lives in a place
where if she was as beautiful as Cinderella, nobody but a bunch of
hill-bullies would ever see her. I want power, power that the world's
got to bow down to and acknowledge--and I might just as well be locked
up in somebody' hen-house. Well, maybe it's enough for you only to dream
about the music you don't ever expect to hear, but as for me, I dream,
too, and a dream ain't much use to me unless I can turn it into facts.
I'm going to make your dreams come true--every one of 'em. I'm going to
make Mary's dreams come true. There ain't no better blood in the world,
Paul, than you an' me have got in our veins an' I'm goin' to see that we
get what we're entitled to."

Paul's pale cheeks colored for an instant and something deep within him
stirred in response to the trumpet-like confidence of the voice which
spoke with such assurance of the absurdly impossible. Suddenly he awoke
to the innate music of the inspired human tongue, and there was that in
the face and figure of the taller stripling which abashed him, as though
he had intruded on a prophet in his moment of exaltation. Ham was
listening to voices silent to other ears, and in his eyes glowed such
resolve and invincible purpose as must have characterized the minute
men when they steeled their hearts to meet and conquer the seemingly
unconquerable.

"Out there beyond them piled-up rocks and God-forsaken fields," swept on
the other, "there's a _real_ world where the tides are tides of gold,
an' for me they are goin' to sweep in with a plunder of riches an' power
that all hell can't stop! Out yonder there are cities where men are
doing things an' ships are lyin' at the wharves with stuff that comes
from the ends of the earth--an' those ships are goin' to go an' come
when and where I tell 'em! They're goin' to carry cargoes at my biddin'
an' my people are goin' to have what they want. Instead of a wheezy
little bellows organ that acts like it had the asthma and cracked voices
singin' hymns out of tune, you're goin' to listen to operas, an' Mary's
goin' to have men that the world knows come courtin' her--in the place
of ignorant lumber-jacks." The young speaker paused for breath, and when
he spoke again it was in a voice that defied contradiction or doubt.
"I'm goin' to make the name of Hamilton Montagu Burton the best-known
name in the United States of America!"

"How do you know you can do all them things, Ham?" The question stole
from lips that trembled