le of Guinea
bands, put them in open wagons, done up with painted muslin
announcements, and sent them forth to tear off the melody and otherwise
delight the eye and ear of the town. As the big stuff came off the press
it was slapped up on every blank wall and fence in the city that wasn't
under guard; and when the job was finished, St. Louis fairly glared with
it. If there was a person who hadn't heard of the Talking Horse by the
end of the week, they must have been deaf, dead or in jail.

"The nag was to make his first appearance on Monday, and the last sheet
of paper had been put up and the last hand bill disposed of by Saturday
afternoon.

"'How does she look?' says Cap. to me when I came in.

"'Great,' says I. 'If they ain't tearing the place down to get in on
Monday, why my bump of prophecy has a dent in it.'

"'Let 'em come,' says Cap., looking very much tickled. 'We need the
money and we ain't turning nobody away. The horse has reached town and
will be brought around to-morrow morning; so you make it a point to be
on hand to let it and the handler in.'

"I was around bright and early on Sunday morning, and along comes the
horse. He was got up in the swellest horse stuff I ever saw--beaded
blankets of plush and silk, with his name embroidered on them, and all
that kind of goods. The handler was a husky with one lamp and a bad one
at that.

"'Where do I put him?' says he.

"'On the top floor,' says I. 'We've got planks on the stairs and a
rigging fixed to haul him up by.'

"When we got him safely landed and the glad coverings off, I looked him
over.

"'His intellect must sort of tell on him, don't it?' asks I.

"'Why, he is some under weight,' says the fellow in charge.

"'He don't look over-bright to me,' I goes on.

"'He never does on Sundays,' the husky comes back. 'It's sort of an off
day with him.'

"Then I went out to lunch and stayed about two hours; when I got back I
found a gang of cops and things buzzing all over the place. Cap. was in
the office, his plug hat on the back of his head and a cigar in his
mouth.

"'What's the trouble?' says I.

"'Had a hell of a time around here,' says he. 'I was called up on the
'phone and got down as soon as I could. Just take an observation of that
fellow over there.'

"The fellow referred to was the handler of the Talking Horse. His left
arm was done up in splints and bandaged from finger-tips to shoulder,
and he had a clump of reporters around him