Chapter 2
Section 2 of Captain Billy's Whiz-Bang, Volume 3, Number 31, March 1922. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Read by Adam Milligan. Captain Billy's Whiz-Bang, Volume 3, Number 31, March 1922, by W. H. Fawcett. Section 2.
The Ornery Pups. A traveler in the Tennessee mountains sought refuge one evening at a wayside cabin. He had traveled all one chill April day and was cold, hungry, and footsore. With true mountain hospitality, the old mountaineer invited him to supper and insisted that he spend the night. The host made him comfortable before a huge open fireplace and set a jug of Mountain Dew beside his chair.
Also introduced him to his 18-year-old daughter, who was the only other occupant of the cabin, unless we may include four lank hounds stretched before the fireplace. The old man hastened out to look after his chores, and the girl busied herself in the kitchen. The cabin was typical of the region having two rooms, one containing a bed and two chairs, and the other serving as kitchen and dining room.
The traveler, left to himself, took three or four heavy shots of the moonshine, and soon forgot his weariness and the chill of the April day. He divested himself of his shoes, settled himself with a sigh of content, and steamed his sopping feet in the glow of the fire. Shortly, one of the hounds raised his head languidly and sniffed suspiciously.
He scrambled to his feet, howled mournfully, and dived beneath the bed, the others following him as if they had gone crazy. A piteous whining and snarling issued from under the bed for several minutes, and the traveler became alarmed. The dogs must be mad. He arose and opened the door, and the dogs shot from under the bed and through the open door. Each departed, howling as if St. Nick was after him. It was puzzling, to say the least.
The comely daughter entered the room shortly, and the traveler addressed her as follows. What is the matter with those dogs? he inquired. I don't know, she replied. Less than one of them brung something dead indoors. Dad always kicks hell out in the whole passel of him when they do that. The Young Gringo. Havana's tropical sunshine, coupled with a few jolts of Ron Bacardi's superior, hath driven ye old cap'n to lyrical lines of lisping lingo. So I sit me down on my
cane-bottom chair with pencil stub in hand to transcribe that famous colo rhyme, The Young Gringo. The poem has to do with the proper actions of Americans in Cuba and other tropical countries. The first you must learn is to listen, not speak, for the one thing we hate is a youngster with cheek. Shut up from the first, be attentive and meek, when you're next to a hardened old gringo. And now, from the start, don't mistakenly think that to be a good sport you must gamble and drink,
and play the darn fool to rise up, not sink, is the motto of every right gringo. But if you do gamble and never can win, don't damn at the dicebox and kick up a din, but keep your tongue silent and switch on a grin, and pay up your debts like a gringo. Don't think that love's river continually flows, but just take a tip from a fellow who knows, and pay for the water for washing your clothes. It's cheaper all round for the gringo.
Yet when you have read this, you don't think I'm right, and in spite of the caution your love thoughts take flight. Then take my advice, son, wed something that's white. It's best in the end for a gringo. If you happen to take a fair damsel to dine, don't squander your money to put up a shine, but order her beer, though she may ask for wine, or you'll sure be a fool of a gringo. Now if you must drink, my advice to begin is to stick to a whiskey and soda, or gin, and never
forget that the bottle must win, for it's never been beat by a gringo. So don't go on thinking your inside's a sieve, and now there's a piece of advice I would give. If you ain't good, be careful, and then you may live to get your gray hairs as a gringo. Be slow to offend and reluctant to blame, be quick to forgive and treat all men the same. You must hold a straight flush in life's little game to be worthy the name of a gringo. Say, nice day, ain't it? A stuttering man walked up to a boy
who had a parrot in a cage and said, can that parrot talk? Well, replied the boy, if he couldn't talk better than you, I'd kill him. This sounds like bull. A visitor who was stopping at a hotel was much disturbed by the snoring of one of his friends sleeping in an adjoining room. Suddenly, the snore ceased, and death-like stillness oppressed the listener. Thinking that something had happened to his friend, he went into his room and found him sitting up in bed.
The friend said, I was sleeping with my mouth open, and I think I have swallowed a mouse. The hotel doctor was sent for, who adopted the novel expedient of calling in the services of a hotel cat and placed a piece of toasted cheese some little distance from the patient's mouth, thinking that the mouse, smelling the cheese, would come out to eat it and would fall a prey to the cat. While the remedy was working, the doctor went downstairs to get a drink,
and the patient fell asleep and resumed his snoring. When the doctor returned, the cat was missing. Pat's Hole. Pat was hard at work digging a post hole when the boss strolled by. Well, Pat, said he, noting the progress of the work, do you think you will be able to get all that dirt back into the hole again? Pat looked doubtfully at the pile of dirt, and after some thought said, no sir, sure I don't think I've dug the hole deep enough. End section two.
