ingly.

"Blind," said Bud sadly, shaking his head--"too bad--too
bad--great--great hoss!"

"Yes, but the leds, Bud--that hoss, Ben Butler there, holds a world's
record--he's the only cock-eyed hoss in the world."

"You don't say so--that critter!--cock-eyed?" Bud laughed and slapped
his leg gleefully. "Didn't I always tell you so? World's
record--great--great!"

Then it broke gradually through on Bud's dull mind.

He slapped his leg again. "An' him--his namesake--he was cock-eyed,
too--I seed him onct at New 'Leens."

"Don't you never trust a cock-eyed man, Bud. He'll flicker on you in
the home-stretch. I've tried it an' it never fails. Love him, but
don't trust him. The world is full of folks we oughter love, but not
trust."

"No--I never will," said Bud as thoughtfully as he knew how to
be--"nor a cock-eyed 'oman neither. My wife's cock-eyed," he added.

He was silent a moment. Then he showed the old man a scar on his
forehead: "She done that last month--busted a plate on my head."

"That's bad," said the Bishop consolingly--"but you ortenter
aggravate her, Bud."

"That's so--I ortenter--least-wise, not whilst there's any crockery
in the house," said Bud sadly.

"There's another thing about this hoss," went on the Bishop--"he's
always spoony on mules. He ain't happy if he can't hang over the
front gate spoonin' with every stray mule that comes along. There's
old long-eared Lize that he's dead stuck on--if he c'u'd write he'd
be composin' a sonnet to her ears, like poets do to their lady
love's--callin' them Star Pointers of a Greater Hope, I reck'n, an'
all that. Why, he'd ruther hold hands by moonlight with some old
Maria mule than to set up by lamplight with a thoroughbred filly."

"Great--great!" said Bud slapping his leg--"didn't I tell you so?"

"So I named him Ben Butler when he was born. That was right after the
war, an' I hated old Ben so an' loved hosses so, I thought ef I'd
name my colt for old Ben maybe I'd learn to love him, in time."

Bud shook his head. "That's agin nature, Bishop."

"But I have, Bud--sho' as you are born I love old Ben Butler." He
lowered his voice to an earnest whisper: "I ain't never told you what
he done for po' Cap'n Tom."

"Never heurd o' Cap'n Tom."

The Bishop looked hurt. "Never mind, Bud, you wouldn't understand.
But maybe you will ketch this, listen now."

Bud listened intently with his head on one side.

"I ain't never hated a man in my life but what