Often they are people, who, in
certain stages of civilization, do, or have done, good work, but who,
when these stages have passed, find themselves surrounded by conditions
which accentuate their worst qualities, and make their best qualities
useless. The average desperado, for instance, has, after all, much the
same standard of morals that the Norman nobles had in the days of the
battle of Hastings, and, ethically and morally, he is decidedly in
advance of the vikings, who were the ancestors of these same nobles--and
to whom, by the way, he himself could doubtless trace a portion of
his blood. If the transition from the wild lawlessness of life in the
wilderness or on the border to a higher civilization were stretched
out over a term of centuries, he and his descendants would doubtless
accommodate themselves by degrees to the changing circumstances. But
unfortunately in the far West the transition takes place with marvellous
abruptness, and at an altogether unheard-of speed, and many a man's
nature is unable to change with sufficient rapidity to allow him to
harmonize with his environment.
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