"Them remyarks o' yours is shore wisdom, Jack," drawled Broncho in his musical Texan, as he blew a cloud of tobacco-smoke slowly through his nose. "What you-alls calls success don't always pan out so rich as you calculated it would. Often the kyards stacks up mighty contrary, an' when you're just about callin' for drinks round, blandly surmisin' in your sublime ignorance that you makes a winnin' an' is shore due to scoop the pot, that 'ere gent 'Providence,' who's sittin' some quiet an' unobstrusive whilst you raises the bet to the limit, just steps in an' calls your hand. Then it is that your full house goes down like an avalanche before his four of a kind, an' you, some sore an' chagrined, meanders off an' ponders on this vale of tears." "You're some long-winded, Broncho," said old Ben Sluice, "but you're dead right. I've seen a hell's slew o' minin' pards go under just 'coss they'd struck it rich. They rakes in their dinero an' away they goes, playin' it high an' standin' the crowd, all the time a-consumin' o' nosepaint unlimited; an' the next thing you knows is they done jumped the track." "H'I knew a real bang-up toff once," joined in the cockney. "'E wos a genelman, too, boiled shirt, shiny pants an' h'all, an' a dead smooth job 'e 'ad--just raked in the quids for doin' nuffin' but loaf 'round. You've all 'eard of the Scotch 'Ouse--leastways, h'any that's been to the little village h'I come from. Well, 'e was wot they calls 'shopwalker' there. H'I goes in there one day (h'I'd got a big payday comin', an' h'I thinks, thinks h'I, I'll be cute this time an' lay in a bang-up outfit). Well, h'in I goes an' h'up 'e comes as h'affable an' perlite as you please an' sez: "'And what's yours, sir?' "Well, h'I wos h'all took aback, gettin' sich a question from a puffect stranger. At last h'I stammers out: "''Arf-an'-'arf, an' thank ye kindly, mister.' "Well, 'e just smiles superior-loike, an' sez, "'I mean, what do you want to buy?' "Well, I thinks to myself, 'That's comin' it low on a chap.' It weren't the friendly touch, wos h'it? But h'I don' sye nuffin' 'bout it, but gets a rig-out an' skips. "Next v'yage h'I comes into the West Indy Docks. I thinks as h'I loafs round, mebbe I'll go an' see if my rorty toff is still on top. Well, 'e ain't there, so I asts the cove wot I bought the duds from, when did 'e cut 'is 'ook? Well, wot d'you think, byes: 'e'd been an' committed sooicide. Stroike me good an' blind, but you could a' knocked me down wiv a feaver when I 'ears it." "What's a dead cinch to one gent is jest an ornery layout to another," commented Broncho. "I allows that 'shopwalker' o' yours don't accoomilate no joys from his duties. Mebbe he reckons them mighty low, not to say debasin', an' finally he gets that fretful an' peevish he jest throws up his deal in disgust, jumps on his war-pony, an' lights out on the death trail."