The
mountains
are
very
high
and
steep
about
Carson,
Eagle
and
Washoe Valleys—very high
and
very
steep,
and
so
when
the
snow
gets
to
melting
off
fast
in
the
Spring
and
the
warm
surface-earth
begins
to
moisten
and
soften,
the
disastrous
land-slides commence.
The
reader
cannot
know
what
a land-slide is, unless
he
has
lived
in
that
country
and
seen
the
whole
side
of
a
mountain
taken
off
some
fine
morning
and
deposited
down
in
the
valley,
leaving
a vast, treeless,
unsightly
scar
upon
the
mountain's front
to
keep
the
circumstance
fresh
in
his
memory
all
the
years
that
he
may
go
on
living
within
seventy
miles
of
that
place.
General
Buncombe
was
shipped
out
to
Nevada
in
the
invoice
of
Territorial
officers,
to
be
United
States
Attorney.
He
considered
himself
a
lawyer
of
parts,
and
he
very
much
wanted
an
opportunity
to
manifest
it—partly
for
the
pure
gratification
of
it
and
partly
because
his
salary
was
Territorially
meagre
(which
is
a
strong
expression).
Now
the
older
citizens
of
a
new
territory
look
down
upon
the
rest
of
the
world
with
a calm,
benevolent
compassion,
as
long
as
it
keeps
out
of
the
way—when
it
gets
in
the
way
they
snub it. Sometimes
this
latter
takes
the
shape
of
a
practical
joke.
One
morning
Dick Hyde rode furiously
up
to
General
Buncombe's
door
in
Carson
city
and
rushed
into
his
presence
without
stopping
to
tie
his
horse.
He
seemed
much
excited.
He
told
the
General
that
he
wanted
him
to
conduct
a suit
for
him
and
would
pay
him
five
hundred
dollars
if
he
achieved
a victory.
And
then,
with
violent
gestures
and
a
world
of
profanity,
he
poured
out
his
grief.
He
said
it
was
pretty
well
known
that
for
some
years
he
had been farming (or ranching
as
the
more
customary
term is)
in
Washoe District,
and
making
a successful
thing
of
it,
and
furthermore
it
was
known
that
his
ranch
was
situated
just
in
the
edge
of
the
valley,
and
that
Tom Morgan owned a ranch immediately
above
it
on
the
mountain
side.
And
now
the
trouble
was,
that
one
of
those
hated
and
dreaded
land-slides had
come
and
slid Morgan's ranch, fences, cabins, cattle,
barns
and
everything
down
on
top
of
his
ranch
and
exactly covered
up
every
single
vestige
of
his
property,
to
a
depth
of
about
thirty-eight feet. Morgan
was
in
possession
and
refused
to
vacate
the
premises—said
he
was
occupying
his
own
cabin
and
not
interfering
with
anybody else's—and said
the
cabin
was
standing
on
the
same
dirt
and
same
ranch
it
had
always
stood on,
and
he
would
like
to
see
anybody
make
him
vacate. "And
when
I reminded him," said Hyde, weeping, "that
it
was
on
top
of
my ranch
and
that
he
was
trespassing,
he
had
the
infernal
meanness
to
ask
me
why
didn't I stay
on
my ranch
and
hold
possession
when
I
see
him
a-coming!
Why
didn't I stay
on
it,
the
blathering lunatic—by George,
when
I
heard
that
racket
and
looked
up
that
hill
it
was
just
like
the
whole
world
was
a-ripping
and
a-tearing
down
that
mountain
side—splinters,
and
cord-wood,
thunder
and
lightning,
hail
and
snow, odds
and
ends
of
hay
stacks,
and
awful
clouds
of
dust!—trees going
end
over
end
in
the
air, rocks
as
big
as
a
house
jumping 'bout a
thousand
feet high
and
busting
into
ten
million
pieces,
cattle
turned
inside
out
and
a-coming
head
on
with
their
tails hanging
out
between
their
teeth!—and
in
the
midst
of
all
that
wrack
and
destruction
sot
that
cussed Morgan
on
his
gate-post, a-wondering
why
I didn't stay
and
hold
possession!
