THE LIBRARY 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 'The Man\Vho Lied on Arkansas 
 
 and 
 
 t Got Him 
 
 The Editor 
 or THE 
 
 Arkansas &krtrlj Souk 
 
 With Fifty Illustrations 
 
 Mostly by The Liar. 
 
 Copyright May, 1909, by 
 The Sketch Book Publishing Co., Llttl* Rock, Ark. 
 
 SECOND EDITION
 
 IN ARKANSAS 
 
 Said Chollie to the Farmer Man 
 Way down in Arkansas, . 
 
 "A scientific way I'll show 
 
 To milk youh bloomin 1 caw!' 
 
 Said the Farmer Man to Chollie, 
 
 "You will? Haw, haw! Haw! Haw I 
 
 Jteur waj tteatgny wgj, By Gosh ..... , , 
 .'. J'vejsa^.in Ajiansas.i* *. ' ......
 
 DEFINITIONS. 
 
 A LIAR One who lies. 
 ARKANSAS A State. The open door of opportuni 
 THE MAN WHO LIED ON ARKANSAS. "E Pluribu 
 Unum." 
 
 lo$4- 
 
 in 
 
 N 
 
 D 
 
 CJ 
 
 The Monumental Kind,
 
 DRAMATIS PERSONAE. 
 The Liar Man. 
 
 A well-groomed individual with an automatic tongue who 
 visited Arkansas when he had fizzled out everywhere else. 
 Here he wrote lies about a great State and a good people 
 which netted him a fortune. He took up with Arkansas 
 people, received every courtesy at their hand, and for their 
 kindness made them appear ridiculous. But at last he was 
 run down by Eetribution and passed on to a community 
 where his apples were always served baked and his hot 
 water baths were free. 
 
 The Arkansas Girl. 
 
 A charming daughter of the New South who came des 
 perately near falling in love with the Liar Man because of 
 his worldly polish, his unselfish devotion to an aged mother, 
 his preference for the Baptist Church, ihis entnusiastic love 
 of Arkansas, and his utter and uncompromising hatred of 
 anything like a lie. 
 
 Jack. 
 
 A big-hearted, brolad-tehouldered, well-educated Son of 
 Arkansas who had "horse sense," had never spent any time 
 with affinities, had never smoked cigarettes with chorus girls 
 on the Bowery, had never rented a dress suit, dodged his 
 tailor, or jumped a board bill. He loved the Girl 
 
 The Fury. 
 
 A superannuated Affinity of the Liar Man's. He had 
 forcibly detached himself from the tenacity of her affections 
 some ten years before, but these same deserted affections 
 refused to die, and rigged in full war paint, and none 
 the more sweet-tempered because of her years of disap 
 pointing search, she was still an his track, though he knew 
 it not.
 
 DEDICATION 
 
 f I V O the cheerful ones who have at 
 - some time exaggerated, prevari 
 cated or falsified, this story is respectfully 
 dedicated, with the hope that each will 
 buy one copy, in which event its suc 
 cess is assured.
 
 FOREWORD. 
 
 Not Written by The Liar. 
 
 On a time long, long before the primitive ancestors of the 
 Ananias kind had outgrown their monkey habits, the Master 
 Workman of the Universe made a planet, which he ribbed 
 with rock, skirted with clouds, and hung in the firmament to 
 be fashioned by the forces of Nature into a fit habitation for 
 that princely animal, Mankind. 
 
 When Time had done its work, the Universal Workman 
 supplied the new-made planet with resources for the develop 
 ment of its future inhabitants. Soil and sunshine, silver 
 and gold, iron and zinc, forests and coal, precious stones and 
 healing waters, were supplied and to every section gave He 
 some treasure, to none gave He all. 
 
 When He had finished He found He had some treasure left 
 from every clime and section. There was coal, millions of 
 tons; there was tall timber, millions of feet; there was the 
 richest black soil yet spread in any fertile valley; there was 
 fruit land and prairie land; there was marble and zinc and 
 lead; a mountain of ceramic clay; there w*re pearls enough 
 to fill a river, an extinct volcano crater full of diamonds, 
 and the most wonderful hot springs in all the earth. 
 
 "What shall I do with it" the Master Workman said. 
 "If I put it all in one place the Human Animal will desert 
 every other spot on earth and fight for it." 
 
 W'ben He had thought, He reached out His hand of power 
 and tipping back the lowlying water from a yet inundated 
 section, He rent the new-made earth with mighty mountains 
 and here he moved His collection of treasures. 
 
 The black soil made river bottoms, the fruit sail made 
 uplands, the zinc was hid in the pockets of the mountains; 
 the tall timbers were sowed thick as grass and under the new 
 domain was hid strata on strata of coal. Pearls were scat 
 tered in the river bed and in the farthest corner behind th 
 roughest rocks was hid the store of diamonds. 
 
 When He had finished His crowning work the Master 
 Workman locked the treasure in Nature's bosom and left it 
 until future generations should learn to use the key of 
 Progress. 
 
 When the White Man came, <he found the Red Man of the 
 Arkansas Tribe in possession of this unknown store of treas 
 ure, and so he called his new discovery Arkansas.
 
 PORTRAITS OF THE LEADING MAN 
 
 When he landed in town, 
 
 He looked real good, 
 And received such treatment 
 
 As honest men should. 
 
 When he got a check 
 
 For his first big Me, 
 The man was so tickled 
 
 He feared he would die 
 
 When he met the 
 
 Arkansas Girl so sweet, 
 He reduced this grin 
 
 To something neat. 
 
 When the Arkansas Maiden 
 
 Said plainly "No!" 
 The Liar Man looked 
 
 Like the "tail of woe." 
 
 But when she arrived he had dodged for 
 years 
 
 And fell on his neck with a clinging kias, 
 The man who had told a thousand lies 
 Wished he were dead and looked like 
 
 This.
 
 "Jack" 
 
 8
 
 THE LIAR ARRIVES. 
 
 Some men lie to be funny 
 Some lie to keep out of jail; 
 
 Some men li to make money, 
 And her eon hangeth this tale. 
 
 It was in his system, but hadn't begun to 
 work out yet when he set foot on Arkansas soil : 
 and, having the appearance of an honest hus 
 tler, the Liar Man did not find it hard to get 
 acquainted with respectable people. 
 
 In due course of time he received invitations 
 to dine with business men, and later was hon 
 ored with a few invitations to visit at some of 
 their homes. 
 
 The hospitality of the Southern home had 
 gone as far as the history of its existence. The 
 Liar Man had heard of it, and accepted his first 
 invitation with pleasure. 
 
 The home in this case was of magnificent 
 Colonial style, bearing out the stately elegance 
 of the Old South, with every modern elegance 
 and comfort. 
 
 The Liar Man had on numerous occasions 
 enjoyed splendid homes from the " outside in." 
 The reason he wasn't in was because the occu 
 pants didn't like his style. 
 
 Now that he had an opportunity of enjoying 
 the best from the " inside out," he was de 
 lighted, and began to coach himself on the gen 
 tle art of " making out like he vas ust to it." 
 
 He found this home a dream of artistic
 
 beauty and an ideal of comfort, but its attrac 
 tions were immediately relegated to the roar 
 when he met the daughter of the house. 
 
 The Girl was a typical daughter of the South. 
 She was royally independent and charmingly 
 dependant; she was vivacious or serious as 
 occasion demanded; and, withal, she was wom- 
 
 A "Little Kocker." 
 
 anly and beautiful, and as loyal to her native 
 State as was her best friend "Jack" to her. 
 
 When the Liar Man was presented as a stran 
 ger who was much interested in Arkansas and 
 its development, the Grirl at once showed her 
 friendly interest by inviting him to her " Ar 
 kansas Boom." 
 
 10
 
 "This is our 'show room for strangers,," 
 she explained. * ' So many visitors come to our 
 home who have wrong ideas about the wonder 
 ful resources of our State and the talent of our 
 people that we have arranged this as a little 
 educational proposition. Everything in it, from 
 the marble mantel and the pretty tiling to the 
 hand-carved oak table, is home made. Then 
 there is a shelf of books by Arkansas writers- 
 poetry, fiction, history, essays and text-books. 
 One of our writers, a well-known member of the 
 Society of Arts of London and the National 
 Art Club of New York, is author of an art 
 classic; one of our historians has a national 
 reputation, and Arkansas has furnished Ma 
 sonry of the world its poet laureate. And our 
 artists'? Oh, yes, we have them, and it has 
 been left for one of the best in both New York 
 and Paris to be from Arkansas. And music- 
 listen!" and she seated herself at a piano, ran 
 her fingers over the keys, and sang that popular 
 little song, "Honey, Make My Dream Gome 
 True." 
 
 As the Girl sang the Liar Man felt a great 
 big sentimental feeling creeping over him. It 
 was not a shaft from Cupid's dart. Cupid had 
 long ago passed him up as a bad case. But it 
 was a substitute that made him wish he could 
 be singing the song to her with the assurance 
 that she would not deny its brave request. 
 
 "How is that for Arkansas?" the Girl said, 
 laughing, and when she told him she had lots 
 more nice songs by Arkansas composers and 
 he looked dreadfully lonesome and longingly at 
 
 11
 
 12
 
 her, and hungry to hear them, she invited him 
 to spend an evening with " Arkansas musi 
 cians," and he said he would. 
 
 After the Girl had told the Liar Man about 
 some of the best private libraries in the city 
 and had given him the information- he desired 
 of some of its most important social and 
 study organizations, they sat down to get 
 better acquainted, and before dinner was an 
 nounced the Girl had been informed in a deli 
 cate and charming manner by the Liar Man 
 that the reason he had thus far pursued the 
 lonely path of the bachelor boy was because 
 of his great and powerful devotion to an aged 
 and infirm mother. 
 
 This self-sacrifice appealed to the Girl, and 
 when he followed it up by mentioning incident 
 ally that he was brought up in the Baptist faith 
 she felt that she could trust him implicitly. 
 This move into the Baptist faith was a happy 
 thought of the Liar Man, who took his tip from 
 the sight of a well-read Baptist paper on the 
 library table. And when the Liar Man waxed 
 eloquent in his praise of Arkansas and her peo 
 ple, and paid a tribute to Arkansas women be 
 side which the most flowery speech he had ever 
 made a chorus girl turned pale, the Arkansas 
 Girl was delighted with her new acquaintance, 
 and wished Jack had traveled as much and 
 could say as nice things as the Liar Man. 
 
 Then came dinner at a table shining with sil 
 ver and cut-glass, correct in its appointments 
 and most delightful in informal hospitality. 
 The perfume of choice flowers filled the air, and 
 
 13
 
 once more outside the Colonial mansion, he 
 looked back, rubbed his eyes and wondered, like 
 in the adjoining conservatory the song of birds 
 made sweet music. 
 When it was all over, and the Liar Man stood 
 
 They're Great on Having a Head for Things in Arkansas 
 
 Aladdin, if it were true, and then smiled at 
 thought of the Girl. She was as far superior to 
 any type of woman he had even known as she 
 was different, and he determined to cultivate 
 her friendship. 
 
 Meantime Jack, blissfully ignorant of the in 
 roads made in her estimation of him by the 
 Liar Man, enjoyed his pipe-dream of the time 
 when the Girl would leave the Colonial man 
 sion for a little rose-grown home he was saving 
 money to buy. 
 
 14
 
 THE "ARKANSAS TRAVELER." 
 
 The next morning after his dinner at the 
 Colonial mansion the Liar Man started on a 
 journey out into the country after something- 
 nobody knew what. 
 
 As he traveled he became so lost in happy 
 reflections of his meeting with the Grirl that he 
 lost his way, and after wandering around in the 
 sticks for a few hours he came in sight of a 
 humble home occupied by an aged couple of 
 poor country folk. 
 
 The Liar Man reined his horse, asked a few 
 questions, and finding that he was far from 
 home, accepted an invitation to " light, take 
 a bite and rest." 
 
 The back-country man had no cut-glass and 
 would not have known an olive from a cocktail. 
 His wife's bare shoulders had never glistened 
 above a Paris gown ; they were not of the glis 
 tening kind. He had no conservatory with 
 orchids. He had no orchestra playing heavenly 
 music behind a screen of palms. But the Liar 
 Man was not so accustomed to these things that 
 he couldn't get along one night without them, 
 so he accepted the invitation to stop until 
 morning. 
 
 His hostess proved to be a motherly old lady, 
 who welcomed him cordially and immediately 
 set about preparing him food. When it was 
 ready it was not served in courses, with mono- 
 
 15
 
 Faculty Meeting at the University of Arkansas. 
 
 gram napkins and Bohemian finger-bowls, and 
 she did not sit opposite him and shake scintilla 
 tions from diamond ear-bobs into his dazzled 
 eyes. He sat down to a meal of hot corn cakes, 
 a pitcher of buttermilk, a slice of juicy ham, 
 and some fresh butter and honey ; and while he 
 ate, his hostess, who was fat and wobbled like 
 a bowl of jelly, stayed near to give him fresh 
 cakes and pour his milk ; and if her hospitality 
 was not as glittering, it was as genuine as that 
 of the day before. 
 
