Meantime the voice of the senator from Chouteau County went on, clear and distinct, creating consternation as might the voice from Sinai. In his earnestness he stepped nearer the speaker's desk, and faced the hushed audience, fearlessly. He made no pretence of oratory, but his words were terribly effective. "In olden times, bribers were branded on the cheek with the letter B. If we had the time, I would suggest that we pass a law, before this session is over, to brand not only the bribers, but the bribed with a white-hot iron, so that the owner might identify his property. This brand should be burned into the political mavericks who, since the convening of this Assembly, have run with every herd, and openly sought the highest bidder for their worthless carcasses. For these cattle of unknown pedigree I have only words of contempt. "Mr. President: The state in which we find ourselves on this, the last night of the session, should make us pause. We are apt to be dim-sighted to our own failings, and clear-sighted to the faults of others; but I ask you in all candor, do the men who have so nearly elected a United States senator believe that he is the choice of the State for that high office, or that he would be considered by that legislative body if it were not for the influence of his wealth? We would better be unrepresented in Congress than misrepresented, and I ask you, gentlemen," turning again to the legislators, "if you are going to vote again as you did in the last ballot, and allow a sick man to cast his vote for Robert Burroughs and thus elect him? I know," he added with impressive slowness, "whereof I speak! That we are Democrats or Republicans, Labor or Fusion, should not figure in this contest. Instead, each man should consider whether we, a young State, shall enter Washington tarred with the ineradicable pitch of bribery or shall we send a man who will show the elder States that Montana is proud of her newly acquired statehood, and that no star in the Northwest firmament shines more pure? "To those who have allowed themselves in this fiery ordeal to swerve from their duty to their State, through the temptation of personal gain, let me say that they will be branded and dishonored, despised at home and abroad; that they will be political pariahs forever, unless they reconsider their votes while yet there is time. They have been clay, moulded on the potter's wheel of the political manipulator behind whom the leading candidate has worked his nefarious will. Because a man is rich shall we condone his base acts? A poor man is as likely to commit crime as a rich one; but he would do so for very different reasons. The rich man in politics, sins for his own self-gratification; the poor man, to better himself or his family, often not comprehending the enormity of his crime.