was a
cat-fight, he'd bet on it; if there was a chicken-fight, he'd bet on
it; why, if there was two birds setting on a fence, he would bet you
which one would fly first; or if there was a camp-meeting, he would be
there reg'lar to bet on Parson Walker, which he judged to be the best
exhorter about here, and he was, too, and a good man. If he even see a
straddle-bug start to go anywheres, he would bet you how long it would
take him to get to--to wherever he _was_ going to, and if you took him
up, he would foller that straddle-bug to Mexico but what he would find
out where he was bound for and how long he was on the road. Lots of
the boys here has seen that Smiley and can tell you about him. Why, it
never made no difference to _him_--he'd bet on _any_ thing--the
dangest feller. Parson Walker's wife laid very sick once, for a good
while, and it seemed as if they warn't going to save her; but one
morning he come in, and Smiley up and asked him how she was, and he
said she was considerable better--thank the Lord for his inf'nit'
mercy--and coming on so smart that with the blessing of Prov'dence
she'd get well yet; and Smiley, before he thought, says, 'Well, I'll
risk two-and-a-half she don't anyway.'"

Thish-yer Smiley had a mare--the boys called her the fifteen-minute
nag, but that was only in fun, you know, because, of course, she was
faster than that--and he used to win money on that horse, for all she
was so slow and always had the asthma, or the distemper, or the
consumption, or something of that kind. They used to give her two or
three hundred yards start, and then pass her under way; but always at
the fag-end of the race she'd get excited and desperate-like, and come
cavorting and straddling up, and scattering her legs around limber,
sometimes in the air, and sometimes out to one side amongst the
fences, and kicking up m-o-r-e dust and raising m-o-r-e racket with
her coughing and sneezing and blowing her nose--and always fetch up at
the stand just about a neck ahead, as near as you could cipher it
down.

And he had a little small bull-pup, that to look at him you'd think he
warn't worth a cent but to set around and look ornery and lay for a
chance to steal something. But as soon as money was up on him he was a
different dog; his under-jaw'd begin to stick out like the fo'-castle
of a steamboat, and his teeth would uncover and shine like the
furnaces. And a dog might tackle him and bully-rag him, and bite him,
and