You-all has seen these yere gents as makes pets of snakes. Mebby
it's once in a thousand times you cuts the trail of sech a party.
Snakes is kittens to him, an' he's likely to be packin' specimens
'round in his clothes any time.
"That's the way with this Crawfish Jim. I minds talkin' to him at
his camp one day when I'm huntin' a bunch of cattle. The first I
notes, snake sticks his head outen Crawfish's shirt, an' looks at me
malev'lent and distrustful. Another protroods its nose out up by
Crawfish's collar.
"'Which you shore seems ha'nted of snakes?' I says, steppin' back
an' p'intin' at the reptiles.
"'Them's my dumb companions,' says Crawfish Jim. 'They shares my
solitood.'
"'You-all do seem some pop'lar with 'em,' I observes, for I saveys
at once he's plumb off his mental reservation; an' when a party's
locoed that a-way it makes him hostile if you derides his little
game or bucks his notions.
"I takes grub with Crawfish that same day; good chuck, too; mainly
sheep-meat, salt-hoss, an' bakin'-powder biscuit. I watches him some
narrow about them snakes he's infested with; I loathin' of 'em, an'
not wantin' 'em to transfer no love to me, nor take to enlivenin' my
secloosion none.
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