 When it came time to retire the "stranger" 
 was shown to a low room overhead, where a 
 
 16
 
 Suggested by a Visit to the Arkansas Legislature.
 
 freckled boy with stubby hair already occupied 
 the bed. The "stranger" crawled in and slept 
 the sleep of the just, for as yet he had not lied 
 on Arkansas. 
 
 In the morning, when he awoke, the freckled 
 boy had disappeared, having stolen away 
 quietly lest he should awaken the "stranger." 
 
 He glanced about and noticed a turkey-tail 
 fan hanging over the bed. He remembered this 
 afterward, and it proved to be worth, money to 
 him made into a hen in a story. 
 
 After a good breakfast the freckled boy 
 brought his horse and he was directed on his 
 way. 
 
 Because his host had never read "Chester 
 field's Letters to His Son," nor his hostess 
 attended a finishing school at Washington some 
 little extras were omitted in his entertainment, 
 such as pump-handle handshaking and insincere 
 flattery, but the aged country couple had shown 
 their kindly feeling for the "stranger," and 
 that was more than he did for them, for out of 
 this visit grew the famous "Arkansas Trav 
 eler" story. 
 
 In this story he described his first meal in 
 Arkansas as consisting of generous chunks of 
 female swine bosom only he called it by an 
 other name, and further described it as being 
 decorated with "buttons;" the milk, thick with 
 flecks of yellow butter, had turned into lye, 
 which he drank because it was called coffee, 
 and which skinned his throat; the flakey bread 
 was "dodger" that he wished he had dodged, 
 and the honey and butter was stewed pumpkin 
 
 18
 
 sweetened with sorghum. The turkey-tail fan 
 had evoluted into a sick hen which roosted on 
 the head of the bed, face to the wall; the boy 
 had multiplied many times, and slept "seven- 
 
 Rus/in<?ss Men From All Sections Attend Conventions in 
 Little Rock. 
 
 teen in a bed in Arkansas;" the fat and moth 
 erly hostess was pictured as a cadaverous hag 
 with one tooth, who scraped potatoes with her 
 toenails, and simplified housework by letting the 
 dogs lick the frying-pan. The honest old host 
 
 19
 
 had retrograded back toward the human ani 
 mal of the stone age, wild eyed and with cuckle- 
 burrs in his whiskers, which extended all over 
 his body. He wore wide-top boots; the leg of 
 one filled with bottled "bug juice," the other 
 loaded with bowie knives. 
 
 The rosebush by the doorway had changed 
 under- the magic of his pen into the hide of 
 some impossible animal which was nailed to 
 the side of the house, and the song of the mock 
 ing bird was turned into the bedlam of a thou 
 sand frogs that "barked like hounds" in a 
 nearby swamp. 
 
 The Liar Man had eaten reprehensible diet 
 on the Bowery, where the mingled smell of 
 slop, sour beer, spoiled cabbage, moldy dish 
 water and unwashed immigrants would have 
 driven a native Arkansan to despair. He had 
 heard all sorts of sounds and seen all sorts of 
 sights, but it had never occurred to his mind to 
 write them up and deliver them to the world 
 as prima facie evidence of New York's uncivil 
 ized and barbaric condition. 
 
 But Arkansas was different from New York. 
 He could afford to write about Arkansas; pro 
 vided he didn't sign his own name. So he 
 wrote, sent the "Arkansas Traveler" away, 
 and in return received a check. 
 _ Meantime he had called on the Girl and de 
 lighted her with a lovely story of the gracious 
 hospitality of the old country couple, of their 
 humble home made charming even in its pov 
 erty by trailing roses and the songs of mocking 
 birds, and he drew a fine picture of an old 
 
 20
 
 springhouse which had never existed, and told 
 her how delicious the milk tasted that had been 
 cooled in its bubbling fountain. And to cap the 
 climax of this interesting report he brought the 
 Girl a toast which he had made over from a 
 book of poems, and told her he iiad written it 
 himself. 
 
 TO ARKANSAS. 
 
 Where was it Nature's lavish hand 
 Prepared the best and happiest land? 
 In that great State so good and grand 
 In Arkansas. 
 
 Where are men brave to do and dare? 
 Where are the women fond and fair? 
 Where peace and plenty? Take me there 
 To Arkansas. 
 
 The Girl was delighted with this toast, and 
 she felt a growing admiration for the Liar Man 
 which boded ill for Jack's peace of mind when 
 he should discover it. 
 
 Brilliant Member of the Arkansas Bar. 
 
 21
 
 Infant Industries Flourish. 
 
 --^
 
 THE ARKANSAS LEGISLATURE. 
 
 The Liar Man's first article came out in a 
 funny paper under the alluring caption, "Po- 
 dunk in Arkansas," in which Podunk was rep 
 resented as a traveler bent on securing an un 
 biased account of the manners and customs of 
 an unknown people. 
 
 The success of this first story and the 
 cheering proportions of the check it brought 
 spurred him on to more daring deeds of valor 
 in the literary world, if literature deserves to 
 be thus scandalized, and in looking about for 
 something else to describe he strolled into the 
 Arkansas Legislature. 
 
 Here he found a body composed of lawyers, 
 teachers, farmers, business men and a few poli 
 ticians, known by their patent-leather shoes and 
 their eminently pious and peaceful counte 
 nances. The lawyers and teachers and business 
 men looked about as average men do ; the farm 
 ers were not wearing patent-leather; they had 
 too much regard for the comfort of their feet, 
 and their tastes also ran to low collars worn 
 loose. One fat old patriarch from Buckhorn 
 Township had discarded his altogether, and 
 considered it nobody's business if he chose to 
 leave his short neck free to work in its socket 
 rather than to be hampered on every side by 
 stiff linen, " which was powerful expensive" 
 when it came to washing. 
 
 23
 
 The unconventional old brother meant no dis 
 respect to his patent-leather colleagues, and 
 had more sense in a minute than some of the 
 men who sympathized with his lack of aesthetic 
 taste, but he proved to be the very hint need 
 ful to the Liar Man, who was spoiling to write 
 another funny story descriptive of Arkansas 
 from the viewpoint of Podunk. 
 
 The Legislator-Elect Beads Law. 
 
 He had watched the course of legislation and 
 had seen it crystallizing into such laws as the 
 initiative and referendum, uniform text-books, 
 State sanitarium for tuberculosis, game laws, 
 appropriations for benevolent and educational 
 institutions, and he had witnessed the gamest 
 fight he had ever seen in a legislature over the 
 question of state-wide prohibition. In short, 
 he found such legislation as a moral and peace 
 able commonwealth finds necessary in a day of 
 advanced civilization. 
 
 It was not of good laws, but of lawmakers, 
 the Liar Man proposed to write, and when he 
 
 24
 
 saw the Buckhorn member appear without a 
 collar, his inspiration was complete, and he 
 wrote what he mentally dubbed a " cracker- 
 jack" about the Hay Seed and Hill Billie as 
 Lawmakers. 
 
 In this story he pictured an election time in 
 the rural districts of Arkansas, and described 
 the animation that took place at the hill billie's 
 home when it became certain he was, to go to 
 the great city of Little Rock to help make laws. 
 His wife caught him immediately, curried his 
 whiskers, and began to cut his hair. This job 
 took all day, and the top of one ear was cut off 
 in trying to get hold of the heavy growth that 
 hid it. After the haircutting his good wife 
 made him a new pair of pants, and the neigh 
 bors, proud to be of service, contributed a sum 
 sufficient to purchase a black oilcloth valise. 
 Meantime, the newly-elected lawmaker got an 
 almanac and a blue-back spejler, and stole away 
 to educate himself so that he might be able to 
 protect the interests of his people against the 
 machinations of the ''high-collared roosters" 
 that would tax him and "his'n" until he would 
 not have enough left to buy "cut-plug." On 
 the fateful day of his departure the whole fam 
 ily drove twenty miles in an oxcart and for the 
 first time saw a "choo-choo" train, which 
 scared the three youngest children into fits and 
 made the lawmaker himself nervous. 
 
 Immediately upon reaching the city the legis 
 lator set out to search for a wagon-yard, and 
 was delighted on finding it to meet several fel 
 low lawmakers. After getting a ten-cent lunch 
 
 25
 
 "SAL 00 /V
 
 they took hold of hands so nothing could steal 
 them and set out to see the town. In their trav 
 els they met a Senator. At first he did not 
 have their confidence, his store-bought clothing 
 darkly hinting that he might be a boodler. But 
 he produced credentials, and with him they 
 took their first taste of city high life by rid 
 ing on electric cars. 
 
 They all enjoyed it but the Senator, whose 
 watch gave him trouble. Every time the con 
 ductor rung up a fare the Senator set his watch 
 five minutes ahead, by the register, and by the 
 time he had gone around twice and the register 
 marked twenty-seven, he called the conductor 
 and inquired what kind of a "l:lam<vl clock" 
 he was running his car by. 
 
 After the ride the party went sightseeing on 
 Main street, and paused before a display win 
 dow showing gents' hose. 
 
 "By gum! Does everybody wear them 
 things?" the First Man asked. 
 
 "By hen! They must," said the Second. 
 
 "By heck! Men's getting to be just like whn- 
 men, hain't they!" said the Third. 
 
 "By golly!" exclaimed the Fourth, with his 
 eyes set on a pair of purple beauties with red 
 lines on them, "them's the prettiest I ever 
 seen. I've a mind to try a set when I draw 
 pay, I be durned if I hevn't." And when he 
 learned that the Senator wore sox, he said he 
 might get "two set." 
 
 After lunching on a hamburger, they turned 
 their faces toward the wagon-yard, but were in 
 duced by the Senator to move to a four-dollar 
 
 27
 
 boarding house as a residence more fitting the 
 dignity of their positions in life. 
 
 Here they said their prayers and crawled in, 
 leaving the last man to put out the light. He 
 
 Arkansas Female Suffragist 
 
 blew hard, and when his lung power was all 
 but exhausted a fellow from under the cover 
 called, "Put out that there light!" 
 28
 
 "I can't. The blame thing's in a bottle." 
 
 "Blow in good and hard." 
 
 "I can't git the stopper out." 
 
 And then they all crawled out and examined 
 the stopper, and finally retired, leaving it to 
 burn. 
 
 This was a specimen of what the Liar Man 
 wrote. The supposed-to-be-funny jokes were as 
 old as the hills, but it didn't matter. Few of 
 those who read it would ever visit the Arkansas 
 Legislature; and, after giving out the informa 
 tion that booze and prosperity meant the same 
 to the Arkansas Legislature, and putting on all 
 sorts of finishing touches, he went out to an XV. 
 dinner at the home of the Girl. Here he met a 
 brilliant party composed of business and profes 
 sional men, among them being iwo Senators 
 and a couple of Representatives. Their broad 
 cloth was cut in correct lines, their table man 
 ners made him have hard work in acting "like 
 he vas ust to it," and he couldn't keep up with 
 the conversation, for it took in national and 
 international topics with which he was sadly 
 unfamiliar. 
 
 But he enjoyed the oysters and fish and salad> 
 and hoped to see the Girl a few minutes before 
 he went home. 
 
 His wish was granted, and the compliments 
 he paid the lawmaking body of Arkansas and 
 its members would have made a small book. 
 The Girl appreciated this. Meantime, the best 
 batch of lies he had yet written was on its way 
 abroad to add further to the fame of Podunk. 
 
 29 1
 
 30
 
 JACK MAKES CHARGES. 
 
 The Country Club at Little Bock, with a 
 membership of one hundred of the represent 
 ative citizens of the Capital City, offered a fine 
 opportunity for the Liar Man to get acquainted 
 with many he had not as yet met, and after a 
 time the long-hoped-for invitation came, and 
 he was a guest of the club. After- a delightful 
 ride on the famous Pulaski Heights electric 
 line, popular on account of its splendid scenery 
 and fine service, and a short walk through a fine 
 bit of wood, the Liar Man found himself at the 
 Country Club, where he was received with that 
 cordiality that marks the Southerner. Here, at 
 one of the best appointed country clubs in the 
 South, he smoked, golfed, enjoyed the magnifi 
 cent view and told tales which added to his im 
 portance by those who believed them. 
 
 But there were those who took his stories 
 with a grain of allowance, and some even went 
 so far as to accept the statement of their abso 
 lute truth with a mental reservation that, told 
 out loud, would not have sounded hospitable. 
 
 One of these happened to be Jack. 
 
