CHAPTER XVII.—THE GREAT STEWART CAMPAIGN.

As I states, I saveys nothin’ personal of politics. Thar’s mighty little politics gets brooited about Wolfville, an’ I ain’t none shore but it’s as well. The camp’s most likely a heap peacefuller as a com-moonity. Shore, Colonel Sterett discusses politics in that Coyote paper he conducts; but none of it’s nearer than Washin’ton, an’ it all seems so plumb dreamy an’ far away that while it’s interestin’, it can’t be regyarded as replete of the harrowin’ excitement that sedooces a public from its nacheral rest an’ causes it to set up nights an’ howl.

Rummagin’ my mem’ry, I never does hear any politics talked local but once, an’ that’s by Dan Boggs. It’s when the Colonel asks Dan to what party he adheres in principle—for thar ain’t no real shore-enough party lurkin’ about in Arizona much, it bein’ a territory that a-way an’ mighty busy over enterprises more calc’lated to pay—an’ Dan retorts that he’s hooked up with no outfit none as yet, but stands ready as far as his sentiments is involved to go buttin’ into the first organization that’ll cheapen nose-paint, ’liminate splits as a resk in faro-bank, an’ raise the price of beef. Further than them tenets, Dan allows he ain’t got no principles.

Man an’ boy I never witnesses any surplus of politics an’ party strife. In Tennessee when I’m a child every decent gent has been brought up a Andy Jackson man, an’ so continyoos long after that heroic captain is petered. As you-all can imagine, politics onder sech conditions goes all one way like the currents of the Cumberland. Thar’s no bicker, no strife, simply a vast Andy Jackson yooniformity.

The few years I puts in about Arkansaw ain’t much different. Leastwise we-all don’t have issues; an’ what contests does arise is gen’rally personal an’ of the kind where two gents enjoys a j’int debate with their bowies or shows each other how wrong they be with a gun. An’ while politics of the variety I deescribes is thrillin’, your caution rather than your intellects gets appealed to, while feuds is more apt to be their frootes than any draw-in’ of reg’lar party lines. Wherefore I may say it’s only doorin’ the one year I abides in Missouri when I experiences troo politics played with issues, candidates, mass-meetin’s an’ barbecues.

For myse’f, my part is not spectacyoolar, bein’ I’m new an’ raw an’ young; but I looks on with relish, an’ while I don’t cut no hercoolean figger in the riot, I shore saveys as much about what’s goin’ on as the best posted gent between the Ozarks an’ the Iowa line.

What you-all might consider as the better element is painted up to beat Old Stewart who’s out sloshin’ about demandin’ re-election to Jeff City for a second term. The better element says Old Stewart drinks. An’ this accoosation is doubtless troo a whole lot, for I’m witness myse’f to the following colloquy which takes place between Old Stewart an’ a jack-laig doctor he crosses up with in St. Joe. Old Stewart’s jest come forth from the tavern, an’ bein’ on a joobilee the evenin’ before, is lookin’ an’ mighty likely feelin’ some seedy.

“Doc,” says Old Stewart, openin’ his mouth as wide as a young raven, an’ then shettin’ it ag’in so’s to continyoo his remarks, “Doc, I wish you’d peer into this funnel of mine.”

Then he opens his mouth ag’in in the same egree-gious way, while the scientist addressed scouts about tharin with his eyes, plenty owley. At last the Doc shows symptoms of bein’ ready to report.

“Which I don’t note nothin’ onusual, Gov’nor, about that mouth,” says the Doc, “except it’s a heap voloominous.”

“Don’t you discern no signs or signal smokes of any foreign bodies?” says Old Stewart, a bit pettish, same as if he can’t onderstand sech blindness.

“None whatever!” observes the Doc.

“It’s shore strange,” retorts Old Stewart, still in his complainin’ tones; “thar’s two hundred niggers, a brick house an’ a thousand acres of bottom land gone down that throat, an’ I sort o’ reckons some traces of ’em would show.”

That’s the trouble with Old Stewart from the immacyoolate standpint of the better classes; they says he overdrinks. But while it’s convincin’ to sooperior folks an’ ones who’s goin’ to church an’ makin’ a speshulty of it, it don’t sep’rate Old Stewart from the warm affections of the rooder masses—the catfish an’ quinine aristocracy that dwells along the Missouri; they’re out for him to the last sport.

