Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-08-17
THE PLUM TREE.
BY DAVID GRAHAM PHILLIPS.
Copyright 1906 By the Bobbs-Merrin Company
XIV.
A "Boom Factory"

XIV.
A "Boom Factory"
In the early autumn of that last year OF
his governor Burbanks wife died-a
grim and unexpected fulillment Of their
pretended anxieties OF six months before.
1t was in some respects great a loss to
me as to hfm-how great to us both did
not-indeed could not-measure until sew
eral years passed. She was what l regard
as typical American wife-devoted to her
husband. jealousy guarding his interests.
yet as keen to see his shortcomings as she
was to see her own. And how much more
persistent and intelligent in correcting her
faults than he In correcting his! Like most
men. he was vain-that is, while he would
probably have admitted In large, vague
way that wasn't perfect, when 1t came
to details he would defend his worst fault
against any and all criticism. Like most
women. she, too was vain-but an intelli-
gent woman's vanity, instead of making
her self-complacent, somehow spurs her on
TO hide ner weak points and to show her
best points in the best light. For example,
Mrs. Burbank, a pretty woman and proud
or 1t. was yet conscious of her deficiencies
In dress and manners through her plain
and rural early surroundings. 1t was inter-
esting and instructive, too. to watch her
studying and cleverly copying, or, rather.
adapting Carotta; for she took from Car
lOtta only that which could be fitted with
out visible joint into her own pattern.
Latterly, whenever l was urging upon
Burbank line of action requiring courage
or a sacrifice of some Of his many in
sidious forms of personal vanity, 1 always
arranged for her to be present at our con-
ferences. And she would sit there, ap-
parently absorbed in her sewing; but in
reality she was seeing not only the surface
reasons l gave him. but also those under
lying and more powerful reasons which we
do not utter, sometimes because we
like to play the hypocrite to ourselves,
again because we must give the other
person chance to play the hypocrite
left him reluctant and trying to
muster courage to refuse or finesse to
evade, only to find him the next day con-
sentirg, perhaps enthusiastic. Manys the
time she spared me the disagreeable ne
cessty of being peremptory-doubly dis
agreeable because show Of authority has
ever been distasteful to me. and because an
order can never be so heartily executed as
is an assimilated suggestion.
When l went TO him month after her
death l expected he would still be crushed
as ne was at the funeral. l listened with
a feehng OF revulsion to his stilted and as
IL seemed to me, perfunctory platitudes on
his rreparable loss''-stale rhetoric about
her and to her most intimate friend and
ms! l had thought he would be imagining
himseif done with ambition forever; l had
reared his strongly religious nature would
lead him to see Judgment upon him and
her Tor having exaggerated her indisposi-
ton to gain a political point And l had
mapped out what would say to induce him
to go on Instead, after few of those
stereotyped mortuary sentences, he Shifted
10 politics and was presently showing me
that her death had hardly interrupted his
plannings for the presidential nomination.
AS for the Judgment" l had forgotten
that in his religion his deity was always on
his side, and his misfortunes were always
of the evil one. These deities OF men of &C
ton! Man with his god ventriloquist pup
pet in his pocket, and with his conscience
at hoo
leading string,
However, it gave me a shock this vivid
reminder from Burbank of the slavery of
ambtion-ambition, the vice of vices For
1t takes its victims all-moral, mental.
physical And, while other vices rarely
wreck any but small men or 1nture more
than what is within their small circles OF
influence ambition seizes only the superior
and sets them on to their superior
powers to blast communities, states, ma
tons, continents. Yet 1t is called a virtue
And men who have sold themselves to II
and for it to the last shred of manhood are
esteemed and, mystery of mysteries, esteem
themselves
1 had come to Burbank to manufacture
him into a President His wife and l had
together produced an excellent raw
terial. Now, to make 1t up into the finished
product!
He pointed to the fling cases that COW
cred the west wall of his library from floor
to ceiling, from north window to south Il
course" said he. Then with his ''woeful
widower" pose. he added: They We're her
suggestions
l looked a the filing cases and waited
for him TO explain.
When We're first married." he went
on presently. "she said. 1t seems to me, If
l were public man. l should keep every
thing relating to myself-every speech. all
that the newspapers said, every meeting
and the lists of the important people who
were there, notes of all the people l ever
met anywhere. every letter or telegram or
note | received If you do. you may find at
ter a few years that you have an enormous
list of acquaintance. You've forgotten
them because you meet so many, but they
will not have forgotten you, who were one
of the principal figures at the meeting or
reception That's In substance what she
said. And SO, we began and kept 1t up
he paused in his deliberate manner, COM
pressed his lips, then added-"together.'
| opened one Of the filing cases, glanced
at him for permission, took out slip of
paper under the MS 1t was covered with
notes, In Mrs. Burbanks writing, of re-
ception given to him at the Manufacturers
Club in st. Louis three years before. A lot
of names, after each some reminders of the
standing and the personal appearance of
the man. Another slip, taken at random
from the same box, contained similar notes
OF a trip through Montana eight years be-
fore.
"Wonderfulr' 1 exclaimed, as the full
value of these Accommodations doomed In my
nina. Il knew she was an extraordinary
woman. Now l see that she had genius
for politics.
His expression-a peering through that
eternal pose of his-made me revise my
first judgment of his mourning. For l
caught a glimpse of real human being.
one who had loved and lost. looking grief
and pride and gratitude. "If she had left me
two or three years earlier" he said in that
solemn. posing tone, Il doubt if I should
have got one step further. AS 1t is. l may
be able to go on, thought have lost-my
staff"
What fantastic envelopes does man. after
he has been finished by Nature, wrap about
himself In his efforts to improve her hand
work Physically, even when most
dressed, we are naked in comparison with
the enswathings that hide our real mental
and moral selves from one another-and
from ourselves.
My campaign was based the contents
of those filing cases. / learned all the places
throughout the west-cities. towns, central
ly-located villages-where he had been and
had made an impression; and by simple and
obvious means we We're able to convert
them into centers of "the Burbank BOOM"
I could afterward trace to the use we made
of those memoranda the direct getting of no
less than one hundred and seven delegates
to the national convento1-and that takes
No account of the VaSter Indirect value of