 That night the broad-shouldered Arkansan 
 called on the Girl. 
 
 "I met a fellow at the Country Club today 
 who gave out the impression that he has a pretty 
 good stand-in out here. Who is he I" Jack de 
 manded. 
 
 31
 
 "What did he say?" the Girl answered. 
 
 "It wasn't so much what he said as the infer 
 ence he left. It made me red-headed. ' ' 
 
 "There's nothing to get red-headed about. 
 Father brought him out here one night, and I 
 invited him to come again. He is thoroughly in 
 
 Printing* 
 
 love with our people, and so enthusiastic over 
 the future of our State that I enjoy talking to 
 him. ' ' 
 
 'And he's been coming to see you?" 
 'Not exactly to see me." 
 "But he sees you?" 
 
 Copyright, 1909, by Mrs. Bemie Babcock
 
 New Edition 
 
 33
 
 "He's seen me a few times." 
 
 "I don't know what you find in him what 
 is it a woman admires about a smooth-tongued 
 fellow of his kind? Honest, Margaret, what is 
 it?" 
 
 "He's a lovely, cultured gentleman. He 
 comes of a fine family, his ancestry running 
 back through three hundred years of Cavalier 
 stock. His grandfather founded a big ^ New 
 York publishing house, in which he has inter 
 ests. He is talented, and writes beautiful 
 poetry, and he never had a sister and is lone 
 some in a strange place, and I think it's as little 
 as we can do when men of his ability visit our 
 State to treat them kindly." 
 
 Jack was silent. He was trying to recall 
 something he had heard the Liar Man tell at 
 the club. 
 
 Then he said: "And so you like him. Well, 
 / do not, and I'm going to tell you why. I have 
 sized him up as a full-fledged, unmitigated liar 
 of the thoroughbred sort. ; and you know that 
 I hate a liar as well as I love you." 
 
 The Girl flushed. "Jack," she said, sharply, 
 "you make an awful charge against a friend 
 of mine!" 
 
 "How do you know he's not a liar?" 
 
 "How do I know it? Why, do you suppose 
 a man who is as devoted as he is to his Chris 
 tian mother would tell lies ? ' ' 
 
 "How do you know he has a Christian moth 
 er?" 
 
 "He says she is a Christian. He ought to 
 know!" 
 
 34
 
 "How do you know he has any mother at 
 all?" 
 
 "He says so. That's why!" 
 
 Jack smiled. "Liars nearly always tell lies," 
 he observed. 
 
 "He couldn't tell a lie," she continued. 
 "He's a good Baptist." 
 
 "Who said so?" 
 
 "He did." 
 
 "Hard on the Baptists," Jack observed, "but 
 a liar will lie, Baptist or no Baptist. This man 
 is a liar, and if you were not a good little Sun 
 day-school girl I would give you a bracing good 
 idea of what kind of a liar I think he is." 
 
 "I am shocked, Jack," the Girl exclaimed. 
 1 1 1 never thought you would use such language. 
 It's almost as bad as swearing to call a man a 
 liar, and it's dangerous, too. Lots of men have 
 been killed for calling other men liars." 
 
 "Are you afraid the clever tale-teller will 
 blast the fond hope of my parents and send me 
 to an untimely end by taking my young life? If 
 you are, calm your fear, mademoiselle!" said 
 Jack with melodramatic effect. And then he 
 laughed. 
 
 This was unfortunate. It always made the 
 Girl mad to be laughed at by Jack, and he knew 
 it. 
 
 "Don't worry about me, little girl," he con 
 tinued, "but look out for the other fellow or 
 I'll catch him out here some night and make 
 his smiling countenance look like calf liver." 
 
 The Girl's eyes were flashing and her cheeks 
 had red spots on now. 
 
 35
 
 "I think," she said haughtily, "that you had 
 better not take any chances on meeting my 
 friend out here at least not until you cool 
 down somewhat and settle back into the habits 
 of a gentleman. I should not like to have any 
 friend least of all this one, insulted by being 
 called a liar, and to see his face beat into calf 
 liver would certainly be very embarrassing!" 
 
 Ordinarily Jack would have laughed again. 
 
 Street Scene at Brinklev. 
 
 But the situation was getting serious. He had 
 never seen her more angry, and he didn't like 
 the way she spoke to him. 
 
 "I didn't know your friendship with him had 
 reached this acute stage," he observed. 
 
 "I think a great deal of 'him." she observed 
 stiffly. 
 
 Jack was both surprised and angry. 
 
 He hesitated a moment, then turned toward 
 the door. 
 
 1 1 Good-bye, Kid, ' ' he said. " I'll not be back 
 until you send for me. ' ' 
 
 36
 
 "I CHOOSE YOU." 
 
 The evening following Jack's last call on the 
 Girl, the Liar Man came and had a little talk 
 with the girl on ideals, and after delicately inti 
 mating that he had found his ideal woman and 
 that she was not far away, he asked what quali 
 ties she most admired in men. 
 
 "I like purpose, honesty, strength, and above 
 all, sincerity," she said. "There is so much 
 hypocrisy, so much thin veneer, so much that is 
 untrue. I hate insincerity. As an indication of 
 character it is an unerring sign of weakness 
 and duplicity. The woman or man who says 
 sweet words to one's face and sticks the dag 
 ger of insinuating criticism in one's back is 
 dangerous always, and when a man's ability 
 puts him in a position to treat national men and 
 affairs, or communities and commonwealths, he 
 becomes an element in society that society 
 should put down when he is false. A lie is not 
 a nice topic for polite conversation; to charge 
 any man or woman with being a liar is to say 
 the worst, for back of a lie is a motive, and in 
 this motive hides the danger. And yet there 
 are liars, and some, who will not make a lie, 
 love one. When I was little I learned a verse 
 about "whosoever loveth or maketh a lie." I 
 believe liars are an abomination to the Lord, 
 and in this respect at least I am like Him, ' ' and 
 the Girl paused. 
 
 37
 
 The Liar Man smiled at her last remark, and 
 then leaned back in his leather chair and let an 
 expression, sad and wistful, creep over his face. 
 
 "How our childhood stays with us!" he said 
 in a subdued tone, as if treading on the thresh 
 old of sacred memories. "I learned the same 
 verse, when I was little that you did, and at 
 my mother's knee was taught that a lie is an 
 abomination to the Lord. No man can more 
 appreciate your sentiment on this question 
 than I." 
 
 And then he produced a poem which, he said, 
 he had written, and which was to appear in a 
 handsome volume he was issuing through the 
 printing plant in which he had vested interests. 
 
 The poem was entitled, "I Choose You!" 
 
 I CHOOSE YOU. 
 
 The world is a wide one that holds you and me, 
 
 And peopled with folks false and true, 
 
 That charm many hearts as they come and they go- 
 But 1 choose you. 
 
 There are others bewitching, entrancing and gay, 
 
 There are types of the old and the new; 
 
 There are those who have fortunes some few who have 
 fame 
 
 But I choose you. 
 
 I choose you, dear heart, for I love only one, 
 
 Without you the world would be blue; 
 
 So in all the vast throng you are dearest to me 
 
 And I choose you. 
 Copyright, 1908, Mrs. Bernie Babcock. 
 
 This poem he stole from an out-of-print num 
 ber of the "Arkansas Sketch Book." He hesi 
 tated about appropriating it, but finally de 
 cided, since it appeared without a name, that if 
 the Girl had once seen it and raised any ques- 
 
 38
 
 tion as to its author, he would tell her he con 
 tributed to the " Sketch Book" and received 
 ten dollars for it. 
 
 But the Girl asked no questions. She slept 
 with it under her pillow and wished Jack 
 had more sentiment in his make-up. He never 
 wrote a poem in his life and escaped reading 
 as many as possible. 
 
 Eastern Arkansas Planter. 
 
 39
 
 AN ODE TO ARKANSAS. 
 
 Written for the Arkansas Press Association of 1908. 
 
 An L. E. Or. I mean to write 
 
 2 U, dear Bkansaw, 
 A State without a || 
 
 Yet charged with many a flaw. 
 
 In fl's hard to XQ'S 
 
 Is shown a lOdenC 
 By people & by press abroad 
 
 Our critics fierce 2 B. 
 
 They say our heads E MT Is 
 
 Of all I D A's new; 
 Our progress has gone 2 D K 
 
 & we E going 2. 
 
 They from the truth do D V 8. 
 
 With confidence B 9 
 Mbrace your oppur2niT 
 
 To tell them they are 
 
 Don't B 2 EZ. U have had 
 
 Great 40tude B4. 
 Get out your t, if need B, 
 
 And wade through C 's of gore. 
 
 We do not try 2 cut a 
 
 Nor seem so 1 drous y's, 
 Though we have Sty times more sense 
 
 Than those who tales Dvise. 
 
 The riches of our State would cause 
 
 A happy! 
 The beauty of our girls XQ's 
 
 A plea for annexation. 
 
 Should NE NV B aroused 
 
 'Tis done by Nature's SS" 
 Who blessed with beauty & great wealth 
 
 This of the land. 
 
 Here's 2 U Ekansaw Old State!' 
 
 Wake up! Use all your I's 
 In XLNC U XL, 
 
 In spite of all the lies. 
 
 40
 
 THE LIAR TELLS THE TRUTH 
 
 The Liar Man had been out of the city sev 
 eral weeks, making a tour of Arkansas with 
 the Business Men's Club, which intended giv 
 ing the State some extensive advertising, and 
 on this State-wide trip he had secured sufficient 
 information about Arkansas' present prosper 
 ous condition and the opportunities the future 
 promised its wonderful resources, to distort 
 into a whole library of lies. 
 
 These he began to write for the Podunk 
 Papers, but it was none of these he told the 
 Girl the evening he spent telling her the inci 
 dents of his trip. 
 
 In his account he took the Girl with him on 
 an imaginary trip. After a pleasant ride over 
 the Rock Island, at which stops were made at 
 numerous thriving towns along the way, they 
 arrived in the border city of Arkansas, Fort 
 Smith. Here they received a royal welcome. 
 The Liar Man found seventy-five miles of 
 paved streets to go automobiling on; he found 
 sixty manufacturing plants, among them that 
 of the Fort Smith Refrigerator Company, mak 
 ing the finest ice-boxes in the country, and the 
 Fort Smith Cracker Company, which gave him 
 leave to eat as many as he wanted of their two 
 hundred kinds of cakes and crackers. He found 
 a great brick plant baking brick in three ovens 
 each with a capacity of 100,000 and having 
 
 41
 
 orders for three years ahead to supply Fort 
 Smith's demands. He found this great plant 
 using natural gas as fuel, and learned that 
 within a radius of ten miles of Fort Smith 
 there are over sixty natural gas wells, with a 
 daily output of 100,000,000 feet, and that this 
 fuel costs less than the cost of handling coal, 
 even though the latter is close at hand. He found 
 
 A Bunch, of i'ort Smith Farmers. 
 
 churches and homes and schools, the public 
 schools having a fund of a million dollars. He 
 found splendid electric car service, an Elec 
 tric Park that made him think of his "own dear 
 Coney" as the brightness of its first view met 
 his eye, and a Country Club built and main 
 tained in a manner that would do credit to New 
 York. 
 
 From Fort Smith he went to Van Buren, and 
 picked up some figures on the fruit shipment 
 from this section, which netted shippers for 
 
 42
 
 strawberries $500,000, for peaches $700,000, 
 and for potatoes $700,000 in one season. He 
 visited Fayetteville, the "Athens of Ar 
 kansas," and was surprised and delighted 
 at the University of Arkansas. When the 
 Liar Man arrived in the tale of his. travels 
 at the home of the big red apple, he de 
 scribed the country in such glowing terms 
 that the Girl hardly recognized her own 
 home land, and when he recounted the courte 
 sies shown his party everywhere, from Boone- 
 ville to Siloam Springs and from Yellville to 
 Harrison, she was more than ever certain that 
 no better people could be found in any land or 
 clime than those in Arkansas, and thought the 
 Liar made a pretty enough speech to print 
 when he spoke of the "long-extended orchard" 
 in "the garden spot of the world," and said 
 the people of Northwest Arkansas were as good 
 to get acquainted with as their apples were to 
 eat and as true at heart. She didn't know, 
 poor Girl, that he had already written a hun 
 dred pages of something that didn't sound any 
 thing like what he was telling her. 
 
 Fort Smith 'a Four Hundred Put on a Heap of Style. 
 
