took the reins of the Slumgullion Stage the next morning, for the
schoolmistress was one of his passengers. As he entered the highroad, in
obedience to a pleasant voice from the "inside," he suddenly reined up
his horses and respectfully waited as Tommy hopped out at the command of
Miss Mary. "Not that bush, Tommy--the next."

Tommy whipped out his new pocketknife, and, cutting a branch from a tall
azalea bush, returned with it to Miss Mary.

"All right now?"

"All right."

And the stage door closed on the Idyl of Red Gulch.




BROWN OF CALAVERAS


A subdued tone of conversation, and the absence of cigar smoke and boot
heels at the windows of the Wingdam stagecoach, made it evident that
one of the inside passengers was a woman. A disposition on the part
of loungers at the stations to congregate before the window, and some
concern in regard to the appearance of coats, hats, and collars, further
indicated that she was lovely. All of which Mr. Jack Hamlin, on the
box seat, noted with the smile of cynical philosophy. Not that he
depreciated the sex, but that he recognized therein a deceitful element,
the pursuit of which sometimes drew mankind away from the equally