the fact that she was wearing Congress
gaiters, comfortable but not "dressy."

"Pardner with your left with your left hand round!"

Andy P. Symes held Essie Tisdale's hand in a lingering clasp and
whispered in foolish flattery:

"Terpsichore herself outdone!"

"Swing in the centre and seven hands around. Birdie hop out and crow hop
in! Take holt of paddies and run around agin!"

Abe Tutts executed a double shuffle on the corner.

"Allemande Joe! Eight hand to pardner and around you go! Balance to
corners, don't be slack! Turn right around and take a back track! When
you git home, don't be afraid. Swing her agin and all promenade!"

It was a glorious dance and it moved unflaggingly to the end; but when
it was done and the dancers laughing and exhausted sought their seats,
it was discovered that Snake River Jim had fallen to weeping because he
said it was his unhappy lot to work while others danced.

Therefore Sylvanus Starr suggested that out of a delicate regard for an
artist's feelings, and no one could deny but Snake River Jim was that,
the dance be temporarily suspended while the bridegroom and others
expressed their sentiments and delight in the occasion by a few remarks,
Sylvanus Starr himself setting the example by bursting into an eulogy
which had the impassioned fervor of inspiration.

The vocabulary of laudatory adjectives gleaned in many years' experience
in the obituary department of an eastern newspaper were ejected like
volcanic matter, red hot and unrestrained, running over and around the
name of Symes to harden into sentences of which "a magnificent specimen
of manhood, a physical and intellectual giant, gallantly snatching from
our midst the fairest flower that ever bloomed upon a desert waste,"
only moderately illustrates the editor's gift of language.

When Andy P. Symes stood on a chair and faced the expectant throng the
few trite remarks which he had in mind all but fled when his eyes fell
for the first time upon his bride buttoned into her "going away gown."
As he mounted the chair his face wore the set smile of the man who
means to die a nervy death on the gallows. His voice sounded strained
and unnatural to himself as he began:

"Ladies and gentlemen."

"Wee-hee!" squealed a youth in a leather collar and a rattleskin
necktie.

"This is the happiest moment of my life!"

"Wee-ough! It ought to be!" yelled the "Sheep King of Poison Crick" as
he pressed the arms of the Misses Starr g