 43
 
 He described to the Girl a visit to the famous 
 Poole fruit farm at Ozark, and a delightful en 
 tertainment at ' ' The Cabin, ' ' the summer home 
 in the Ozark Mountains of one of Little Rock's 
 popular business men. He mentioned the cul 
 ture and refinement he found at every turn, 
 and the prosperity and progress he found 
 working hand in hand at Russellville and other 
 towns on the Fort Smith road. He had nice 
 things to say of Conway and Morrillton, of Au 
 gusta and Hope and Newport and Jonesboro, 
 of Magnolia and Texarkana, of Arkadelphia, 
 where he found a great milling plant ; of Pine 
 Bluff, which he described as the " queen city of 
 lumber and cotton," and devoted some time to 
 describing. He made the Girl proud and 
 pleased with his glowing account of the new 
 roads and highways at Pine Bluff, of its won 
 derful mills and its big-hearted, progressive 
 people. He told about the prairie cities; of 
 Stuttgart, with its rice mill and other indus 
 tries; Lonoke, and the flourishing cities and 
 towns in Eastern Arkansas, where millions of 
 acres of the richest land in the world yield 
 such crops as can nowhere but in such soil be 
 duplicated. He was a guest at Blytheville and 
 numerous other Eastern Arkansas stopping 
 points; and from them all brought something 
 encouraging to tell the Girl, who was delighted 
 to hear so good an account of her State, and 
 especially glad that it came to her from an out 
 sider who was beginning to make Jack's dream 
 of the rose-grown cottage take on mighty un 
 certain outlines. 
 
 44
 
 When lie had set forth the rich resources of 
 Arkansas as he had seen them, he counted off 
 a list of health resorts he had discovered in 
 Arkansas from Hot Springs, where European 
 nobility comes to boil out and retired capital 
 ists congregate just to see which can outdo the 
 other in the delightful abandon of spending 
 thousands of dollars as other men spend 
 nickles, to Heber, tucked away in the moun 
 tains, a delightful resting place for the trav 
 eler who doesn't wish to yacht or golf or 
 appear in full dress for dinner or play poker 
 or flirt with a chorus girl. The Girl had long 
 known of Arkansas' health resorts, and had vis 
 ited most of them, but she liked to hear the Liar 
 Man give his impressions, and listened as if it 
 were entirely new as he told of Eureka Springs, 
 with its fine hotels and glorious environs; of 
 Magazine, the beautiful blue pile that holds its 
 head in the clouds; of Mount Nebo, with its 
 unparalelled view of the valleys, its many 
 attractions, not the least being the quality of 
 the people one meets there; Monte Ne, than 
 which there can be no more delightful place for 
 the summer tourist; Lake Village, with its his 
 toric lake and fine fishing; Potash Sulphur, 
 Mammoth Springs, Silioam Spring, and numer 
 ous other mountain and spring places. Last, 
 but not least, Caddb Gap Springs, which have 
 bubbled into the limelight to draw their share 
 of health and pleasure-seekers. 
 
 These and other places 'of interest the Liar 
 Man and the Girl discussed, and when she asked 
 him why he didn't write about them as he had 
 
 45
 
 told her of them, so that all the world might 
 know a stranger's impressions of Arkansas, he 
 said he had thought of it, and, while his talent 
 lay mostly in the direction of poetry, he might 
 later get up a series of articles on "A Stran 
 ger's Impressions of Arkansas." 
 
 The Liar Man had a lot of stories to tell the 
 Girl, but he had spent so much time discoursing 
 about Arkansas and recounting its opportuni 
 ties, that he had to go. And, after receiving 
 an invitation to call the next night and tell the 
 stories, he hustled off to add a few lines to 
 'Podunk's lastest. A thought had come to him, 
 which, properly distorted, would make story 
 matter, and he wanted to get it down before it 
 got away. 
 
 Helena Club Woman 
 
 46
 
 THE LIAE TELLS A FEW LIES. 
 
 One of the charming little stories the Liar 
 Man told the Arkansas Girl was about another 
 Arkansas Girl he met in the mountains. 
 
 He had gone on a yachting party up White 
 River to get information about pearl fishing, 
 with a view of establishing a button factory, so 
 he said. 
 
 With the skill of an artist the Liar Man de 
 scribed the scenery along White River as 
 charming as that of the Hudson, with its blue- 
 topped mountains, its picturesque gorges 
 clothed with verdure, its forests and waterfalls. 
 The fact was he had not been traveling with an 
 eye for natural scenery, and was giving the 
 Girl a description read from a book of travels, 
 but she did not know it. He described the pearl 
 fishers at work, and told the Girl he got on the 
 track of a beautiful violet pearl which he in 
 tended to secure and present to her, and he 
 -quoted a couplet about an "Arkansas girl and 
 an Arkansas pearl," which made her sorry he 
 couldn't get the pearl. He didn't tell her the rea 
 son he failed to get the pearl was because there 
 was no such pearl, and, if there had been, his 
 present bank account would not have permitted 
 an investment. After the pearl industry intro 
 duction, he described a trip into the mountains, 
 and told the mountain maid story. In this he 
 painted a picture of a rosy-cheeked maiden com- 
 
 47
 
 48
 
 ing down a shady path with a calf. Her soft 
 tresses were blowing in the wind and her short 
 skirt disclosed a pair of beautifully shaped 
 ankles and chubby feet. The calf was a little 
 pet, a white-faced Hereford, and was as gentle 
 as a kitten. 
 
 It was a beautiful picture, and the Girl had 
 no means of knowing that what he really did 
 meet was a barefoot country girl driving a 
 yearling which was not even second cousin to a 
 Hereford, and which was, so far from being 
 gentle as a kitten, that it butted the Liar Man 
 out of the path because he was not gentleman 
 enough to step into the wet grass and let the 
 girl have right of way. The only honest touch 
 he left to the picture was a snuff stick in the 
 girl's mouth, and this nearly spoiled the pretty 
 story for the Girl. 
 
 When she showed her disapproval of the 
 snuff brush, and the short skirt, the Liar Man 
 at once proved to her^that it was no worse for 
 a country girl to dip a sweet gum twig into 
 ground tobacco and hold it in her mouth than 
 for a society girl to roll her tobacco in a ciga 
 rette and smoke it. The country girl carried 
 her tobacco in a little tin box, the city girl car 
 ried hers in a silver cigarette case. Which was 
 worse? And then, in a fatherly and delicate 
 manner, he showed the Girl that Dame Fashion 
 stood sponsor for exceeding scarcity of wear 
 ing apparel on the female human frame if the 
 starting point be well taken, a shortness of ap 
 parel going down being permissible. Inasmuch 
 as custom permits this shortage of garment go- 
 
 49
 
 ing down, why should custom condemn no great 
 er scarcity when the starting point was the other 
 mean extremity? The Girl had never thought 
 of the matter in this light, and the fatherly wis 
 dom of the Liar Man was even more attractive 
 to her than his talent for poetry. 
 
 Another story he told her was of a fox hunt 
 in Eastern Arkansas when he was the guest of 
 a well-known Senator who knows every fox trail 
 in Arkansas and has the finest pack of hounds 
 in the State. 
 
 "Did you kill a fox?" the Girl asked eagerly. 
 "I've always wanted a brush." 
 
 "No, but I killed a bear," the Liar Man said, 
 and then he explained why he didn't get a fox, 
 and told how he got the bear. The story was 
 so exciting the Girl held her breath and feared 
 for the life of her brave friend, and if she had 
 not seen him before her, she would have been 
 certain he met death, so hazardous was his posi 
 tion and so enraged the bear. 
 
 She had no means of knowing the bear was 
 made over from a half-starved pig, and that the 
 party who was doing the running was the man 
 instead of the bear. 
 
 Once, a long time after, when she and Jack 
 were entertaining in their own little home, she 
 heard the story from the Senator and laughed 
 as heartily as Jack. 
 
 She didn't know yet that she ever would hear 
 an untruth escape from the lips of the brave 
 bear-killer, and, so far as Jack was concerned, 
 she hadn't thought of the little home with him 
 for a month. 
 
 Jack surmised as much. That's what hurt. 
 
 50
 
 HOW THE RAZOR-BACK HAPPENED. 
 
 One of the most successful lies the Liar Man 
 told on Arkansas was the outgrowth of his tour 
 over Arkansas with the Business Men's Spe 
 cial. 
 
 At every point he shut his eyes to facts and 
 conjured up far-fetched tales. The splendid 
 business men of Fort Smith, who had so hand 
 somely entertained him, he referred to as "a 
 bunch of Fort Smith farmers," and the touring 
 car that whirled him over the paved streets of 
 a fine city degenerated into a shack pulled by a 
 pair of jack- rabbit mules. The splendid report 
 of the fruit industry he had secured at Van 
 Buren, changed into a poem which appeared as 
 follows in Podunk Literature : 
 
 It was in the year of '82, in the merry month of June, 
 That I landed in Van Buren one sultry afternoon. 
 A walking skeleton came up to me and handed out his paw 
 And invited me to his hotel, "The best in Arkansas." 
 
 I followed this landlord unto his dwelling place, 
 Poverty was depicted in Ms melancholy face, 
 His beard it was corn-dodger r his beef I couldn't chaw, 
 And that 'a the kind of chuck I got in the State of 
 Arkansas. 
 
 I started out next morning to catch an early train. 
 
 Said he, "You 'd better work for me, I have some land to 
 
 drain ; 
 
 I '11 give you fifty cents a day, your board and lodge and all, 
 And you '11 find yourself a different man wnen you leave old 
 
 Arkansas. 
 
 51
 
 I worked six weeks for this galoot, Jess Herald was his 
 
 name; 
 
 He stood seven feet in his boots, he was tall as any crane; 
 His hair hung down in ringlets, down o'er_his lantern jaw; 
 He 's the photograph of all those gents who are raised in 
 
 Arkansas. 
 
 He fed me on corn-dodger, as hard as any rock, 
 
 My teeth began to loosen and by knees began to knock; 
 
 I got to thin on sassafras tea I could hide behind a straw, 
 
 And indeed I was a different man when I left Arkansas. 
 
 I got aboard an evening train, a quarter after five, 
 
 And started out for Coffeyville, half dead and half alive; 
 
 I got a quart of whisky my troubled mind to thaw, 
 
 And I got drunk as a boiled owl when I left Arkansas. 
 
 Farewell to sage and sassafras tea and those corn-dodgei 
 
 pills, 
 
 Farewell to the ague, the canebreaks, and the chills; 
 If ever I see that land again, I '11 hand to you my paw, 
 For that will be through a telescope from here to Arkansas. 
 
 Farewell to Jesse Herald, likewise hlis darling wife; 
 I never can forget her to the last day of my life; 
 She put ber little hand in mine and tried to squeeze my paw 
 Said she, "Dear Bill, remember me when you leave old 
 Arkansas. ' ' 
 
 The episode with the mountain maid and the 
 calf afforded him a valuable hint for a picture 
 of an Arkansas woman, which he introduced by 
 describing the domestic calf of Arkansas, a fierce 
 creature known to attack the human in broad 
 daylight, and which can only be kept under con 
 trol by half-wild women of great size, who 
 roam the fields and climb the hills, chew green 
 twigs and eat 'clay. The more civilized moun 
 tain maids have hair of a bleached yellow and 
 coarse, like frayed rope. Their heads are 
 shaped like wasp nests, they have mouths like 
 a fish, and wear "panties" made of flour sacks, 
 
 52
 
 which hang down to their ankles. The affluent 
 among these country girls have a new red calico 
 dress once a year. The middle and poorer 
 classes have but one garment per year, and all 
 look alike, for whatever color these gowns were 
 in the beginning, they grow into the same color, 
 never having been washed. 
 
 As he thought of the severity with which the 
 calf had butted him out of the path he enlarged 
 on the Arkansas girl article until he had made 
 one of his most famous stories. 
 
 He then turned his attention to the fox hunt, 
 and the great bear that he didn't kill, and pro 
 ceeded to get even with a little Arkansas pig 
 which had scared the wits entirely out of him, 
 by telling lies even on this innocent animal. 
 
 The hunting party was sleeping peacefully 
 when the Liar Man became aroused by the clat 
 ter of cooking utensils. Seizing a gun, he 
 rushed toward the cooking tent, when some- 
 tning came snorting along that scared the day 
 lights nearly out of him at the first snort. 
 Throwing his gun at the evil beast, hoping 
 thereby to stay it a moment in its mad endeavor 
 
 Evidences of Civilization in Arkansas. 
 
 53
 
 to bite him, he galloped in the direction of the 
 nearest tree, crying mightily for help. By this 
 time the bear looked every inch of seven feet 
 tall, with teeth a foot long, and blood and fire 
 in its eye. 
 
 When his companions arrived to his rescue 
 they found a pig trotting into the shadows. 
 This was the bear. 
 
 It was some time before his beating heart 
 steadied itself so that he could climb to the 
 ground. When he arrived on terra firma he 
 found himself intact, with the exception of cer 
 tain portions of his pajamas that were left 
 sticking on the scaly bark. 
 
 But he got even with the pig by manufactur 
 ing him into twenty-seven varieties of the Ar 
 kansas razor-back, each one worse than the last, 
 from an old he animal used for sawing timber 
 into logs to a little fellow used for boring key 
 holes. 
 
