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Show 244 TALES OF THE COLORADO PIONEERS. tory in the penitentiary, and it would be a first rate place for him to learn to make boots and shoes. He was captivated with the idea, thought it a splendid thing for him, as he had no legs and could not do ordinary work. He said it would take him six years to learn to make a first class boot, and for this reason, if the Judge would sentence him to the penitentiary for six years, he would plead guilty. I saw the propriety of fixing the sentence at six years, and at once closed the contract with the Mexican and fully intended to carry it out in good faith. We then took him back into the court-room, where the Judge was patiently awaiting us. Without saying anything to the Court about the boot and shoe business, I announced that the prisoner had concluded to withdraw his plea of not guilty, and plead guilty. The plea of not guilty was accordingly withdrawn, and the Judge proceeded to explain to the prisoner the consequences of the plea of guilty. But the prisoner persisted in his plea, relying of course upon the boot and shoe contract made in the back room, of which contract the Court was entirely ignorant. " I supposed the Judge would reserve sentence until the trials were all over, and would then sentence all the convicts on the last day of the term. In the mean time I would quietly inform the Judge of the boot and shoe bargain entered into in the back room. " Imagine my amazement when the Judge, immediately after the plea of guilty was entered, proceeded to sentence the Mexican to the penitentiary for only two years, and that without a word about boots and shoes. " This sentence was at once and in the presence of the Court, communicated to the poor fellow, when, of all the mad Mexicans since the days of the Aztecs, he was the |