rt time ago, as I had my crops all gathered in and
produce sold I calculated as how it would be a good time to come down
here. Folks at home said I'd be buncoed or have my pockets picked fore
I'd bin here mor'n half an hour; wall, I fooled 'em a little bit, I wuz
here three days afore they buncoed me. I spose as how there are a good
many of them thar bunco fellers around New York, but I tell you them
thar street keer conductors take mighty good care on you. I wuz ridin'
along in one of them keers, had my pockit book right in my hand, I
alowed no feller would pick my pockits and git it long as I had it in
my hand, and it shet up tight as a barrel when the cider's workin'. Wall
that conductor feller he jest kept his eye on me, and every little bit
he'd put his head in the door and say "hold fast." But I'm transgressin'
from what I started to tell ye. I wuz ridin' along in one of them
sleepin' keers comin' here, and along in the night some time I felt a
feller rummagin' around under my bed, and I looked out jest in time to
see him goin' away with my boots, wall I knowed the way that train wuz a
runnin' he couldn't git off with them without breakin' his durned neck,
but in about half an hour he brot them back, guess they didn't fit him.
Wall I wuz sort of glad he took em cause he hed em all shined up slicker
'n a new tin whistle. Wall when I got up in the mornin' my trubbles
commenced. I wuz so crouded up like, durned if I could git my clothes
on, and when I did git em on durned if my pants wa'nt on hind side
afore, and my socks got all tangled up in that little fish net along
side of the bed and I couldn't git em out, and I lost a bran new collar
button that I traded Si Pettingill a huskin' peg fer, and I got my right
boot on my left foot and the left one on the right foot, and I wuz so
durned badly mixed up I didn't know which way the train wuz a runnin',
and I bumped my head on the roof of the bed over me, and then sot
down right suddin like to think it over when some feller cum along and
stepped right squar on my bunion and I let out a war whoop you could a
heerd over in the next county. Wall, along cum that durned porter and
told me I wuz a wakin' up everybody in the keer. Then I started in
to hunt fer my collar button, cause I sot a right smart store by that
button, thar warns another one like it in Punkin Centre, and I thought
it would be kind of doubtful if they'd have any like it in New York,
wall I see one stuck rig