 Thus it came to pass that, while the Busi 
 ness Men's Special was touring the State, get 
 ting facts and figures about Arkansas to develop 
 a yet "greater Arkansas," the guest on whom 
 they were bestowing every courtesy and kind 
 ness was, by their expenditure of time and 
 money, getting together such a batch of lies as 
 would make the effort of the Business Men's 
 Club twenty-five years slow in developing, so 
 great does the speeding power of a lie exceed 
 that of the truth. 
 
 There was something with better speeding 
 power than truth on the track of the Liar Man, 
 however. 
 
 54
 
 11 FLORA AND FAUNA." 
 
 Once, away back in the days of his childish 
 innocence, the Liar Man had gone to school and 
 had heard about ' * flora and fauna. ' ' This came 
 to him now as a good title, and so he wrote 
 about the flora and fauna of Arkansas. 
 
 In his travels he had seen more wild flowers 
 in Arkansas than he had ever seen before, and 
 had heard more bird music and had enjoyed 
 more good hunting and fishing. 
 
 He had seen Pulaski Heights when its slopes 
 and dells were purple with violets. He had seen 
 the snowy blossoms of the dogwood gleaming 
 through the trees, and had stood in admiration 
 before the stately magnolia, with its giant blos 
 soms. He had sniffed the air, fragrant with 
 wild plum and hawthorn blooms. He had seen 
 the scarlet trumpet vine in all its beauty, and 
 the wild rose growing in profusion. He had ad 
 mired rose-pink poppies growing on grassy 
 slopes, purple iris on its wiry stems, white 
 daisies, snapdragon, phlox, spring beauty and 
 ferns such as would be the envy of a New York 
 hothouse. He had trod under the pillared aisles 
 of Arkansas forests, and had admired the glory 
 of the oak, the stately pride of the pine, the 
 feathered crest of the cypress, the lacework of 
 the gum and elm branches, and the grace of 
 swinging willows. He had reveled in the beauty 
 of fern-grown dell, mossy valley and wooded 
 mountain. 
 
 He had heard the plaintive music of the wild 
 
 55
 
 56
 
 dove mourning in some thicket; he had heard 
 the meadow lark and the glorious, umnatchable 
 song of the mocking bird. He had hunted the 
 turkey, and had listened with delight to the 
 story of early days, when wild turkeys flocked 
 the woods in such droves that the pioneer could 
 stand in his cabin door and shoot them by the 
 dozen. He had hunted deer and found game 
 fish. 
 
 But when he came to write his "flora and 
 fauna" article, it developed that Podunk was, 
 in a frame of man, even to "out-Podunk Po 
 dunk." 
 
 About all he could think of in the flora line 
 was stinkweed and poison ivy. "The first," he 
 wrote, "grows everywhere, and emits such an 
 odor that health officers have organized a cru 
 sade against it and have ordered it buried as 
 fast as discovered. ' ' And he told .a funny story 
 about a boy that put some in his father's 
 trouser pockets, and his wife got a divorce be 
 cause he wouldn't wash his feet. "Poison 
 ivy," he wrote, "was less offensive, but more 
 dangerous. A beautiful vine, growing in profu 
 sion, it is often picked by the unsuspecting, 
 when its deadly poison proves fatal. If the vic 
 tim simply inhales the deadly atmosphere which 
 surrounds it he will soon break out in pimples, 
 which develop into blisters and then into warts. 
 These warts are very painful, but the natives 
 welcome them, as, in case they do not appear, 
 the poison will go to the head and swell it to 
 enormous proportions. Persons with this affec 
 tion are said to have the "big head." If water 
 
 57
 
 gets on the brain when the head is in this en 
 larged condition it drowns the intelligence. The 
 reason so many of the natives of Arkansas lack- 
 intelligence is due entirely to the poison ivy, 
 and not .to any prenatal suggestion or paternal 
 influence, neither of which ever bother Arkan 
 sas people. The scrub oak is seen everywhere. 
 It takes twenty to make an ordinary tree. They 
 are used principally for building rail fences 
 and farmhouses, and the largest limbs make 
 good brush for bean vines. ' ' 
 
 When he came to the "fauna" he marshaled 
 up a long train of wild, weird and rapacious in 
 sects, wild and domestic animals and natives. 
 
 58 
 
 Springs in Arkansas Are Well Patronized.
 
 He started with the tarantula, and gave out 
 information to the effect that "its size equals 
 that of a dinner plate; it jumps like a leopard 
 and gallops like a hound, and hides by the road 
 side, from whence it springs on solitary travel 
 ers, drags them to the underbrush and kicks the 
 stuffing out of them with its powerful hairy 
 legs." This made a thrilling story. Then he 
 described the centipede as a deadly carnivorous 
 insect, with a thousand legs, which live in set 
 tlements and go out on the hunt like a human. 
 Their claws are so horny they sound when trav 
 eling over the rocks as if they wore shoes." 
 The mosquito came next, and was written of as 
 an attraction "never billed and yet never seen 
 unbilled, its bill being obtruded many times, 
 when it is considered quite a bore." This 
 sounded so smart he wanted to read it to the 
 Girl, only he didn't dare. From the mosquito 
 the Liar Man moved his pen down to the tick. 
 
 He had been to numerous picnics and garden 
 parties and had never seen a tick. But he had 
 learned from the dictionary that they were 
 found in most Southern States, so he located a 
 million in Arkansas, and described the harrow 
 ing manner in which they fasten their glutton 
 ous clutches on the human frame and use it for 
 lunch purposes, and when his description was 
 at an end he told a story of a tick which grew 
 so big it was mistaken for a bed tick. 
 
 After this sally the Liar Man moved from the 
 insect into the bird world, and mentioned buz 
 zards and bullfrogs as the principal song birds 
 
 59
 
 of Arkansas. The first is a warbler of some 
 note, whose song, "Hark, From the Tombs," 
 can be heard almost anywhere in Arkansas. He 
 says this bird is held in veneration by the com 
 mon classes, and is the best-fed animal in the 
 State. Complimentary to the bullfrog, he said 
 the Arkansas bullfrog was the finest singer he 
 had ever heard. 
 
 Before he reached the larger animals he had 
 run out of anything to say, and only mentioned 
 dogs, which, he said, were "indiginous to the 
 soil" and grew to such proportions it took 
 dynamite to move them unless they had a mind 
 to go. He also spoke briefly of a "hard-tail," a 
 nearly extinct animal he had on a few occasions 
 seen plowing with a woman in some isolated 
 districts. 
 
 When he had finished this he went/out and 
 bought a copy of "Pictures and Poems of Ar 
 kansas," in green leather binding, and took it 
 out to the Girl. 
 
 Little ROCK (Society Man. 
 
 60
 
 , AKANSAS STATE FAIR. 
 
 The Liar Man concluded to go to the State 
 Fair and see what Arkansas could get up in the 
 way of an exhibit. 
 
 When he arrived at Beautiful Oaklawn he 
 was agreeably surprised, for although its fame 
 had reached even to New York, where he had 
 heard it discussed at Belmont Park, he was not 
 prepared for just the picture that met his view. 
 
 The State Fair was also a surprise. He had 
 been over the State, but had not seen its prod 
 ucts collectively. Here they were cotton and 
 corn and rice and fruit and vegetables, and 
 plenty of people were enjoying it. Eastern 
 tourists, Arkansas business men and farmers 
 rubbed elbows, and the Liar Man grew inter 
 ested in watching them and hearing the differ 
 ent expressions of what they saw. 
 
 He visited the interesting places of Hot 
 Springs, and found it to be well entitled to its 
 worldwide fame. Here were numerous springs 
 giving out 1,000,000 gallons of water daily 
 for the healing of the nations. Here were hotels 
 of magnificent proportions and palatial furnish 
 ings; here was the Army and Navy Hospital, 
 and the beautiful mountain reserves, with their 
 picturesque scenery and delightful mountain 
 drives. 
 
 But in the story he wrote of Podunk at Hot 
 Springs he didn't mention any of these attrac- 
 
 61
 
 tions. He had a drawing made which was sup 
 posed to be very funny, with the inscription, 
 "The springs of Arkansas are well patron 
 ized." The State Fair made a splendid topic 
 for a big lie, and he wrote it. Its main features 
 were "a lot of pumpkins, a few chunks of coal, a 
 pig just recovering from the measles, a cow that 
 looked like an extinct bicycle, and innumerable 
 "Reubens" trying to buy gold watches for 
 fifteen cents a chance, and walking home as a 
 result of the purchase. In this article he de 
 scribed Paw and Maw Peters on "the Pike," 
 writing something like this : 
 
 "Paw," said a little old lady with big spec 
 tacles, as she clutched the arm of a stoop-shoul 
 dered man with a red handkerchief, who stood 
 under a megaphone in front of a tent, "does the 
 feller say 'fleas?' " 
 
 "If my ears hain't turned to wood he does 
 say- 'fleas.' Yes, Maw, he says 'fleas.' " 
 
 "Fleas! fleas!" she exclaimed, "thirty thou 
 sand dollars worth of fleas! Who ever heard 
 tell of thirty thousand dollars worth of fleas ! ' ' 
 and she turned her ear in the direction of the 
 megaphone and listened as the spieler continued 
 his uninterrupted spiel. 
 
 "Don't it beat anything you ever heard tell 
 of? He does say 'fleas.' Paw, what sort of 
 fleas do you reckon these is? They ain't no 
 common dog fleas, certain." 
 
 "Electrical fleas, I reckon," he answered, 
 thoughtfully. 
 
 "Electrical fleas?" 
 
 "I reckon they must be. That would account 
 
 62
 
 fer their hoppin'. Electricity could make 'em 
 hop to beat the band. ' ' 
 
 "Listen, Paw, he's tellin' something," and 
 the farmer and Mrs. Peters moved closer to the 
 megaphone. 
 
 "Marvelous performance!" he was shouting, 
 "exhibiting all but human intelligence in their 
 spectacular gymnastic feats. Come on! Come 
 on!" 
 
 "Paw, What Sort of Fleas Do You Keckon These Is 
 
 63
 
 "This here's a bunco, Maw. Let's pass it 
 up." 
 
 Just then the megaphone turned in the direc 
 tion of the interested pair of listeners. ' ' Come 
 on! This way to see real live fleas do marvel 
 ous stunts. Satisfaction guaranteed or money 
 refunded. Pass in. Hurry! Hurry!" , 
 
 "I saw, Paw, we better investigate this here 
 flea business. If fleas is comin' into use, I got 
 some to sell. I bet this here whole flea circus 
 hain't got a flea in it as big as them on old Tige, 
 and I never dreamed they was worth anything. 
 Let's go in." 
 
 They next stopped in front of a tent decorated 
 with the picture of a big blue giant, a man with 
 a megaphone shouting. 
 
 "Mountain of flesh!" repeated Mrs. Farmer 
 Peters. "Paw, don't you reckon he's stretchin' 
 it mightily?" 
 
 Farmer Peters eyed the tent critically. ' * She 
 hain't no mountain, sure. But if that place 
 bulging up at the top is her head, she's big as a 
 house. Remember them pictures in Sam's 
 Christmas book about a feller named Gulliver? 
 He run acrost some whoppers in his time. Like 
 enough they've caught one of them somewhere. 
 You know, Maw, money can get anything. I like 
 fat women. Let 's go in and see this one. ' ' And 
 Farmer Peters turned toward the tent. 
 
 From the fat lady 's tent they went to see the 
 Alligator Girl and heard that civilization has 
 done little for her. * ' She has a remarkable ap 
 petite for dog and a fondness for geese," the 
 megaphone man shouted. "Untamed and at 
 
 64
 
 home with alligators, she is the curiosity and 
 puzzle of the age. Don't miss this opportunity 
 of seeing the Alligator Girl. Spectators warned 
 not to arouse her. She bites. This way! This 
 way ! ' ' 
 
 * 
 
 '<* 
 
 The People Gathered to See the Mountain of Flesh. 
 
 "Let's step in, Maw, unless you 're afraid of 
 gettin' bit," said Paw Peters. 
 
 "You 're more apt to get bit than I am. 
 You's bin bit more 'n once," she retorted, and 
 they went in. 
 
 In and out of the cheap shows they went, 
 until at last they stopped before a show which 
 Maw Peters objected to. 
 
 65
 
 "Paw Peters! Paw Peters, where 're you 
 go in'?" she panted, when he paused at the 
 ticket office, digging in his trouser pocket for 
 coin. 
 
 "Paw Peters! Paw Peters!" his alarmed 
 companion exclaimed, "where are you going?" 
 
 "Two tickets front row tickets and hurry 
 up," he said, as he threw down a half-dollar. 
 
