some concession to curiosity. Nor could any mortal for long wear such
clothes in the face of Arizona without being required to show cause. He
had got away with it last night, by surprise; but that would be about
all.

At my fiftieth attempt to enter into conversation with him, I
unexpectedly succeeded. I believe I was indicating the points of
interest. You can see farther in Arizona than any place I know, so there
was no difficulty about that. I'd pointed out the range of the
Chiracahuas, and Cochise's Stronghold, and the peaks of the Galiuros and
other natural sceneries; I had showed him mesquite and yucca, and mescal
and soapweed, and sage, and sacatone and niggerheads and all the other
known vegetables of the region. Also I'd indicated prairie dogs and
squinch owls and Gambel's quail and road runners and a couple of coyotes
and lizards and other miscellaneous fauna. Not to speak of naming
painstakingly the ranches indicated by the clumps of trees that you
could just make out as little spots in the distance--Box Springs, the
O.T., the Double H, Fort Shafter, and Hooper's. He waked up and paid a
little attention at this; and I thought I might get a little friendly
talk out of him. A cowboy rides around alone so much he sort of likes to
josh when he has anybody with him. This "strong silent" stuff doesn't go
until you've used around with a man quite some time.

I got the talk, all right, but it didn't have a thing to do with
topography or natural history. Unless you call the skate he was riding
natural history. That was the burden of his song. He didn't like that
horse, and he didn't care who knew it. It was an uncomfortable horse to
ride on, it required exertion to keep in motion, and it hurt his
feelings. Especially the last. He was a horseman, a jockey, he'd ridden
the best blood in the equine world; and here he was condemned through no