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Page 99
If long hair, part of a sombrero, Mexican spurs, &c., would make a
fellow famous, I already occupy a topmost niche in the Temple Frame. If
my wild, untamed aspect had not been counteracted by my well-known
benevolent and amiable expression of countenance, I would have been
arrested long ago by the Rangers on general suspicions of murder and
horse stealing. In fact, I owe all my present means of lugubrious living
to my desperate and bloodthirsty appearance, combined with the confident
and easy way in which I tackle a Winchester rifle. There is a gentleman
who lives about fifteen miles from the ranch, who for amusement and
recreation, and not altogether without an eye to the profit, keeps a
general merchandise store. This gent, for the first few months has been
trying very earnestly to sell me a little paper, which I would like much
to have, but am not anxious to purchase. Said paper is my account,
receipted. Occasionally he is absent, and the welcome news coming to my
ear, I mount my fiery boss and gallop wildly up to the store, enter with
something of the sang froid, grace, abandon and recherche nonchalance
with which Charles Yates ushers ladies and gentlemen to their seats in
the opera-house, and, nervously fingering my butcher knife, fiercely
demand goods and chattels of the clerk. This plan always succeeds. This
is by way of explanation of this vast and unnecessary stationery of
which this letter is composed. I am always in too big a hurry to demur
at kind and quality, but when I get to town I will write you on small
gilt-edged paper that would suit even the fastidious and discriminating
taste of a Logan.
When I get to the city, which will be shortly, I will send you some
account of this country and its inmates. You are right, I have almost
forgotten what a regular old, gum-chewing, ice-cream destroying, opera
ticket vortex, ivory-clawing girl looks like. Last summer a very fair
specimen of this kind ranged over about Fort Snell, and I used to ride
over twice a week on mail days and chew the end of my riding whip while
she "Stood on the Bridge" and "Gathered up Shells on the Sea Shore" and
wore the "Golden Slippers." But she has vamoosed, and my ideas on the
subject are again growing dim.
If you see anybody about to start to Texas to live, especially to this
part, if you will take your scalpyouler and sever the jugular vein, cut
the brachiopod artery and hamstring him, after he knows what you have
done for him he will rise and call you blessed. This country is a silent
but eloquent refutation of Bob Ingersoll's theory: a man here gets
prematurely insane, melancholy and unreliable and finally dies of lead
poisoning, in his boots, while in a good old land like Greensboro a man
can die, as they do every day, with all the benefits of the clergy.
W. S. Porter
* * * *
Austin, Texas, April 21, 1885.
Dear Dave: I take my pen in hand to let you know that I am well, and
hope these few lines will find you as well as can be expected.
I carried out your parting injunction of a floral nature with all the
solemnity and sacredness that I would have bestowed upon a dying man's
last request. Promptly at half-past three I repaired to the robbers'
den, commonly known as Radams Horticultural and Vegetable Emporium, and
secured the high-priced offerings, according to promise. I asked if the
bouquets were ready, and the polite but piratical gentleman in charge
pointed proudly to two objects on the counter reposing in a couple of
vases, and said they were.
I then told him I feared there was some mistake, as no buttonhole
bouquets had been ordered, but he insisted on his former declaration,
and so I brought them away and sent them to their respective
destinations.
I thought it a pity to spoil a good deck of cards by taking out only
one, so I bundled up the whole deck, and inserted them in the bouquet,
but finally concluded it would not be right to violet (JOKE) my promise
and I rose (JOKE) superior to such a mean trick and sent only one as
directed.
I have a holiday to-day, as it is San Jacinto day. Thermopylae had its
messenger of defeat, but the Alamo had none. Mr. President and fellow
citizens, those glorious heroes who fell for their country on the bloody
field of San Jacinto, etc.
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