to ascertain what the city must pay when it comes to take over the street railway system.
But we did not do it at first, and we did not do it at last. At first it was impossible to get it into the councilmanic head that it was at all necessary, especially since it cost money to retain the "experts," as they are called, to do the work. They were prone to that old vice of the human mind which leads it to imagine that when it has stated the end to be achieved it has at the same time stated the means of achieving it,—like the advice to the bashful man "to assume an easy and graceful attitude, especially in the presence of ladies"—and when council was finally convinced and had provided the funds for the experts, we could not agree as to who should be employed. That is, the human equation was apparent. There was unhappily nobody but men to make evaluations, and all the engineers who were competent were employed by street railway companies, and expected or hoped to continue to be employed by street railway companies, and they had evolved so many fantastic notions of "intangible" value that they could account for almost any excess in artificial capitalization, and make the grossest exhibition of corporate greed in watering stocks appear like veritable self denial in frugality and economy. We selected Professor Bemis to represent the city, because he was one of the few of the "experts" committed to the people's cause; he had advised Tom Johnson throughout his long war. But the company never could be brought to select anybody, or to agree upon the third arbiter—even
