trying to get him to admit that he believed
that his example might be fruitful of results agreeable to him in the
future. I could not conclude that he really agreed with me. "People do
not remember; they forget. They remember so long as you are directly
before them with something that interests them. That may be a lower
gas-rate, or a band that plays good music. People like strong people,
and only strong people, characters of that sort--good, bad or
indifferent--I've found that out. If a man or a corporation is stronger
than I am, comes along and denounces me, or spends more money than I do
(or can), buys more beers, makes larger promises, it is 'all day' for
me. What has happened in my case is that, for the present, anyhow, I
have come up against a strong corporation, stronger than I am. What I
now need to do is to go out somewhere and get some more strength in some
way, it doesn't matter much how. People are not so much interested in me
or you, or your or my ideals in their behalf, as they are in strength,
an interesting spectacle. And they are easily deceived. These big
fighting corporations with their attorneys and politicians and
newspapers make me look weak--puny. So the people forget me. If I could
get out, raise one million or five hundred thousand dollars and give the
corporations a good drubbing, they would adore me--for awhile. Then I
would have to go out and get another five hundred thousand somewhere, or
do something else."

"Quite so," I replied. "Yet _Vox populi, vox dei_."

Sitting upon his own doorstep one evening, in a very modest quarter of
the city, I said:

"Were you very much depressed by your defeat the last time?"

"Not at all," he replied. "Action, reaction, that's the law. All these
things right themselves in time, I suppose, or, anyhow, they ought to.
Maybe they don't. Some man who can hand the people what they really need
or ought to have will triumph, I suppose, some time. I don't know, I'm
sure. I hope so. I think the world is moving on, all right."

In his serene and youthful face, the pale blue, philosophical eyes, was
no evidence of dissatisfaction with the strange experiences through
which he had passed.

"You're entirely philosophical, are you?"

"As much as any one can be, I suppose. They seem to think that all my
work was an evidence of my worthlessness," he said. "Well, maybe it was.
Self-interest may be the true law, and the best force. I haven't quite
made up my mind yet.