line out for their camp; an' don't you yourse'f get too zealous
neither an' come too clost, or as shore as I casts my first vote for
Matty Van Buren, I'll plug you plumb center.'

"But the nephy, he thinks different. In spite of Captain Moon's
protests, he gives himse'f up to the agent on the promise of
protection.

"'You're gone, lad,' says Moon, when the nephy insists on yieldin';
'you won't last as long as a pint of whiskey in a five-hand poker
game.'

"But this yere young Moon is obdurate an' goes over an' gives
himse'f to the agent, who puts it up he'll send him to Prescott to
be tried in co't for beefin' the mule-thief Apache that a-way.

"Shore! it turns out jest as Captain Moon says. Before they'd gone a
half mile, them wards of the gov'ment, as I once hears a big chief
from Washin'ton call 'em, takes the nephy from this yere fallacious
agent an' by fourth drink time that mornin', or when it's been sun-
up three hours, that nephy is nothin' but a mem'ry.

"How do they kill him? In a fashion which, from the coigne your
Apache views things, does 'em proud. That nephy is immolated as
follows: They ropes him out, wrist an' ankle, with four lariats;
pegs him out like he's a hide they're goin' to dry. Thar's a big ant
hill close at hand; it's with reference to this yere ant colony that
the nephy is staked out. In three hours from the tune them ants gets
the word from the Apaches, they've done eat the nephy up, an' the
last vestitch of him plumb disappears with the last ant, as the