IRRIGATION, POLITICS, AND SECTIONALISM 93 



been sapiently remarked in the columns of 

 an Eastern paper of repute, no one knows 

 what the people's favourite orator meant, or 

 indeed means now, by his oft- repeated figures 

 of speech, still, when shouted forth by a man 

 with waving hair and upturned eyes, they 

 strike everybody who is dissatisfied with the 

 way the world is moving as the very soul of 

 eloquence. The American people have been 

 dissatisfied for a long while. Spoiled by 

 prosperity, they have revelled for years in 

 reckless extravagance, public and private, 

 and now are endeavouring to lay the blame 

 of present conditions anywhere but at the 

 door of national thriftlessness ; yet no one 

 with any powers of observation can deny 

 that this extravagance has as much to answer 

 for as those wider international issues and 

 events which are almost equally overlooked. 

 It has been well said that the intelligent and 

 upright American farmer would indignantly 

 refute the accusation that he desired to 

 repudiate the nation's debts of honour, if 

 he knew whither his straying feet were lead- 

 ing him. That is true enough ; the trouble 

 was that during the electoral campaign he 



