out into the other room, and directly Uncle Emsley comes in in his
shirt sleeves, with a pitcher of water. He turns around to get a glass
on the table, and I see a forty-five in his hip pocket. 'Great post-
holes!' thinks I, 'but here's a family thinks a heap of cooking
receipts, protecting it with firearms. I've known outfits that
wouldn't do that much by a family feud.'

"'Drink this here down,' says Uncle Emsley, handing me the glass of
water. 'You've rid too far to-day, Jud, and got yourself over-excited.
Try to think about something else now.'

"'Do you know how to make them pancakes, Uncle Emsley?' I asked.

"'Well, I'm not as apprised in the anatomy of them as some,' says
Uncle Emsley, 'but I reckon you take a sifter of plaster of Paris and
a little dough and saleratus and corn meal, and mix 'em with eggs and
buttermilk as usual. Is old Bill going to ship beeves to Kansas City
again this spring, Jud?'

"That was all the pancake specifications I could get that night. I
didn't wonder that Jackson Bird found it uphill work. So I dropped the
subject and talked with Uncle Emsley for a while about hollow-horn and
cyclones. And then Miss Willella came and said 'Good-night,' and I hit
the breeze for the ranch.

"About a week afterward I met Jackson Bird riding out of Pimienta as I
rode in, and we stopped on the road for a few frivolous remarks.

"'Got the bill of particulars for them flapjacks yet?' I asked him.