Significant remark! It opens up a prospect wide and fair, Suggesting to the thoughtful mind--_my_ mind-- A scheme that is the boss lay-out. Instead Of stopping passengers, let's carry them. Instead of crying out: "Throw up your hands!" Let's say: "Walk up and buy a ticket!" Why Should we unwieldy goods and bullion take, Watches and all such trifles, when we might Far better charge their value three times o'er For carrying them to market? LELAND, THE KID: Put it there, Old son! HAPPY HUNTY: You take the cake, my dear. We'll build A mighty railroad through this pass, and then The stage folk will come up to us and squeal, And say: "It is bad medicine for both: What will you give or take?" And then we'll sell. COWBOY CHARLEY: Enlarge your notions, little one; this is No petty, slouching, opposition scheme, To be bought off like honest men and fools; Mine eye prophetic pierces through the mists That cloud the future, and I seem to see A well-devised and executed scheme Of wholesale robbery within the law (Made by ourselves)--great, permanent, sublime, And strong to grapple with the public throat-- Shaking the stuffing from the public purse, The tears from bankrupt merchants' eyes, the blood From widows' famished carcasses, the bread From orphans' mouths! HAPPY HUNTY: Hooray! LELAND, THE; KID: Hooray! ALL: Hooray! _(They tear the masks from their faces, and discharging their shotguns, throw them into the chapparal. Then they join hands, dance and sing the following song:)_ Ah! blessèd to measure The glittering treasure! Ah! blessèd to heap up the gold Untold That flows in a wide And deepening tide-- Rolled, rolled, rolled From multifold sources, Converging its courses Upon our-- LELAND, THE KID: Just wait a bit, my pards, I thought I heard A sneaking grizzly cracking the dry twigs. Such an intrusion might deprive the State Of all the good that we intend it. Ha! _(Enter Sootymug. He saunters carelessly in and gracefully leans his back against a redwood.)_ SOOTYMUG: My boys, I thought I heard Some careless revelry, As if your minds were stirred By some new devilry. I too am in that line. Indeed, the mission On which I come-- HAPPY HUNTY: Here's more damned competition! _(Curtain.)_ A BAD NIGHT DRAMATIS PERSONÆ. VILLIAM _a Sen_ NEEDLESON _a Sidniduc_ SMILER _a Scheister_ KI-YI _a Trader_ GRIMGHAST _a Spader_ SARALTHIA _a Love-lorn Nymph_ NELLIBRAC _a Sweetun_ A BODY; A GHOST; AN UNMENTIONABLE THING; SKULLS; HOODOOS; ETC. _Scene_--a Cemetery in San Francisco. _Saralthia, Nellibrac, Grimghast._ SARALTHIA: