IRRIGATION, POLITICS, AND SECTIONALISM 91 



people, and that the Federal Government, 

 considered as a representative Government, 

 is a failure, more or less. To the outsider, 

 who is popularly supposed to see most of 

 the game, the astonishing thing about these 

 apparently opposing, but in truth perfectly 

 reconcilable, sentiments is that they should 

 have been so laggard in manifesting them- 

 selves. The causes, however, for those who 

 know the country, are not far to seek. A 

 natural reluctance to question or disturb in- 

 stitutions religiously designed not merely for 

 a young country's own enlightenment, but 

 as lights to lighten the darkness of effete 

 monarchies, is one cause, and not an un- 

 important one. 



The arguments of the Free Silverites, set 

 forth on street corners, isolated ranches, and 

 where not, but rarely unheard in the Territory, 

 are as restricted as is the view of the painter 

 who, for the purpose of confining his sketch 

 within artistic limits, cuts him a small circle 

 of pasteboard, and through this peephole 

 makes the necessary observations. Outside 

 of this limited radius he sees nothing. 

 Admitting the possibility that the Free 



