Not that I look down on them saddle-bags--fur from it--I honor 'em
and I honor the rich men that have cut iron roads through continents,
mountain and abyss, honor them that have made talkin' under the ocean
possible and through the pathless air. Yes, indeed, I honor 'em from
nearly the bottom of my heart. But I would honor 'em still more if
they should now all on 'em stand up in a row before Uncle Sam, and
say, We have done all we could to help the people (and ourselves at
the same time), and now as we see that you can help 'em still more
than we can, we turn our improvements all over into your hands to use
for the people, for you can make travel jest as much cheaper as letter
carryin', and do it just as peaceable. Why, what a stir it would make
on earth and in heaven, and Uncle Sam would see that they didn't lose
anything by it. He'd see jest what a grand thing they wuz doin', and
pay 'em well for it. And these rich men, instead of leavin' their
wealth in bags of greenbacks for moth and rust and lawyers to corrupt,
and fightin' heirs to break through their wills and steal, would leave
it in grateful memories and a niche in history where their benine
faces would stand up with all the great benefactors of the race.
Hain't that better, Mr. Astofeller, than to leave jest money for a
fashionable wife and golf-playin' sons to run through?"

Mr. Astofeller said he believed it wuz better; he looked real
convinced. And seein' him in this softened frame of mind I went on and
brung up a number of incidents provin' that the great folks of the
past had held a good many of my idees in regard to wealth. I reminded
him of Mr. Cincinnatus who did so much to make Rome glorious, when the
public sought him out for honors (he not a-prancin' through the
country with torch-light processions and a brass band, talkin' himself
hoarse, and lavishin' money to git it), no indeed, when they sought
him for a candidate for public honors they found him a not fixin' up
the primarys and buyin' bosses, but ploughin' away, just as peaceable
as his oxen, workin' on his own little farm of four acres. He wuz
satisfied with makin' enough to live on. Live and let live was his
motto.

"And Mr. Regulus, the leader of the great Roman forces, wuz satisfied
with his little farm of seven acres, creepin' up a little in amount
from four to seven. But it wuzn't till long, long afterwards that the
rich grew enormously rich and the poor poorer, and what a man had wuz
h