150 THE COUNTRY BOY 



in Portland with the sketches and game 

 chickens, but no aUigator. The alHgator, 

 when we got to Denver, where it was twenty 

 below zero, refused to move even a toe, so 

 thinking him frozen stiff and dead, I tried to 

 bend him and he broke in two like a brittle 

 stick, and I threw the pieces out the window. 

 The truth is that had I put him in warm water, 

 in five minutes he would have been swimming, 

 but I wasn't as much on alligators as I was on 

 roosters. 



I got home to Silverton and told my father 

 of the great things I had seen, the glorious 

 time I had had, but father seemed to be worried 

 about something that didn't please him; his 

 face bore an expression of disappointment. 

 I asked him what was the matter. He said he 

 was disappointed to see me come home with 

 only two roosters! 



The roller-skate craze hit Silverton just as 

 the spring-bottom pants fad was leaving town. 

 It's funn}^ how fashions vary. I remember 

 one spell in Silverton that we were having our 

 trousers cut with so much spring on the bottom 

 that only the end of our toes were exposed 

 and six montlis after that high tide of spring- 



