made the two towns what they are. The same good old crowd,"
he repeated, "--and up to the same old games!"

At this point he could scarcely proceed for laughter. "Like true
pioneers," he went on, "not satisfied with what you've got, but wanting
such a lot more--if I might say so in the language of the dictionary, a
deuce of a lot more."

Almost every sentence had been punctuated by cheers. His personality
dominated them as aforetime with some new accent to it; his voice was
like that of one given up from the dead, yet come back from the wars
alive and loving. They never knew what a figure he was until now when
they saw and heard him again, and realized that he was one of the
few whom the world calls leaders, because they have in them that
immeasurable sympathy which is understanding of men and matters. Yet in
the old days there never had been the something that was in his
voice now, and in his face there was a great friendliness, a sense of
companionship, a Jonathan and David something. He was like a comrade
talking to a thousand other comrades. There was a new thing in him and
they felt it stir them. They thought he had been made softer by his
blindness; and they were not wrong. Even the Manitou section were
stilled into sympathy with him. Many of them had heard his speech in
Barbazon's Tavern just before the horseshoe struck him down, and they
heard him now, much simpler in manner and with that something in his
voice and face. Yet it made them shrink a little, too, to see his blind
eyes looking out straight before him. It was uncanny. Their idea was
that the eyes were as before, but seeing nothing-blank to the world.

Presently his hand shot out again. "The same old crowd!" he said. "Just
the same--after the same old thing, wanting what we all want: these two
places, Manitou and Lebanon, to be boosted till they rule the West and
dominate the North. It's good to see you all here again"--he spoke very
slowly--"to see you all here together looking for trouble--looking for
trouble. There you are, Jim Barager; there you are, Bill Riley; there
you are, Mr. William John Thomas McLeary." The last named was the butt
of every tavern and every street corner. "There you are, Berry--old
brown Berry, my barber."

At first the crowd did not quite understand, did not realize that he was
actually pointing to the people whom he named, but presently, as Berry
the barber threw up his hands with a falsetto cry of understanding,
there