“Suppose the old Gov’nor does drink,” says one, “what difference does that make? Now, if he’s goin’ to try sootes in co’t, or assoome the pressure as a preacher, thar’d be something in the bluff. But it don’t cut no figger whether a gov’nor is sober or no. All he has to do is pardon convicts an’ make notaries public, an’ no gent can absorb licker s’fficient to incapac’tate him for sech trivial dooties.”

One of the argyments they uses ag’in Old Stewart is about a hawg-thief he pardons. Old Stewart is headin’ up for the state house one mornin’, when he caroms on a passel of felons in striped clothes who’s pesterin’ about the grounds, tittivatin’ up the scenery. Old Stewart pauses in front of one of ’em.

“What be you-all in the pen’tentiary for?” says Old Stewart, an’ he’s profoundly solemn.

Tharupon the felon trails out on a yarn about how he’s a innocent an’ oppressed person. He’s that honest an’ upright—hear him relate the tale—that you’d feel like apol’gizin’. Old Stewart listens to this victim of intrigues an’ outrages ontil he’s through; then he goes romancin’ along to the next. Thar’s five wronged gents in that striped outfit, five who’s as free from moral taint or stain of crime as Dave Tutt’s infant son, Enright Peets Tutt.

But the sixth is different. He admits he’s a miscreant an’ has done stole a hawg.

“However did you steal it, you scoundrel?” demands Old Stewart.

“I’m outer meat,” says the crim’nal, “an’ a band of pigs comes pi rootin’ about, an’ I nacherally takes my rifle an’ downs one.”

“Was it a valyooable hawg?”

“You-all can gamble it ain’t no runt,” retorts the crim’nal. “I shore ain’t pickin’ out the worst, an’ I’m as good a jedge of hawgs as ever eats corn pone an’ cracklin’.”

At this Old Stewart falls into a foamin’ rage an’ turns on the two gyards who’s soopervisin’ the captives.

“Whatever do you-all mean,” he roars, “bringin’ this common an’ confessed hawg-thief out yere with these five honest men? Don’t you know he’ll corrupt ’em?”

Tharupon Old Stewart reepairs to his rooms in the state house an’ pardons the hawg convict with the utmost fury.

“An’ now, pull your freight,” says Old Stewart, to the crim’nal. “If you’re in Jeff City twenty-four hours from now I’ll have you shot at sunrise. The idee of compellin’ five spotless gents to con-tinyoo in daily companionship with a low hawg-thief! I pardons you, not because you merits mercy, but to preserve the morals of our prison.”

The better element concloods they’ll take advantage of Old Stewart’s willin’ness for rum an’ make a example of him before the multitoode. They decides they’ll construct the example at a monstrous meetin’ that’s schedyooled for Hannibal, where Old Stewart an’ his opponent—who stands for the better element mighty excellent, seein’ he’s worth about a million dollars with a home-camp in St. Looey, an’ never a idee above dollars an’ cents—is programmed for one of these yere j’int debates, frequent in the politics of that era. The conspiracy is the more necessary as Old Stewart, mental, is so much swifter than the better element’s candidate, that he goes by him like a antelope. Only two days prior at the town of Fulton, Old Stewart comes after the better element’s candidate an’ gets enough of his hide, oratorical, to make a saddle-cover. The better element, alarmed for their gent, resolves on measures in Hannibal that’s calc’lated to redooce Old Stewart to a shorething. They don’t aim to allow him to wallop their gent at the Hannibal meetin’ like he does in old Callaway. With that, they confides to a trio of Hannibal’s sturdiest sots—all of ’em acquaintances an’ pards of Old Stewart—the sacred task of gettin’ that statesman too drunk to orate.

This yere Hannibal barbecue, whereat Old Stewart’s goin’ to hold a open-air discussion with his aristocratic opponent, is set down for one in the afternoon. The three who’s to throw Old Stewart with copious libations of strong drink, hunts that earnest person out as early as sun-up at the tavern. They invites him into the bar-room an’ bids the bar-keep set forth his nourishment.

Gents, it works like a charm! All the mornin’, Old Stewart swings an’ rattles with the plotters an’ goes drink for drink with ’em, holdin’ nothin’ back.

For all that the plot falls down. When it’s come the hour for Old Stewart to resort to the barbecue an’ assoome his share in the exercises, two of the Hannibal delegation is spread out cold an’ he’pless in a r’ar room, while Old Stewart is he’pin’ the third—a gent of whom he’s partic’lar fond—upstairs to Old Stewart’s room, where he lays him safe an’ serene on the blankets. Then Old Stewart takes another drink by himse’f, an’ j’ins his brave adherents at the picnic grounds. Old Stewart is never more loocid, an’ ag’in he peels the pelt from the better element’s candidate, an’ does it with graceful ease.