 "Paw Peters," his wife exclaimed in dismay, 
 "this here ain't no place for you!" 
 
 "I'll be blest if it ain't," he answered. 
 
 "But you're a deacon in the Baptist church." 
 
 "Deacon nothin'," he exclaimed. "Come on 
 if you want to go with me, and hurry!" 
 
 And the poor soul was dragged in to see 
 
 Cleo. 
 
 **##***## 
 
 Just and right it was to follow that E^tribu- 
 tion, armed to the teeth, was to overtake the 
 Liar Man in this city in which he now compla 
 cently wrote lies. 
 
 66
 
 LITTLE BOCK. 
 
 With the evident belief in saving the best 
 until last, the Liar Man reserved his funny 
 story about Little "Rock until he had paid his 
 compliments, per Podunk, to every other sec 
 tion of the State. 
 
 He knew Little Rock pretty well by now. He 
 was well acquainted with the officers and mem 
 bership of its Board of Trade, its Business 
 Men's League and its Retail Merchants' Asso 
 ciation. He had been a guest at their lunch 
 eons for the upbuilding of a " greater Little 
 Rock." He had noted on every hand the nu 
 merous evidences of healthy city growth, the 
 erection of splendid public and business build 
 ings, the improvement of streets and the in 
 crease in the volume of business. He had seen 
 forty thousand bales of cotton at one ware 
 house, stretching away in avenues like minia 
 ture barlap houses, and had learned of the im 
 portance of Little Rock as a cotton center; and 
 yet he said its business men were "mossbacks" 
 and its commerce like that of a country village. 
 
 He had been a guest at the Country Club, the 
 Athletic Association, the Quapaw Club, the 
 Scottish Rite Consistory, and the Elks' Home. 
 He had swam in the Y. M. C. A. natatorium and 
 bowled in its alleys. He had been a guest of 
 the Automobile Club, the Shooting Club and the 
 Yachting Club. He had heard Yaw and Nor- 
 dica and Calve and Patti at the Opera House, 
 
 67
 
 and had been to lectures and musicales and box 
 and dinner parties innumerable; and yet he 
 said there was no social life in Arkansas 's cap 
 ital city, because of the fossilized ideas of the 
 people who didn't want their young people to 
 go to anything more exciting than Sunday 
 school, lest they should become ' ' worldly mind 
 ed, ' ' nor their old people anything more wicked 
 than prayer meeting. 
 
 Little Rockers Looking at the First Four-Story Sky-Scraper 
 Built in the Capital City. 
 
 He had seen the handsome new Little Rock 
 Library; had read in the Y. M. C. A. library; 
 had been to the Co-operative Library, and had 
 been offered the use of numerous private libra 
 ries; and yet he said there were no libraries in 
 Little Rock and that the most cultured citizens 
 had never heard of Omar or Aristotle. Dawn 
 was, however, to break over this heathen dark 
 ness, as a Woman's Club was agitating the mat 
 ter of a getting a library. He said he heard 
 them talking about it, and one lady said: "We 
 must have all 'Ben-Hur's' works in it," to 
 which the other assented. 
 
 "And I think we ought to keep all the great 
 American poets, like Ralph Waldo Longfellow 
 
 68
 
 and William Cullen Alcott and Joseph Thomas 
 Jefferson in one place, don't you all?" And 
 they assented. 
 
 "And how would it do to have portraits of 
 a few of the great historians, like Bertha Clay 
 and Shakespeare, put in frames and hung up? 
 It might inspire our sons to make something of 
 themselves, ' ' said a third. And when two dozen 
 
 LUtle Brx-k Society Girl ia Riding Habit. She Rides 
 Astride. 
 
 69
 
 as helpful suggestions had been accepted they 
 were ready for the library. 
 
 When the library question was settled, the 
 educational question was discussed. The Liar 
 Man had visited the High School from top to 
 bottom ; had watched its cooking classes with a 
 hungry desire to eat the goods things they con 
 cocted. He had watched the sewing classes, and 
 inwardly and outwardly declared his steadfast 
 belief in tlie education that was practical and 
 mnde good homemakers. He had seen the man 
 ual training classes and had visited the splendid 
 ly equipped laboratories, among the finest in the 
 iooiuli. He had seen the athletic training of its 
 box s and girls, and had admired their progress 
 in art and music; and much of this same work 
 he knew was being done in every public school 
 in the city. He visited the magnificent new St. 
 Mary's Academy and the Litle Rock College, 
 but he never mentioned any of these' in his treat- 
 merit of educational advantages in Arkansas. 
 ! iV produced figures to prove it the most igno 
 rant burg on earth, and told how he had seen 
 prominent citizens in Little Rock sitting in the 
 car, with a newspaper upside down, trying to 
 look intelligent. 
 
 He put in a line about the streets, which, lie 
 said, were built "when Heck was a pup" out 
 of cobblestones, and he told a story about a man 
 \\ho was foolish enough to get an automobile. 
 In his new machine he started down street, but 
 the way was so rough it only hit the road three 
 limes a block, and folks thought it was a flying 
 machine. After telling as many lies on Little 
 
 70
 
 Rock as he could well cram into the space allot 
 ted to Podunk, he wound up nt the Old State 
 House, which he accused of having been built 
 before the war. 
 
 This charge was a true one as far as it went, 
 but it didn't go far enough for the Old State- 
 house was built seventy years ago and stands 
 today, somewhat the worse for wear, but still a 
 monument of ante-bellum glory and a source of 
 veneration and pride to the people of a new 
 generation. 
 
 It would seem to some liars too much like 
 
 In Little Rock the Poor Old Booster Works Overtime While 
 His Wife Takes Vocal Lessons and Does Society Stunts. 
 
 71
 
 telling lies on a venerable gray-haired man to 
 lie on the Old Statehouse. 
 
 But the Man Who Lied on Arkansas had no 
 bump of veneration and was like George Wash 
 ington in that George could not tell a lie while 
 this one couldn't tell the truth. So the Old 
 Statehouse got its share. He said its yard was 
 grown up with underbrush and its basement so 
 damp that snakes and bullfrogs crawled into it 
 when the July sun turned their hiding places 
 along the river bank into a sandbar. There 
 were other things he said that he thought were 
 equally funny. But in enlarging the infirmities 
 of the Old Statehouse he never mentioned the 
 magnificent new State Capitol in course of con 
 struction. 
 
 Instead of giving any news of this nature 
 to the world he had an amateur artist whose 
 friendship he had cultivated, draw some "sup 
 posed-to-be-funny pictures." One was of Little 
 Rock citizens out viewing the first "sky 
 scraper" four stories high. He had a killing 
 picture made of a Little Bock rooster working 
 overtime while his wife did society stunts; a 
 picture of a female suffragist, Little Rock va 
 riety, business man attending a convention, and 
 as a climax he had the Little Rock society girj 
 pictured in a divided riding habit. 
 
 This was a powerful ludicrous picture and 
 the Liar Man laughed his eyes nearly out when 
 he. saw it. 
 
 Well it was that he had his laugh when he 
 did. Fate was to make use of this picture, and 
 Jack was to take a hand in the game. 
 
 72
 
 INFANT INDUSTRIES. 
 
 The Liar Man had by this time written a thou 
 sand lies and coarse jokes on Arkansas and was 
 now about to have his Podunk collection made 
 into a book. His publishers assured him it 
 would sell like hot cakes, and he needed the 
 money, for he had some choice investments 
 ] licked out in Arkansas. 
 
 During his stay in Arkansas he had taken a 
 trip to Hot Springs and other points and with 
 his feet on a velvet rug and his head on a tapes- 
 try cushion had enjoyed the luxuries of up-to- 
 date train service, meantime digging from the 
 recesses of his brain every old joke he could 
 think of to put in a "slow train" story, even 
 to that ancient one of the lady who offered the 
 conductor a child's ticket for a decrepit old man 
 who, when he got on the train, was an innocent, 
 curly-haired child just cutting his eye teeth. 
 
 The Liar Man had quarters at a hotel where 
 his wants were attended by a maid and a porter, 
 where he wiped his fingers on satin damask 
 and moistened his moustache in fragrant water 
 after a ten-course dinner. 
 
 But the Arkansas Hotel was a different thing 
 when Podunk took hold of it. His first refer 
 ence to the Arkansas hotel was a humorous 
 selection about a man who had the back of his 
 head blown off one day, and the coroner said 
 his landlady got too much soda in the biscuit. 
 He referred again to the female swine bosom 
 which in this case was tied on a piece of stout 
 
 73
 
 twine and used by each boarder in turn, to 
 grease his pallet for the passage down of the 
 dodger, saving it to boil with greens next day. 
 He pictured chickens roosting on the meal bar 
 rel, the cook trying to scare a tomcat off the 
 biscuit-board by spitting tobacco in his eye, and 
 guests wiping their fingers on the seats of their 
 pants and picking their teeth with butcher 
 knives. 
 
 He attended a ball at the Quapaw Club and 
 saw more fine ladies and gentlemen than he had 
 ever met in New York, for in the Eastern ine- 
 tropolic, tailors and landladies had kept him 
 jumping at such a lively rate he never had time 
 to establish social relations. That was before 
 he lied on Arkansas. Now he had plenty of 
 money and in the first dress suit he ever owned, 
 was trying to feel "like he vas ust to it." Here 
 were army officers from Fort Boots and leading 
 club and society men of Little Rock. Here were 
 fair women in gowns from Paris, New York, 
 and up-to-date home-gown builders. It was a 
 brilliant affair of music, lights, laughter, cour 
 teous men and fair women. But when an Ar 
 kansas dance appeared in Podunk literature as 
 a sample of social life, it was a knock-down and 
 drag-out, in a log house where a cross-eyed 
 fiddler ground out fierce strains while men in 
 flannel shirts swung girls in pink calicoes and 
 blue beads, ending in a free-for-all fight in which 
 several dogs were kicked to death and a feud 
 begun that lasted ten years. 
 
 The Liar Man said a hundred nice things 
 about the different schools he visited in Arkan- 
 
 74
 
 sas, but when he gave his impressions to Po- 
 dunk readers they saw a log cabin with a dirt 
 floor and puncheon seats on which were ranged 
 about thirteen woe-begone looking specimens of 
 Arkansas youth, each with a different book, 
 ranging in kind from a 'blue-back speller to a 
 Pope's Essay on Man with its insides all torn 
 out. 
 
 Once he had taken occasion to look into 
 health statistics and found Arkansas 's record 
 good. But Podunk must tell a lie of some sort, 
 so he strained his thinking apparatus and 
 finally ground out a silly verse about chills and 
 pills and many ills. He depicted the sad ap 
 pearance of a man whose internal organs had 
 been drowned by sassafras tea which he drank 
 in large quantities to cure the "pink eye." He 
 told of several men who, having been salivated, 
 had choked to death on their own teeth, and of 
 yet others who took quinine until their ears 
 roared so they thought Satan was after them, 
 and they finally landed in the "bug house." 
 All this Podunk reduced to his kind of liter 
 ature. 
 
 A portion of another article was devoted to 
 the press of Arkansas. For months he had 
 read the Arkansas Gazette with its up-to-date 
 service in the morning and the Evening Demo 
 crat in the afternoon. He had found the Ar 
 kansas Sketch Book the handsomest magazine 
 in the South ; he had discovered the country 
 press to be up to date and the religious press 
 to be well patronized. He had found poultry 
 and professional and society journals, but when 
 he mentioned the Arkansas press he did it in a 
 
 75
 
 ..a 
 
 tr'afci 
 f- 3 p 
 bO o ' * 
 
 I S3" 
 
 m ^ a O 
 
 
 
 ^3 
 
 o M 
 
 'e * 
 
 fe ^H 
 
 JS rfj 
 
 PH-H 
 
 76
 
 joking manner, mentioning the "Tall Grass 
 Gazette," and the "Bulltown Bazoo," both tri 
 weeklies tried to get out one week and got out 
 the next. He told a tale about a "squirrel- 
 head" who being approached by a boodler, bit 
 him. He made quite a story of this. The point 
 was never obvious, but the word " squirrel- 
 head" sounded so good it was well worked. 
 
 In addition to the varied industries he had 
 found in Arkansas, ranging from tomato can 
 ning to building sky-scrapers, he had found 
 some unusual industries. Among them ostrich 
 and alligator farms, an elk ranch, bauxite at 
 Bauxite. He had visited the largest peach or 
 chard in the world at El Dorado, had seen the 
 $100 prize-winning "World's Fair" hen at 
 a Stuttgart chicken fair, and had visited Ves 
 tal's famous greenhouse and seen plant life from 
 an orchid to a pecan tree. 
 
