A tall, humbly male bird stood nigh him, as tall agin most as he wuz.
And as I looked at Josiah he muttered, "I'll learn him--I'll learn the cussed fool to keep in his own spear." I laid holt of his vest, and sez I, "What, do you mean, Josiah Allen, by them dark threats?
Tell me instantly," sez I, for I feared the worst.
"Seein' this dum fool is so willin' to take work on him that don't belong for males to do, I'll give him a job at it.

I'll see if I can't ride some of the consarned foolishness out of him." Sez I, "Be calm, Josiah; don't throw away your own precious life through madness and revenge.

The ostrich hain't to blame, he's only actin' out Nater." "Nater!" sez Josiah scornfully--"Nater for males to stay to hum and set on eggs, and hatch 'em, and brood young ones?
Don't talk to me!" He wuz almost by the side of himself.
And in spite of my almost frenzied appeals to restrain him, he lanched upon him.
You could ride 'em by payin' so much, and money seemed to Josiah like so much water then, so wild with wrath and revenge wuz he.
I see he would go, and I reached my hand up, and sez I, "Dear Josiah, farewell!" But he only nodded to me, and I hearn him murmurin' darkly-- "Seein' he's so dum accommodatin' that he's took wimmen's work on him that they ort to do themselves, I'll give him a pull that will be apt to teach him his own place." [Illustration: "I'll give him a pull that will be apt to teach him his own place."] And he started off at a fearful rate; round and round that inclosure they went, Josiah layin' his cane over the sides of the bird, and the keeper a-yellin' at him that he'd be killed.
And when they come round by us the first time I heard him a-aposthrofizin' the bird-- "Don't you want to set on some more eggs?
don't you want to brood a spell ?" and then he would kick him, and the ostrich would jump, and leap, and rare round.

But the third time he come round I see a change--I see deadly fear depictered in his mean, and sez he wildly-- "Samantha, save me! save me! I am lost!" sez he.
I wuz now in tears, and I sez wildly-- "I will save that dear man, or perish!" and I wuz jest a-rushin' into the inclosure when they come a-tearin' round for the fourth time, and jest a little ways from us the ostrich give a wild yell and leap, and Josiah wuz thrown almost onto our feet.
As the keeper rushed in to pick him up, we see he held a feather in his hand.
He thought it wuz tore out by excitement, and Josiah clinched the feathers to save himself.
But Josiah owned up to me afterwards that he gin up that he wuz a-goin' to be killed, and that his last thought wuz as he swooned away--wuz how much ostrich feathers cost, and how sweet it would be to give me a last gift of dyin' love, by pickin' a feather off for nothin'.
I groaned and sithed when he told me, and sez I, "What won't you do next, Josiah Allen ?" But this wuz hereafter, and to pick up the thread of my story agin.
Wall, Josiah wuzn't killed, he wuz only stunted, and he soon recovered his conscientousness.
And before half a hour passed away he wuz a-talkin' as pert as you please, a-boastin' of how he would tell it in Jonesville.

Sez he, "I wonder what Deacon Henzy will say when I tell him that I rode a bird while I wuz here ?" Sez he, "He never rode a crow or a sparrer." "Nor you, nuther," sez I; "how could you ride a crow ?" "Wall," sez he, "I've rid a ostrich, and the news will cause great excitement in Jonesville, and probable up as fur as Zoar and Loontown." Then come Solomon's Temple.