter in a four column leader. I'll |
smash the next boomer that SAYS free
land to me. Free land! if this is free
land, what the devil
Alice stopping him)-Hush, hush!
Reeves freeing himself)-I say, if |
6his is free land what in the devil would |
you call bigh-priced lanI? The settler
pays for his free land all that makes
life worth living these families have
purchased their bare and miserable
acres with blood and sweat and tears.
Free land! bah! For a century there
has been no free land in America.
Alice Crying to be calm)-I know it,
but it only makes it worse to think of it,
Reeves (quickly)-F Forget it then for I've
come to take you out of it. Hush. now!
Not word. I've let you spoil i've of
the best years of my life. You shan't
say world must be heard now.
Then follows a struggle between Alice
and her lover, in which she refuses to
leave her parents and go with him to
the East, at the end of which he retires,
angered at her obstinacy.
The fourth scene describes the terri
Bile droughts that is destroying the crops
and reducing Edwards to despair. since
another failure will insure the fore
closure of his mortgage and leave him
without even his miserable home. The
storm ends with terrible tornado, ac-
by hail, which absolutely de-
'troys the crops and wrecks the build
ngs, Edwards himself receiving severe
injuries from which he barely escapes
with his life to find himself, in the end
Walter Reeves, who has not
eft the country, returns and successful
y presses his suit and the final solu-
hon OF the problem is that he takes the
broken old man East and cares for his
amily, charity having to be called in at
asst, since there is no possibility of find
ng place where man by mere indus
ry can make way against such obstacles
IS have beset Edwards. The play ends
With Edward surrender and his discoy-
Try that he is paralyzed, and closes as
ollows:
Edwards (after long pause)-I sur
ender. I'm beat. l give up. but it
lurts, it hurts! I'm like an old broken '
cythe, hung up, t rust in the rain; | S
init no use to y now, Jennie! Here's '
ny hand, young man; Walter, my son, J
AXE her back t. Boston where she ought J
be, an take me back t Derry.
ha'n't be burden to y long. don't S
pose I'm wuth the trouble, but I'd G
Undo like T. be bpIied back there. l q
ate t die out on this hot prairie with