Gov. Murray, the gritty Gentile governor of Utah, would be noticed in a
crowd. He is very tall, yet well proportioned, square-built and handsome.
He was called fine looking in Kentucky, but the narrow-chested apostle of
the abnormally connubial creed does not see anything pretty about him.
Murray moves about through Salt Lake City in a cool, self-possessed kind
of way that is very annoying to the church. Full-bearded, with brown
moustache and dark hair parted a little to leeward of center; clothed in a
diagonal Prince Albert coat, a silk hat and other clothes, he strolls
through Zion like a man who hasn't got a yelping majority of ignorant
lepers, led by a remorseless gang of nickel-plated apostles, thirsting for
his young blood. I really believe he don't care a continental. The days of
the avenging angel and the meek-eyed Danite, carrying a large sock loaded
with buckshot, are over, perhaps; but only those who try to be Gentiles in
a land of polygamous wives and anonymous white-eyed children, know how
very unpopular it is. Judge Goodwin, of the Tribune, feels lonesome if he
gets through the day without a poorly spelled, spattered, daubed and
profane valentine threatening his life. The last time I saw him he showed
me a few of them. They generally referred to him as a blankety blank
“skunk,” and a “hound of hell.” He said he hoped I wound pardon him for
the apparent egotism, but he felt as though the Tribune was attracting
attention almost everyday. Some of these little billet-doux invited him to
call at a trysting place on Tribune avenue and get his alleged brains
scattered over a vacant lot. Most all of them threatened him with a
rectangular head, a tin ear, or a watch pocket under the eye He didn't
seem to care much. He felt pleased and proud. Goodwin was always pleased
with things that other men didn't like much. In the old days, when he and
Mark Twain and Dan DeQuille were together, this was noticed in him. Gov.
Murray is the same way. He feels the public pulse, and says to himself:
“Sometime there's going to be music here by the entire band, and I desire
to be where I shan't miss a note.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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