CHAPTER XITHE BACK COUNTRY

The Home of“J. Ledyard Symington”

The building of the distinguished name had,however, been continued, and the legend on the door was now, “J. Ledyard Symington-Symington, Bart.” The reception days had been effaced. The old man may have achieved that point in his social aspirations when he “didn’t care to know anybody who wasn’t anybody.” Like Don Quixote, he may have departed to battle with hostile windmills, or he may have walked into his estates “unknown,” to mingle in phantom social functions in ghostly halls and silent chambers in the Great Beyond.

Perhaps there are no “Tuesdays and Thursdays” there, and calling cards and stovepipe hats are unnecessary. His blighted hopes, and those that may have ended in fruition, concern the widely distributed gossips along the coast no more.

While we may be interested and amused with the petty gossip, the rude philosophy, the quaint humor, the little antagonisms, and the child-like foibles of these lonely dwellers in the dune country, the pathos that overshadows them must touch our hearts.

They have brought their life scars into the desolate sands, where the twilight has come upon them.The roar of a mighty world goes on beyond them. Unable to navigate the great currents of life, they have drifted into stagnant waters.

Happy Cal’s unwelcome guests and his blighted affections—Catfish John’s rheumatism and his pork that “them fellers” stole—Old Sipes’s lost “kittle”—Doc Looney’s unappreciative wives—J. Ledyard Symington’s “humiliations,” and all the other troubles of the old outcasts, will disappear into the oblivion of the years, with the rest of the affairs and happenings of this life.

If they have not been ambitious, their rapacity has not destroyed empires, or deluged the earth with blood. If they have not been learned, they have not used knowledge to devise means for the destruction of human life. If they have not been powerful, their greed has not oppressed and impoverished their fellow-beings.

Let us hope that the storms from the lake, and civilization on the shore, will deal gently with these poor derelicts, as they peacefully fade away into the elements from which they came.

(From the Author’s Etching)“RESUMING THEIR MIGRATIONS”

(From the Author’s Etching)

“RESUMING THEIR MIGRATIONS”

BEHIND the ranges of the sand hills, lie stretches of broken waste country. It is diversified with patches of woods, tangled thickets, swamps, little ponds, stagnant pools covered with green microscopic vegetation, and small areas of productive soil. There are long, low elevations, covered sparsely with gnarledpines, spruces, poplars, and sumacs. Tall elms, many willows, and an occasional silvery barked sycamore, lend variety to the scene.

Here and there, just back of the big hills, are deep secluded tarns, which have no visible outlets or inlets. One looks cautiously down from the surrounding edges. In the obscurity of the deep shadows there is tangled dead vegetation, a few decayed tree-trunks, and an uncanny stillness. Unseen stagnant water is there, and the mysterious depths seem to be without life. They are fit abodes for gnomes, and evil spirits may haunt their silences. There is an instinctive creepy feeling, and an undefined dread in the atmosphere around them.

Swamps of tamarack, which are impenetrable, contribute their masses of deep green to the charm of the landscape. The ravagers of the wet places hide in them, and the timid, hunted wild life finds refuge in their still labyrinths. In the winter countless tracks and trails on the snow lead into them and are lost.

Among the most interesting of the marsh dwellers is the muskrat. This active little animalis an ever-present element in the life of the sloughs, and he is the most industrious live thing in the back country. His numerous families thrive and increase, in spite of vigilant enemies that besiege them. The larger owls, the foxes, minks, and steel traps are their principal foes.

A MARSH DWELLER

The houses, irregular in shape and size, dot the surfaces of the ponds and swamps. They are built of lumps of sod and mud, mixed with bulrushesand heavy grass. They usually contain two rooms, one above the other, and little tunnels lead out from them, under ground, providing channels of escape in case of danger, and safe routes of approach to the houses from the burrows in the higher ground along the banks.

The upper cavity of the little adobe structure is usually lined with moss and fine grass. Lily roots, freshwater clams, and other food are carried up into it from under the ice in the winter. In these cosy retreats the little colonies live during the cold months, oblivious to the cares and dangers of the outside world.

There is a network of thoroughfares and burrows in the soft earth among the roots of the willows on the neighboring banks. The devious secret passages and runways are in constant use during the summer.

The muskrats are great travelers, and roam over the meadows, through the ravines, up and down the creeks, and around on the sand hills, in search of food and adventure. They run along the lake shore at night, and their tracks are found all over the beach. Their well-beaten paths radiatein all directions from their homes. They are not entirely lovable, but the back country would be desolate indeed without them.

A SENTINEL IN THE MARSH

The herons stand solemnly, like sentinels, among the thick grasses, and out in the open places, watching for unwary frogs, minnows, and other small life with which nature has bountifully peopled the sloughs. The crows and hawks drop quickly behind clumps of weeds on deadly errands in the day time, and at night the owls, foxes, andminks haunt the margins of the wet places. The enemies of the Little Things are legion. Violent death is their destiny. With the exception of the turtles, they are all eaten by something larger and more powerful than themselves.

(From the Author’s Etching)THEY “DROP INTOTHE PONDS AND MARSHES”

(From the Author’s Etching)

THEY “DROP INTOTHE PONDS AND MARSHES”

In the fall and early spring the wild ducks and geese drop into the ponds and marshes, and rest for days at a time, before resuming their migrations. They come in from over the lake during the storms to find shelter for the night, and are reluctant to leave the abundant food in these nooksbehind the hills. A flat-bottomed boat among the bulrushes, and a few artificially arranged thick bunches of brush and long grass, which have been used as shooting blinds, usually explain why they have not stayed longer.

A few of the ducks remain during the summer, build their nests on secluded boggy spots, and rear their young; but the minks, snapping turtles, and other enemies besides man, generally see that few of them live to fly away in the fall.

Occasionally a small weather-beaten frame house, and a tumble-down old barn, project their gables into the landscape. Around them is usually a piece of cleared land that represents years of toil and combat with the reluctant soil, obstinate stumps, and tough roots.

Nature has begrudgingly yielded a scanty livelihood to the brave and simple ones who have spent their youth and middle age in wresting away the barriers which have stood between them and the comforts of life. The broken-spirited animals that stand still, with lowered heads, in the little fields and around the barn, are mute testimonies of the years of drudgery and hardship.

