was only temporarily withdrawn, and that the base was not available for selection purposes. When the Register of The Dalles Land Office refused to file the list, Mays insisted that he should, and finally persuaded him to do so, whereupon the State issued certificates of purchase on all the tracts embraced in these selections. They were likewise cancelled by order of Governor Chamberlain, and the amounts deposited thereon covered into the State treasury.
So much has been said concerning- my indictment on February 3, 1905, by the Marion County grand jury, that I feel it incumbent upon me to give a brief history of the facts incident thereto. In January of that year, shortly after my conviction in the 11-7 case, I was engaged by residents of California to acquire title to 6,400 acres of State school sections in Klamath County, Oregon. On account of the trouble in which I was already involved with the Government, and realizing that Governor Chamberlain would not tolerate any crooked work in the State Land Office, I determined to obey the laws as well as possible, and with that object in view, and in order to be what I then considered on the safe side, I secured the applicants for the ten half sections in Salem, where it would be an easy matter for the authorities to find out that I was not using any fictitious person in making the applications.
My contract with these applicants contemplated furnishing them the money with which to obtain certificates of purchase, they in turn to assign to me a nine-tenths undivided interest in the lands. In addition, I was to pay them $20 cash,Page 337
