gazed, and marveled; then they went forth to tell
their friends that they might come and do likewise.

"For weeks the coin came into the box like a spring freshet in the hill
country, and Cap. must have kept the bank working after hours; at any
rate, he sat around and smoked with a smile so angelic, that, to look at
him, one wondered how he could wear it and not drift away into the
ethereal blue. It was a good month before the thing lost its pulling
power, and when it stopped Cap. had planted the stake that boosted him
into the company he now keeps and set him to handling voices that cost
thousands of simoleons an hour.

"When all was over, I found time to take the husky, with the damaged
fin out and throw a few drinks into him. Then he told me the whole
story.

"'The old man didn't think you could do the thing justice if you were
wise,' says he, 'so he kept you out. This ain't the horse the fellow
offered to sell him, at all. He bought it at a bazar for ten dollars,
the day before I brought it around. When you went out for lunch Cap. he
comes in. We done for the plug in a minute, and as Mighty Marda was all
but gone, on account of his rat diet, we finished him, too. Then we
wrecked the place up some, took a couple of turns about the horse with
Mardo, called in Doc. Forbes, who stood in, to fix up the fictitious
fracture, and then rung in the show.'

"Yes," observed Bat, thoughtfully, after a pause, "I've made up my mind
that H. Wellington Sheldon is a wise plug."

THE OWL-CRITIC

BY JAMES T. FIELDS

"Who stuffed that white owl?" No one spoke in the shop,
The barber was busy, and he couldn't stop;
The customers, waiting their turns, were all reading
The "Daily," the "Herald," the "Post," little heeding
The young man who blurted out such a blunt question;
Not one raised a head, or even made a suggestion;
And the barber kept on shaving.

"Don't you see, Mr. Brown,"
Cried the youth, with a frown,
"How wrong the whole thing is,
How preposterous each wing is
How flattened the head is, how jammed down the neck is--
In short, the whole owl, what an ignorant wreck 'tis!
I make no apology;
I've learned owl-eology.
I've passed days and nights in a hundred collections,
And can not be blinded to any deflections
Arising from unskilful fingers that fail
To stuff a bird right, from his beak to his tail.
Mister Brown! Mist