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The whole city quit business to go to the barbecue and hear the speeches.

Bob made the first address. He spoke for two hours about everything and anything–he told stories, and dealt in love, life, death, politics and farming–all but railroading. The crowd was delighted–cheers filled the air.

When the opposition got up to speak and brought forward its profound reasons and heavy logic, ‘most everybody adjourned to the tables to eat and drink.

Finally there came rumors that something was going on across the river. The opposition grew nervous and started to go home, but in some mysterious way the two ferryboats were tied up on the farther bank, and were deaf and blind to signals.

It was well after dark before the people reached home, and when they got up the next morning they found the new railroad had a full mile of track down and engines were puffing at their doors.

Bob made another speech in the public square, and cautioned everybody to be law-abiding. The second railroad had arrived–it was a good thing–it meant wealth, prosperity and happiness for everybody. And even if it didn’t, it was here and could not be removed except by legal means. And we must all be law-abiding citizens–let the matter be determined by the courts. Then there were a few funny stories, and cheers were given for the speaker.

On the next trip of the little stern-wheeler the young lawyer and his brother arrived. They hadn’t much baggage, but they carried a tin sign that they proceeded to tack up over a store on Adams Street. It read thus: “R. G. & E. C. Ingersoll, Attorneys and Counselors at Law.” And there the sign was to remain for twenty-five years.

* * * * *

At Peoria, the Ingersoll Brothers did not have to wait long for clients. Ebon was the counselor, Robert the pleader, and some still have it that Ebon was the stronger, just as we hear that Ezekiel Webster was a more capable man than Daniel–which was probably the truth.

The Ingersolls had not been long at Peoria before Robert had a case at Groveland, a town only a few miles away, and a place which, like Shawneetown, has held its own.

The issue was the same old classic–hogs had rooted up the man’s garden, and then the hogs had been impounded. This time there was a tragedy, for before the hogs were released the owner had been killed.

The people for miles had come to town to hear the eloquent young lawyer from Peoria. The taverns were crowded, and not having engaged a room, the attorney for the defense was put to straits to find a place in which to sleep. In this extremity ‘Squire Parker, the first citizen of the town, invited young Ingersoll to his house.

Parker was a character in that neck of the woods–he was an “infidel,” and a terror to all the clergy ’round about. And strangely enough–or not–his wife believed exactly as he did, and so did their daughter Eva, a beautiful girl of nineteen. But ‘Squire Parker got into no argument with his guest–their belief was the same. Probably we would now call the Parkers simply radical Unitarians. Their kinsman, Theodore Parker, expressed their faith, and they had no more use for a “personal devil” that he had. The courage of the young woman in stating her religious views had almost made her an outcast in the village, and here she was saying the same things in Groveland that Robert was saying in Peoria. She was the first woman he ever knew who had ideas.

It was one o’clock before he went to bed that night–his head was in a whirl. It was a wonder he didn’t lose his case the next day, but he didn’t.

He cleared his client and won a bride.