for the nomination for the Presidency. The poor old commonwealth
is in a bad way, and it needs just such boys as you two are. The
war started us downhill, but we might have done better--I know I
might. The earth was too rich--it made life too easy. The horse,
the bottle of whiskey, and the plug of tobacco were all too easily
the best--and the pistol always too ready. We've been cartooned
through the world with a fearsome, half-contemptuous slap on the
back. Our living has been made out of luxuries. Agriculturally,
socially, politically, we have gone wrong, and but for the
American sense of humor the State would be in a just, nation-wide
contempt. The Ku-Klux, the burning of toll-gates, the Goebel
troubles, and the night rider are all links in the same chain of
lawlessness, and but for the first the others might not have been.
But we are, in spite of all this, a law-abiding people, and the
old manhood of the State is still here. Don't forget that--THE OLD
MANHOOD IS HERE."

Jason had sat eager-eyed and listening hard. Bewildered Gray felt
his tears welling, for never had he heard in all his life his
father talk this way. Again Colonel Pendleton turned his face to
the window and went on as though to the world outside.

"I wouldn't let anybody out there say this about us, nor would
you, and maybe if I thought I was going to live many years longer
I might not be saying it now, for some Kentuckian might yet make
me eat my words."

At this the eyes of the two boys crossed and both smiled faintly,
for though the sick man had been a generous liver, his palate
could never have known the taste of one of his own words.