오 헨리의 단편소설이다.
The first time my optical nerves was disturbed by the sight of Buckingham Skinner was in Kansas City. I was standing on a corner when I see Buck stick his straw-colored head out of a third-story window of a business block and holler, "Whoa, there! Whoa!" like you would in endeavoring to assuage a team of runaway mules.
I looked around; but all the animals I see in sight is a policeman, having his shoes shined, and a couple of delivery wagons hitched to posts. Then in a minute downstairs tumbles this Buckingham Skinner, and runs to the corner, and stands and gazes down the other street at the imaginary dust kicked up by the fabulous hoofs of the fictitious team of chimerical quadrupeds. And then B. Skinner goes back up to the third-story room again, and I see that the lettering on the window is "The Farmers' Friend Loan Company."
미국의 소설가로, 본명은 윌리엄 시드니 포터. 오 헨리는 필명이다. 본래 은행원이었는데 횡령을 해서 감옥에 간 후 감옥에서의 비참한 생활을 바탕으로 휴머니티가 돋보이는 감동적인 이야기를 썼다. 다소 억지스러운 휴머니티는 비판받기도 하지만, 빈민들의 애환을 다채롭고 교묘히 그려 많은 독자들의 사랑을 받았다.