“My brother,” said he, “when I first came out of Princeton I was burnin’ up with zeal.  There was the world, the whole wide world, plunged into an abyss of error and wrongdoin’.  I was the sole and remainin’ hope.  Like all great men, I naturally wanted to begin the savin’ as early as possible; and like everybody else who comes out of Princeton, I thought the best medium for immediate salvation was journalism.  I wasn’t a newspaper man.  I never said that at all.  I was a journalist.

“Well, dad got me a place on a paper in New York, and I worked on the dog-fight department for a time, it havin’ been discovered that I was noted along certain lines of research in Princeton.  I knew the pedigree and fightin’ weight of every white, black, or brindle pup in four States.  Now, a whole lot of fellows come out of college who don’t know that much; or if they do, they don’t know how to apply their knowledge.  Now dogs, that’s plumb useful.

“I was still doin’ dogs when the presidential campaign came along, or rather, that feature of our national customs which precedes the selection of the People’s Choice.  First thing, of course, the People’s Choice had to take a run over the country—­which was a good thing, too, because he didn’t know much about it—­and let the people in general know that he was their choice.  I went along to tell the other people how he broke it to them.”

I confess I sat up at this, for there was now so supreme an innocence in Dan Anderson’s eye that one might have been morally certain that something was coming.  “From dogs to politics—­wasn’t that a little singular?” I asked.

“Yes,” said he; “but you have to be versatile in journalism.  The regular man who was to have gone on that special presidential car got slugged at an art gatherin’.  I didn’t ask for the place.  I just went and told the managin’ editor I was ready if he would give me an order for expense money.  It wouldn’t have been good form for him to look up and pay any attention to me, so I got the job.  I needed to see the country just as much as the People’s Choice did.

“Three other fellows went along,—­newspaper men.  I was the only real journalist.  We did the presidential tour for ten towns a day.  I watched what the other fellows did, and in about two hours it was easy.  Everything’s easy if you think so.  Folks made a lot of fuss about gettin’ along in the world.  That’s all a mistake.

“People’s Choice tore it off in fine shape.  Comin’ into Basswood Junction he turns to his Honorable Secretary, and says he, ’Jimmy, what’s this?’ Jimmy turns to his card cabinet, and says he:  ’Prexie, this is Basswood Junction.  Three railroads come in here—­and get away as soon as they can.  Four overall factories and a reaper plant.  Population six thousand, and increasin’ satisfactory.  Hon. Charles D. Bastrop, M.C., from this district, on the straight Republican ticket for the last three hundred years; world without end.’