On approaching the house we encounter a few ducks that splash into the ditch along the muddy road, and disappear in great trepidation among the weeds and bulrushes beyond the fence. The loud barking of a mongrel dog is heard, a lot of chickens scatter, and several children with touseled heads and frightened faces appear. Behind them a lean-faced woman in a faded calico dress looks out with a reserved and kindly welcome. The dog is rebuked sharply, and finally quieted. The scared children hastily retreat into the house, and peek out through the curtained windows. We explain that we came to ask for a drink of water. The woman disappears for a moment, brings a cup, and some rain water in a broken pitcher, with which to prime the pump in the yard.

This wheezy piece of hardware, after much teasing, and encouragement from the broken pitcher, finally yields, and one object of the visit is accomplished. The children begin cautiously to reappear, their curiosity having got the better of their alarm.

A few commonplace remarks about the weather, a complimentary reference to a flower bed near thefence, an inquiry as to the ages of the children, soon establish a friendly footing, and we are asked to sit down on the bench near the pump and rest awhile.

“Don’t you sometimes feel lonely out here, with no neighbors?” I asked. “No, indeed,” she replied. “We’ve got all the neighbors we want. Nobody lives very near here, but there isn’t a day passes that I don’t see somebody drivin’ by out on the road. I ride to town every two or three weeks, an’ that’s enough for anybody.”

A man of perhaps forty, but who looks to be fifty, rather tall and spare, with bent shoulders and shambling step, appears after a few minutes. His shaved upper lip and long chin whiskers strictly conform to the established customs of the back country.

It is a land of the chin whiskers, and they are met with everywhere in the by-paths of civilization. Their picturesque quality is the delight of him who uses the lead pencil and pen to portray the oddities of his race.

He has come from over near the edge of the timber, where he has been repairing a decayed railfence. His greeting is kindly, and we are made to feel quite at home. Some fresh buttermilk from an old-fashioned churn near the back door adds to the pleasant hospitality, and the loud cackling of a proud and energetic rooster, adorned with brilliant plumage, who takes credit for the warm egg which a dignified old hen has just left in the corner of the corn crib, lends an air of cheerfulness and animation to the scene. He has just learned of the achievement, and the glory is his.

Out in the yard is a covered box with a circular hole in its front. A small chain leads into it, which is attached to the outside by a staple. After a few minutes the furtive wild eyes of a captive coon peer out fearfully from the inner darkness of the box. He was extracted from the cosy interior of a hollow tree, over near the edge of the swamp, during his infancy, and was the sole survivor of a moonlight attack on his home tree, after the dogs had located the happy family. The tree was cut down, the little furry things mangled by savage teeth, and their house made desolate. The little fellow was carried into a hopeless captivity, where his days and nights are passed in terror. He is a prisoner and not a pet.

It is mankind that does these things—not the brutes—and yet we cry out in denunciation when humanity is thus outraged. We chain and cage the wild things, and shriek for freedom of thought and action. Verily this is a strange world!

I talked with one of the little girls about the coon. She told me his story and said they called him “Tip.” My heart went out to him, and I longed to take him under my coat, carry him into the deep woods, and bid him God speed. He probably would have bitten me had I attempted it, but in this he would have been justified from his point of view, for he had never had a chance in his despoiled life to learn that there could be sympathy in a human touch. In this poor Tip is not alone in the world.

Time slumbers in the back country. The weekly paper is the only printed source of news from the outside, and, with the addition of a monthly farm magazine, with its woman’s department, constitutes the literature of the home. These periodicals are read by the light of the big kerosene lamp on the table in the middle of the room, and the facts and opinions found in them become gospel.

The country village is perhaps a couple of miles farther inland. There is a water-mill on the little river, and bags of wheat and corn are taken to it to be ground. The miller—sleepy-eyed and white—comes out and helps to unload the incoming grain, or deposit the flour or meal in the back part of the wagon.

The general store and post-office is on the main road, near the mill. The proprietor is the oracle of the community, and a fountain of wit and wisdom. The store is the clearing-house for the news and gossip of the passing days.

A weather-beaten sign across the front of the building reads, “The Center of the World.” The owner declares that “this must be so, fer the edges of it are just the same distance off from the store, no matter which way ye look.”

There is much unconscious philosophy in the quaintly humorous sign, for, after all, how little we realize the immensity of the material and intellectual world that is beyond our own horizon. The homely wit touches incisively one of the foibles of human kind.

Elihu Baxter Brown, the storekeeper, is well

THE “GENERAL STORE”

along in years. He is tall, somewhat stoop-shouldered, and his eyes look quizzically out of narrow slits. His heavy gray mustache dominates his face, the cumbersome ornament suggesting a pair of frayed lambrequins. He lives in a little old-fashioned house that sets back in a yard next his store. A quiet gray-haired woman, with a kindly face, sits sewing in the shade near the back door. They walked to the home of the minister fifteen miles away, to be married, over fifty yearsago. They trudged back in the afternoon and began their lives together in the humble frame house that now shows the touch of decay and the scars of winter storms.

THE STOREKEEPER

The small trees that they planted around it have grown tall enough almost to hide the quiet home among their shadows. Little patches of sunlight that have stolen through the leaves are scatteredover the roof on bright days, like happy hours in solemn lives.

In a sealed glass jar on a “what-not” in a corner of the front room is a hard queer-looking lump, encrusted with dry mold, a fragment of the wedding cake of half a century ago, which has been faithfully kept and cherished through the years. To the world outside it is meaningless; here it is sacred.

The little things to which sentiment can cling are the anchorages of our hearts. They keep us from drifting too far away, and they call to us when we have wandered. The small piece of wedding cake—gray like the heads of those who reverence it—has helped to prolong the echoes of the chimes of years ago. It was a rough gnarled hand which carefully put the glass jar back into its place after it was shown, but it was a tender and beautiful thought that kept it there.

The old man is now seventy-six. He says that sometimes he is only about thirty, and at other times he is over a hundred—it all depends on the weather and the condition of his rheumatism.

“When I git up in the mornin’,” said he, “I first find out how my rheumatism is, then I take a look at the weather, an’ figger out what kind of a day it’s goin’ to be. If it’s goin’ to rain I let ’er rain, an’ if it ain’t, all well an’ good. Business is pretty slow when it rains, an’ when its ten or fifteen below in the winter, they ain’t no business at all. When it gits like that I hole up like a woodchuck, an’ set in the back part o’ the store in my high-chair, an’ make poetry an’ read. I don’t like to do too much readin’, fer readin’ rots the mind, an’ I’d rather be waitin’ on people comin’ in. Most gen’rally a lot o’ the old cods that live ’round ’ere drop in an’ we talk things over.

