Delance wanted to know. 'It's a big
job.'

"'I propose that we try Harry,' I said; 'in my opinion it will
interest him. I've had him in training for a year or so, and he's
about ready for big work.'

"'I don't believe Harry can do it,' his father declared.

"'I should think it might not be to his taste,' said Bill Warburton.

"'But I have later and better information than the rest of you,' I
said. 'If you will leave the matter in my hands you may hold me
responsible for the results.'

"They gave me the white card. I could do as I liked. The fact is, I
had just had a letter from Harry which filled me with new hope. I have
it here."

The Honorable Socrates Potter took the letter from his pocket and
said:

"You see, Harry has been discovering America. He is the Columbus of
our heiristocracy. His mental map has been filled with great cities
and splendid hotels, and thrifty towns and enormous areas of wheat and
corn, and astonishing distances and sublime mountain scenes. Moreover,
he has learned the joys of a simple life; he had to. Of course, he
knew of these things, but feebly and without pride, as one knows the
Tetons who has never seen them. Leaving in May, he stopped in all the
big cities, and finished his journey from the railroad with a
stage-ride of some ninety miles. Of the stage-ride and other matters,
he writes thus:

"'On the front seat with the driver sat a lady smoking a cigar, who,
now and then, offered us a drink from a bottle. At her side was a lady
with a wooden leg, and a hen in her hand. You know every woman is a
lady out here. The driver swore at the horses, the hen swore at the
lady, and several of the passengers swore at each other, and it was
all done in the most amiable spirit. Two rough-necks sat beside me who
kept shooting with revolvers at sage-hens as they--the men, not the
hens--irrigated the tires with tobacco-juice. At the next stop I got
into a row with a one-eyed professor of elocution, because he said I
carried too much for the size of my mule, an' didn't speak proper. He
objected to my pronunciation, and I to his choice of words. In the
argument his revolver took sides with him. I got one of my toes lopped
with a bullet, and the lady who carried the cigar and the bottle took
me to her home and nursed me like a mother, and the lady with the
wooden leg brought me strawberries every day and sang to me and told
me some good stories. I had thought it was a God-forsaken country,
but