Lamoille newsdealer. [volume] (Hyde Park, Vt.) 1860-1877, 1870-06-08
Jim Smiley's Frog.
BY MARK TWAIN.

NO~'N
him home, and said he calculated to edu-
cate him; and so he never done nothing
for three months but sit in his back yard
and learn the frog how to jun. And you
bet he did learn him, too, He'd give
him little punch behind, and the next
minute you'd see that frog whirling in the
air like doughnut-see him turn a sum-
merset, and maybe a couple, if he got
good start, and come down fat-footed and
all right like cat. He got him up so in
the matter Of catching flies, and kent him
in practice so constant, that he would
nail fly every time as he could see
him,
Smiley said that all the frog wanted
vas education, and he could do almost
anything, and believe him. Why I've
seen him set Daniel Webster down here on
the foor-Daniel Webster was the name
of the frog-and sing out: "Flies, Dan',
flies, and qnicker'n you'd wink he'd spring
up and shake fly of'n the counter there
and flop down on the floor again as solid
as COB Of mud and fall TO scratching
the side Of his head with his hind foot as
Indifferent as if he hadn't no idee he had
done any morn any frog might do,
You never seed frog so modest and
straightforward as he was, for all he
was 50 gifted,
And when it came to square jumping
on the dead level, he could get over more
ground at one straddle than any animal
Of his breed you ever seed. Jumping on
on dead level was his strong suit, you
understand and when it came to that Smi-
ley would ante up money to him as long
as he had red.
Smiley was monstrous proud of his frog
and well he might be, for fellers that had
Travelled and bin almost everywhere all
said that he laid over every frog that they
seed.
Well, Smiley kept the beast in little
lattice box, and he used to fetch it down
town sometimes, and lay for a bet.
Once fellow-a stranger in camp, he
was-come across him with his box, and
says.
"What sort of a thing have got in the
box ?"
And Smiley, sorter indifferent like, you
know
"It might be parrot, or it might be a
canary, maybe; but it amt, its only just
frog"
>And the fellow took it and looked at it
careful, and turning it round this way and
that, says;
"H'm--so it is. Well, what's he good
for ?"
"Well," Smiley says, easy and careless,
'he's good enough for one thing l should
judge-he can out jump any frog in Gala
veras county"
The feller took the box again and took
another long and particular look, and
gives it back to Smiley, and says very
deliberate:
"Well, don't see no points about that
there frog that's any better'n any other
frog"
maybe you don't, Smiley said. May.
be you understand frogs, and maybe you
don't understand 'em; maybe you amt
only an amateur, as it were. Anyways,
I've got my opinion, and I'll risk forty
dollars that he can out jump any frog in
Calaveras county"
And the feller studied minute or two,
and then says, kinder sad like
"Well, L only stranger here, and |
amt got no frog but if l had frog I'd
bet you"
And then Smiley says:
"That's all right, That's all right
If you'll hold my box minute, I'll go
and get you frog; and so the feller took
the box and put up his forty dollars along
Smiley's and set down to wait.
SO he set there good while, thinking
to his hisself, aud TUX the frog out and
pried open his mouth and took a teaspoon
aud filled him full Of qtail shot-iled
him pretty near up to the chin, and set
him on the floor.
Smiley, he went out in the swamp and
stopped around in the mrd for log time,
and finally he ketchcd frog and fetched
him in, and gave him to the feller, and
says:
"Now, if you are ready, set him along
side of Dan'l, with his forepaws just even
with Dan'l's, and III give you the word.
Then he says, "one--two--three-jump! |!
and him and the fellcr touched up the
J frogs from behind and the new frog hop.
ped off lively, but Dan'l gave heave
histed up bis sboulder--so--like French
man, but it wasn't no use he couldn'
bulge; he was planted as solid as an an