The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-11-12
An Address Delivered While
The Sheriff Is Selling His
Property.
TALE OF SHAMEFUL PERFIDY.
Accused the "Cattle King" of Repay.
ing Service by Making Him
PennileSS.

by Henry Miller. The property is worth
$4,000, but it was bid in by an agent for Mil
Ter for the amount of the mortgage, inter-
est and costs.
Barker is one of the Oldest residents of
this county, and is highly esteemed and
respected. He has for several years been
helpless invalid, and is in poor circum-
! stances.
Just before the property was sold on the
courthouse steps, Barker addressed the
crowd, which numbered many of the most
prominent citizens of the county, who had
assembled in response to the notice pub
llshed by him in the press. He made
most scathing attack an Miller. He re-
cited how he had disbursed money for
Miller & Lux for the election of Judges
and for the control of newspapers, and
concluded by reading the following open
letter, copy of which had already been
sent to Miller:
| Henry Miller-SIR: For the first time take
the opportunity to write you few lines. do
not intend that it shall be the last time either.
The remembrance is still fresh in my mind of
the day sat in your Office in San Francisco, in
company with yourself and Mr.. Lux--whom
believe to have been an infinitely better man
than yourself-when both you and he were dis
cussing with myself the course of action that
was TO be taken by me in your joint interest,
and when you yourself, looking into my eyes,
closed the interview with these words: Barker,
we never forget our friends
have learned to my cost what you meant
when you used the language above quoted
and how much faith is to be placed in either
your generosity or your honor. 1 have file
OF letters from Mr.. Lux, written by his own
hand, that Will more than verify all / shall
say to you or otherwise in regard to this
matter, and desire to do his memory the JUS
tee to add that do not believe that he would
ever have been guilty OF the inhumanity and
injustice that you have shown. The utter and
cold-blooded heartlessness that you have dis
played toward me completely absolves me
from any sentiment of respect or delieacy
might yet have toward you and entities me to
use plain language in writing to you or speak
ing OF you.
The manner in which you have "remem-
bered' the man who did more than any other
man In Kern County TO secure TO you your
water rights without which your great estate
here would not have been worth "bean" and
would have relapsed into a desert, is pro-
nounced by every man III Kern County and
elsewhere, who understands your action as the
Quintessence of coldblooded and heartless in
gratitude. After you had agreed TO let me re-
new the mortgage and give me time to try to
Il
out of my property, which, with my last wears
taxes delinquent, / so badly needed you, in
order to have some excuse for your treachery
and bad faith, throw the blame on to Mr..
While, and say that from representations made
TO you by him you "saw no reason why you
should keep your promise" or, IN other words.
act like man.
r. E. Houghton informs me OF this. Mr..
While, in an interview with me, denies that he
r,ol,,
Is lie ont somewhere.
l foolishly, it now seems to me, have taken
up your cause at all times, in season and out
of season. by W hich course have made myself
many bitter and powerful enemies. l have
more than once jeopardized my life in so do
ing, and the last time, when the Mexican cattle
thieves counterfeited your brand, and when l
went TO your corrals at your request to identity
the mutilation, and out OF about 100 head
OF cattle that you had seized ! found
thirty-eight head of mine, instead of taking
my cattle home others did, and mindng
my own business, gave you $500 worth of
my cattle, which you shipped out of the coun-
try, an act that if you had spark of generosity
in your character, should make you blush to
even think of. And that was not all. I spent
months OF my time prosecuting the thieves,
which no other man that was interested did,
and paid all of my own expenses while so doing,
had OF making living, afflicted as l am by
disease that totally incapscitates me from
labor OF any kind, and with motherless
family of daughters to care for who are wholly
dependent upon me.
do not write you this with the idea that it
Will make any change in your action toward
me. firmly believe you are too far gone for
that. The vice OF old age, the last and greatest
OF earthly vices that gets possession of the
souls OF men-I mean that of avarice-has
taken too firm a hold upon you and has not
left you particle of human feeling.
This is plain talk. | should much prefer to
have 1t with you personally, and you do not
get this kind, perhaps, as often as you deserve
1t, presume. trust it may do you good to
"see yourself as others see you" AS far as 1
am concerned l shall defy you to go on and do
your worst. l shall have a congregation of nv
friends on the steps of the Courthouse on No
vember IL to witness the crowning act of
your lngratitude in the sale of my property. |
shall issue invitations all over the country to
call them together, and 1 shall not be slow to
call their attention to the fact that Henry
Miller, the great land monopolist and "cattle
king" takes this mode to add to the Ii 500 900
acres of land already owned by him, and to
bring ruin and desolation ON a better man
than himself, who in equity and Justice does
not owe him one dollar. l shall have nv chill
dren there, too, and l shall impress upon them
how easy it is to grow rich and how little the
Almighty must value riches when they study
the characters of one upon whom he bestows
much.
They will simply follow your example.
Nothing is more easy. It is only to do as YOU
have done-trust nobody, befriend none; get
everything, no matter how, and keep all thew
get; to stint themselves and everybody belong
ing to Them TO be the friend of no man and
have no man for a friend; to heap interest.
cent upon cent; to be mean, miserable ac-
cursed of God and hated ana despised by man
for some thirty or forty years, and riches will
come as sure as disease and disappointment
will follow. And when a great fortune is
gathered by SUCH means, and by an utter and
total disregard of all the charities and best
impulses OF the human heart, and at the ex-
pense of every enjoyment, save that of wallow-
ing in filthy lucre and meanness, death comes
to finish the work, the worthless carcass is
hidden from the sight of man in the ssyile
earth from whence it sprang." The heirs have
their ''war dance over it, the vultures of the
law flock TO the feast and fatten there and the
spirit goes where?
l shall keep a copy of this epistle, and as l
intend to write you series Of such when get