282 AT THE SIGN OF THE STOCK YARD INN 



"The review reads all well enough," said Mr. 

 BRABROOK, "but are you sure you have not made 

 any 'breaks'?" I had courage enough to assure him 

 that I believed it was 0. K., and so with some little 

 trepidation the business manager in the absence of 

 the editors put the stuff in type, and slipped it into 

 the last form going to press. As for myself, I was 

 frightened half out of my wits. There would be 

 the devil to pay, sure enough, if I had "fallen down." 

 The paper appeared, and a few days later in walked 

 "Uncle BILLY" SMITH himself. My desk was in the 

 business office, and when the dear old man took a 

 chair and said, with mock severity, "BRABROOK, who 

 wrote that matter about my cattle?" I knew the 

 end had come. I felt myself growing smaller and 

 smaller every moment, and would have been truly 

 thankful if the floor had mercifully opened and let 

 me through where no one could witness my impend- 

 ing humiliation and BRABROOK'S wrath. The latter 

 was quite as sure as I myself that mortal offense 

 had been committed through his and my own stu- 

 pidity, and a good customer's further business lost 

 forever. So he turned red and then white, and 

 finally stammered, in tones absolutely apologetic in 

 their quality: "Well, I believe that in the absence 

 of our regular editors it was written by one of the 