“This rheumatism o’ mine is a queer thing. I’ll tell ye sumpen confidential. You prob’ly won’t believe it, an’ I wouldn’t want what I say to git out ’cause its so improb’le, an’ it might hurt my credit, but I’ve bin cured o’ my rheumatism twice by carryin’ a petrified potato in my pocket. An old friend of mine, Catfish John’s got it now, an’ I don’t want to take it away from ’im as long as it’s helpin’ ’im, but when ’e gits through with it, I’m goin’ to have it back on the job, an’ you betI’ll be hoppin’ ’round ’ere as lively as a cricket. The potato ’ll prob’ly be ’ere next week. I’ve had it fer ten years, an’ it beats everything I’ve ever tried.”

I asked the old man to allow me to see some of the poetry he had “made,” and thereby opened up a literary mine. The request touched a tender chord and I was ushered back to a worn desk of antique pattern in the rear of the store. He raised the lid and extracted the treasure. A book had been removed from its binding, and the covers converted into a portfolio. He gently removed about a hundred sheets of paper of various shapes and sizes, covered with closely written matter. Some of the spelling would have shocked the shade of Lindley Murray, and made it glad that he had passed away, and some of it would have made a champion of spelling reform quite happy. It wasvers libreof the most malignant type. Rhymes were freely distributed at picturesque random, and while the ideas, rhythm, and meter were quite lame at times, much of the verse was better than some recently published imagist poetry, which contains none of these things. Humor and pathoswere intermingled. Sometimes there was much humor where pathos was intended, and often real pathos lurked among the lighter lines.

There are many singers who are never heard. Melodies in impenetrable forests and trills that float on desert air are for those who sing, and not for those who listen. A happy soul may pour forth impassioned song in solitude, for the joy of the singing, and a solitary bard may distil his fancy upon pages that are for him alone.

The verse of Elihu Baxter Brown is its own and only excuse for being. It has solaced the still hours, and if its creator has been its only reader, he has been most appreciative.

A touching lay depicts his elation upon the departure of his wife “in a autobeel” on a long visit to distant relatives, but the joy prevails only during the first six lines. The remaining thirty are devoted to sorrow and “lonely misery as I walketh the street,” and end with “when will she be back I wonder?” He falls into a “reverree” and from under its gentle spell the virile lines, “The brite moon makes a strong impress on me,” and “I’ve named my pet hen after thee,” float into the world.With “eyes full of weep” he reflects that “sometimes she’s cold as all git out,” and further on he wishes that his “loved one was a pie,” so as to facilitate immediate and affectionate assimilation.

He bids the world to “go on with its music and kink it another note higher.” In later lines he naïvely admits that “of all the poets I love myself the best.” Alas, he has much company! This effusion ends with “Gosh, I can’t finish this poetry till I pull myself together.”

War, love, spring, and beautiful snow flow through the limping measures. There are odes to the sun, the rain, and to his old bob-tailed gray cat, “Tobunkus,” who drowses peacefully on the counter near the scales.

The inspection of the poems led to the exhibition of his box of relics and curios, which he greatly valued. Among the carefully ticketed and labeled items, which we spread out on the counter, was a small chip from Libby Prison, a fragment of stone picked up near the National Capitol, a shark’s tooth, some Indian arrow-heads, an iron ring from a slave auction pen of ante-bellum days, a chip from the pilot house of a steamboatthat was wrecked sixty years ago on the Atlantic coast, the dried stump of a cigar which had been given to him when he visited a Russian man-of-war in Boston harbor in 1859, and many other odds and ends that were of priceless value to him.

I picked up a small, round piece of wood, which he told me was the most remarkable and interesting relic of the whole lot. “That,” said he, “is a piece of the first shaving brush I ever shaved with”—a fact fully as important as most things, seemingly significant at present, will be a century hence. This wonderful object completed the exhibition, and the collection was carefully put away.

The interior of the store was rather gloomy, badly ventilated, and was pervaded with numberless and commingled odors. I could distinguish kerosene, dead tobacco-smoke, stale vegetables, damp dry-goods, and smoked herrings, but the rest of the indescribable medley of smells baffled analysis.

The stock of merchandise was varied, but there was very little of any one kind, except plug tobacco. Over a case containing several large boxes of this necessity of life in the back country was astrip of cardboard, on which was inscribed, “Don’t use the nasty stuff.” Under a wall-lamp was another placard, “This flue don’t smoke, neither should you.” Other examples of the proprietor’s wit were scattered along the edges of the shelves, and on the walls, and helped to impart an individual character to the place. Among them were, “Don’t be bashful. You can have anything you can pay for.” “This store is not run by a trust.” “No setting on the counter—this meansyou!” “Credit given only on Sundies, when the store is closed.” “Don’t talk about the war—it makes me sick.”

A large portion of the stock was in cans. Some of them had evidently been on the shelves for many years. There were cove oysters, sardines, and tinned meats of various kinds, with badly fly-specked labels. The old man remarked that “some o’ them air-tights has bin on hand since the early eighties.”

The humble tin can has been one of the important factors in the progress of the human race. With the theodolite, the sextant, and the rifle, it has been carried to the waste places of the earth,and because of it they have bloomed. Tin cans have lined the trails to unknown lands, and they have been left at both of the poles. The invader has flung them along his remorseless path when he has gone to murder quiet distant peoples whose religion differed from his own, and they have thus been made “instruments of the Lord’s mercy.” They lie on ghastly battlefields, mingled with splintered bones, where a civilization, of which we have boasted, has left them.

They are scattered over the bottom of the sea, float languidly in the currents of uncharted rivers, and rust on the sands of the deserts. They are hiding-places for tropical reptiles in tangled morasses, and prowling beasts sniff at them curiously in deserted camps along the outer rims of the world.

They symbolize the ingenuity of the white man, and in them has reposed the remains of every kind of fish, reptile, bird and beast that he has used for food. The aged bull, the scrawny family cow, the venerable rooster, the faithful superannuated hen, the senile billy goat, and other obsolete domestic animals, have found a temporary tombwithin mysterious walls of tin, and have helped to feed others than those who canned them. They enclose fruit and vegetables that could not be sold fresh, and in them they go to the uttermost parts of the earth.

It was indeed strange destiny that took the sardine, flashing his bright sides in the blue Mediterranean, and left him immured on a musty shelf in a store in the back country. If he, with the contents of the cans around him, could return to life, there would be a motley company.

