Page:Tales of the long bow.pdf/119

 look close, there's more difference than you would imagine to be possible. It was great fun when they forced me to take my pet out of the wrapping of shawls, and they found what a large pet it was."

"And do I understand," cut in the Colonel, "that it was something like that—with the other laws?"

"The other laws," said Pierce, "are certainly arbitrary, but perhaps you do not altogether do them justice. You do not quite appreciate their motive. You do not fully allow for their origin. I may say, I trust with all modesty, that I was their origin. I not only had the pleasure of breaking those laws, but the pleasure of making them."

"More of your tricks, you mean," said the Colonel; "but why don't the papers say so?"

"The authorities don't want 'em to," answered Pierce. "The authorities won't advertise me, you bet. I've got far too much popular backing for that. When the real revolution happens, it won't be mentioned in the newspapers."

He paused a moment in meditation and then went on.

"When the police searched for my pug and found it was a pig, I started wondering how