For a wonder the weather bad been
favourable; the windmills were all working, the bogs had dried
up, the beef had lasted over, the remuda had not strayed--in
short, there was nothing to do. Sang had given us a baked
bread-pudding with raisins in it. We filled it--in a wash basin
full of it--on top of a few incidental pounds of chile con, baked
beans, soda biscuits, "air tights," and other delicacies. Then
we adjourned with our pipes to the shady side of the blacksmith's
shop where we could watch the ravens on top the adobe wall of the
corral. Somebody told a story about ravens. This led to
road-runners. This suggested rattlesnakes. They started Windy
Bill.
"Speakin' of snakes," said Windy, "I mind when they catched the
great-granddaddy of all the bullsnakes up at Lead in the Black
Hills. I was only a kid then. This wasn't no such tur'ble long
a snake, but he was more'n a foot thick. Looked just like a
sahuaro stalk. Man name of Terwilliger Smith catched it. He
named this yere bullsnake Clarence, and got it so plumb gentle it
followed him everywhere. One day old P. T. Barnum come along and
wanted to buy this Clarence snake--offered Terwilliger a thousand
cold--but Smith wouldn't part with the snake nohow.
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