"'That's more'n I'd give my old daddy for him,' says I.
"Then we began to talk, and palaver, and hile, and at last I got him down to two hundred and ten, and him to give in a old saddle and bridle, so's I could ride him off.
"Waal, I paid down the money, and then rode off for Jenkins' stable feeling pooty proud and happy that I'd made a clean forty dollars by my barg'in.
"But, somehow or other, I couldn't find Jenkins' stable, nor Jenkins nuther, and I hain't found 'em since.
"To git right down to the gist on't, I'd been awfully fooled, and tricked into paying two hundred and ten dollars for a hoss that I didn't want myself, and that I's glad to git rid on, arterwards for one hundred and five, jest one-half the critter cost me.
"Waal, mister, that's the story that all the folks round my way is a-grinning and a-snickering over, and I s'pose I've got to grin and bear it till the hull darned thing dies out and be darned to it.
"It's l'arned me for one thing, that them slick-looking, slick-talking city fellers kin lie and cheat like thunder; and for another thing, that it don't dew for a country chap to butt his brains ag'in them city scamps and al'ays 'spect to git the best on't."
[THE PHANTOM ENGINEER.]
"Whenever I tell the story," said Alf Whitney, throwing away his half-smoked cigar, and putting his long legs on the top of the table, in a way some men have when a story is to be forthcoming, "everybody winks at everybody else, as much as to say, 'Alf had taken too much whisky that time,' or 'Alf was asleep and dreamed the whole thing.' But I tell you, comrades, though you are at liberty to disbelieve what I tell you, it is true; and that's all I know about it. I'm no long-headed metaphysician to reason it all out—I only know what happened, and it's that I'm going to tell."