 But in writing of infant industries of Arkan 
 sas, Podunk passed these up and mentioned the 
 stork business, the poor, overworked bird suffer 
 ing from brain fag brought about by the fear 
 of making wrong deliveries since the population 
 of Arkansas is "white, black, and colored." 
 He got nearly killed once for making a mistake 
 of this kind. Podunk went farther than most 
 writers on this most interesting subject and said 
 the Arkansas stork delivered its goods with 
 their jaw teeth cut to enable them to eat dodger. 
 
 His second hit was with a diamond story. 
 
 "What you got in that bag?" said a stranger 
 to a young fellow in home-made trousers, who 
 toiled along a dusty way toward town with a 
 heavily laden tow-sack on his back. 
 
 77
 
 "Diamonds," came the reply. 
 
 "Diamonds?" said the stranger in astonish 
 ment. 
 
 "Yep the genunine Arkansas diamond." 
 
 "Let 's see them." 
 
 The bag was opened and a pile of crystals 
 shaken out. 
 
 "What are they for?" the stranger asked. 
 
 "These is nice fer flower-bed borders." 
 
 "I don't mean this kind of diamonds. I'm 
 talking about the little ones used in rings and 
 scarf pins. Got any of them?" 
 
 "Yep, but they' re gone up. They ust to sell 
 at a dollar a quart; now they 're two. That's 
 about four bits a cupful," and untying a red 
 bandana he stirred up a quantity of small crys 
 tals. 
 
 "These ain't polished, but they shore do shine 
 when they 're treated right." 
 
 "And these are Arkansas diamonds?" 
 
 "Yep, the genuine." 
 
 "Will you sell a dime's worth? I only need 
 a few." 
 
 "Yep, a nickel's worth, if you say so," and 
 counting out a dozen the deal was closed. 
 
 "Arkansas diamonds," said the man and the 
 peddler wondered why he laughed. 
 
 The Liar Man hesitated before writing this. 
 He had been trying for three months to get some 
 stock in the Pike County mine and had just been 
 notified that it could be secured. 
 
 But thinking as he had thought before of his 
 pressing need of money, he let it go. 
 
 78
 
 A BAD MOVE. 
 
 Before the Liar Man signed a contract with 
 the publishers who guaranteed to sell a million 
 copies of his famous lies on Arkansas, he had 
 their written promise that they would under no 
 condition disclose his identity. 
 
 In the first place, unless she was dead (and he 
 hoped she was) there was an ex- Affinity some 
 where looking for him. 
 
 Ten years before he had made some promises 
 to a poor soul who believed them. Aiid when 
 she learned that she had put too much confi 
 dence in a big liar instead of a good Baptist or 
 even a decent white man, she determined to see 
 that he made good in her case, if he never did 
 another. 
 
 When the Liar Man got unmistakable evidence 
 of this determination, he decided to scoot, and 
 lose .himself. The ex- Affinity was ten years 
 older than he, and as he was no spring chicken 
 he argued that she was old enough to take care 
 of herself and he proposed to let her do ft. 
 
 She never once dreamed that he would turn 
 his back on metropolitan high life for a tame 
 existence in far-away Arkansas. The Liar Man 
 was sure of this and thus felt secure so long as 
 she didn't run across his name. 
 
 In addition to this, he would not for the 
 world have had the Arkansas Girl know who 
 Podunk was. She possessed a different and 
 stronger attraction for him than any of his 
 
 79
 
 numerous affinities had ever done, and he met a 
 new one every once in a while, and his acquain 
 tance with her had stimulated him to so decent 
 a life in Arkansas and he had for the time being 
 lost interest in affinities. 
 
 The book came out in due season and his first 
 royalty enabled him to go in handsomely on 
 Arkansas investments. He got an option on 
 some tall timber, bought a site for a couple of 
 factories and interested himself in a proposed 
 railroad. He knew a Chicago capitalist who 
 wanted to put a mill on the timber tract and 
 had another money-man in mind to interest in 
 the railroad. 
 
 The book had been somewhat discussed but 
 not among the class of people with whom the 
 Girl associated, and the Liar Man wondered if 
 she had ever seen or heard of it, and several 
 months after its appearance he took a copy out 
 to the Colonial home one night and presented it 
 to the Girl. 
 
 "Is it something for me?" she said smiling, 
 and with the smile yet on her face she opened 
 the package. 
 
 Then the smile gave place to an expression 
 of surprise and displeasure, for the kind and 
 quality of the book was suggested on its red and 
 green cover. 
 
 She turned the pages and as she did so the 
 expression on her face that at first bespoke sur 
 prise, now showed disgust, and before she had 
 proceeded far, the brightness of her eyes and 
 the red spots her cheeks were such evidences as 
 Jack had learned meant trouble ahead. 
 
 80
 
 "Did you look at this before bringing it to 
 me?" she inquired, casting a searching glance at 
 the Liar. 
 
 The Liar was no fool. He saw the fire in her 
 eye. 
 
 "I must confess I did not," he said anx 
 iously. "Is n't it all right?" 
 
 "All right?" she repeated angrily. "It is an 
 abominable lie from the first page to the last, 
 and not even a decent lie at that!" 
 
 "You don't say!" he exclaimed. "Let me 
 see!" and he held out his hand. 
 
 She passed him the open book and his eye fell 
 on a full-page picture entitled "Home Life in 
 Arkansas." Something intended to represent 
 a female of the 'genus homo,' occupied a seat 
 in the middle of what was supposed to be a 
 room. She had a pair of raw-boned offspring 
 on her knee taking their sustenance from Na 
 ture's supply source which was as innocent of 
 any covering as was a matronly hog nearby. 
 The little brothers and sisters in various stages 
 of undress fought pups for the possession of 
 ham bones making faces at each other like mon 
 keys, and the father of the family was doing the 
 chiropodist act on a sore toe with the bread 
 knife. 
 
 As the Girl held this picture before him, the 
 Liar Man flushed with shame. 
 
 "This is outrageous!" he exclaimed. "I 
 should have examined it, but I did not think of 
 finding anything like this in a reputable book 
 store. I saw it was something about Arkansas 
 and thought you would like to look at it. I only 
 
 81
 
 hope you give me credit for being too much of 
 a gentleman to present any self-respecting 
 young lady with such disreputable trash, and 
 you certainly believe me too great a friend of 
 our beloved Arkansas to aid in her traducing 
 by adding to the circulation of this so much as a 
 single copy. Let us put it in the fire, ' ' and the 
 Liar Man made a move in the direction of the 
 grate. But the Girl held out her hand. 
 
 He hesitated, then gave it to her. 
 
 She looked in the front. 
 
 "Podunk" she read to herself and then she 
 repeated the name of the publishing house. 
 
 "I am glad you brought this book," she said, 
 ' ' for now that I know of its existence I am going 
 to -try to find out who this Podunk is. Will you 
 help me?" 
 
 "Will I help locate this scoundrel!" he re 
 peated, "Will I? It will be a pleasure. I will 
 lend any effort to discover the perpetrator of 
 this vile trash. Let me get the address. ' ' And, 
 taking the publisher's name carefully, he tucked 
 it in his pocket. 
 
 "I will write this very night before I sleep," 
 he declared. "No time shall be lost in showing 
 the scoundrel to the world. ' ' 
 
 And he did write that night, but he wrote to 
 call his publisher's attention to the existing con 
 tract guarantee not to uncover Podunk 's iden 
 tity. 
 
 82
 
 JACK TO THE RESCUE. 
 
 The Liar Man had hard luck in his effort to 
 discover the identity of Podunk and the Girl 
 grew impatient and finally sent for Jack. 
 
 "Jack," she said, "you always used to like 
 detective work and I want somebody to help me 
 find out something. It is quite necessary to my 
 happiness, Jack, that I find this out." 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 * ' The identity of a man. ' ' 
 
 "Your friend, the man " 
 
 "Now, Jack, be nice. Don't make me fuss 
 today. This is important, and it 's got nothing 
 whatever to do with him." 
 
 "All right, then. Go ahead." 
 
 "You know Podunk, Jack?" 
 
 "Podunk?" he repeated. Podunk who? I 
 never heard of Podunk." 
 
 "O yes you have, Jack. He wrote that book 
 of stories on Arkansas." 
 
 Jack laughed. 
 
 "I don't see how you can laugh, Jack," the 
 Girl said, looking serious. "Such terrible lies 
 as he has told and so many of them." 
 
 "That 's just the beauty of them," Jack ex 
 plained. "They are such preposterous lies no 
 body can believe them." 
 
 ' ' but they will create an influence and peo 
 ple do not stop to run down lies. I am sure of 
 it ! " and there was distress in her voice. 
 
 83
 
 "And you want me to help you discover the 
 identity of Podunk?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "What do you propose to do to him!" 
 
 "Write him a letter," she answered. 
 
 "Nice punishment," he observed. "It 's 
 been a long time since you wrote to me I sup 
 pose I have n't been bad enough." 
 
 84 
 
 He -Met a New Affinity Every Once in a While.
 
 "Don't talk that way, Jack, and I '11 write 
 you a letter." 
 
 "I '11 do this or any other possible or impos 
 sible thing under heaven for you, Kid, you know 
 it. But you have n't been calling on me much 
 lately. I imagined the other fellow was doing 
 all your bidding that friend of yours whose de 
 votion to his aged mother will make a saint of 
 him, who serves God in the fear of the Baptist 
 faith, and who would n't know the truth, naked 
 or clothed, if he met it in broad daylight. ' ' 
 
 "He has tried but has been very busy lately 
 and out of town a great deal," she answered. 
 ' ' He wrote to the publishers who informed him 
 the author did not want his identity divulged." 
 
 "I would n't either, if I were he." 
 
 "Look Jack," she whispered. "Can you im 
 agine anything more horrid than this?" and she 
 called his attention to the picture of the Little 
 Bock society girl in divided riding habit. You 
 know that I ride that way and I 'm afraid this 
 Podunk is somebody that has been here, maybe 
 someone who has ridden with me, and that this 
 is my picture. ' ' 
 
 Jack scruntinized it carefully and then looked 
 carefully at the Girl. 
 
 "I believe it is your picture," he remarked 
 slowly. "It looks like you, Kid," and then he 
 laughed until the Girl's vexation gave way to 
 tears. 
 
 This ended the laughing on Jack's part. 
 
 "Jack," she sobbed, "do you think that 
 that awful-looking thing looks like me?" 
 
 "Just about as much as it looks like my 
 
 85
 
 grandmother or Dinah or Sara Bernhardt, or 
 Podunk." 
 
 This was reassuring, and he continued, "I 
 will do my best to unearth the villain and when 
 I discover him, I '11 inflict any punishment you 
 mete out to him. ' ' 
 
 "If you will, Jack well, if you will I don't 
 know what I '11 do for you, but I like you yet, 
 Jack." 
 
 And then Jack surprised both himself and the 
 
 Girl by kissing her before he hurried out. 
 
 ********* 
 
 A few days later Jack called again. 
 
 "I have a clew," he said, and taking from his 
 pocket a bit of cardboard he handed it to the Girl 
 and she held in her hand a rough sketch of the 
 Little Bock society girl in riding habit. 
 
 ' ' Where did you get it I " she inquired. 
 
 "From the artist who made the drawing in 
 Podunk 's book." 
 
 "Tell me tell me talk fast," she exclaimed. 
 
 Nothing much to tell. I was stirring around 
 in a friend's room a few days ago, who imagines 
 he is an artist, when I ran across this with some 
 other sketches. I asked him what it was and he 
 said a rough sketch for a fellow here who has 
 been getting up stuff for some funny paper in 
 the east." 
 
 "Did you find out who the fellow is?" 
 
 "0 yes. You wanted it done, and I wanted it 
 because you did and since we both wanted it 
 
 "Jack 'dear Jack don't try to be funny 
 now. Tell me who had the pictures made ! ' ' 
 
 Jack hesitated. 
 
 86
 
 " Please, Jack, hurry up," she pleaded. 
 
 "You know him," he said slowly. "In fact, 
 he 's a friend of yours. He is devoted to an 
 aged mother, and is a good Baptist." 
 
 "Jack, you don't mean" 
 
 "He 's exactly who I do mean!" 
 
 The Girl stood speechless. 
 
 "I don't believe it," she finally exclaimed. 
 "I mean I can't believe it, Jack." 
 
 "I was afraid you could n't, so I brought you 
 some additional proof. Do you know this hand 
 writing ? ' ' and he passed her an open letter. 
 
 She gazed at it speechless. It had come to 
 her times innumerable on candy boxes and roses, 
 and there were a dozen notes in her desk with 
 the same signature. 
 
 "How did you get it?" she inquired when she 
 could speak. 
 
 "I have a friend in Chicago in the book bus 
 iness. I gave him your friend's name and asked 
 him to communicate with him through the house 
 publishing the Podunk stuff telling him that I 
 wanted to establish an identity. What you hold 
 in your hand was his reply." 
 
