“Well, now, as I said, all this time the ol’ bean was workin’ beautifully. I saw just what they was up to and before that Brooklyn Boy that had the sword could yell, ‘Fire!’ I’d jumped clean out of bed and through the window.” George paused, and wetted his throat with an appropriate liquid. “Of course,” he added, “my room is on the third floor an’ I got sort o’ banged up—as you fellas notice. But just think what might have happened if I’d been drunk and couldn’t a’ made that jump in time!” § 243 When O. Henry Met the Poet Scout Bob Davis of _Munsey’s Magazine_, who has a mania for bringing celebrities together just to see how they react on each other, was strolling along Broadway with O. Henry in the latter hours of the nineteenth century, when Captain Jack Crawford, the poet scout, his hair waving in the wind, came sailing across Madison Square. Davis introduced the pair and dragged them off to lunch. Captain Jack, like most poets, having memorized all his own verse, never let a chance go by to hold the willing or unwilling listener spellbound. He opened up on the Bagdad Scribe before the oysters arrived. He spilled frontier poetry all over the premises, shook his hair out in a burst of blank verse, wedded the Pecos River to the Rocky Mountains, swept through the Yellowstone, tramped the plains, shot Indians, broke horses and piled the rhythmic dust of pioneer days all over O. Henry. Captain Jack did all the talking and all the reciting that was done at that luncheon, which lasted two hours. About 3.30 P. M. the party broke up and O. Henry staggered out into the fresh air waving Davis and Crawford a mute farewell. In the morrow’s mail Bob received the following note: “My dear Colonel Davis: “How is your friend Captain Crack Jawford, the go it spout? “O. Henry.” § 244 Our Institutions Approved A candidate for citizenship came to a naturalization bureau in New York to take out his first papers. The applicant was a Russian who spoke badly broken English. With him was a friend and sponsor from the East Side. Under examination the candidate betrayed a tremendous lack of knowledge of national history and institutions and public men. Finally the examiner turned to the alien’s companion: “Here,” he said testily, “this man’s ignorance is appalling. Take him away and explain something to him about the Constitution and the government of the United States. Don’t bring him back until he is better qualified.” The East Sider led his crestfallen fellow-countryman away. Within an hour they both returned. “Here,” said the Examiner, “what brings you here again?” “Everything is all right,” stated the East Sider. “I took my friend out and read to him out of the Constitution, and he says he likes it first-rate.” § 245 The Annoyed Mr. Goldstein