s and stick
his little finger out while drinking, just like a sheep man or a
citizen. Great skyrockets! but I hated to see Perry all corrupted
and Willie-ized like that.

"He came out to the gate, and shook hands; and I says, with scorn,
and speaking like a paroquet with the pip: 'Beg pardon--Mr.
Rountree, I believe. Seems to me I sagatiated in your associations
once, if I am not mistaken.'

"'Oh, go to the devil, Buck,' says Perry, polite, as I was afraid
he'd be.

"'Well, then,' says I, 'you poor, contaminated adjunct of a
sprinkling-pot and degraded household pet, what did you go and do
it for? Look at you, all decent and unriotous, and only fit to sit
on juries and mend the wood-house door. You was a man once. I have
hostility for all such acts. Why don't you go in the house and
count the tidies or set the clock, and not stand out here in the
atmosphere? A jack-rabbit might come along and bite you.'

"'Now, Buck,' says Perry, speaking mild, and some sorrowful, 'you
don't understand. A married man has got to be different. He feels
different from a tough old cloudburst like you. It's sinful to waste
time pulling up towns just to look at their roots, and playing faro
and looking upon red liquor, and such restless policies as them.'

"'There was a time,' I says, and I expect I sighed when I mentioned
it, 'when a certain domesticated little Mary's lamb I could name was
some instructed himself in the line of pernicious sprightliness. I
never expected, Perry, to see you reduced down from a full-grown
pestilence to such a frivolous fraction of a man. Why,' says I,
'you've got a necktie on; and you speak a senseless kind of indoor
drivel that reminds me of a storekeeper or a lady. You look to me
like you might tote an umbrella and wear suspenders, and go home of
nights.'

"'The little woman,' says Perry, 'has made some improvements, I
believe. You can't understand, Buck. I haven't been away from the
house at night since we was married.'

"We talked on a while, me and Perry, and, as sure as I live, that
man interrupted me in the middle of my talk to tell me about six
tomato plants he had growing in his garden. Shoved his agricultural
degradation right up under my nose while I was telling him about the
fun we had tarring and feathering that faro dealer at California
Pete's layout! But by and by Perry shows a flicker of sense.

"'Buck,' says he, 'I'll have to admit that it is a little dull at
times. Not that I'm not