IN COWBOY LAND. 



223 



eating Johnson that is the naim he is generally called 

 he is an olde mauntneer and large and fine looking and 

 one of the Best Story Tellers in the country and Very 

 Polight genteel to every one he meets I wil tel you 

 how he got that naim Liver-eating in a hard Fight 

 with the Black Feet Indians thay Faught all day John- 

 son and a few Whites Faught a large Body of Indians 

 all day after the fight Johnson cam in contact with a 

 wounded Indian and Johnson was aut of ammunition 

 and thay faught it out with thar Knives and Johnson 

 got away with the Indian and in the fight cut the livver 

 out of the Indian and said to the Boys did thay want 

 any Liver to eat that is the way he got the naim of 

 Liver-eating Johnson 



" Yours truly " etc., etc. 



Frontiersmen are often as original in their 

 theories of life as in their names ; and the 

 originality may take the form of wild savagery, 

 of mere uncouthness, or of an odd combina- 

 tion of genuine humor with simple acceptance 

 of facts as they are. On one occasion I ex- 

 pressed some surprise at learning that a cer- 

 tain Mrs. P. had suddenly married, though 

 her husband was alive and in jail in a neigh- 

 boring town ; and received for answer : 

 " Well, you see, old man Pete he skipped the 

 country, and left his widow behind him, and 

 so Bob Evans he up and married her ! " 

 which was evidently felt to be a proceeding 

 requiring no explanation whatever. 



In the cow-country there is nothing more 

 refreshing than the light-hearted belief enter- 

 tained by the average man to the effect that 

 any animal which by main force has been sad- 

 dled and ridden, or harnessed and driven a 

 couple of times, is a " broke horse." My 



