It took nerve to beard us that way,
when one comes to think it over. If we had been guilty of that raid, it
was dollars to doughnuts that we would resist arrest, and according to
the rules and regulations of the Force, they were compelled to take a
long chance. A Mounted Policeman can't use his gun except in
self-defense. He isn't supposed to smoke up a fugitive unless the
fugitive begins to throw lead his way--which method of procedure gives a
man who is, in the vernacular, "on the dodge" all the best of a
situation like that; for it gives an outlaw a chance to take the
initiative, and the first shot often settles an argument of that kind.
The dominating idea, as I understood it, was that the majesty of the law
should prove a sufficiently powerful weapon; and in the main it did. No
thief, murderer, or smuggler ever yet successfully and systematically
defied it. Men have gone to the bad up there--robbed, murdered,
defrauded, killed a Policeman or two, maybe, but in the end were
gathered in by "the riders of the plains" and dealt with according to
their just deserts. So it has come to pass throughout the length and
breadth of the Northwest that "in the Queen's name" out of the mouth of
an unarmed redcoat, with one hand lightly on your shoulder, carries more
weight than a smoking gun.
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