Perhaps, in quiet midnight hours, wraiths come out of the tins and play in the moonbeams that filter through the dusty windows. They may all have been there so long that social caste has been established. The fish, lobsters, cove oysters and clams, being sea people, probably hold aloof. This they may well do, as they are on the upper shelves.

The elderly domestic animals may have a dignified stratum of their own, in which the affairs of the old families can be discussed, while those who were feathered in life possibly form another palegroup that devotes itself entirely to questions of personal adornment.

Behind the red labels on the lower shelves are the devilled ham and the pig’s feet. The goblins from these may hold high carnival in the silvery light—the frolics of the indigestibles—and their antics may last until the gray of the morning comes.

Nameless elfs may appear in the little throng. They are from the soups, and have so many component parts that they know not what they are. Naturally they may precede the others, but if they are in the ghostly circle, they are not of it.

Probably the specters from the canned hash are at the lower end of the scale.

I suggested to the old man that all these things might be happening while he slumbered, but he declared that I was mistaken. “There’s never bin any doin’s like that goin’ on ’round the store,” said he.

Figuratively, it might be said that many of us obtain most of our intellectual food from cans. The diet may be varied occasionally by fresh nutrients, but too often we rely upon products bearing established trade-marks for our mental sustenance. The rows of labels, honored by time and dimmed by dust, stand like tiers of skulls, with their eyeless caverns gravely still—mute symbols of the eternal hours—as if staring in dull mockery out of a vanished past. Living currents flow around us unheeded. We absorb predigested thought to repletion, and neglect vibrant mental forces, that through disuse become depleted, instead of enriching them with the study of the green and growing things that have not been put in cans.

“About ev’ry third year,” said the old man, “business gits worse’n ever, an’ that’s when a hoss trader named Than Gandy comes ’round. He lives some’rs in the eastern part o’ the state, an’ after ’e’s bin through ’ere ’e waits long enough fer most of ’em to fergit ’im before ’e comes agin. He starts out from where ’e lives with a sulky, an’ a crow bait hoss, an’ about five dollars. He spends a couple o’ months on ’is travels among the little places away from the railroads, an’ when ’e gits through with ’is trip, ’e has a string o’ seven er eight hosses, an’ four er five little wagons an’ buggies, an’ a lot o’ harnesses an’ whips an’ calves an’ sheep, an’ a big wad o’ money. He’s got allthem things to boot in trades ’e keeps makin’. He beats ev’rybody ’e runs up ag’inst, an’ when ’e quits ’round ’ere nobody’s got any money left to buy things with. They don’t know what’s happened to ’em till ’e’s away off. When ’e stops at the store, he gen’rally trades me sumpen fer what ’e wants.

“Once Jedge Blossom traded hosses with ’im when ’e was piped, an’ gave ’im ten dollars to boot. He got a bum animal shifted on ’im, an’ when ’e sobered up, ’e sent Gandy a bill fer fifteen dollars fer legal advice, an’ the advice was not to come into this part o’ the country any more.”

The old man told me that he was born in a small town in Massachusetts.

“I was named after the preacher of our church. He was a great man an’ ’is eloquence was wonderful. His name was the Reverend Elihu Baxter, an’ ’e used to go up into the pulpit, an’ lean ’is stummick ’way out over it, an’ say,‘Now you listen to me’!—an’ that’s the way ’e drawed ’em to ’im. When ’e’d first begin, the church ’ud be so still that you could hear the flies buzz, an’ ’is voice would sound all hollow, like ’e was talkin’ into abig dish-pan. We don’t have no more preachers like ’im now days, an’ people don’t go to church no more like they did then. We don’t have no more old-fashioned Sundays. There’s too many newspapers, an’ what they have to say takes the place o’ what we used to hear in the pulpit. What the preachers say now days ain’t interestin’ any more. People rest an’ play on Sunday now, instid o’ bein’ solemn an’ sad an’ settin’ ’round an’ listenin’ over an’ over to somebody tellin’ about them three fellers that was in the fiery furnace.”

He felt deeply his responsibility as a representative of the national government. The post-office department, with its rows of glass-fronted mail boxes, numbered from 1 to 40, was located at the right of the store entrance. The mail bag was brought daily from the railroad station, five miles away, by a fat-faced young man in blue overalls and a hickory shirt. His elbows flopped madly up and down as his horse galloped along the highway with the precious burden across the pommel. He made another trip at night with the out-going mail, and when the hoof-beats were heard on the road, there would be many glances at the clocksin the houses along his route, and the fact approvingly noted, that “Bill’s on time to-night, all right.”

There are many people in the world who win lasting laurels by being “on time.” Some do it quietly, and others by flopping their arms violently, to the accompaniment of resonant hoof-beats, as “Bill” does, but being “on time” is essential to success in life. “Bill” may have no other argument to present for his eventual redemption than the fact that he was always “on time,” but it cannot fail to be powerful and convincing.

“I would like this postmaster business,” said the old man, “if it wasn’t fer all the books I have to write in an’ the blanks I have to fill out. It keeps people comin’ in, but sometimes I have to set up pretty near all night writin’ out things fer the gov’ament. I don’t keep no books fer the store, fer I never sell nothin’ ’cept fer cash, or fer sumpen that’s brought in, an’ I keep my expense account in my hat. If the sheriff ever comes ’round ’ere to close me up, ’e won’t find no books to go by. I spend all the money that gits in the drawer, an’ if what’s in the store should burn up, I’d be ahead’cause I’ve got insurance, an’ I’d git it all at once; so I guess I’m all right. I ain’t got much to show fer my life, ’cept a grin, but that’s sumpen. Some day I’ll have all the poetry I’ve made printed into a volume that’ll be put on sale, an’ I’ll have a reg’lar income an’ I won’t have to work no more.

“I’m keepin’ a first class place here. There’s a lot o’ this new-fangled stuff that I’ve stopped carryin’. People always buy it out when they come in, an’ I have to keep gittin’ more all the time. If I don’t have them things they ask fer, they’ll prob’ly buy sumpen that’s already on hand. I can’t please ev’rybody all the time, or I’d be worked to death. I don’t keep no likker, but anybody can git most anything else here that’ll make ’em smell like a man, an’ I don’t sell no cigarettes. A feller come in ’ere with one once, an’ when ’e went out ’e left ’is punk on the edge of a pile o’ paper. After a while some o’ the bunch out in front noticed some fire, an’ it pretty near burnt up the store, an’ besides they smell like a burnt offering, an’ I don’t like ’em.”

