Jeff onfurls his lay-out an' opens up his game.'

"Thar's one thing," suddenly observed my aged companion, as he eyed
me narrowly, pausing in the interesting Colonel Sterett's relation
concerning his family, and becoming doubly impressive with an
uplifted fore-finger, "thar's one thing I desires you to fully
grasp. As I reels off this yere chronicle, you-all is not to
consider me as repeatin' the Colonel's words exact. I ain't gifted
like the Colonel, an' my English ain't a marker to his. The Colonel
carries the language quiled up an' hangin' at the saddle horn of his
intelligence, like a cow puncher does his lariat. An' when he's got
ready to rope an' throw a fact or two, you should oughter see him
take her down an' go to work. Horn or neck or any foot you says;
it's all one to the Colonel. Big or little loop, in the bresh or in
the open, it's a cinch the Colonel fastens every time he throws his
verbal rope. The fact he's after that a-way, is shore the Colonel's.
Doc Peets informs me private that Colonel Sterett is the greatest
artist, oral, of which his'try records the brand, an' you can go
broke on Peets's knowin'. An' thar's other test'mony.

"'I don't lay down my hand,' says Texas Thompson, one time when him
an' me is alone, 'to any gent between the Rio Grande an' the Oregon,
on sizin' up a conversation. An' I'll impart to you, holdin' nothin'
back, that the Colonel is shorely the limit. Merely to listen, is an
embarrassment of good things, like openin' a five-hand jack-pot on a
ace-full. He can even out-talk my former wife, the Colonel can, an'
that esteemable lady packs the record as a conversationist in Laredo
for five years before I leaves. She's admittedly the shorest shot
with her mouth on that range. Talkin' at a mark, or in action, all
you has to do is give the lady the distance an' let her fix her