pped the Duke. "I'd only suspected it
up to now!"

But when he edged in at the door he discovered that his grandson was not
making the usual spectacle which the untried orator affords. The zeal
which had driven him into the fight was supporting him as he faced the
men who were his associates. He stood at his desk, pale--but
unfaltering. He was talking to them, man to man.

"It has met me to my face, it has followed at my back through all these
weeks," he was saying. "I'm accused of helping to wreck my party. You
know better than that, gentlemen. You know who did the wrecking. It has
been going on for years. And we have been asked to hide the retreat of
the wreckers. I refuse to allow those men who have wrecked our party to
call themselves the true prophets and summon us to follow them. Our
party is not simply the men who hold office for their personal gain. If
making them honest or putting them out is destroying the party, then
let's destroy and rebuild.

"We need to rebuild.

"Up in our woods it's dangerous to leave slash on the ground after a
winter's cutting. The politicians have left a lot of slash in this
State. The fire has got into it. It is burning up the old dead branches
and tops, but it is hurting the standing timber, too--I understand that.
Why not see to it after this that the men who leave political slash
shall not be allowed to operate!

"It's a bad litter, gentlemen, that has been left around the roots of
our prohibitory law. I have introduced the bill that's now under
consideration. It has nothing to do with the principle of
prohibition--the theory of that was threshed out in these chambers
before I was born. But isn't it time, gentlemen, to have a test of the
_practice_ of prohibition?

"I know little about politics. I am merely one of the hundreds of young
men in this State who stand on the outside of politics and want the
opportunity to be honest when we vote. We appeal to the older men of
this State to drop the game for a little while and give us a chance to
start fair. The biggest corporation in this State is the State itself,
and I like to think that all of us, young or old, are partners or
stockholders. I've been brought up in business. We know what we'd all do
in straight business. Why can't we do it in State affairs? Too many
influences surround a legislature to make its work really deliberative.
After the heat and arguments of this session have died away we ought to
have a meeting on a