"'Give a guess what Hamilton brings in the Big Eastern,' I says to him. "'I dunno,' says he. 'How much?' "'Sixteen thousand bucks!' I says. 'How does that lay on your stummick?' "'Hell!' says Micky. 'That ain't nothin'--look-a-here!' "He shoves a paper at me he's been holdin' in his mitt. It's a ridin' contract fur two years with the Ogden stable at ten thousand a year. "So you see, just like I tells you," Blister wound up, "they lay down real money fur _class_." "The man who bought the horse," I said, "certainly got what he paid for--everybody knows _now_ that Hamilton has class. But how about the boy?" "Did you ever see Vincent ride?" Blister looked at me inquiringly. "I saw him ride once in the English Derby," I replied. "Why?" "Well," said Blister, "his mother lives in New York in a brownstone house he bought her, with two Swede girls to do as much work as she'll let 'em. When he comes home, she calls him 'Micky.' Is there class to him?" "Yes," I said, "there's class to him." EXIT BUTSY "What's all them rubes got ribbons on 'em fur?" asked Blister. I followed his gaze to a group of variously garbed men and women who had just rounded the paddock, and who slowly bore down upon us as they drifted from stall to stall in a haphazard inspection of the great racing plant at Latonia. Prominent upon the person of each member of this party was a bountiful strip of yellow ribbon. The effect was decidedly gay. I had encountered similar ribbons in every nook and cranny of the Queen City during the last few days, and I knew that each bore in thirty-six point Gothic condensed, the words, "Ohio State Grange." "Those are Ohio farmers and their wives who are attending a convention in Cincinnati," I explained. "The ribbons are convention badges." Blister allowed the saddle girth he was mending to lie unnoticed across his knees as the delegates by twos and threes straggled past. Each female member of the party carried a round paper fan with a cane handle, and talked unceasingly. These streams of conversation were entirely regardless of one another. It was as though many brooks babbled onward side by side, but never joined. One fragment that reached us, I preserved. "An' I sez to the doctor when he come, sez I, 'Doctor, I ain't held a bite on my stummick these three livelong days!'" This was delivered by a buxom dame, fanning vigorously the meanwhile, and was noteworthy since the lady was closely followed by a little man whose frailty suggested dissolution, and who bore a large lunch box under one arm and a heavy child upon the other. The men appeared somewhat interested in the pampered nervous-looking thoroughbreds, but made few comments. As compared to their women folk they seemed more silent than the very tomb itself. Long after the grangers had drifted out of our sight, Blister's thoughts seemed devoted to them. Several times he chuckled to himself.