the money--then what?"

"Well, he put down de fo' aces with one hand and drew his revolver with
the other. De sharper concluded he would let the money stay; and dat
broke up de game. You ought to have seen dat sharper's face. He's a
mighty slick rogue, and I bet you he'll put a ball into dat sheep-herder
before we gets up to Fort Gibson."

"Why don't you tell him of it?"

"Shucks! What do I want to go and get myself into trouble for? He goes
up and down dis road every year and he knows it already. It aint none of
my business."

The reader will remember that we are describing things that happened a
good many years ago. At that time the cotton-planters, and the
cattle-and sheep-herders who lived far back in the country, made use of
the steamboats, which were the only means of communication they had.
Gambling was much in vogue, and if the sharpers who met them at New
Orleans couldn't find any means of inducing them to play there, they
would take passage in these boats and try them again when every other
influence except reading was at a discount. It was a dangerous thing to
pick up a stranger on these trips, especially if one had money with him,
or anything that could be changed into money. For instance, there was a
contractor who started from New Orleans to do some government business
at Little Rock. He had half a dozen teams and everything he wanted to
make his enterprise successful, with the exception of the men. Those he
was going to hire of the planters, and of course he had to have some
money to do it with. On the way up he fell in with a very modest
stranger who didn't know anything about playing cards, and the
consequence was before he reached his destination he was penniless. And
the beauty of it was the modest stranger was dead broke, too! Every cent
of his little hundred dollars had been won by the two strangers whom the
contractor had invited to join in their game, as well as the last mule
which the latter had to pull his wagons. The contractor made out a bill
of sale of everything he had, and the next morning he was missing. He
had jumped overboard, and everybody thought he was drowned accidentally.
The modest stranger and his two confederates took the mules ashore and
sold them at a big figure, and went back to New Orleans well satisfied
with their trip. It seems that in the case of this stranger the sharpers
had picked up the wrong man. He had "stocked" the cards on them, and won
everything they had, and