"We are certain to encounter opposition. The Senate may not ratify this Texas treaty." "The Senate will _not_ ratify," said he. "I am perfectly well advised of how the vote will be when this treaty comes before it for ratification. We will be beaten, two to one!" "Then, does that not end it?" "End it? No! There are always other ways. If the people of this country wish Texas to belong to our flag, she will so belong. It is as good as done to-day. Never look at the obstacles; look at the goal! It was this intrigue of Van Zandt's which stood in our way. By playing one intrigue against another, we have won thus far. We must go on winning!" He paced up and down the room, one hand smiting the other. "Let England whistle now!" he exclaimed exultantly. "We shall annex Texas, in full view, indeed, of all possible consequences. There can be no consequences, for England has no excuse left for war over Texas. I only wish the situation were as clear for Oregon." "There'll be bad news for our friend Señor Yturrio when he gets back to his own legation!" I ventured. "Let him then face that day when Mexico shall see fit to look to us for aid and counsel. We will build a mighty country _here_, on _this_ continent!" "Mr. Pakenham is accredited to have certain influence in our Senate." "Yes. We have his influence exactly weighed. Yet I rejoice in at least one thing--one of his best allies is not here." "You mean Señor Yturrio?" "I mean the Baroness von Ritz. And now comes on that next nominating convention, at Baltimore." "What will it do?" I hesitated. "God knows. For me, I have no party. I am alone! I have but few friends in all the world"--he smiled now--"you, my boy, as I said, and Doctor Ward and a few women, all of whom hate each other." I remained silent at this shot, which came home to me; but he smiled, still grimly, shaking his head. "Rustle of silk, my boy, rustle of silk--it is over all our maps. But we shall make these maps! Time shall bear me witness." "Then I may start soon for Oregon?" I demanded. "You shall start to-morrow," he answered. CHAPTER XXIV THE WHOA-HAW TRAIL There are no pleasures where women are not. --Marie de Romba. How shall I tell of those stirring times in such way that readers who live in later and different days may catch in full their flavor? How shall I write now so that at a later time men may read of the way America was taken, may see what America then was and now is, and what yet, please God! it may be? How shall be set down that keen zest of a nation's youth, full of ambition and daring, full of contempt for obstacles, full of a vast and splendid hope? How shall be made plain also that other and stronger thing which so many of those days have mentioned to me, half in reticence--that feeling that, after all, this fever of the blood, this imperious insistence upon new lands, had under it something more than human selfishness?