The Louisiana Democrat., 1890-09-24
| SINGLE TAX DEPARTMENT.
UNDER THE WHEEL.
Hnmlfh Garland's New P1ay-Tho Singls
Tax Idea In the Drama.
[cosr1Nurp FROM LAST 1ssuE.l

INK xUess IA INC DrHHlds
coNr1NuED FROM LAST ISSUE.
Reeves (tenderly. smi1ing)-Yes,
thirsty for the sight of you. (Alice goes
ihte the house. Reeves walks about,
glancing keenly at all points of the
plain.) So this is the reality of the em-
igrant's dream! The homestead in the
free West, tho house beside the river
embowered i'll treesl
| A wide dun land where the fierse suns smitc,
And the wind is furnace breath;
| Where the beautiful sky has q sinister light,
| And The earth lies dread and dry as death;
| Where the sod lies scorching, and the wan
grass sigha.
And the hot red morning has no BIRDS
My God! what a place for my beautiful
girl--for anybody's girl-a wide-walled
/ grave.
iAlice enters with glass, which she
fills and hands to him. lie drinks, say
ing): In land like this the gift of
water must mean as 1t does with tho
Arabs, the highest hospitality.
Alice-1 can't say how much Two
shall
Reeves quitting his arm about her)
Don't try. If 1 had only known your
real feelings-but how could from
those letters? Uooking off left. What
in the world is that girl doing? She's
unhitching my team! I'llstop her. (Ex.
l, talking.)
Alice (walking abont) How can let
him go again? Have the strength?
But must, Imust! I can't leave father
now, at the height of his terrible strug-
gle. must stay.
Walter (re-enters with Linnie, hold
lrg her by the hands,N--I suppose this is
Linnie-anybow the little witch was
nnhitching my team; another minute
and she might have had a runaway.
| Linnie (scornfully)- Runaway moth
Ing! What do you take me for? Allie
and hitch up the horses and go out in
the fields-we plow, and drive the har-
vester-and we help shock the wheat
don't we, Allie?
! Reeves (surprised)- )-Do you do tpat?
With this hand, that used to love to
watch on the piano? 0 horro.'s!
STROKES it.) Poor bruised little hand.
(Kisses it)
| Linnie (goes off in mock disgust)-
Girls like me don't count. My hand can
get we'll itself Fl all you care. Wal n
SO it goes. {does into the house.)
Reeyes-And you live there' (point-
ing at the house.)
Alice-Yes, with my people.
Roavoa - rhrourl your horrihla
winters?
Alice (qnietly)-Yes, and there are
days when that hut, poor as it is seems
like palace. Last winter it seemed as
If the snow would never tire of sliding to
and fro on the plains. Days and days
we were shut up here.
Reeves deeply affected Heavens,
what prison! And yet saw dozens not
SO good as came along.
Alice (quietly)-We lived in that sod
shanty a year.
4 Reeves (1ifting 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 (frmly but sweetly)-There was
no other way. They couldn't have lived
without me- My little teaching has
| kept us in groceries, and beside, there
have been days when father was too
lame to work and have worked in the
fields, and taken care of the cattle in
the barn
| Reeves (seizing her hands)-Don't tell
tne any tnore--1'll rage--Ill swear.
| Alice-We must bear 1t.
Reeves (savagely)-Bear it! won't
bear it. I'll expose the whole internal
matter in four column leader. I'll
smash tho next boomer that says free
land to me. Free land! if this is free
land, what the devil
| Alice (stopping him hush!
Reeves freeing himselD-l say, il
this is free land what in the devil would
you call high priced land? 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 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
Recves(quickly) -Forgetit then, orIyt
come to take you out of it Hush, now
Not a word. I've let you spoil five O
the best years Of my life. You shan
say world must be heard now.
Then follows a struggle between Alice
and her lover, in which she refuses tt
leave her parents and go with him t.
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 crop
and reducing Edwards to despair, sine
another failure will insure the fore
closure Of his mortgage and leave hin
without even his miserable home. Th
storm ends with a terrible tornado, ac
companied by hail, which absolutely de
stroys the crops and wrecks the build
ings, Edwards himself receiving sever
injuries from which he barely escape
with his life to find himself, in the end
paralyzed Walter Reeves, who has no
!, left the country, returns and successful
ly presses his suit, and the final solr
tion of the problem is that he takes tn
broken old man East and cares for hi
family, charity having to be called in a
last, since there is no possibility of fine
ing place where man by mere indu:
. try can make way against such obstacle
: as have beset Edwards. The play enj
. with Edward surrender and his disco
( cry that he is paralyzed, and closes {
i. follows: