Speed, Yuba Bill! oh, speed us to our dinner!
Speed to the sunset that beckons far away.
SECOND TOURIST
William of Yuba, O Son of Nimshi, hearken!
Check thy profanity, but not thy chariot's play.
Tell us, O William, before the shadows darken, Where, and, oh! how we shall dine? O William, say!
YUBA BILL
It ain't my fault, nor the Kumpeney's, I reckon, Ye can't get ez square meal ez any on the Bay, Up at you place, whar the senset 'pears to beckon--Ez thet sharp allows in his airy sort o' way.
Thar woz a place wor yer hash ye might hev wrestled, Kept by a woman ez chipper ez a jay--Warm in her breast all the morning sunshine nestled;
Red on her cheeks all the evening's sunshine lay.
SECOND TOURIST
Praise is but breath, O chariot compeller!
Yet of that hash we would bid you farther say.
YUBA BILL
Thar woz a snipe--like you, a fancy tourist--Kem to that ranch ez if to make a stay, Ran off the gal, and ruined jist the purist Critter that lived--STRANGER (quietly)
You're a liar, driver!
YUBA BILL (reaching for his revolver).
Eh!
Here take my lines, somebody--CHORUS OF PASSENGERS
Hush, boys! listen!
Inside there's a lady! Remember! No affray!
YUBA BILL
Ef that man lives, the fault ain't mine or his'n.
STRANGER
Wait for the sunset that beckons far away, Then--as you will! But, meantime, friends, believe me, Nowhere on earth lives a purer woman; nay, If my perceptions do surely not deceive me, She is the lady we have inside to-day.
As for the man--you see that blackened pine tree, Up which the green vine creeps heavenward away!
He was that scarred trunk, and she the vine that sweetly Clothed him with life again, and lifted--SECOND TOURIST
Yes; but pray How know you this?
STRANGER
She's my wife.
YUBA BILL
The h-ll you say!
THOMPSON OF ANGELS
It is the story of Thompson--of Thompson, the hero of Angels.
Frequently drunk was Thompson, but always polite to the stranger;
Light and free was the touch of Thompson upon his revolver;
Great the mortality incident on that lightness and freedom.
Yet not happy or gay was Thompson, the hero of Angels;
Often spoke to himself in accents of anguish and sorrow, "Why do I make the graves of the frivolous youth who in folly Thoughtlessly pass my revolver, forgetting its lightness and freedom?
"Why in my daily walks does the surgeon drop his left eyelid, The undertaker smile, and the sculptor of gravestone marbles Lean on his chisel and gaze? I care not o'er much for attention;
Simple am I in my ways, save but for this lightness and freedom."
So spake that pensive man--this Thompson, the hero of Angels, Bitterly smiled to himself, as he strode through the chapparal musing.
"Why, oh, why?" echoed the pines in the dark olive depth far resounding.
"Why, indeed?" whispered the sage brush that bent 'neath his feet non-elastic.
Pleasant indeed was that morn that dawned o'er the barroom at Angels, Where in their manhood's prime was gathered the pride of the hamlet.
Six "took sugar in theirs," and nine to the barkeeper lightly Smiled as they said, "Well, Jim, you can give us our regular fusil."
Suddenly as the gray hawk swoops down on the barnyard, alighting Where, pensively picking their corn, the favorite pullets are gathered, So in that festive bar-room dropped Thompson, the hero of Angels, Grasping his weapon dread with his pristine lightness and freedom.
Never a word he spoke; divesting himself of his garments, Danced the war-dance of the playful yet truculent Modoc, Uttered a single whoop, and then, in the accents of challenge, Spake: "Oh, behold in me a Crested Jay Hawk of the mountain."
Then rose a pallid man--a man sick with fever and ague;
Small was he, and his step was tremulous, weak, and uncertain;
Slowly a Derringer drew, and covered the person of Thompson;
Said in his feeblest pipe, "I'm a Bald-headed Snipe of the Valley."
As on its native plains the kangaroo, startled by hunters, Leaps with successive bounds, and hurries away to the thickets, So leaped the Crested Hawk, and quietly hopping behind him Ran, and occasionally shot, that Bald-headed Snipe of the Valley.
Vain at the festive bar still lingered the people of Angels, Hearing afar in the woods the petulant pop of the pistol;
Never again returned the Crested Jay Hawk of the mountains, Never again was seen the Bald-headed Snipe of the Valley.
Yet in the hamlet of Angels, when truculent speeches are uttered, When bloodshed and life alone will atone for some trifling misstatement, Maidens and men in their prime recall the last hero of Angels, Think of and vainly regret the Bald-headed Snipe of the Valley!
THE HAWK'S NEST
(SIERRAS)
We checked our pace, the red road sharply rounding;
We heard the troubled flow Of the dark olive depths of pines resounding A thousand feet below.
Above the tumult of the canyon lifted, The gray hawk breathless hung, Or on the hill a winged shadow drifted Where furze and thorn-bush clung;
Or where half-way the mountain side was furrowed With many a seam and scar;
Or some abandoned tunnel dimly burrowed,--A mole-hill seen so far.
We looked in silence down across the distant Unfathomable reach:
A silence broken by the guide's consistent And realistic speech.
"Walker of Murphy's blew a hole through Peters For telling him he lied;
Then up and dusted out of South Hornitos Across the Long Divide.
"We ran him out of Strong's, and up through Eden, And 'cross the ford below, And up this canyon (Peters' brother leadin'), And me and Clark and Joe.
"He fou't us game: somehow I disremember Jest how the thing kem round;
Some say 'twas wadding, some a scattered ember From fires on the ground.
"But in one minute all the hill below him Was just one sheet of flame;
Guardin' the crest, Sam Clark and I called to him, And,--well, the dog was game!
"He made no sign: the fires of hell were round him, The pit of hell below.
We sat and waited, but we never found him;
And then we turned to go.
"And then--you see that rock that's grown so bristly With chapparal and tan--Suthin crep' out: it might hev been a grizzly It might hev been a man;
