54-40 or Fight

54-40 or Fight

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Title: 54-40 or Fight
Author: Emerson Hough
Release Date: December 15, 2004 [eBook #14355]
Language: English
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54-40 OR FIGHT
by
EMERSON HOUGH
Author of The Mississippi Bubble, The Way of the Man, etc.
With Four Illustrations by Arthur I. Keller
A. L. Burt Company Publishers New York
1909

[Illustration: "Madam," said I, "let me, at least, alone." Page 49]

TO Theodore Roosevelt
PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES AND FIRM BELIEVER IN
THE RULE OF THE PEOPLE
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED WITH THE LOYALTY AND
ADMIRATION OF THE AUTHOR

CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I
THE MAKERS OF MAPS II BY SPECIAL DESPATCH III IN
ARGUMENT IV THE BARONESS HELENA V ONE OF THE
WOMEN IN THE CASE VI THE BOUDOIR OF THE BARONESS

VII REGARDING ELISABETH VIII MR. CALHOUN ACCEPTS IX
A KETTLE OF FISH X MIXED DUTIES XI WHO GIVETH THIS
WOMAN XII THE MARATHON XIII ON SECRET SERVICE XIV
THE OTHER WOMAN XV WITH MADAM THE BARONESS XVI
DÉJEÛNER A LA FOURCHETTE XVII A HUNTER OF
BUTTERFLIES XVIII THE MISSING SLIPPER XIX THE
GENTLEMAN FROM TENNESSEE XX THE LADY FROM
MEXICO XXI POLITICS UNDER COVER XXII BUT YET A
WOMAN XXIII SUCCESS IN SILK XXIV THE WHOA-HAW
TRAIL XXV OREGON XXVI THE DEBATED COUNTRY XXVII
IN THE CABIN OF MADAM XXVIII WHEN A WOMAN WOULD
XXIX IN EXCHANGE XXX COUNTER CURRENTS XXXI THE
PAYMENT XXXII PAKENHAM'S PRICE XXXIII THE STORY OF
HELENA VON RITZ XXXIV THE VICTORY XXXV THE PROXY
OF PAKENHAM XXXVI THE PALO ALTO BALL EPILOGUE
CHAPTER I
THE MAKERS OF MAPS
There is scarcely a single cause in which a woman is not engaged in
some way fomenting the suit.--Juvenal.
"Then you offer me no hope, Doctor?" The gray mane of Doctor
Samuel Ward waved like a fighting crest as he made answer:
"Not the sort of hope you ask." A moment later he added: "John, I am
ashamed of you."
The cynical smile of the man I called my chief still remained upon his
lips, the same drawn look of suffering still remained upon his gaunt
features; but in his blue eye I saw a glint which proved that the answer
of his old friend had struck out some unused spark of vitality from the
deep, cold flint of his heart.
"I never knew you for a coward, Calhoun," went on Doctor Ward, "nor
any of your family I give you now the benefit of my personal
acquaintance with this generation of the Calhouns. I ask something

more of you than faint-heartedness."
The keen eyes turned upon him again with the old flame of flint which
a generation had known--a generation, for the most part, of enemies.
On my chief's face I saw appear again the fighting flush, proof of his
hard-fibered nature, ever ready to rejoin with challenge when challenge
came.
"Did not Saul fall upon his own sword?" asked John Calhoun. "Have
not devoted leaders from the start of the world till now sometimes rid
the scene of the responsible figures in lost fights, the men on whom
blame rested for failures?"
"Cowards!" rejoined Doctor Ward. "Cowards, every one of them! Were
there not other swords upon which they might have fallen--those of
their enemies?"
"It is not my own hand--my own sword, Sam," said Calhoun. "Not that.
You know as well as I that I am already marked and doomed, even as I
sit at my table to-night. A walk of a wet night here in Washington--a
turn along the Heights out there when the winter wind is keen--yes,
Sam, I see my grave before me, close enough; but how can I rest easy
in that grave? Man, we have not yet dreamed how great a country this
may be. We must have Texas. We must have also Oregon. We must
have--"
"Free?" The old doctor shrugged his shoulders and smiled at the arch
pro-slavery exponent.
"Then, since you mention it, yes!" retorted Calhoun fretfully. "But I
shall not go into the old argument of those who say that black is white,
that South is North. It is only for my own race that I plan a wider