"Ah," said I coolly, "you must be born with a rifle in
your hand, Captain, to shoot well. Every body shoots well
in America. I do not call myself a good shot. I have not
had the requisite experience; but there are those who
can take out the eye of a squirrel at a hundred yards."

"Can you see the eye of a squirrel at that distance?"
said the Captain, with a knowing wink of his own little
ferret eye.

That question, which raised a general laugh at my expense,
was a puzzler. The absurdity of the story, which I had
heard a thousand times, never struck me so forcibly. But
I was not to be pat down so easily.

"See it!" said I, "why not? Try it and you will find your
sight improve with your shooting. Now, I can't boast of
being a good marksman myself; my studies" (and here I
looked big, for I doubted if he could even read, much
less construe a chapter in the Greek Testament) "did not
leave me much time. A squirrel is too small an object
for all but an experienced man, but a "_large_" mark like
a quart bottle can easily be hit at a hundred yards--that
is nothing."

"I will take you a bet," said he, "of a doubloon, you do
not do it again?"

"Thank you," I replied with great indifference: "I never