This, he said, is only a little joke of theirs, and theyll go a good deal further when they get their blood up. Still, I tried to warn you what you might expect.
So! said Muller, with a placid grin. It is noding to der franc tireurs . I was in der chase of Menotti among der Vosges. Also at Paris.
Well, said Grant drily, Im most afraid that by and by youll go through very much the same kind of thing again. What you saw at the depot is going on wherever the railroad is bringing the farmers in, and weve got men in this country whod make first-grade franc tireurs .
IV MULLER STANDS FAST
By it the Fräulein Muller, flaxen-haired, plump, and blue-eyed, sat knitting, and Larrys eyes grew a trifle wistful when he glanced at her. It was a very long while since any woman had crossed his threshold, and the red-cheeked fräulein gave the comfortless bachelor dwelling a curiously homelike appearance. Nevertheless, it was not the recollection of its usual dreariness that called up the sigh, for Larry Grant had had his dreams like other men, and Miss Muller was not the woman he had now and then daringly pictured sitting there. Her father, perhaps from force of habit, sat with a big meerschaum in hand, by the empty stove, and if his face expressed anything at all it was phlegmatic content. Opposite him sat Breckenridge, a young Englishman, lately arrived from Minnesota.
What do you think of the land, now youve seen it? asked Grant.
Muller nodded reflectively. Der land is good. It is der first-grade hard wheat she will grow. I three hundred and twenty acres buy.
Well, said Grant, Im willing to let you have it; but I usually try to do the square thing, and you may have trouble before you get your first crop in.
Und,
said Muller, so you want to sell?
Grant laughed. Not quite; and I cant sell that land outright. Ill let it to you while my lease runs, and when that falls in youll have the same right to homestead a quarter or half section for nothing as any other man. In the meanwhile, I and one or two others are going to start wheat-growing on land that is ours outright, and take our share of the trouble.
Ja, said Muller, but dere is much dot is not clear to me. Why you der trouble like?
Well, said Grant, as Ive tried to tell you, it works out very much like this. It was known that this land was specially adapted to mixed farming quite a few years ago, but the men who ran their cattle over it never drove a plough. You want to know why? Well, I guess it was for much the same reason that an association of our big manufacturers bought up the patents of an improved process, and for a long while never made an ounce of material under them, or let any one else try. We had to pay more than it was worth for an inferior article that hampered some of the most important industries in the country, and they piled up the dollars in the old-time way.
Und, said Muller, dot is democratic America!
Yes, said Grant. That is the America we mean to alter. Well, where one man feeds his cattle, fifty could plough and make a living raising stock on a smaller scale, and the times quite close upon us when they will; but the cattle-men have got the country, and it will hurt them to let go. Its not their land, and was only lent them. Now Im no fonder of trouble than any other man, but this country fed and taught me, and kept me two years in Europe looking round, and Id feel mean if I took everything and gave it nothing back. Muller will understand me. Do you, Breckenridge?
The English lad laughed. Oh, yes; though I dont know that any similar obligation was laid on myself. The country I came from had apparently no use for a younger son at all, and it was kicks and snubs it usually bestowed on me; but if theres a row on hand Im quite willing to stand by you and see it through. My folks will, however, be mildly astonished when they hear Ive turned reformer.
Grant nodded good-humouredly, for he was not a fanatic, but an American with a firm belief in the greatness of his countrys destiny, who, however, realized that faith alone was scarcely sufficient.
Well, he said, if its trouble youre anxious for, its quite likely youll find it here. Nobody ever got anything worth having unless he fought for it, and weve taken on a tolerably big contract. Were going to open up this state for any man who will work for it to make a living in, and substitute its constitution for the law of the cattle-barons.
Der progress, said Muller, she is irresistible.
Breckenridge laughed. From what I was taught, it seems to me that she moves round in rings. You start with the luxury of the few, oppression, and brutality, then comes revolution, and worse things than you had before, progress growing out of it that lasts for a few generations until the few fittest get more than their fair share of wealth and control, and you come back to the same point again.
Muller shook his head. No, he said, it is nod der ring, but der elastic spiral. Der progress she march, it is true, round und round, but she is arrive always der one turn higher, und der pressure on der volute is nod constant.