The Wasp — 1890 — page 477: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This is a humorous Western tall tale rather than political satire. The story, set at Adobe Ranch in Merced County, concerns a narrator who agrees to help an Englishman drive sheep across California in 1875. After a day's hard work, the group shelters in a cabin for Christmas Eve. The men discuss ghosts around the fire. When strange noises occur—attributed to wind and dying embers—they panic, believing the cabin haunted. The narrator reveals the "ghost" is actually just frightened sheep and a porcupine. The satire gently mocks the Englishman's credulity and the men's superstitious fears, deflating their masculine bravado through comedic revelation of mundane explanations for supernatural-seeming events.