, and some few white men whom I
pretend not to recognize. I am like the man Herrick writes about, "One
of the crowd; not of the company."

The dancing is of a primitive order not unlike the natural movement
which street children make to the strains of the hurdy-gurdy.

In higher circles, it is known by the name of the turkey-trot.
Scientists classify it under the more dignified appellation of
"neuromuscular co-ordination."

As compared with a ball, say at Government House, this one has some
marked peculiarities. There are no chaperones, no refreshments, many
sitting-out places, and it is wholly in the dark save for the light of
a tolerant and somewhat remote moon.

A white woman who watches it is considered by the men of her own race
to be one of five things--stupid, innocent, mean, obstinate, or unduly
curious, whereas to be accurate she may only be a conscientious scribe.

CHAPTER XVII

A COUNTRY WOMAN AT THE CITY RACES

Still do our jaded pulses bound
Remembering that eager race.--R. W. GILBERT.

This favour would never have come to me if I had not found a two-eyed
peacock feather in the paddock. It isn't reasonable to suppose that a
simple, country-bred person from back Alberta-way could have such
story-book luck on her first wager. La-la-la!

All the way down I kept praying, "Lead not Janey into temptation,"
knowing right well I would slay any one who kept me out. I take off my
hat to myself.

"Dear me!" says John. "One would think you cut your teeth on a bit
instead of a pen." Some people like the idea of betting: some don't.

At this Woodbine race-course in Toronto, they no longer have turf
accountants. Their days were numbered when careless people started to
call them bookies. They have been succeeded by steel slot affairs
called pari-mutuel machines. The words pari and mutuel would seem to
be almost synonymous, one meaning equal, the other reciprocal. The
reciprocal arrangements are like this; the party of the first part gets
the money; the party of the second part, the experience. "And the
machine?" you ask. (I asked that too.) The machine, which is only an
impersonal way of saying the Jockey Club, gets as its commission five
per centum of all wagers, and I am told it makes as high as eight
thousand dollars the day. There are as many ways of fixing the races
as there are of making bannocks on the Mackenzie River, but you can't
fix the machine. It never gets tired of be