I asked him if he ever went over to the lake.

“Not fer about fifteen years. We all drove over there fer a bath, an’ I took a bad cold an’ I haven’t bin there since. This talk o’ washin’ all the time is nonsence. Jedge Blossom’s got a big tin bath tub up to his place, that’s painted green, an’ ’e gits in it an’ sloshes ’round ev’ry Saturday night when ’e’s home, but when Monday mornin’ comes ’e don’t look no better’n anybody else.”

During one afternoon that I spent with him in the rear of the store, he showed me some of the literature which he had taken down from the stock on one of the upper shelves, and had been reading during the winter. The pile consisted of old-fashioned dime novels of years ago, with their multicolored illustrated paper covers. Among the titles, and on the blood-curdling, well-thumbed pages, I found names that were once familiar and much beloved. “Lantern-Jawed Bob,” “Snake Eye,” “Deadwood Dick,” “Iron Hand,” “Navajo Bill,” “Shadow Bill,” “The Forest Avenger,” “Eagle-Eyed Zeke,” “The War Tiger of the Modocs,” “The Mountain Demon,” and many other forgotten heroes of boyhood days, “advanced coolly and stealthily” out of the mists of the dim past, andonce more they scalped, robbed, trailed, circumvented bloodthirsty pursuers, had hair-breadth escapes, mocked death, rescued peerless maidens from savage redskins in the wilderness, and finally married them, as of yore.

The romance in the pile was irretrievably bad, but it recalled happy memories. It was not surprising that the old man was impressed with the idea that “too much readin’ rots the mind,” when spring came, and he had finished the stack.

Around the big stove, on chilly days, the owners of the chin whiskers congregate, with cob pipes and juicy plug. They contribute liberally to the square boxes filled with sawdust that serve as cuspidors. In this solemn circle the great political problems of the nation are considered and solved.

The gossip of the township is exchanged, and the personal frailties of absent ones discussed. The local Munchausen tells wondrous tales of his cow, that stands out in the river and is milked by hungry fish that wait among the lilies, and of hailstorms he has seen that have demolished brickyards.

A projected barn, the sale of a horse or cow, the repairs on a wagon, the prospects of frost orrain, the crops, the price of hogs, the tariff, the trusts, the rascality of the railroads, and many other subjects, are mingled with the gossip of the neighborhood. These matters are all deeply pondered over. They talk about their rheumatism, the “cricks” in their backs, their coughs, their aches and pains, and the foolish vagaries of the “women folks.” They buy patent medicines, and they bathe only when they get caught in the rain.

THE PESSIMISTS

A slatternly looking woman comes in, buys somecalico, thread, two yards of ribbon, and some hooks and eyes. When she departs some one remarks, “Wonder wot she’s goin’ to make now!” From that the conversation drifts to “the feller that left ’er about two years ago.” The proprietors of the chin whiskers all knew “when ’e fust come ’round, ’e wasn’t any good,” and the sage prophecies of by-gone days are now fully verified. The demerits of a certain horse, which he had once sold to one of the prophets, are again recounted, and the general opinion is that after the delinquent “got through with the lawsuit ’e was mixed up in, ’e went out west som’ers with the money ’is lawyer didn’t git. Anyhow, ’e was no good.” Nobody is “any good.”

When the time comes to “git home to supper,” the dilapidated vehicles begin to crawl out into the fading light and disappear. They carry the pessimists and the few necessaries which they have bought at the store—some molasses, sugar, tea and coffee, possibly a new shovel, some nails, and always a plentiful supply of plug tobacco, a great deal of which is filtered into the soil of the back country. Some eggs, butter, vegetables, and otherproduce of the little farm has been left in payment.

THEY “CRAWL OUT INTO THE FADING LIGHT”

After the tired horses are unhitched and fed, the exciting gossip is retold at the supper table. A few chores are done, an hour or so is spent around the big lamp, and another eventful day has closed. A week may pass before another trip is made to the sleepy village.

Those who are gone are under the tall grasses and wild flowers on the hill near the woods, beyond the little weather-beaten country church. The iron bell has tolled for them as they were laid away, and now that it is all over, it is the same with them as if they had been monarchs or millionaires.

A touching, if crude, epitaph can be deciphered on one of the gray mossy stones through the crumbling fence. After the name and the final date are the lines,

“Shed not for me the bitter tearsNor fill the heart with vain regrets.’Tis but the casket that lies here,The gems that filled them sparkles yet.”

and lower, under a pair of clasped hands, “We will meet again,” and it may be that a mighty truth is on the stone.

The “Jedge”.

THE road leading from the lake, through the sand hills, and the low stretches of the back country, over to the sleepy village, is broken—and badly broken—by numerous sections of corduroy reinforcements, which have been laid in the marshy places, across small creeks and quagmires. The portion of the road near the lake is seldom traveled. Occasionally, during the hot weather, a wagon-load of people will come over from the sleepy village, and from the little farms along the road, and go into the lake to get cool. They will then spend the rest of the day sweltering on the hot sand to get warm, and return at night.

Beyond the marsh, perhaps half way to the village, is the residence and office of Judge Cassius Blossom, the local Dogberry, the repository of the conflicting interests, and final arbiter in most of the petty dissensions of the sparsely settled country in which he lives.

OLD SETTLERS IN THE BACK COUNTRY

The “Jedge” was a faithful member of the solemn conclaves of the wise ones with the chin whiskers at the general store in the sleepy village, where he often reversed the decisions of the supreme court. His chair in the charmed circle around the big old-fashioned stove, and among the sawdust cuspidors, in winter, and out on the platform under the awning in summer, was looked upon as the resting-place of about as much legal wisdom, and about as much bad whisky, as one man could comfortably carry around. His dissertations were always anxiously listened to and absorbed by his auditors, each according to his capacity. His opinions and observations were variously interpreted to the home firesides around through the country at night, according to the intellectual limitations of the narrator.

“The Jedge says that they’s some cases that’s agin the common law, an’ they’s some cases that’s agin the stattoot law, but about this ’ere case he was talkin’ about, ’e said ’e’d ’ave to look up sumpen. He told about a case where some feller ’ad sued another feller fer some money that was owin’ to ’im, but ’e’d lost the notes, but ’e was goin’ togit a judgment agin this feller all the same, an’ make a levy on ’im. You bet I’m goin’ to be thar when this case comes up in court an’ see wot’s doin’. The Jedge is sharper’n a tack, an’ you bet them fellers over to the county seat ain’t goin’ to put nothin’ over on’ im, if ’e’s sober. He’ll make points on all of ’em, but if ’e goes over thar an’ sets ’round Fogarty’s place boozin’, ’e’ll lose out.”

