The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
Mark Twain

There was a feller here once by the name of Jim Smiley in the winter of '49 - or
may be it was the spring Of '50 - I don't recollect exactly, somehow; but anyway, he was
the curiosest man about, always betting on anything that turned up you ever see, if he
could get anybody to bet on the other side; and if he couldn't, he'd change sides. Why, it
never made no difference to him he would bet on any thing - the dangdest feller.
Well, thish-yer Smiley had rat-tarriers, and chicken-cocks, and tom-cats, and all
them kind of things, till you couldn't rest, and you couldn't fetch nothing for him to bet on
but he'd match you. He ketched a frog one day, and took him home, and said he
cal'klated to edercate him; and so he never done nothing for three months but set in his
back yard and learn that frog to jump. And you bet you he did learn him, too. He'd give
him a little punch behind, and the next minute you'd see that frog whirling in the air like
a doughnut - see him turn one summerset, or maybe a couple, if he got a good start, and
come down flat-footed and all right, like a cat. He got him up so in the matter of
catching flies, and kept him in practice so constant, that he'd nail a fly every time as far
as he could see him. Smiley said all a frog wanted was education, and he could do most
anything - and I believe him. Why, I've seen him set Dan'l Webster down here on this
floor - Dan'l Webster was the name of the frog - and sing out, 'Flies, Dan'l, flies !' and
quicker'n you could wink, he'd spring straight up, and snake a fly off'n the counter there,
and flop down on the floor again as solid as a gob of mud, and fall to scratching the side
of his head with his hind foot as indifferent as if he hadn't no idea he'd been doin' any
more'n any frog might do. You never see a frog so modest and straightfor'ard as he was,
for all he was so gifted. And when it come to fair and square 'umping on a dead level, he
could get over more ground at one straddle than any animal of his breed you ever see.
jumping on a dead level was his strong suit, you understand: and when it come to that,
Smiley would ante up money on him as long as he had a red. Smiley was monstrous
proud of his frog, and well he might be, for feelers that had travelled and been
everywheres, all sal 'd he laid over any frog that ever they see.
Well, Smiley kept the beast in a little lattice box, and he used to fetch him down
town sometimes and lay for a bet. One day a feller - a stranger in the camp, he was -
come across him with his box, and says:
'What might it be that you've got in the box?'
And Smiley says, sorter indifferent like, 'It might be a parrot, or it might be a
canary, maybe, but it ain't -- it's only just a frog.'
And the feller took it, and looked at it careful, and turned it round this way and
that, and says, 'H'm - so 'tis. 'Well, what's he good for?'
'Well,' Smiley says, easy and careless, 'he's good enough for one thing, I should
judge - he can outjump any frog in Calaveras County.'
The feller took the box again, and took another long, particular took, and gave it
back to Smiley, and says, very deliberate, 'Well, I don't see no p'lnts about that frog that's
any better'n any other frog.'
'Maybe you don't,' Smiley says. 'Maybe you understand frogs, and maybe you
don't understand 'em; maybe you've had experience, and maybe you ain't only a amateur,
as it were. Anyways, I've got my opinion, and I'll risk forty dollars that he can outiump
any frog in Calaveras County.'
And the feller studied a minute, and then says, kinder sad like, 'Well, I'm only a
stranger here, and I ain't got no frog; but if I had a frog, I'd bet you.'
And then Smiley says, 'That's all right - that's all right - if you'll hold my box a
minute, I'll go and get you a frog.' And so the feller took the box, and put up his forty
dollars along with Smiley's, and set down to wait.
So he set there a good while thinking and thinking to hisself, and then he got the
frog out and prized his mouth open and took a teaspoon and filled him full of quail shot -
filled him pretty near up to his chin - and set him on the floor. Smiley he went to the
swamp and slopped around in the mud for a long time, and finally he ketched a frog, and
fetched him in, and gave him to this feller, and says:
'Now, if you're ready, set him alongside of Dan'l, with his forepaws just even with
Dan'l's, and I'll give the word.' Then he says, 'One - two - three - jump!' and him and the
feller touched up the frogs from behind, and the new frog hopped off, but Dan'l give a
heave, and hysted up his shoulders - so - like a Frenchman, but it warn't no use - he
couldn't budge; he was planted as solid as an anvil, and he couldn't no more stir than if he
was anchored out. Smiley was a good deal surprised, and he was disgusted too, but he
didn't have no idea what the matter was, of course.
The feller took the money and started away; and when he was going out at the
door, he sorter jerked his thumb over his shoulder - this way - at Dan'l, and says again,
very deliberate, 'Well, I don't see no p'ints about that frog that's any better'n any other
frog.'
Smiley he stood scratching his head and looking down at Dan'] a long time, and at
last he says, 'I do wonder what in the nation that frog throwed off for - I wonder if there
ain't something the matter with him - he 'pears to look mighty baggy, somehow.' And he
ketched Dan'l by the nap of the neck, and lifted him up and says, 'Why, blame my cats, if
he don't weigh five pound!' and turned him upside down, and he belched out a double
handful of shot. And then he see how it was, and he was the maddest man he set the frog
down and took out after that feller, but he never ketched him.