Laws
bless
me, I
just
took
one
glimpse, General,
and
lit
out'n
the
county
in
three
jumps exactly. "But
what
grinds
me
is
that
that
Morgan
hangs
on
there
and
won't
move
off'n
that
ranch—says it's his'n
and
he's going
to
keep
it—likes
it
better'n
he
did
when
it
was
higher
up
the
hill. Mad! Well, I've been
so
mad
for
two
days
I couldn't find my
way
to
town—been
wandering
around
in
the
brush
in
a
starving
condition—got
anything
here
to
drink, General?
But
I'm
here
now,
and
I'm a-going
to
law.
You
hear
me!"
Never
in
all
the
world, perhaps,
were
a man's feelings
so
outraged
as
were
the
General's.
He
said
he
had
never
heard
of
such
high-handed
conduct
in
all
his
life
as
this
Morgan's.
And
he
said
there
was
no
use
in
going
to
law—Morgan had
no
shadow
of
right
to
remain
where
he
was—nobody
in
the
wide
world
would
uphold
him
in
it,
and
no
lawyer
would
take
his
case
and
no
judge
listen
to
it. Hyde said
that
right
there
was
where
he
was
mistaken—everybody
in
town
sustained
Morgan; Hal Brayton, a
very
smart lawyer, had taken
his
case;
the
courts being
in
vacation,
it
was
to
be
tried
before
a referee,
and
ex-Governor Roop had
already
been appointed
to
that
office
and
would
open
his
court
in
a
large
public
hall
near
the
hotel
at
two
that
afternoon.
The
General
was
amazed.
He
said
he
had suspected
before
that
the
people
of
that
Territory
were
fools,
and
now
he
knew
it.
But
he
said
rest
easy,
rest
easy
and
collect
the
witnesses,
for
the
victory
was
just
as
certain
as
if
the
conflict
were
already
over. Hyde wiped
away
his
tears
and
left.
At
two
in
the
afternoon
referee Roop's Court
opened
and
Roop
appeared
throned
among
his
sheriffs,
the
witnesses,
and
spectators,
and
wearing
upon
his
face a
solemnity
so
awe-inspiring
that
some
of
his
fellow-
conspirators
had
misgivings
that
maybe
he
had
not
comprehended,
after
all,
that
this
was
merely a joke.
An
unearthly
stillness
prevailed,
for
at
the
slightest
noise
the
judge
uttered
sternly
the
command: "Order
in
the
Court!"
And
the
sheriffs
promptly
echoed
it. Presently
the
General
elbowed
his
way
through
the
crowd
of
spectators,
with
his
arms
full
of
law-books,
and
on
his
ears
fell
an
order
from
the
judge
which
was
the
first
respectful
recognition
of
his
high
official
dignity
that
had
ever
saluted them,
and
it
trickled
pleasantly
through
his
whole
system: "Way
for
the
United
States
Attorney!"
The
witnesses
were
called—legislators, high
government
officers, ranchmen, miners, Indians, Chinamen, negroes.
Three
fourths
of
them
were
called
by
the
defendant
Morgan,
but
no
matter,
their
testimony
invariably went
in
favor
of
the
plaintiff
Hyde.
Each
new
witness
only
added
new
testimony
to
the
absurdity
of
a man's
claiming
to
own
another
man's
property
because
his
farm
had slid
down
on
top
of
it.
Then
the
Morgan
lawyers
made
their
speeches,
and
seemed
to
make
singularly
weak
ones—they
did
really
nothing
to
help
the
Morgan cause.
And
now
the
General,
with
exultation
in
his
face, got
up
and
made
an
impassioned effort;
he
pounded
the
table,
he
banged
the
law-books,
he
shouted,
and
roared,
and
howled,
he
quoted
from
everything
and
everybody, poetry, sarcasm, statistics, history, pathos, bathos, blasphemy,
and
wound
up
with
a
grand
war-whoop
for
free
speech,
freedom
of
the
press,
free
schools,
the
Glorious
Bird
of
America
and
the
principles
of
eternal
justice! [Applause.]