In talking with Sipes, one afternoon, about some of the roads in the back country, he suggested that we take a walk over to the Judge’s house and see him. “The Jedge has got a map that’s got all them things on it. The ol’ feller deals in law, an’ land, an’ fire insurance, an’ everythin’ else.”

After Sipes had carefully shut the door of his shanty, and secured it with an old iron padlock, we started on our journey. He said that he generally locked the place up when he went away, as “there was sometimes some fellers snoopin’ ’round that might swipe sumpen, an’ the Jedge told me oncet that if anybody ever busted open the lock, it would show bulgarious intent, an’ they’d git sent up fer it if they ever got caught, but if they went inwhen the place wasn’t locked, it was trespass on the case, or sumpen like that.”

We trudged along through the deep sand for half a mile or so, and then turned through an opening in the dunes where the road came in. Our walk led through the broken wet country for about a mile before we came to more solid ground. On the way across the marshy strip the old man pointed out familiar spots where he had “lambasted pretty near a whole flock o’ ducks at one shot.” In another place he had once spent nearly an hour in “sneakin’ up on a bunch o’ wooden decoys that some feller had out, an’ when I shot into ’em you’d a thought a ton o’ lead ’ad struck a lumber pile. The feller yelled when I fired. He was back in some weeds, an’ I guess ’e was afraid there was goin’ to be sumpen doin’ on ’im with the other bar’l if ’e didn’t yell.”

A tamarack swamp, about half a mile away, was a favorite haunt for rabbits in the winter. He often went over there on the ice after there had been a light fall of snow.

“Them little beasts are pretty foxy, but I just go over there an’ set still, an’ when one of ’em comeshoppin’ ’round out in the open, I shoot the fillin’ out of ’im. I’ve got as many as twenty there in one day.

“When we git over to the Jedge’s house, don’t you go ag’inst none o’ that whisky that ’e’s got in a big black bottle in the under part of ’is desk. He calls the bottle ‘Black Betty,’ an’ it’s ter’ble stuff. It kicks pretty near as hard as my ol’ scatter gun, an’ ’e has to keep a glass stopper in the bottle. A common cork would be et up. A man that laps up whisky like that has to have a sheet-iron stummick, an’ I guess the Jedge’s got one all right, fer ’e’s bin hittin’ it fer years.

“He fills the bottle up out of a big demijohn, that ’e gits loaded up from a partic’lar bar’l at Fogarty’s place over to the county seat when ’e goes to court, an’ lots o’ times when ’e don’t go to court. The bar’l replenishes the demijohn, the demijohn replenishes Black Betty, an’ Black Betty replenishes the Jedge, an’ after that the Jedge has to replenish Fogarty—so it all works ’round natural—an’ the Jedge keeps a skinful all the time.

“A white man could drink the grog we used to have on the ship an’ still see, but the Jedge’s dopewould make a hole in a pine board, an’ you pass it by.”

This I solemnly promised to do.

“I notice that them fellers that take up stiddy boozin’ have to ’tend to it all the time. When ol’ Jedge Blossom finds out that them law cases that ’e’s always talkin’ about interferes with ’is boozin’, ’e’ll quit monkeyin’ with ’em. It must a bin a sweet country that ’e bloomed in. Pretty near every time I go to see ’im, ’e ain’t home. They say ’e’s off ’tendin’ to some important cases before the master in chancery. Them cases is prob’ly mostly before Black Betty, fer I notice ’e always comes home from ’em stewed, an’ sometimes ’is horse comes home alone an’ ’e comes later. He takes drinks lots o’ times when ’e don’t need ’em. He just drops ’em in to hear ’em spatter.

“They’ll find ’im in a catamose condition some day when ’e’s over to the county seat, that ’e won’t come out of, an’ when it’s all over they can dispose of ’is remains by just pourin’ ’im back into Fogarty’s bar’l. All that’ll be left of ’im’ll be ’is thirst, an’ they’d better put wot’ll be left of ’is fire insurance business in with ’im, fer ’e’ll need some.”

The old man’s entertaining review of the frailties of the “Jedge,” and of alcoholic humanity in general, continued until we arrived at our destination.

The small frame house, which was once white, but now a dingy gray, was adorned with faded green blinds. It stood about fifty feet back from the road. Some mournful evergreens stood in painful regularity in the front yard. The fence was somewhat dilapidated, and on it was a weather-beaten sign:

Cassius Blossom, J.P.,Attorney and Counsellor at Law,Notary Public,Fire Insurance, Real Estate.

A gravel walk, fringed with white shells, led from the rickety gate to the rather ecclesiastical-looking front door. Sipes remarked in passing that “them white shells was to help the Jedge steer ’is course on dark nights, when ’e was three sheets in the wind, an’ beatin’ up aginst it.”

There was a brown bell-handle near the door, and when it was pulled we could hear a prolonged, hoarse tinkling somewhere off in the rear of thehouse. We soon heard footsteps, and a forbidding-looking female opened the door. She was quite tall and angular. A few faded freckles around the nose—a mass of frowsy red hair, liberally streaked with gray—a general untidiness—and a glint in her yellowish-brown eyes, as she peered out at us over her brass-rimmed spectacles, produced impressions that were anything but assuring.

On being admitted to the house, we were ushered into the “library,” which also evidently served as a dining-room and office. A round table stood in the middle of the room, covered with a soiled red and white fringed table cloth. A hair-cloth sofa, with some broken springs and bits of excelsior protruding from underneath, occupied one side of the apartment, and there were several chairs of the same repellant material. A narrow roll-top combination desk and bookcase, freely splotched with ink-stains, stood near the window. Behind the dusty glass doors of the bookcase were a few well-worn books, bound in sheepskin. The first volume of Blackstone’s Commentaries, a copy of Parsons on Contracts, two or three volumes of court reports, and the Revised Statutes of the state, completed the assemblage of legal lore.

