There were one or two laughs of other men, who thought they were about to see a man quietly baited. But Apache Kid was not the man to stand much baiting, even of a mild stamp. I think few of the men there, however, understood the nature that prompted him when he turned slowly in his chair and said: "Well, sir, I wear it for several reasons." "Oh! What’s them?" "Well, the first reason is personal—I like to wear it." There was a grin still on the face of the questioner. He found nothing particularly crushing in this reply, but Apache went on softly: "Then again, I wear it so as to aid me in the study of the character of the men I meet." "O! How do you work that miracle?" "Well, when I meet a man who does n’t seem to see anything strange in my wearing of the kerchief I know he has travelled a bit and seen the like elsewhere in our democratic America. Other men look at it and I can see they think it odd, but they say nothing. Well, that is a sign to me that they have not travelled where the handkerchief is used in this way, but I know that they are gentlemen all the same." There was a slight, a very slight, exulting note in his voice and I saw the faces of the men on the outside of the crowd turn to observe the speaker. I thought the man who had set this ball a-rolling looked a trifle perturbed, but Apache was not looking at him. He lay back in his chair, gazing before him with a calm face. "Then again," he said leisurely, as though he had the whole night to himself, "if I meet a man who sees it and asks why I wear it, I know that he is the sort of man about whom people say here,—in the language of the country,—’Don’t worry about him; he ’s a hog from Ontario and never been out of the bush before!’" There was a strained silence after these words. Some of the more self-reliant men broke it with a laugh. The most were silent. "I’m a hog—eh? You call me a hog?" cried the man, after looking on the faces of those who sat around. I think he would have swallowed Apache Kid’s speech without a word of reply had it not been spoken before so large an audience. "I did not say so," said Apache Kid, "but if I were you, I would n’t make things worse by getting nasty. I tried to josh a man myself this afternoon, and do you know what I did? I called in on him to-night to see whether he had savveyed that I had been trying to josh him. I found out that he had savveyed, and do you know what I did? I apologised to him——" "D’ ye think I ’m going to apologise for askin’ you that question?" "You interrupt me," said Apache Kid. "I apologised to him, I was going to say, like a man. As to whether I think you are going to apologise or not—no." He turned and scrutinised the speaker from head to toe and back again. "No," he repeated decidedly. "I should be very much surprised if you did." "By Moses!" cried the man. "You take the thing very seriously. I only asked you——" and his voice grumbled off into incoherence.