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"Look here," says Percy, "I never drink water unless it's absolutely pure and healthy. Is this all right?"

"Sure," says the waiter.

Percy took a glassful, and most of it was pollywogs.

"Look here," says he, "I thought you said this water was healthy. Look at those bugs."

"That only proves what I said," says the waiter. "If it wasn't healthy the bugs couldn't live in it."

Just then Percy's eye caught a sign that read:

"All the pancakes you can eat for ten cents."

"I'm going to have some pancakes," says he. "What's yours?"

"Chicken," says I.

Percy kept eating pancakes.

When he had eaten twenty plates the boss of the joint began to get interested.

Percy was certainly getting the biggest ten cents' worth I ever saw, when he stepped over and says:

"Don't you think you have had enough?"

"Just one more plate and then—" says Percy.

"Then what?" says the boss.

"Then you can tell the cook to make them a little bit thicker," says Percy.

I tried to chew my chicken, but couldn't get it down. I managed to catch the waiter on his fifteenth lap between the kitchen and Percy's plate, and says:

"Waiter, this chicken is awfully tough."

"Have some pancakes, then," says Percy. "They're good and come cheap."

"Well," says the waiter, "that chicken always was a Jonah. When we tried to kill it, the darned thing flew to the top of the house and we had to shoot it."

"Oh, that accounts for it," says I. "Your aim was bad and you shot the weather cock by mistake."

Percy finally got enough pancakes and paid his ten cents like a man.

We traveled along the road that leads from the hash house, and met a farmer with a gun.

"Say," says I, "have you seen anything worth shooting around here?"

"Not until you came," says he.

I don't blame him though.

Talking of shooting, I don't think I ever told you of the time I went shooting with Teddy.

Teddy is a great shot, but he can't compare with me. I'm going to sing you a song about it, entitled:

"Snap Shot, Half Shot, All Shot; or, It Costs Money To Get Loaded."

On the farms there's consternation,
And there's wide-spread agitation,
For the hunting season's opened up again.
In the paths and in the by-ways,
In the woods and in the highways,
There are packs of dogs and scores of shooting men.

Now and then a pig is squealing,
Or a hen or rooster keeling
Over suddenly in some sequestered spot.
Upon a close examination,
You may glean the information,
That by some lobster of a gunner it was shot.

Now and then a cow is