The pictures on the walls consisted of some stiff-looking crayon portraits in gloomy frames, evidently copied from old photographs—all of which were very bad—another somber frame containing a fly-specked steel engraving of the justices of the U. S. Supreme Court, and still another, out of which the stern and noble face of Daniel Webster looked into the room. His immeasurable services to his country did not prevent him from leaving a malign influence behind him. His unfortunate example convinces many budding statesmen and promising lawyers that the human intellect is not soluble in alcohol, and they are lulled into the belief that the brilliancy of his mind was not dimmed by his indulgences. They emulate his weakness, as well as his strength, and console themselves in their cups with the greatness of Webster.

The “Jedge” sat at the desk, without his coat, writing, his back toward us. His shirt-sleeves, and his wide stand-up collar, were not clean. Evidently he was very busy and must not be disturbed just yet. With a solemn wink of his solitary eye, and an expressive gesture, Sipes attracted my attention to a faint wreath of softly ascending smokeissuing from a cob pipe, which was lying on a window-sill on the opposite side of the room, which suggested that the important business at the desk may have commenced when the bell rang.

Evidently the “Jedge” appreciated the tactical advantage which preoccupation always establishes when business callers come. The visitor, in being compelled to await the disposal of more weighty matters, is duly humbled and impressed with the fact that, at least so far as time is concerned, he is a suppliant and not a dictator.

Dissimulation is an universal practice of man and woman kind. A pessimistic student of the complexities of the human comedy might, with much justice, conclude that at least half of the people on the globe—and especially of those who are super-civilized—pretend, to a greater or less degree, to be something that they are not, and the other half pretend not to be something that they are.

Further thought upon this subject was interrupted by the “Jedge.” The cane-seated swivel chair turned with a loud squeak, and we were before the disciple of Blackstone & Bacchus—thatfamous firm whose dissolution the shade of Webster will never permit.

He was a spare, red-faced man, of perhaps sixty-five, with white hair and tobacco-stained whiskers. His prominent nose appeared to be a little swollen and wore a deep blush. With a learned frown he looked out of his deep-set and bloodshot eyes, over the tops of his spectacles. His voice was deep and hoarse.

“Good morning, gentlemen. What can I do for you?”

It was afternoon, but, as the uncharitable Sipes suggested later, “the Jedge prob’ly hadn’t got home last night yet, or mebbe ’e’d just got up.”

“You will have to excuse me for keeping you waiting, but I’ve just been preparing the final papers in a very important case that I’ve got to file in court by Saturday. I’ve had to work on them steadily for the past few days, as there are some very complicated questions of law involved, and I’ve had to look up a lot of decisions. I am now entirely at your service.”

After being formally introduced by my friend Sipes, I explained the object of the visit. The“Jedge” was very cordial. He arose from his chair, walked impressively, and with much dignity, across the room, resumed his cob pipe, which was still alive, and raised the lid of an old leather-covered trunk, bound with brass nails. After a long search he produced the desired map and spread it out on the table.

“Before we take up this matter of the roads, I think, gentlemen, that we had better have a little refreshment.”

We both politely declined his invitation and expressed a preference for some cold water. He seemed disappointed, and, with a surprised and curious glance at Sipes, returned to the desk, opened one of the lower doors, and gently lifted “Black Betty” out of the gloom.

“I haven’t been feeling very well for several days, and I’ve had some pains in my back. If you’ll excuse me for drinking alone, I’ll just take a little bracer.” Sipes’ solitary eye again closed expressively, as the “Jedge” removed the stopper, grasped the big bottle firmly around the neck, and tilted it among his whiskers with a motion that no tyro could ever hope to imitate.

The answering gurgle indicated that the “bracer” was “going home,” and that, to say the least, it was not homeopathic. After the restoration of “Black Betty” to her hiding-place, the “Jedge” resumed the conversation, without referring to the cold water which we had suggested. Possibly the mention of it had affected him unpleasantly.

He explained the map in detail, and told of several changes that would have to be made in a new one. This led to long accounts, punctuated with more winks by Sipes, of petty litigation, in which he had taken a prominent part, as a result of which a lot of land had been condemned and some new roads established. Had it not been for him, the highways would have been “entirely inadequate, and in very poor condition.”

In summing up his public services he said that he had lived in that part of the state for about thirty years. His advice was now being generally followed, and the country was beginning to pick up. He had several small farms for sale which he would like to show me, if I thought of locating around there; in fact, there was nothing anywhere in that part of the country that was not for sale.

I told him that my interest in the subject was entirely of an artistic character.

“Well, if that’s the case, I can show you a lot of fine scenes, and if you’ll come over some day and get into a buggy with me, I’ll drive you over to the county seat when I go to court.”

He seemed much flattered when I asked him to allow me to make a sketch of him. After it was finished, he examined it critically, to the intense amusement of Sipes. He thought the nose was a little too big, and the hair was “too much mussed up.” He also thought that the drawing made him look a little older than he was, and that the eye was not quite natural, “but of course I can’t see the side of my face, and it may be all right.

“As you are interested in art, you’ll enjoy looking at my pictures.”

He then showed me the array on the walls, of which he was very proud. The crayon portrait of his first wife, with the cheeks tinted pink and the ear-rings gilded, he thought “was a fine piece of work.” A man had come along, about ten years ago, and had made three “genuine crayon portraits” for ten dollars. The “Jedge” supposed that“now days they would be worth a great deal more than that.” The other two “genuine crayon portraits” represented his father and mother, an antiquated couple in the Sunday dress of pioneer days, who looked severely out of their heavy frames. The man had taken the old daguerreotypes away to be copied, and when the completed goods were delivered, he claimed that “the frames alone were worth as much as the pictures.” In this he was quite right.

The “Jedge” wanted to show me an album containing pictures of the rest of his relatives, but fortunately he was unable to find it. In searching for it, however, he ran across a box containing a collection of Indian arrow heads, flint implements, and spears, which were of absorbing interest. He had found some of them himself, and numerous friends, knowing of his hobby, had furnished him with many of these valuable relics of the red man, whose white brothers came with guns and strong waters and appropriated his heritage.

He soon began to show signs of more pains in his back. With an apologetic reference to them, and with more sly winks from Sipes, “Black Betty” was again produced, and her fiery fluid again solaced the arid esophagus of the “Jedge.”

The contents of the bottle were evidently getting dangerously low. He excused himself for a minute, and took it into the next room, where he refilled it from the big demijohn that stood in the corner. Sipes indulged in many amusing grimaces as the sounds from the other room indicated that “Black Betty’s” condition had again become normal.

After we had talked a little while longer, Sipes related to the “Jedge” the story of the tangled set lines, over which he and “Happy Cal” had got into trouble years ago, and wanted to know “what the law was.”

