"Sure, Mike," said the robber. "Everybody here respects me, and
who respects the Wall street high finance and life insurance
robber? Not even their valets. Me one of the people? Ye gods, but
you watch these same people for a few years. You say they run the
government! They and their government are run by Wall street,
which owns the United States senate, body and soul. The people are
pawns on a chess board, moved by the players, and they only talk,
while the Wall street owners act. Let me tell you a story. I once
had a dog trained so that he would lay down and roll over for a
cracker, and would hold a piece of meat on his nose until his
mouth would water and his eyes sparkle, but he would wait for me
to snap my fingers before he would toss the meat in the air with
his nose and snatch it in his mouth, and swallow it whole for fear
I would get it away from him. He would stand on his hind legs and
speak and beg for a bone to be thrown to him so he could catch it.
Do you know, the people of this country remind me of that dog. If
they do not assert themselves and take monopoly, high finance,
insurance robbery, grafting and millionaire and billionaire
ownership of everything that pays by the throat and strangle them
all, and do business themselves instead of having business done
for them by the money power, they will never get noticed except
when they do their tricks like my old dog. When the time comes
that the people wear collars and are led by chains, and they have
to stand on their hind legs and speak to their rich and arrogant
masters for bones, and hold meat on their noses until Wall street
snaps its fingers, you will want to come out here in the mountains
and live the free life of a train robber with a conscience. What
do you think about it, bub?" said the robber to me.

"Well," says I to him, "you talk like a socialist, or a Democrat,