en I'll
remain in happy ignorance of how good it is."

"Well, it _is_ strange how some folk can't abide anything in the meat
way they han't bin used to. D'ye know I've actually knowd men from the
cities as wouldn't eat a bit o' horseflesh for love or money. Would ye
believe it?"

"I can well believe that, Joe, for I have met with such persons myself;
in fact, they are rather numerous. What are you chuckling at, Joe?"

"Chucklin'? if ye mean be that `larfin' in to myself' it's because I'm
thinkin' o' a chap as once comed out to the prairies."

"Let us walk back to the camp, Joe, and you can tell me about him as we
go along."

"I think," continued Joe, "he comed from Washington, but I never could
make out right whether he wos a government man or not. Anyhow, he wos a
pheelosopher--a natter-list I think he call his-self."

"A naturalist," suggested Cameron.

"Ay, that wos more like it. Well, he wos about six feet two in his
moccasins, an' as thin as a ramrod, an' as blind as a bat--leastways he
had weak eyes an wore green spectacles. He had on a grey shootin' coat
and trousers and vest and cap, with rid whiskers an' a long nose as rid
at the point as the whiskers wos.

"Well, this gentleman engaged me an' another hunter to go a trip with
him into the prairies, so off we sot one fine day on three hosses with
our blankets at our backs--we wos to depend on the rifle for victuals.
At first I thought the Natter-list one o' the cruellest beggars as iver
went on two long legs, for he used to go about everywhere pokin' pins
through all the beetles, and flies, an' creepin' things he could sot
eyes on, an' stuck them in a box; but he told me he comed here a-purpose
to git as many o' them as he could; so says I, `If that's it, I'll fill
yer box in no time.'

"`Will ye?' says he, quite pleased like.

"`I will,' says I, an' galloped off to a place as was filled wi' all
sorts o' crawlin' things. So I sets to work, and whenever I seed a
thing crawlin' I sot my fut on it and crushed it, and soon filled my
breast pocket. I coched a lot o' butterflies too, an' stuffed them into
my shot pouch, and went back in an hour or two an' showed him the lot.
He put on his green spectacles and looked at them as if he'd seen a
rattlesnake.

"`My good man,' says he, `you've crushed them all to pieces!'

"`They'll taste as good for all that,' says I, for somehow I'd taken't
in me head that he'd heard o' the way the Injuns make soup