("What are you
surprised about?" inquired Dowden. "Don't you know what our folks are
like, YET? If St. Paul lived in Wainwright, do you suppose he could run
for constable without some of his near neighbors getting out to try and
down him?")
The head and front (and backbone, too) of the opposition to Beasley was
a close-fisted, hard-knuckled, risen-from-the-soil sort of man, one
named Simeon Peck. He possessed no inconsiderable influence, I heard;
was a hard worker, and vigorously seconded by an energetic lieutenant, a
young man named Grist. These, and others they had been able to draw to
their faction, were bitterly and eagerly opposed to Beasley's
nomination, and worked without ceasing to prevent it.
I quote the invaluable Mr. Dowden again: "Grist's against us because he
had a quarrel with a clerk in Beasley's office, and wanted Beasley to
discharge him, and Beasley wouldn't; Sim Peck's against us out of just
plain wrong-headedness, and because he never was for ANYTHING nor FER
anybody in his life. I had a talk with the old mutton-head the other
day; he said our candidate ought to be a farmer, a 'man of the common
people,' and when I asked him where he'd find anybody more a 'man of the
common people' than Beasley, he said Beasley was 'too much of a society
man' to suit him! The idea of Dave as a 'society man' was too much for
me, and I laughed in Sim Peck's face, but that didn't stop Sim Peck!
'Jest look at the style he lives in,' he yelped.
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