nsas:

"DEAR MR. PRESTON:

"I 'm here doing a stage-coach business--straining the leaders of my
legs, hustlin'. If trade keeps up I 'll have coin to melt when I get
home, and you bet I 'll melt it. The food out here would poison a dog.
I ain't got the health to go against it. I 've been sick ever since I
left Chicago, anyhow, on account of Murray Jameson. I met him at the
depot the night I left. He had a box of cigars he said a friend of his
brought him from Mexico. He gave me a handful. I got on the train,
and got busy with one--I like to croaked. Strong!!! Oh, no--it was
n't strong! Drop one of them in a can of dynamite and it's ten to one
it would 'do' the can. Start a 'Mexican' and a piece of Limburger in a
short dash, it's a hundred to one you 'd need a searchlight to find the
Limburger. I 've switched to cigarettes.

"I got in here at six to-night, and I 'm going to get away at one.
After supper (Supper! I 'll tell you about that later!) I went over to
the only shanty in the place that looked like a store, and opened the
door. There were a lot of 'Jaspers' sitting around the stove, chewing
tobacco and swapping lies. I asked the guy that got up when I came in
where he kept his stock (he had nothing in sight). He lighted a
lantern, walked me a quarter of a mile, and showed me four
'mooley-cows'--say, I was sore. But I 'm square with him--I gave him a
couple of 'Mexicans.'

"That supper! Well, say, it was a 'peach.' (I had an egg this morning
and it was a 'bird.') I sat down to the table with a St. Louis
shoe-man. We turned the things down one by one as they came in. A few
soda-crackers on the table saved our lives. We tried the
griddle-cakes. They were pieces of scorched, greasy dough, as big as
pie-plates. There were a couple of 'Rubes' at the other end of the
table; a short, little, fat one, and a long, lean, thin one. We shoved
the cakes on down their way. They ate their own and ours, and ordered
more. I bet the shoe-man five on the fat one. We ordered more
ourselves and pushed them along. The thin man finally began to weaken,
but the fat one got stronger every minute. My friend said I was
'pullin',' and wanted to draw the bet; but I made him 'give up.'

"Just as we were going, the waitress came up with a grouch on, stuck
out her chin, and says, 'Pie?'

"'Is it compulsory?' says the shoe-man.

"'Naw; it's mince.'

"'Well, that lets us out,' he says, and we skipped."

_