IparaMse Circle 



my taste in preferring savage weapons to 

 the far more effective engine of contem- 

 porary civilization resting idle on his sad- 

 dle-horn. I tried a wing-shot in sheer 

 bravado when my bird, frightened by the 

 splashing of the horse's feet in a puddle, 

 rose with a great show of mottled pinions ; 

 but my shaft went absurdly wide of the 

 mark. Then the Creole laughed ironically, 

 and galloped away, flinging back over his 

 sloping shoulder a patois phrase that meant 

 in EngHsh, " Such tomfoolery for a grown 

 man ! " And yet that same cavalier would 

 have thought it not in the least tomfoolery 

 to play poker all night long and find him- 

 self seven dollars and forty cents loser at 

 sunrise. It is all owing to the slant of a 

 man's vision as to what he recognizes, 

 when in a critical mood, as worthy of 

 manly attention. 



I breathed freely once more when the 

 debonair little Creole passed out of sight, 

 riding through the wood beyond Paradise 

 Circle, leaving me alone knee-deep in the 

 stiff marsh-grass. A rail clucking under 

 a broad drift of fallen rushes at the middle 

 46 



