We-all gives a cold thousand for the little boss. We gets him of the sharp who--it bein’ in the old day before railroads--is slammin’ through the mails from Chihuahua to El Paso, three hundred miles in three nights. This bronco--he’s a deep bay, shadin’ off into black like one of them overripe violins, an’ with nostrils like red expandin’ hollyhocks--can go a hundred miles between dark an’ dark, an’ do it three days in a week. Which lie’s shore a wonder, is that little hoss; an’ the saddle an’ upholstery that goes with him, Spanish leather an’ gold, is fit for his company. As Dan leads him up in front of the Red Light Christmas Eve for us to look at, he says: “Gents, if he ain’t a swallow-bird on four legs, then I never sees no sech fowl; an’ the only drawback is that, considerin’ the season, we can’t hang him on no tree.” An’ y ere, now, is where we-all gets scared up. It spoils the symmetry of this story to chunk it in this a-way; but I can’t he’p myse’f, for this story, like that tale of James of the Beads, is troo. Jest as we-all is about to prounce down with our gifts on Dave’s wickeyup like a mink on a settin’ hen--Dan bein’ all framed an’ frazzled up in cow-tails an’ buffalo horns like a Injun medicine man, thinkin’ to make the deal as Santa Claus--Tucson Jennie comes surgin’ up, wild an’ frantic, an’ allows little Enright Peets is lost. Dave, she says, is chargin’ about, tryin’ to round him up. “Which I knows he’s done been chewed up by wolves,” says Tucson Jennie, wringin’ her hands an’ throwin’ her apron over her head. “He’d shore showed up for supper if he’s alive.” It’s obvious that before that Christmas can proceed, we-all has got to recover the beneficiary. Thar’s a gen’ral saddlin’ up, an’ in no time Wolf-ville’s population is spraddlin’ about the surroundin’ scenery. It comes right though, an’ it’s Dan who makes the turn. Dan discovers little Enright Peets camped down in the lee of a mesquite bush, seven miles out on his way to the Floridas mountains. He puts it up he’s goin’ over to the hills to have a big talk an’ make medicine with Moh-Kwa, the wise medicine b’ar that Sioux Sam yere has been reelatin’ to him about. No, that child ain’t scared none; he’s takin’ it cool an’ contented, with twenty coyotes settin’ about, blinkin’ an’ silent on their tails, an’ lookin’ like they’re sort o’ thinkin’ little Enright Peets over an’ tryin’ to figger out his system. Them little wolves don’t onderstand what brings that infant out alone on the plains, that a-way; an’ they’re cogitatin’ about it when Dan disperses ’em to the four winds. That’s all thar is to the yarn. Little Enright Peets is packed into camp an’ planted in the midst of them books an’ blocks an’ candies which Faro Nell su’gests; also, he’s made happy with the little hoss. Dan, in his medicine mask an’ paint, does a skelp dance, an’ is the soul of the hour.