When
the
General
sat down,
he
did
it
with
the
conviction
that
if
there
was
anything
in
good
strong
testimony, a
great
speech
and
believing
and
admiring
countenances
all
around, Mr. Morgan's
case
was
killed. Ex-
Governor
Roop leant
his
head
upon
his
hand
for
some
minutes, thinking,
and
the
still
audience
waited
for
his
decision.
Then
he
got
up
and
stood erect,
with
bended head,
and
thought
again.
Then
he
walked
the
floor
with
long,
deliberate
strides,
his
chin
in
his
hand,
and
still
the
audience
waited.
At
last
he
returned
to
his
throne,
seated
himself,
and
began impressively: "Gentlemen, I feel
the
great
responsibility
that
rests
upon
me
this
day.
This
is
no
ordinary
case.
On
the
contrary
it
is
plain
that
it
is
the
most
solemn
and
awful
that
ever
man
was
called
upon
to
decide. Gentlemen, I
have
listened
attentively
to
the
evidence,
and
have
perceived
that
the
weight
of
it,
the
overwhelming
weight
of
it,
is
in
favor
of
the
plaintiff
Hyde. I
have
listened
also
to
the
remarks
of
counsel,
with
high interest—and especially
will
I
commend
the
masterly
and
irrefutable
logic
of
the
distinguished gentleman
who
represents
the
plaintiff.
But
gentlemen,
let
us
beware
how
we
allow
mere
human
testimony,
human
ingenuity
in
argument
and
human
ideas
of
equity,
to
influence
us
at
a
moment
so
solemn
as
this. Gentlemen,
it
ill
becomes
us, worms
as
we
are,
to
meddle
with
the
decrees
of
Heaven.
It
is
plain
to
me
that
Heaven,
in
its
inscrutable
wisdom, has
seen
fit
to
move
this
defendant's ranch
for
a purpose.
We
are
but
creatures,
and
we
must
submit.
If
Heaven
has chosen
to
favor
the
defendant
Morgan
in
this
marked
and
wonderful
manner;
and
if
Heaven, dissatisfied
with
the
position
of
the
Morgan ranch
upon
the
mountain
side, has chosen
to
remove
it
to
a position
more
eligible
and
more
advantageous
for
its
owner,
it
ill
becomes
us,
insects
as
we
are,
to
question
the
legality
of
the
act
or
inquire
into
the
reasons
that
prompted
it. No—Heaven
created
the
ranches
and
it
is
Heaven's
prerogative
to
rearrange them,
to
experiment
with
them
around
at
its
pleasure.
It
is
for
us
to
submit,
without
repining. "I
warn
you
that
this
thing
which
has
happened
is
a
thing
with
which
the
sacrilegious
hands
and
brains
and
tongues
of
men
must
not
meddle. Gentlemen,
it
is
the
verdict
of
this
court
that
the
plaintiff,
Richard
Hyde, has been deprived
of
his
ranch
by
the
visitation
of
God!
And
from
this
decision
there
is
no
appeal." Buncombe
seized
his
cargo
of
law-books
and
plunged
out
of
the
court-room
frantic
with
indignation.
He
pronounced Roop
to
be
a
miraculous
fool,
an
inspired
idiot.
In
all
good
faith
he
returned
at
night
and
remonstrated
with
Roop
upon
his
extravagant
decision,
and
implored
him
to
walk
the
floor
and
think
for
half
an
hour,
and
see
if
he
could
not
figure
out
some
sort
of
modification
of
the
verdict. Roop
yielded
at
last
and
got
up
to
walk.
He
walked
two
hours
and
a half,
and
at
last
his
face
lit
up
happily
and
he
told
Buncombe
it
had
occurred
to
him
that
the
ranch
underneath
the
new
Morgan ranch
still
belonged
to
Hyde,
that
his
title
to
the
ground
was
just
as
good
as
it
had
ever
been,
and
therefore
he
was
of
opinion
that
Hyde had a
right
to
dig
it
out
from
under
there
and—
The
General
never
waited
to
hear
the
end
of
it.
He
was
always
an
impatient
and
irascible
man,
that
way.
At
the
end
of
two
months
the
fact
that
he
had been
played
upon
with
a
joke
had
managed
to
bore itself,
like
another
Hoosac Tunnel,
through
the
solid
adamant
of
his
understanding.