If you ever looked out of the car-window as you passed through town, you undoubtedly saw him at the depot, walking nervously up and down the platform, peering into the faces of strangers. He is ever on the outlook for crooks, though nothing more violent has happened in our county for years than an assault and battery. But Marshal Furgeson never relinquishes his watch. In winter, clad in his blue uniform and campaign hat, he is a familiar figure on our streets; and in summer, without coat or vest, with his big silver star on which is stamped "Chief of Police," pinned to his suspender, he may be seen at any point where trouble is least likely to break out. He is the only man on the town site whom we are afraid to tease, because he is our chief source of news; for if we ruffle his temper he sees to it that our paper misses the details of the next chicken-raid that comes under his notice. He can bring us to time in short order. When we particularly desire to please him we refer to him as "the authorities." If the Palace Grocery has been invaded through the back window and a box of plug tobacco stolen, Marshal Furgeson is delighted to read in the paper that "the authorities have an important clew and the arrest may be expected at any time." He is "the authorities." If "the authorities have their eyes on a certain barber-shop on South Main Street, which is supposed to be doing a back-door beer business," he again is "the authorities," and contends that the word strikes more terror into the hearts of evil-doers than the mere name, Marshal Furgeson. Next in rank to "the authorities," in the diplomatic corps of the office, come our advertisers: the proprietors of the White Front Dry-Goods Store, the Golden Eagle Clothing Store, and the Bee Hive. These men can come nearer to dictating the paper's policy than the bankers and politicians, who are supposed to control country newspapers. Though we are charged with being the "organ" of any of half-a-dozen politicians whom we happen to speak of kindly at various times, we have little real use for politicians in our office, and a business man who brings in sixty or seventy dollars' worth of advertising every month has more influence with us than all the politicians in the county. This is the situation in most newspaper offices that succeed, and when any other situation prevails, when politicians control editors, the newspapers don't pay well, and sooner or later the politicians are bankrupt.