But the municipal charter had been conceived in that generous fashion which is proper to a state where there are offices in excess of the needs of the population. The Grand Old Man discovered that there was one office which had been overlooked by the astute politicians: that of the Superintendent of Streets and Sidewalks. The streets had not been clearly differentiated from the surrounding desert, and, as for sidewalks, the citizens had been accustomed to cut across the country wherever it pleased them. The highways having been left to the kindly influence of Nature, it never occurred to any one that they should be officially superintended. The Grand Old Man cast a ballot for himself as Superintendent of Streets and Sidewalks, and when the returns were in, it was found that his name led all the rest. He was declared elected by a majority of one.
Then he began to magnify his office. He brought forth a plan of the city which had heretofore been a dead letter. He discovered streets where the wildest imagination had not supposed streets to be possible. Prominent citizens were arrested for obstructing mythical sidewalks. He was encouraged to stretch his prerogatives to the utmost, for every one was curious to see how far they would go. For six months he ruled by right of eminent domain. Leading lawyers gave it as their opinion that all rights not expressly reserved by the Federal and State governments were vested in the Grand Old Man. The Methodist minister, who was inclined to sensationalism, preached a sermon from the text in Nehemiah vi. 6: “It is reported among the heathen, and Gashmu saith it.” “Who this Gashmu was,” said the preacher, in beginning his discourse, “we do not know, but from the importance attributed to his remarks we may fairly assume that he was the Superintendent of Streets and Sidewalks in Jerusalem.”
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Lowell describes the rough humor of the frontier, with the free and easy manners which characterize
this brown-fisted rough, this shirt-sleeved Cid,
This back-woods Charlemagne of empires new,
Whose blundering heel instinctively finds out
The goutier foot of speechless dignities,
Who, meeting Cæsar’s self, would slap his back,
Call him ‘Old Horse’ and challenge to a drink.