all the land I can in the neighborhood. Then the board of this or
that makes its plan public, and there is a rush to get my land,
which nobody cared particular for before.

Ain't it perfectly honest to charge a good price and make a profit
on my investment and foresight? Of course, it is. Well, that's
honest graft.

Or supposin' it's a new bridge they're goin' to build. I get tipped off
and I buy as much property as I can that has to be taken for
approaches. I sell at my own price later on and drop some more
money in the bank.

Wouldn't you? It's just like lookin' ahead in Wall Street or in the
coffee or cotton market. It's honest graft, and I'm lookin' for it
every day in the year. I will tell you frankly that I've got a good lot
of it, too.

I'll tell you of one case. They were goin' to fix up a big park, no
matter where. I got on to it, and went lookin' about for land in that
neighborhood.

I could get nothin' at a bargain but a big piece of swamp, but I took
it fast enough and held on to it. What turned out was just what I
counted on. They couldn't make the park complete without
Plunkitt's swamp, and they had to pay a good price for it. Anything
dishonest in that?

Up in the watershed I made some money, too. I bought up several
bits of land there some years ago and made a pretty good guess