Poor Corinth! So are gone the days of her true glory--the glory of her
usefulness, while the days of her promised honor and power are not yet
fulfilled.

And because the town of this story is what it is, there came to dwell in
it a Spirit--a strange, mysterious power--playful, vicious, deadly; a
Something to be at once feared and courted; to be denied--yet confessed
in the denial; a dreaded enemy, a welcome friend, an all-powerful Ally.

But, for Corinth, the humiliation of her material failure is forgotten
in her pride of a finer success. The shame of commercial and civic
obscurity is lost in the light of national recognition. And that
self-respect and pride of place, without which neither man nor town can
look the world in the face, is saved to her by the Statesman.

Born in Corinth, a graduate of the old Academy, town clerk, mayor, county
clerk, state senator, congressman, his zeal in advocating a much
discussed issue of his day, won for him national notice, and for his
town everlasting fame.

In this man unusual talents were combined with rare integrity of purpose
and purity of life. Politics to him meant a way whereby he might serve
his fellows. However much men differed as to the value of the measures
for which he fought, no one ever doubted his belief in them or questioned
his reasons for fighting. It was not at all strange that such a man
should have won the respect and friendship of the truly great. But with
all the honors that came to him, the Statesman's heart never turned from
the little Ozark town, and it was here among those who knew him best that
his influence for good was greatest and that he was most loved and
honored. Thus all that the railroad failed to do for Corinth the