Old Stewart, however, is regyarded as in peril of defeat. He’s mighty weak in the big towns where the better element is entrenched, an’ churches grow as thick as blackberries. Even throughout the rooral regions, wherever a meetin’ house pokes up its spire, it’s onderstood that Old Stewart’s in a heap of danger.

It ain’t that Old Stewart is sech a apostle of nose-paint neither; it ain’t whiskey that’s goin’ to kill him off at the ballot box. It’s the fact that the better element’s candidate—besides bein’ rich, which is allers a mark of virchoo to a troo believer—is a church member, an’ belongs to a congregation where he passes the plate, an’ stands high up in the papers. This makes the better element’s gent a heap pop’lar with church folk, while pore Old Stewart, who’s a hopeless sinner, don’t stand no show.

This grows so manifest that even Old Stewart’s most locoed supporters concedes that he’s gone; an’ money is offered at three to one that the better element’s entry will go over Old Stewart like a Joone rise over a tow-head. Old Stewart hears these yere misgivin’s an’ bids his folks be of good cheer.

“I’ll fix that,” says Old Stewart. “By election day, my learned opponent will be in sech disrepoote with every church in Missouri he won’t be able to get dost enough to one of ’em to give it a ripe peach.” Old Stewart onpouches a roll which musters fifteen hundred dollars. “That’s mighty little; but it’ll do the trick.”

Old Stewart’s folks is mystified; they can’t make out how he’s goin’ to round up the congregations with so slim a workin’ cap’tal. But they has faith in their chief; an’ his word goes for all they’ve got. When he lets on he’ll have the churches arrayed ag’inst the foe, his warriors takes heart of grace an’ jumps into the collar an’ pulls like lions refreshed.

It’s the fourth Sunday before election when Old Stewart, by speshul an’ trusted friends presents five hundred dollars each to a church in St. Looey, an’ another in St. Joe, an’ still another in Hannibal; said gifts bein’ in the name an’ with the compliments of his opponent an’ that gent’s best wishes for the Christian cause.

Thar’s not a doubt raised; each church believes it-se’f favored five hundred dollars’ worth from the kindly hand of the millionaire candidate, an’ the three pastors sits pleasantly down an’ writes that amazed sport a letter of thanks for his moonificence. He don’t onderstand it none; but he decides it’s wise to accept this accidental pop’larity, an’ he waxes guileful an’ writes back an’ says that while he don’t clearly onderstand, an’ no thanks is his doo, he’s tickled to hear he’s well bethought of by the good Christians of St. Looey, St. Joe an’ Hannibal, as expressed in them missives. The better element’s candidate congratulates himse’f on his good luck, stands pat, an’ accepts his onexpected wreaths. That’s jest what Old Stewart, who is as cunnin’ as a fox, is aimin’ at.

In two days the renown of them five-hundred-dollar gifts goes over the state like a cat over a back roof. In four days every church in the state hears of these largesses. An’ bein’ plumb alert financial, as churches ever is, each sacred outfit writes on to the better element’s candidate an’ desires five hundred dollars of that onfortunate publicist. He gets sixty thousand letters in one week an’ each calls for five hundred.

Gents, thar’s no more to be said; the better element’s candidate is up ag’inst it. He can’t yield to the fiscal demands, an’ it’s too late to deny the gifts. Whereupon the other churches resents the favoritism he’s displayed about the three in St. Looey, St. Joe an’ Hannibal. They regyards him as a hoss-thief for not rememberin’ them while his weaselskin is in his hand, an’ on election day they comes down on him like a pan of milk from a top shelf! You hear me, they shorely blots that onhap-py candidate off the face of the earth, an’ Old Stewart is Gov’nor ag’in.

On the fourth evening of our companionship about the tavern fire, it was the Red Nosed Gentleman who took the lead with a story.

“You spoke,” said the Red Nosed Gentleman, addressing the Jolly Doctor, “of having been told by a friend a story you gave us. Not long ago I was in the audience while an old actor recounted how he once went to the aid of an individual named Connelly. It was not a bad story, I thought; and if you like, I’ll tell it to-night. The gray Thespian called his adventure The Rescue of Connelly, and these were his words as he related it. We were about a table in Browne’s chop house when he told it.”