“Well, Bobby, my boy, what's on your soul this morning?” “A very heavy weight, Mr. Dunstan. Desert land. Acres and acres of it.” “Any water?” “Not yet.” “Any prospect?!” “I have it bottled up, and it's all mine. Now I want the land.” “Well?” “I want to acquire thirty-two thousand acres of state lieu land in Owens river valley, Mr. Dunstan.” “You cannot do it.” “Well, suppose there was a rule in the State Land Office which forced prospective purchasers of state lieu lands to first designate the basis of exchange before their applications would be received and filed. Suppose also that you wanted to turn crook and steal thirty-two thousand acres of lieu land, despite this rule. How would you go about it?” The lawyer glanced at him keenly. “See here, son, I don't give that kind of advice to young fellows--or old fellows for that matter--even for money. I'm an honest corporation attorney, and stealing the public domain is illegal--and very, very risky.” “Don't worry, sir. When I have your advice, I will not follow it. Tell me how you would steal this land. It's a hypothetical question.” Dunstan smiled. “That's unfair--attacking a lawyer with a hypothetical question. It's rather hoisting him on his own petard, as it were. However, I'll answer it. In the first place, if I planned to go into the business of looting the public domain I would conspire with some prominent official of the State Land Office to institute such a rule.” “Good. Somebody conspired with a surveyor-general forty years ago and had such a rule instituted in the State Land Office. The state legislature, however, has never been asked to confirm that rule and spread it in black and white on the statute books.” “Well, having had such a rule instituted” continued Dunstan, “I would then have the public at a disadvantage. Through my friend in the land office I would have primary access to the field notes of the chief of staff in the field, and I would have advance information of where losses of school lands were soon to occur. In other words I would be in position to designate every basis of exchange of lost school lands for lieu lands, and the public would not. I'd give some weak brother say one hundred dollars to file on some lieu lands and use the basis which I would designate, and in the meantime I would hustle around, secure in the knowledge that I had the basis tied up. It would appear of record as used in the state land office. When I had secured a customer for the lieu land I had tied up with my dummy applicant, the dummy would abandon his filing in favor of my client, I would collect the difference between the statutory cost of the land and the price my client paid me for it, whack up with my friends in the land office and consider myself a smart business man.”