thing that I don't seem to be able
to find a name for, that ever cumbered this earth. Now, get the ----
out of this, and good luck to you.'

"I didn't feel a bit sorry for them Chinamen--they're only hairless
monkeys that don't even know enough to wear their tails in the right
place. Their arithmetic proves that. It's regular monkey figgering.
They haven't any numbers that look like numbers at all. Suppose you
want to multipy twenty-five by thirty-six, Chinee system? First you
put down a rooster's foot-track; that's twenty-five. Underneath that
goes the ground-plan of a small house; that's thirty-six. Then you
take an hour off, and work out the sum with a lot of little balls on
wires; then you put down the answer, and what do you think it is? Why,
it's a map of Chicago after the fire! Shucks! And they call
themselves men. I'd go old Job three boils to his one rather than have
any Chinks around me.

"Well, the boys labelled me Hydraulic Smith from that on, and I went
prospecting. Took up with a feller named Agamemnon G. Jones. Aggy was
a big, fine-looking man, with a chest like a dry-goods box, and a set
of whiskers that would start him in business anywhere. They were the
upstandingest, noblest, straightforwardest outfit of whiskers I most
ever saw, and how they come to grow on Ag is a mystery; but they stood
him in many a dollar, now, I tell you that!

"He was a man of pretty considerable education, in some ways, and he
could make you believe that to-day was last Thursday a week ago, if you
weren't on to him. At this time he was kind of under a cloud like
myself, and the way it come about was this:

"He started an assay office when he first struck the gulch, and he used
to bring in results according to the looks of the customer. If the man
looked tender around the feet, Aggy'd knock it to him, and probably the
shave-tail would be so pleased that he would fork out an extra ten; but
if he was plainly vented as one of the boys, there would be just enough
pay in the return to encourage him. Now, Jones did everything
shipshape and in style. Here's the paper that made him trouble."

Hy fished a slip out of the bundle in his old pocket-book and handed it
to me.

AGAMEMNON G. JONES, _Assayer_,
Qualitative and Quantitative Analysis.

_Sample left by Mr. Idaho Kid_ _No. 36,943_.

Value per ton.
Gold ......................................