was
one of the few that never failed me in the Illinois campaign. He is as
honest as the day; you will find him plain-spoken if he speaks at all,
and I have great hopes that you will agree. Tom, the Major and I are
boyhood friends, and for the sake of that friendship he has consented to
this meeting."

"I fear that your kind efforts will be useless, Colonel," Major Colfax
put in, rather tartly. "Mr. McChesney not only ignores my rights, but
was near to hanging my agent."

"What?" says Colonel Clark.

I glanced at Tom. However helpless he might be in a court, he could be
counted on to stand up stanchly in a personal argument. His retorts
would certainly not be brilliant, but they surely would be dogged. Major
Colfax had begun wrong.

"I reckon ye've got no rights that I know on," said Tom. "I cleart the
land and settled it, and I have a better right to it nor any man. And
I've got a grant fer it."

"A Henderson grant!" cried the Major; "'tis so much worthless paper."

"I reckon it's good enough fer me," answered Tom. "It come from those
who blazed their way out here and druv the redskins off. I don't know
nothin' about this newfangled law, but 'tis a queer thing to my thinkin'
if them that fit fer a place ain't got the fust right to it."

Major Colfax turned to Colonel Clark with marked impatience.

"I told you it would be useless, Clark," said he. "I care not a fig for
a few paltry acres, and as God hears me I'm a reasonable man." (He did
not look it then.) "But I swear by the evangels I'll let no squatter
have the better of me. I did not serve Virginia for gold or land, but I
lost my fortune in that service, and before I know it these backwoodsmen
will have every acre of my grant. It's an old story," said Mr. Colfax,
hotly, "and why the devil did we fight England if it wasn't that every
man should have his rights? By God, I'll not be frightened or wheedled
out of mine. I sent an agent to Kentucky to deal politely and reasonably
with these gentry. What did they do to him? Some of them threw him out
neck and crop. And if I am not mistaken," said Major Colfax, fixing a
piercing eye upon Tom, "if I am not mistaken, it was this worthy sergeant
of yours who came near to hanging him, and made the poor devil flee
Kentucky for his life."

This remark brought me near to an untimely laugh at the remembrance of
Mr. Potts, and this though I was far too sober over the outcome of the
conference. Colonel Clark seized hold o