orses, carriages or
donkeys at reasonable rates in town.

The donkey is quite a feature of this country as he is apt to be of all
mountain countries in fact. I have never associated with a more genial
urbane or refined donkey than we have here. He is generally a soft mouse
color, about nine hands high, and delights in making small, elongated
foot-prints on the sands of time.

This small animal of the mountains is frequently accompanied by a robust
but poorly-modulated voice. It is very pathetic and generally needs a
little oil on it. The North Carolina donkey like the Colorado burro,
lives to a great age. He then dies.

Asheville has splendid water works supplying first-class water to those
who wish to use this popular fluid; electric lights all over the city, a
street railway organized with its money put up to construct it next
summer, first-class churches, schools and colleges, well supplied
markets with moderate prices, and lots of genuine attractions beside the
climate. Fuel and whiskey are about the same that they are in Chicago,
so a man need not suffer here provided he has a moderate income.

The sportsman may sport here with impunity, and the angler may also
triangular relaxation.

Moonshine whisky is also produced here in the mountains, though in a
crude way, and very quietly. None of the moonshiners advertise much in
the papers. They do not care for a big run of trade, but seem content to
remain in obscurity. Sometimes, however, their work attracts the
attention of prominent people who come out and call on them with
shot-guns and regrets.

Then the moonshiner does his distillery up in a napkin and goes away
into the primeval forest. Some years ago a party of revenue officers
hunted out one of these amateur distillers and chased him up the side of
the mountain, where they surrounded and captured him with his distillery
on his back, like a Babcock fire-extinguisher, and still warm.

The officer, in his report of the capture, referred to it as a still
hunt, whereupon his commission was promptly revoked. The man who tries
to have any fun with the present Administration must have his
resignation where he can put his hand on it at a moment's warning.

DECLINED WITH THANKS.

BILL NYE POLITELY REFUSES THE JOB OF KING OF BULGARIA.

HE GIVES HIS REASONS FOR THE DECLINATION AND THROWS IN CHUNKS OF
HEAVY-WEIGHT ADVICE--ADVISABILITY OF FORMING A ROYAL TRADES-UNION.

Bill Nye has furnished to the _World