was deeply grateful
for my savin' his life in the second place.

"Yes," says I. "But why do you cry?"

Well, that was because his feelin's was moved. I'll admit that if I
sat on a rock in the Bill Williams Mountains, thinking myself the only
two-legged critter around, and somebody come and kicked my bagpipes in
the air and dog-rassled me down forty rod of hillside, afterwards
fishing me out of the drink, my feelin's would be moved too, but not in
that way. And at the time I'm telling you about, I was young--so young
it makes me tremble to think of it--and I knew a heap of things I don't
know now. For this I thought slightin' of Grandma, notwithstanding the
tall opposition he put up. Somehow I couldn't seem to cut loose from
the effect of his short skirts and fancy work. But I let on to be
satisfied. He amused me, did Grandma.

Next he invites me to come up to his shanty and have a drop of what he
frivolously called "fusky"--"_Uno poquito de
fuskey--aquardiente--senor_." Wisht you could have heard his
Spanish--all mixed up--like this: He says he's "greetin'"--meanin'
yellin', while it's "grito" in Spanish, and his pronunciation had
whiskers on it till you could hardly tell the features. But we got
along. When we struck the cabin the old lad done the honours noble.
I've met some stylish Spaniards and Frenchmen and Yanks and Johnny
Bulls in my time, yet I can't remember aryone who threw himself
better'n Colin Hiccup. There's no place where good manners shows to
better advantage than on a homely man; the constant surprise between
the way he looks and the way he acts keeps you interested.

"To you, senor," says Colin. "Let this dampen the fires of animosity."

"To you right back again," says I. "And let's pipe the aforesaid fires
clean down into the tailin's." So there we sat, thinking better of
each other and all creation. The fires of animosity went out with a
sputter and we talked large and fine. I don't care; I like to once in
a while. I don't travel on stilts much, yet it does a man good to play
pretty now and then; besides, you can say things in the Spanish that
are all right, but would sound simple-minded in English. English is
the tongue to yank a beef critter out of an alkali hole with, but give
me Spanish when I want to feel dressed up.

We passed compliments to each other and waved our hands, bowing and
smiling. In the evening we had music by the pipes. I can't say I'd
confine myself to