interestin' side. When onder
the inflooence of nosepaint, which last is constant, he has three
distinct moods. About the fo'th drink, let a stranger show up,
an'--all aff'ble an' garyoolous--Monte's right thar to do the honors.
When the stranger, gettin' weary, kicks Monte off him, the same bein'
shore to happen final since no one formed in the image of his Maker
can put up with them verbal imbecil'ties of his beyond a given len'th
of time, he'll arch his back an'--apparently--wax that f'rocious a
wronged grizzly to him is as meek as milk. An' yet, as I tells you,
it's simply a blazer; an' the moment the exasperated stranger begins
betrayin' symptoms of goin' to a showdown, Monte lapses into his third
mood of haughty silence, an' struts off like it's beneath him to bandy
words.

"That's the savin' clause in Monte's constitootion; he may get drunk,
but he never gets injoodicious. Thar's a sport from some'ers over
'round Shakespear in the dance hall one evenin', whose patience has
been plenty treespassed on by Monte. By way of bringin' matters to a
deecisive head, this yere Shakespear party tells Monte he's a liar. Do
you reckon Monte hooks up with him? Not a chance! He simply casts on
that maligner from Shakespear a look of disparagement, an' with nose
held high, as markin' his contempt, moves away with the remark.

"'That's something I refooses to discuss with you.'

"Which thar's no more real p'isin in Monte than in a hired girl.

"We has the chance once to try some experiments on Monte, an' it's the
mistake of our lives we don't. Peets, whose regrets is scientific,
feels speshully acoote. Thar's a partic'lar bar'l of nosepaint gets
trundled into camp, which is nothin' short of bein' the condensed
essence of hostility. Black Jack, after years as barkeep, says himse'f
he never sees nothin' like it. On the hocks of two drinks, folks gets
that ornery Enright has it freighted back to Tucson in alarm, fearin'
for the peace of the camp. At the time, none of us thinks of it; but
later it's a subject of gen'ral regret that some of it ain't saved to
try on Monte. Mebby that speshul brand of licker turns out to be the
missin' ingreedient, an' keys him up to deeds of heroism.

"Jest to show you some of the milder workin's of that licker. Boggs
files away four inches of it onder his belt, an' next, when he's
walkin' by the corral an' meets a Mexican, he reaches out in a
casyooal an' abstracted way, collars that Greaser an' he