The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1910-10-01

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eoere,eHy 1909 81 As..Sz nNao eazESAx III
| he had thought vaguessi Of the ra-
cling game. of the most magnificent of
| yachts, of the finest and speediest of
| stables, of the fastest string Of auto
| mobiles, of thousand similar things
| which he had dismissed as unworthy
of his high purpose and Inadequate to
his end; until finally, fortune favoring
him, he hit upon the field of politics.
| Miss Haldane in some of those now
| rather frequent conferences, had cas-
ually enough remarked that she liked
| men who did things, who really ac-
| colnplished something for good in this
world.
Gormly instantly resolved to do
: something. Now If any man really
wants to accomplish good in this
world, there are few opportunities of
greater possibilities than those pre-
scented in the political arena. There
Is also no field in which it is harder
! to accomplish the end. Gormly as a
political force was entirely unknown.
He was without experience. One
requisite, popularity considered vital,
he had, and, that was an abundance of
money. Another requisite he pos
sessed albeit unwittingly, was char
acter. And still. third was his, and
that was Imagination coupled with
capacity-the ideal and the real; the
dreamer and the practical man in one!
An irresistible combination that!
Fortune was further kind to him,
however, for concurrently with his de-
cision she presented him with an
opening. Gormly's business was sufh-
GENTLY great to have enabled him to
extend it in several directions. He
brought Ireland England, France,
Germany, Holland, Spain, Italy, and
the Orient into New York bay and I'M
loaded them in his great institution.
He had conceived, some dozen years
before after paying tremendous freight
charges, the propriety of establishing
his own line of freight steamers. It
had amused him to combine the prac-
tise. of the ancient merchant prince
with the customs of the modern one.
He had bought the controlling inter-
est in freight line of half a dozen
large steamers, which he found no
difficulty in using as cargo carriers
for other people when they were not
supplying his. own needs.
The purchase of the freight line had
with it a lease of one of the piers in
the North river. The lease had run
out the year before. He had there
after availed himself of what he con-
ceived to be an excellent opportunity
OF subleasing another pier in the East
river. The city had just completed an
elaborate railroad, surface and SUBJ
way, for the transportation of heavy
freight from the water front to the
great mercantile establishments in
land. This system had been leased
to the Gotham Freight Traction COM
pany, vast corporation with full
set OF ostensible promoters and d.
rectors, but which had back of it pow
ers and persons unknown to the gen.
eral public, carefully concealed from
1t in fact.
The corporation had not been form
ed to promote the health of its men,
bers. Therefore when Gormly ap-
piled to the authorities for permits
sion to construct switch from his
pier on the one hand and his ware
house near the river front on the other
to connect both with this subway, the
permission was instantly granted, but
coupled with an expense demand upon
him for something like million dol
lars.
Gormly could give Miss Haldane
million dollars to play with; he would
not spend ten cents for bribery. He
saw instantly that the demand upon
him was a mere attempt to hold him
up. To build the switch would cost
perhaps forty or fifty thousand dol
lars; the privilege might be worth as
much more; but inasmuch as no
streets were crossed, no overhead traf-
fic hindered, he was doubtful even az
to that. The road had been built by
private capital-subscribed by the peo-
ple-on public franchise The in
terests of the public were supposed to
be paramount A reasonable return
upon their investment was all that the
promoters had right to expect.
Gormly had consulted his attorneys,
had appealed to the city council and
had done everything that he could to
settle the matter short of publishing
the whole affair He had failed abb
solutely everywhere. The members of
the transportation committee of the
board of aldermen were very sorry,
but they did not see what could be
done. A gentle hint that Gormly
might prefer to indemnify the alder
men for their trouble in case they
should give him permission was met
with panied silence or explosive wrath.
It was furthermore pointed out to him
7 that the board had no power, the
rights of the people having been vest
ed in the corporation for ninety-nine
year period. It was too bad that the
innocent aldermen had allowed them
selves to be placed in such an unfor-
funafe n0sifi0n. h,,f ~ Il woc-ond