"approaching" the old man in that way. The members and the hordes of
camp-followers and all the lobby had settled into a belief that
Representative Rollinson was a sea-green Incorruptible, that of all
honest members he was the most honest. He had become typical of
honesty: sayings were current--"You might as well try to bribe Uncle
Billy Rollinson!" "As honest as old Uncle Billy Rollinson." Hurlbut
often used such phrases in private.

The "Breaker" was Hurlbut's own bill; he had planned it and written
it, though it came over to the House from the Senate under a Senator's
name. It was one of those "anti-monopolistic" measures which Democrats
put their whole hearts into, sometimes, and believe in and fight for
magnificently; an idea conceived in honesty and for a beneficent
purpose, in the belief that a legislature by the wave of a hand can
conjure the millennium to appear; and born out of an utter
misconception of man and railroads. The bill needs no farther
description than this: if it passed and became an enforced law, the
dividends of every rail road entering the State would be reduced by
two-fifths. There is one thing that will fight harder than a
Democrat--that is a railroad.

The "Breaker" had been kept very dark until Hurlbut felt that he was
ready; then it was swept through the Senate before the railroad lobby,
previously lulled into unsuspicion, could collect itself and block
it. This was as Hurlbut had planned: that the fight should be in his
own House. It was the bill of his heart and he set his reputation upon
it. He needed fifty-one votes to pass it, and he had them, and one to
spare; for he took his followers, who formed the majority, into caucus
upon it. It was in the caucus Uncle Billy learned that Hurlbut was
"for" the bill. He watched the leader with humble, wavering eyes,