“‘There,’ said I, ‘is a large bust of Washington. Every citizen of the United States ought to have one, if he has a dust of patriotism in him. I must have the lead cast into rough busts like that.’
“‘Hollow,’ said he, ‘of course.’
“‘No, no,’ sais I, ‘by no manner of means, the heavier and solider the better.’
“‘But,’ said Galena, ‘Mr Slick, excuse me, though it is against my own interest, I cannot but suggest you might find a cheaper material, and one more suitable to your very laudable object.’
“‘Not at all,’ said I, ‘lead is the very identical thing. If a man don’t like the statue and its price, and it’s like as not he wont, he will like the lead. There is no duty on statuary, but there is more than thirty per cent. on lead. The duty alone is a fortune of not less than thirty thousand pounds, after all expenses are paid.’
“‘Well now,’ said he, throwing back his head and laughing, ‘that is the most ingenious device to evade duties I ever heard of.’
“I immediately gave orders to my agents at Liverpool to send so many tons to Washington and every port and place on the seaboard of the United States except New York, but not too many to any one town; and then I took passage in a steamer, and ordered all my agents to close the consignment immediately, and let the lead hero change hands. It was generally allowed to be the handsomest operation ever performed in our country. Connecticut offered to send me to Congress for it, the folks felt so proud of me.
“But I don’t call that smugglin’. It is a skilful reading of a revenue law. My idea of smugglin’ is, there is the duty, and there is the penalty; pay one and escape the other if you like, if not, run your chance of the penalty. If the state wants revenue, let it collect its dues. If I want my debts got in, I attend to drummin’ them up together myself; let government do the same. There isn’t a bit of harm in smugglin’. I don’t like a law restraining liberty. Let them that impose shackles look to the bolts; that’s my idea.”
“That argument won’t hold water, Slick,” said the doctor.
“Why?”