 The Girl looked at the signature again and 
 then letting it fall to the floor she raised her 
 eyes to the face of the broad shouldered Arkan- 
 san and tried to thank him. 
 
 "Poor little Kid," he said tenderly. "I 'm 
 sorry for you and if pounding that lying ass into 
 pulp will do you any good, I '11 catch him to 
 night and pound shall I?" 
 
 "Wait a little before you pound," she said. 
 "I want to have one more interview with him." 
 
 87
 
 OVER THE CRATER, 
 
 Prospects were bright for the Liar Man. Out 
 side capital was going to invest in Arkansas and 
 develop his holdings. 
 
 The time had now come for him to make the 
 diamond rjng proposition to the Girl and after 
 dressing with due taste and arming himself 
 with a box of Erret Hamilton's famous candy, 
 he wended his way to the Colonial mansion with 
 the notion lodged in his mind that he would soon 
 be occupying a good birth in it himself. 
 
 The Girl met him as usual with a bright smile, 
 just how bright he did not realize until later, 
 and in the glow of a soft light she listened at 
 tentively while he told her of his splendid pros 
 pectshis railroad, and his timber land, and he 
 emphasized the fact that nowhere in the world 
 does the future hold so much in store for the 
 wise investor as in Arkansas. 
 
 All this led up to the diamond ring proposi 
 tion. It was to be an Arkansas diamond, fit 
 jewel for that priceless treasure, the Arkansas 
 Girl. 
 
 "What should be done to the man who makes 
 the Arkansas Girl look like this in the eyes of 
 the world?" she inquired, holding a picture of 
 the divided skirt lady before him. 
 
 The Liar Man looked closely at the picture, 
 virgin innocence veiling his face. Then he 
 waxed mighty in denunciation and declared, 
 'The hound who would thus malign Arkansas 
 womanhood should receive the execration of 
 every honest citizen and the severest penalty the 
 law could inflict. ' ' 
 
 88
 
 "What should be done to the man who has 
 thus maligned the reputation of a great State?" 
 and she held toward him the closed book. 
 
 * ' He should be consigned to perdition and left 
 there without mercy or hope, for he is a liar of 
 the deepest dye and the liar's place is already 
 prepared. ' ' 
 
 " Suppose he were the son of an aged and in 
 firm Christian mother and suppose he were a 
 pious Baptist?" 
 
 The Liar Man felt an uneasy feeling creep up 
 his spine. 
 
 "I do not understand exactly what you 
 mean ! " he said. 
 
 "Perhaps this will help. Did you ever see 
 it before?" 
 
 The Liar Man took the drawing, looked at it 
 carefully and declared he had never seen it 
 before. 
 
 "How about this?" and she handed him the 
 letter with his own signature across the bot 
 tom. 
 
 "What does all this mean?" he exclaimed 
 wrathfully. 
 
 "It means that an Arkansas Girl has made a 
 discovery she has discovered Podunk. ' ' 
 
 "You don't insinuate that I am in any way 
 connected with this damnable book, do you?" 
 and he slammed it down on the table. 
 
 ' ' No more than to be its author. ' ' 
 
 "Lord a 'mighty!" he gasped. "What das 
 tardly plot is this that has been hatched by 
 some enemy?" and then the Liar Man fell on 
 his knees and poured out what heart he had left 
 
 89
 
 at the feet of the Arkansas Girl and exclaimed 
 in heart-rending melodrama, "There can be no 
 happiness for me without you. By your refusal 
 you shut the door of heaven in rny face ! Could 
 you be so cruel?" 
 
 Then the Girl in a coldly polite and orthodox 
 manner advised him that she had ever been 
 taught liars were not candidates for heaven 
 and that she would therefore take pleasure in 
 shutting the door of heaven in his face if it were 
 left her and he could call it cruelty or what 
 ever he pleased. 
 
 After all that the Liar Man went home, and 
 Jack dropped in, and before he left he had en 
 tered the "door of heaven" opened by the Girl. 
 
 * * * * * * * * # 
 
 The Liar Man's pride was wounded. He had 
 lost the Girl. His identity was discovered and 
 he feared that this would entail on him endless 
 suffering, for certain he was his superannuated 
 Affinity, the one he had ten years before called 
 "the Fury," would land in his vicinity as soon 
 as she discovered it, and thoughts of what she 
 might do to him made him shiver. 
 
 He congratulated himself, however, that he 
 had secured the investment of Eastern capital 
 just in the nick of time. He would no longer be 
 welcomed in the best circles of Arkansas society 
 and because of this and the painful thought that 
 the ex- Affinity might not yet have passed on to 
 Glory, he determined to travel. 
 
 When he arrived at his hotel he found some 
 mail. 
 
 One letter was from the timber land man. He 
 said : "I must reconsider my acceptance of your 
 
 90
 
 proposition. I 'believe Arkansas offers good op 
 portunities, but my wife and daughters object to 
 living in a community where young ladies go 
 barefoot and chew snuff sticks." 
 
 The next letter was from the railroad pro 
 moter, who said: "We have decided not to in 
 vest in Arkansas for the present. The State 
 presents good opportunities in more ways than 
 one, but until you get lawmakers up to date 
 enough to wear collars and sleep somewhere be 
 side wagon yards, we cannot hope for legislation 
 tending toward the development of railroads." 
 
 A third letter was from the man who was to 
 finance the rice mill and canning factory. He 
 wrote: "I have changed my mind about mov 
 ing to Arkansas. I believe the State offers good 
 opportunities but I have a growing family and 
 must look out for their health and education. 
 Stories of present-day schools in Arkansas and 
 accounts of health conditions are not attrac 
 tive." 
 
 To all of these the Liar Man wrote letters in 
 which he told the truth, the whole* truth and 
 nothing but the truth. . But it was too late. 
 Wrong impressions had spread far and wide, 
 and an impression though intangible is never 
 theless potent. 
 
 But though the Grirl was lost and he had lost 
 on his investments, the Liar Man 's cup of bitter 
 ness was not yet full. Eetribution had just 
 sighted him, and while he felt that Fate was 
 handing him a lemon he knew he should never 
 murmur or repine if either the good Lord or the 
 bad Devil would keep "the Fury" from cross 
 ing his path again. 
 
 91
 
 WHAT GOT HIM. 
 
 During the months that the Liar Man had 
 been getting rich in Arkansas writing Podunk 
 lies, his ex- Affinity had been lying at death's 
 door away back where he had left her, her most 
 faithful friend being a young companion who 
 did a song and dance act in vaudeville. 
 
 For ten years with unwearying patience this 
 ex- Affinity had been in search of the Liar Man, 
 and when the black eyed girl became her friend, 
 she too kept an eye on mankind, hoping to aid 
 in the capture of the culprit. 
 
 All search had thus far proven futile, but the 
 ex- Affinity would never listen to the possibility 
 of his death. 
 
 "His kind do not die young," she would say. 
 
 92 
 
 The Soubrette Was a High Stepper.
 
 ' ' The scoundrel is yet living, going around hunt 
 ing fresh affinities and borrowing money and 
 telling lies. But here 's a chapter that 's not 
 ended; He '11 make good yet!" 
 
 After the illness of the ex- Affinity she decided 
 to go to Hot Springs, Arkansas, to recuperate. 
 It was a long journey to an unknown land, but 
 a number of actresses whom she had known had 
 been there and on the strength of their recom 
 mendation and the young companion's entreaty, 
 the two set out. 
 
 It was about this time that the Liar Man 
 decided to drown his troubles in a few rounds of 
 Hot Springs high life before leaving the State, 
 and with a splendid new outfit of tailored suits 
 and patent leather shoes he arrived in good 
 style in the Valley of Vapors and determined to 
 set about making some new acquaintances. 
 
 Soon after his arrival in Hot Springs he met 
 a charming young woman with black eyes. She 
 was a soubrette and a high-stepper and the Liar 
 Man thought she would do very well as a sub 
 stitute for the Girl who had so recently torn 
 herself from his affections. 
 
 With this idea in mind the Liar Man sent the 
 soubrette an American Beauty rose. She sent 
 him back a smile and that same afternoon they 
 took in the town and before night they were such 
 good friends she had his picture and he had her 
 promise to a grill room supper after her vau 
 deville act. 
 
 When the soubrette returned to the room of 
 her companion in the evening she had a long 
 stemmed rose, a copy of Podunk and a photo- 
 
 93 "
 
 graph to display as trophies of a new acquaint 
 ance. 
 
 When the photograph fell into her hands, the 
 ex- Affinity sprang up with a cry. "The scoun 
 drel! Where is he?" 
 
 Then the, two women had a whispered consul 
 tation and concocted some sort of a plan that 
 filled the ex- Affinity with nervous interest and 
 the soubrette with keen excitement. 
 
 According to those who took part, the grill 
 room party proved a "lollie-p'loolie," whatever 
 that is. The uninitiated might, however, have 
 taken the entire party for " lollie-p 'loolies " be 
 fore their dinner was over. The Liar Man had 
 plenty of money. The soubrette was jolly. 
 Another lady guest was still jollier and the man 
 she was with had n't had a chance to get so 
 much for so little money in many a month. So 
 . they ate and drank, and drank some more. Then 
 they sang a little, danced a little, threw a few 
 plates and then drank a little more especially 
 the Liar Man, who had been on the water wagon 
 so long he felt like sawdust and found it hard 
 to get wet through. The soubrette did n't 
 drink much. She said she had to work the next 
 day, but she kept the others drinking and the 
 Liar Man finally got so happy he emptied his 
 pockets and ihrew ten-dollar bills at the girls 
 and while all this was going on a fifth party 
 appeared upon the scene and stood quietly just 
 within the door a tall angular lady, unmistak 
 ably a peroxide blonde. She viewed the land 
 scape o'er in short order, but waited, for the 
 Liar Man was getting sleepy. When his head 
 
 94
 
 dropped on the table she spoke to the soubrette, 
 took possession of all the Liar Man's money, 
 called a porter, removed the sleepy man to a 
 carriage and then accompanied by the soubrette 
 rolled away in darkness. Fifteen minutes later 
 a justice of the peace was awakened from his 
 slumber to perform a marriage ceremony. The 
 groom was somewhat the worse for champagne, 
 but was good-natured and said just what the 
 ex- Affinity told him to and when it was over she 
 took him home and put him to bed. 
 
 When he awoke in the cold gray dawn of the 
 morning after, his superannuated affinity was 
 hovering over him like an evil bird. 
 
 "You Ve been a long time keeping a prom 
 ise," she said in the same old tone. 
 
 "I never made a promise," he retorted. 
 
 Then she called him a liar and when he denied 
 the allegation she called him another liar. 
 
 He inquired feebly what she was doing there. 
 
 "I 'm staying here as long as you do," she 
 said, "and when you move, I move. You don't 
 get away again, young man. You Ve been a 
 long time getting around to it, but you married 
 me last night, so you need not be scandalized 
 because I am here." 
 
 Then he called her a liar, and as the lie passed 
 between them at a rapid rate the ex-affinity dis 
 played the same temperament that had caused 
 him in bygone days to call her "the Fury," but 
 she submitted proof that she was not a liar. 
 
 "I Ve got you this time, 'till death do us 
 part,' " she said, smiling triumphantly at him 
 "until death do us part, do you understand?" 
 
 95
 
 With a groan the unhappy man turned to the 
 wall and prayed for death, only to be taunted by 
 "the Fury, " who said, "Well, if that 's the way 
 you feel about it, not even death shall separate 
 us. So don't think you can give me the slip 
 again, not even by dying." 
 
 Her words caused a relapse. He grew pale 
 and*called for bottled goods which he drank, 
 and with every drink "the Fury" grew larger 
 and fiercer and changed in aspect until she 
 seemed to be standing over him with gaping 
 mouth, fiery tongue, and lashing, claw-tipped 
 arms. His brain grew dizzy; his hand grew 
 clammy; the world grew dim; but "the Fury" 
 was there growing in size and fierce wrath. He 
 felt himself receding from the earth and being 
 borne toward a dark abyss, but even here "the 
 Fury," with fiery eye and fiendish claws fol 
 lowed him gaining, gaining, until he felt himself 
 drawn into her unyielding arms and felt her hot 
 breath on his clammy cheek and heard her hiss 
 in his ear, "My, but what a Liar you are. I 
 could n't trust you out of my sight even to die !" 
 and the next think he knew he did n't know any 
 thing. In the arms of "the Fury" he had been 
 swallowed by the black gulf. 
 
 Thus the Man Who Lied on Arkansas passed 
 from the scene of his wrongdoing, and if he 
 ever contributed anything more to Podunk lit 
 erature it did not come to the attention of the 
 Girl who, the Liar Man said (though he was 
 such a liar it might not have been the Girl after 
 all who did it) had shut the open door of heaven 
 in his face. 
 
 96 
 
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