up on the bill you 'ain't yet
squared."

"So?" said Jim.

"You bet your boots it's so, and you can't begin to pungle up a minute
too soon!" was the answer.

"I reckon you'd ask a chicken to pungle up the gravel in his gizzard if
you thought he'd picked up a sliver of gold," Jim drawled, in his lazy
utterance. "And an ordinary chicken, with the pip thrown in, could
pungle twice to my once."

"Ain't got the stuff, hey?" said Parky. "Broke, I s'pose? Then maybe
you'll git to work, you old galoot, and stop playin' parson and
goody-goody games. You don't git nothing here without the chink. So
perhaps you'll git to work at last."

A red-nosed henchman of the gambler's put in a word.

"I don't see why you 'ain't gone to work," he said.

"Don't you?" drawled Jim, leaning on the counter to survey the speaker.
"Well, it looks to me as if you found out, long ago, that all work and
no play makes a man a Yankee."

"I ain't no Yankee, you kin bet on that!" said the man.

"That's pretty near incredible," drawled Jim.

"And I ain't neither," declared the gambler, who boasted of being
Canadian. "Don't you forget that, old boy."

"No," Jim slowly replied, "I've often noticed that all that glitters
ain't American."

"Well, you can clear out of here and notice how things look outside,"
retorted Parky.

Jim was slowly straightening up when the blacksmith and the teamster
entered the place. They had heard the gambler's order and were
thoroughly astounded. No man, howsoever poor and unprepared to pay a
wretched bill, had ever been treated thus in Borealis before.

"What's the matter?" said Webber.

"Nuthin', particularly," answered Jim, in his slow, monotonous way,
"only a difference of opinion. Parky thinks he's brainy, and a
gentleman--that's all."

"I can see you don't git another snack of grub in here, my friend,"
retorted Parky, adding a number of oaths. "And for just two cents I'd
break your jaw and pitch you out in the street."

"Not with your present flow of language," answered Jim.

The teamster inquired, "Why don't Jim git any more grub?"

"Because I'm running this joint and he 'ain't got the cash," said
Parky. "You got anything to say about the biz?"

"Jim's got a call on me and my cash," replied the brawny Webber. "Jim,
you tell him what you need, and I'll foot the bill."

"I'll settle half, myself," added Lufkins.

"Thanks, boys, not this evenin'," said Jim, whose pride had singular
momen