The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-07-21
Penalty of Sentiment.

Inc consequences OF his ABANDON
ment of his famous fight against the
New England Gas & Coke company
are thus described by Mr.. Lawson in
'.F'renzied Finance" in the August
Everybody's:
Monday morning it became known
at the state house that I had dropped
the Tight In short order the affair
was off the slate for that year-wiped
clean off the slate; but the conse-
quences ed-consequences to
me- One cannot start an avalanche
and then shoulder it without inviting
self-destruction. The explanations
given out for my volte-face were so
unconvincing that I was not surprised
to learn that rumor had me bought off.
These stories l knew I'd have to stand,
though l trusted to Rogers pledge that
the Whitney crowd would see to it that
my concession was set in the right
light. The legislative session was well
over when there began to be noiSed
around, first rumors, then circumstan-
tial stories, that had held up the New
England Gas & Coke scheme until I
had obtained my price; the price was
stated to be a million dollars. From
Wall and State streets the story got
into the newspapers. Then 1 pub
lished statement as unqualified as I
could make it, declaring that had not
benefited a dollar by the suspension of
hostilities, but, on the contrary, was
out large amounts by my gas fight, and
that 1 had dropped the fight, SO far as
the legislature was concerned, for a
reason purely sentimental, and that
I'm such contingency, however,
denials are idle. Other corporations
had been held up for money under
just such circumstances; and for what
man cease fighting with victory in his
grasp? There could be no other rea-
son, said my enemies; feared many of
my adherents- The story grew as such
| who positively knew that I had re-
ceived this million dollars. My posi-
| ton was most painful. The public be-
| lieved I had turned traitor; my friends
admitted I had made a terrible mis-
| take. There was nothing for me to
do but to pay the price of my Quixotic
folly. I paid tin the long weeks
and months that followed that fatal
Saturday morning. interview" .4.--.-
Hot Weather Coasting.
! In describing How the World Rides, -
| in the August Everybody's, the Rev.
Francis E. Clark says that at Funchal,
in the island of Madeira, the traveller
finds one of the strangest kinds OF
vehicles that the world affords. He sees,
waiting quietly near the wharf, num-
Der of sleds with sleek dun-colored oxen
yoked to each. It is always high sum-
mer time in Madeira, and to see a con-
veyance which he has ever associated
with snow ana Ice ana zero weather Is
at first disconcerting. The stranger
rubs his eyes, and asks what those
things are for, but he soon finds that
they are the public hacks, and that I'M
less he cares to walk he must step in
side, ensconce himself on the cushioned
seats, and wait for the driver to proc
| his slow steeds with the goad that he
always carries. Very soon the vehicle
| begins to slip, slowly to be sure, but
surely, over the smooth little cobble-
stones with which the streets are paved
At any particular difficult turn of the
road, or when coming to a rise OF
ground, the driver plac, little bag OF
grease under the front of the runners
which makes it comparatively easy fol-
| the sturdy steers to pull the sled.
Even up long steep hill these oxen
will slowly make their way. In coming
down again no such tedious process is
used, but, getting into a wide finely up
| holstered sled with wicker sides, the
passenger trusts himself to the tender
mercies of two more or less villainous
| looking guides as steersmen. Each one
of them holds a rope tied to the back OF
the sled, and when the toboggan, as il
| is often called, gets to jumping and
bounding too hilariously, the guides
jump off and pull with all their might
at the ropes"