"From what?"
"Well, he could remember when Chicago was as small as Claybanks is now,
an' had a good deal more swamp land to the acre, too--an' now look at
it! He'd seen St. Paul an' Minneapolis when both of 'em together could
be hid in a town as big as Claybanks--but now look at 'em!"
"But St. Paul and Minneapolis had an immense water-fall and
water-power to attract millers of many kinds."
"Well, hain't we got a crick? They calculate that with a proper dam
above town, we'd have water-power nine months every year, an' there
ain't nothin' else o' the kind within fifty mile. Then there's our clay
banks that the town was named after; they're the only banks of brick
clay in the state; ev'rywhere else folks has to dig some feet down for
clay to make bricks, so we ought to make brick cheaper'n any other
town, an' supply all the country round--when we get a railroad to haul
'em out. They're not as red as some, bein' really brown, but they're a
mighty sight harder'n any red brick, so they're better for foundations
an' for walls o' big buildings. Chicago didn't have no clay banks nor
water-power, but just look at her now! All that made her was her bein'
the first tradin' place in the neighborhood; well, so's Claybanks, an'
it's been so for forty year or more, too, so its time must be almost
come. Your uncle 'xpected to see it all in his time, but, like Moses,
he died without the sight. Why, there's been three or four railroads
surveyed right through here--yes, sir!"
"Is there any Western town that couldn't say as much, I wonder?" Philip
asked.
"Mebbe not, but they hain't all got clay banks an' a crick; not many of
'em's got eleven hundred people in forty year, either. An' say--it's
all right for you to talk this way with me--askin' questions an' so on,
an' wonderin' if the place'll ever 'mount to anythin', but don't let
out a bit of it to anybody else--not for a farm. You might's well be
dead out here as not to believe in the West with all your might, an'
most of all in this part of it."
"Thank you; I'll remember."
Then Philip went out and walked slowly about the shabby village until
he found himself in the depths of the blues.