-"Don't talk to me," he bellowed--for by this time
his voice had risen to the pitch of a methodist's, in a
camp-meeting--"Don't talk to me of antiquity, and time, and length of
possession, as things to be respected. They're nawthin--jest nawthin'
at all. Possession's good in law, I'll admit; and I contind that's jest
what the tenants has. They've got the lawful possession of this very
property, that layeth (not eggs, but) up and down, far and near, and all
around; a rich and goodly heritage, when divided up among hard-working
and honest folks; but too much, by tens of thousands of acres, for a
young chap, who is wasting his substance in foreign lands, to hold. I
contind that the tenants has this very, precise, lawful possession, at
this blessed moment, only the law won't let 'em enj'y it. It's all owing
to that accursed law, that the tenant can't set up a title ag'in his
landlord. You see by this one fact, fellow-citizens, that they are a
privileged class, and ought to be brought down to the level of gin'ral
humanity. You can set up title ag'in anybody else, but you shan't set up
title ag'in a landlord. I know what is said in the primisis," shaking
his head, in derision of any arguments on the other side of this
particular point; "I know that circumstances alter cases. I can see the
hardship of one neighbour's coming to another, and asking to borrow or
hire his horse for a day, and then pretendin' to hold him on some other
ketch. But horses isn't land; you must all allow _that_. No, if horses
_was_ land, the case would be altered. Land is an element, and so is
fire, and so is water, and so is air. Now, who will say that a freeman
hasn't a right to air, hasn't a right to water, and, on the same
process, hasn't a right to land? He _has_, fellow-citizens--he _has_.
These are what are called in philosophy elementary rights; which is the
same thing as a right to the elements, of which land is one, and a
principal one. I say a principal one; for, if there was no land to stand
on, we should drop away from air, and couldn't enj'y _that_; we should
lose all our water in vapour, and couldn't put it to millin' and
manafacterin' purposes; and where could we build our fires? No; land is
the _first_ elementary right, and connected with it comes the first and
most sacred right to the elements.

"I do not altogether disregard antiquity, neither. No; I respect and
revere pre-emption rights; for they fortify and sustain the right to the