But I don't understand any of it.

It is the most astounding thing I ever heard of, at any rate." "Now, my dear sir, I want to ask you how Longfellow _could_ manage a gun ?" "Why, as any other man does, of course." "Man! man! Why, merciful Moses! you didn't think I was talking about human beings all this time, did you?
Why, Longfellow is a horse! They were racing--running races over at the course this afternoon; and I was trying to tell you about it." "You don't say ?" remarked the doctor, with a sigh of relief.

"Well, I declare, I thought you were speaking of the poet, and I hardly knew whether to believe you or not; it seemed so strange that he should behave in that manner." Then Mr.Butterwick went into the smoking-car to tell the joke to his friends, and the doctor sat reflecting upon the outrageous impudence of the men who name their horses after respectable people.
While he was thinking about it, another sensational occurrence attracted his attention.
A man sitting in the same car with the doctor had placed a bottle of tomato catsup neck downward in the rack above his seat.

Presently a friend came in, and in a few moments the friend, who was cutting his finger-nails with a knife, introduced the subject of the races.

The discussion gradually became warm, and as the excitement increased the man with the knife gesticulated violently with the hand containing the weapon while he explained his views.