an offer from a gentleman pdf

That bids him flout the law he makes;

That bids him make the law he flouts.

-Kipling.

In buoyant spirit the Hon. Charles Norton rode up the bridle path leading through the Langdon plantation to the old antebellum homestead which, on a shaded knoll, overlooked the winding waters of the Pearl River. No finer prospect was to be had in all Mississippi than greeted the eye from the wide southwest porch, where on warm evenings the Langdons and their frequent guests gathered to dine or to watch the golden splendor of the dying sun.

The Langdon family had long been a power in the South. Its sons fought under Andrew Jackson at New Orleans, under Zachary Taylor in the war with Mexico, and in the Civil War men of that name left their blood on the fields of Antietam, Shiloh, the Wilderness and Gettysburg. But this family of fighting men, of unselfish patriots, had also marked influence in the ways of peace, as real patriots should. Generations of Langdons had taken deepest pride in developing the hundreds of acres of cotton land, whose thousands of four-foot rows planted each April spread open the silvery lined bolls in July and August, and the ripened cotton fiber, pure white beneath the sun, gave from a distance the picture of an expanse of driven snow.

The Hon. Charles Norton had reason for feeling well pleased with the world as he fastened his bay Virginia hunter to a convenient post and strode up the steps of the mansion, which was a characteristic survivor of the "old South," the South of gilded romance and of gripping tragedy. Now in this second year of his first term as Congressman and a promising member of the younger set of Southern lawyers, he had just taken active part in securing the election of Colonel William H. Langdon, present head of the family, to the United States Senate, though the ultimate action of the Legislature had been really brought about by a lifelong friend of Colonel Langdon, the senior Senator from the State, James Stevens, who had not hesitated to flatter Norton and use him as a cat's-paw. This use the Hon. Charles Norton seemed to consider an honor of large proportions. Not every first-term Congressman can hope for intimacy with a Senator. Norton believed that his work for Langdon would win him the family's gratitude and thus further his ambition to marry Carolina, the planter's oldest daughter, whose beauty made her the recipient of many attentions.

A complacent gleam shone in Norton's eyes as they swept over the fertile acres of the plantation. He thought of the material interest he might one day have in them if his suit for the hand of Carolina progressed favorably. Suddenly his reverie was interrupted by the voice of young Randolph Langdon, a spirited lad in his early twenties, who had just been made plantation manager, by his father.

"Well, how is the honorable to-day?" said Randolph, approaching from the doorway. "I didn't think a Congressman could be spared from Washington but rarely, especially when the papers say the country needs such a lot of saving."

"Oh, this 'saving the country' talk goes all right in the story books," replied Norton, who exercised considerable influence over the youth through a long acquaintanceship and by frequently taking him into his confidence, "but this country can take pretty good care of itself. In Congress we representatives put the job of saving it over on the Senate, and the Senate hands back the job to us. So what's everybody's business isn't anybody's; a fine scheme so long as we have a President who keeps his hands off and doesn't-"

"But how about the speeches and the bills?" broke in Randolph. "I thought-"

"Yes, yes; to be sure," the Congressman quickly added. "Nearly all of us introduce these so-called reform bills. When they're printed at government expense we send copies, carried free by the Post-office Department, to our constituents, and when we allow the bills to die in some committee we can always blame the committee. But if there's a big fight by our constituents over the bill we let it pass the House, but arrange to kill it in the Senate. Then we do the same thing for the Senators. Like in every other business, my boy," continued Norton as he led the way into the house, "it's a case of 'you tickle me and I'll tickle you' in politics. And don't let any one fool you about the speeches either. They are pretty things to mail to the voters, but all the wise boys in Washington know they aren't meant seriously. It's all play acting, and there are better actors in the Senate than Henry Irving or Edwin Booth ever were."

"I don't think my father looks at things in the way you do, Charlie."

"No? Well, maybe he doesn't now, but he will later on when he takes his seat in the Senate. If he isn't wise enough to play around with the rest of the Senators he won't get any bills passed, especially any bill carrying an appropriation or of any other particular importance."

"What!" ejaculated the planter's son. "Do you mean to say that if father won't do what the other Senators want him to do they will combine against him and destroy his usefulness, make him powerless-a failure?"

The Congressman smiled patronizingly on the youth. "Why, of course they will. That's politics, practical politics, the only kind that's known in Washington. You see-"

"But the leaders of the great parties!" cried the young plantation manager, in amazement. "Why don't they prevent this?"

"Because they invented the system and because political party differences don't amount to a whole lot much of the time in Washington. The politicians do most of their criticizing of the other party away from Washington, where the voters can hear them. But when circumstances sometimes force a man to rise to assail the other side in Congress he afterward apologizes in secret for his words. Or, sometimes he apologizes beforehand, saying: 'I've got to hand out some hot shot to you fellows just to please a crowd of sovereign voters from my district who have come up to Washington to see me perform. So, of course, I've got to make a showing. Don't mind what I say. You know I don't mean it, but the old fogies will go back home and tell their neighbors what a rip-snortin' reformer I be.'"

"Is that the way you represent your district; Norton?" asked Planter

Langdon, who at this juncture entered the room.

"No, no, Mr. Langdon-I should say Senator now, I suppose. I was merely telling Randolph how some legislators conduct themselves."