This wuz his best argument, and I sez, “If I couldn’t talk over anything but this I wouldn’t talk at all. The idee,” sez I, “of human bein’s with hearts in their bosoms a-settin’ to see a wild animal kill a human bein’, and visey versey.” Sez I, “If I should see it goin’ on I should be so shamed on’t that I shouldn’t want to speak agin at all for some time.”
But sez Josiah, “It’s a national recreation; it’s fascinatin’; probble you’d like it.”
“Mebby,” sez I; “mebby my heart would git so hard that I could enjoy it—I, that in days of pig and beef killin’ have always run into the parlor bedroom and put my fingers in my ears to escape the sounds of agony the poor brutes make.” Sez I, “Spozen if in them days I should invite the minister and his folks and the Jonesvillians, and have high seats built up aginst the side of the barn, and let ’em witness the gory spectacle?”
The Matador.
Josiah sot a minute in deep thought. “Wall,” sez he, “I’ll be hanged if it wouldn’t be stylish. You could drape some turkey-red calico over the top, kinder canopy style, and I and Ury could dress like them Spanish Matadors with knee-breeches and a long sash, and some feathers in our hats.”
Sez he, growin’ enthused with the new idee, “We could use our winter scarfs—they’re very gay colored; and I could take that long feather out of your winter bunnet, and have it hang down gracefully over my left shoulder, and I guess Tirzah Ann would lend me a couple to stand up in front. I declare, it would be sunthin’ new and uneek, and we’ll have it next fall.”
I glared at him with a stuny look, and sez I—“And while you’re all dressed up and enjoyin’ yourself, what of the poor dumb brutes who are made to suffer the agony of death?” Sez I, “What happiness could come to you built up on a custom of pain and sufferin’, bloodshed and terrer? Let me hear no more about sech a seen.”
“But,” sez he, “it would make talk; it would be the topic in all the genteel circles of Jonesville and Loontown.”
“If you should brain me with a tommyhawk it would make talk,” sez I.