After listening carefully to all of the facts, the “Jedge” cleared his throat slightly and delivered his opinion.

This preliminary slight clearing of the throat implies deliberation, and often adds impressiveness to a forthcoming utterance. Sipes remarked later, that “nobody never lived that was as wise as the Jedge looked when ’e hemmed a little an’ got on ’is legal frown.”

“It seems from the facts before us, that the mass of property under consideration was discovered on the shore, about half-way between the homes of the two claimants, neither of whom, as a matter of fact, possessed original title to it. The position of the mass when found brings up several difficult questions of law, involving facts which aremalum in se. A portion of it was on the surface of the water, a portion of it was submerged, and still another portion was on dry land. According to maritime law, that portion on the surface was flotsam, and that portion which was submerged was jetsam. The laws affecting flotsam and jetsam would prevail as to these two portions, but as to the portion which rested on dry land, I am inclined to think that thelex lociwould apply.”

Whereupon, the bewildered Sipes asked, “Who done this?”

Disregarding the interruption, the “Jedge” again slightly cleared his throat and continued:

“A priori, I am of opinion thatprima facieevidence of ownership rests with possession, and that theonus probandimust necessarily beex adverso.” The “Jedge” then stated that the opinionwould cost half a dollar. Sipes was speechless, but paid the fee.

The “Jedge” had charged “Happy Cal” a dollar one night, years ago, for an opinion in the same case. He had advised Cal “not to disturb thestatus quo.” The dazed client paid the money and disappeared into the darkness. He probably stopped at Sipes’s place, where the untangled lines were stretched out to dry, and cut them up, on his way home, thus disposing of the “status quo” entirely.

It was to the credit of the “Jedge” that he never took any more than his clients had, and they could always come back when they had more.

We finally thanked the “Jedge” for his courtesy, and bade him good-bye.

On the way back I reimbursed Sipes in the matter of the half-dollar which he had paid for the opinion, as it had really been worth more to me than it was to him. After we had left the house, the old man’s comments on the visit were earnest and caustic.

“Wot d’ye think o’ the gall o’ that old cuss chargin’ me half a dollar fer all that noise ’e madeabout them lines? I don’t know that feller Losey ’e spoke of. He was never ’round ’ere at all, an’ ’e never ’ad nothin’ to do with them lines, an’ that melon in the sea, that ’e told about, was all bunk. There was nothin’ like that near that bunch o’ stuff. I don’t know what ever become o’ Cal. He may be now in spotless robes, fer all I know, but I know ’e cut up them lines just the same. There was about two miles of ’em, when they was fixed up an’ stretched out, an’ they was worth some money, an’ as long as the feller that ’ad ’em out in the lake didn’t come along to claim ’em, they was mine. Cal never ’ad no bus’ness with ’em, an’ I don’t need to mosey over an’ pay that old tank fifty cents to find it out, neither. Cash us Blossom is a good name fer him, all right. He’s everythin’ I said ’e was on the way over, an’ more, too. He’s got some fresh money now, an’ I’ll bet the demijohn’ll be trundled over to the county seat the first thing in the mornin’. He can buy a lot o’ the kind o’ Whisky ’e drinks fer half a dollar.

“He lays ’is demijohn on the side, underneath, when ’e starts out, but when ’e drives home it’s always standin’ up in the back o’ the buggy, sonothin’ ’ll spill, an’ that’s more’n the Jedge could do. When I see ’im drivin’ on the road, I can always tell, by where the demijohn is, whether ’e’s got a cargo or travelin’ light. That heap big Injun dignity that ’e’s always puttin’ on when ’e makes them spiels o’ his, gives me tired feelin’s. You can’t mix up dignity with whisky without spoilin’ both of ’em. If ’e ever comes over to my place, you can turn me into snakes if I don’t charge ’im a half a dollar fer the first question ’e asks. I’ll bet ’e won’t come though, fer I’m too near the water. I wish I could sic old Doc Looney on ’im some time. He wouldn’t stay afloat long after the Doc got to ’im.”

I asked Sipes if the forbidding-looking female who came to the door was the Judge’s wife.

“Not on yer life,” he replied. “If ’e had a wife, she’d kill ’im. That ol’ cactus is ’is housekeeper. She’s a distant relative o’ some kind, an’ she’s just waitin’ fer Black Betty to finish ’im up so’s she’ll git the house.”

We arrived at Sipes’s place about dusk. I had left my boat on the beach, and, as the old man helped me push it into the water, he indulged infinal anathemas against the “Jedge.” He shook his fist in his direction and said that “when we go over there ag’in we’d better leave our money in the shanty.”

I happened to stop at the store in the sleepy village one hot day during the following summer. The “Jedge” was just getting into his buggy, but stopped and greeted me cordially. I intended leaving for home that evening, and he kindly offered to take me to the railroad station, about five miles away. I gladly accepted his offer, although he did not appear to be in a very good condition to drive a horse.

On the way across the country he recited his public services, discussed the details of his “important cases,” and unfolded his dreams of the future of the county.

We arrived at the station just in time to enable me to jump quickly out of the buggy and catch the train that was pulling out. I paused on the rear platform to call out a good-bye to the “Jedge,” but he had tried to make too short a turn on the narrow road, and the buggy was lying on its side, much twisted up. The horse had stopped and waslooking inquiringly back from between the broken thills. The “Jedge,” who was partially under the wreck, but evidently unhurt, waved a cheerful farewell at me as the train passed the water tank, and in the distance I could see that he was getting safely out of the scrape.

The station agent and a few villagers, who had come to the depot to see that the train arrived and departed properly, were going to his assistance.

From about two miles away I saw the black buggy top slowly resume its normal position and begin to move on the road. The “Jedge” was probably by this time much in need of “refreshment,” and, as he was now on the way to the county seat, relief was not very far off. Undoubtedly his friend Fogarty would fully and deeply sympathize with him in his troubles as long as his cash lasted.

He was one of the pathetic failures whom we meet daily in the walks of life. Naturally gifted, and fairly well educated, he had started bravely out on his road of destiny, with noble ambitions and alluring hopes. In the early part of the journey he had lifted a fatal chalice to his lips, and the way became dark. He drifted from the highway that might have led to fame and fortune to the still by-path in which we found him. Because he was not strong, he fell—as countless others have fallen before him.

The shadow of “Black Betty” has fallen over a chair in the sleepy village that is now empty, and it may be that the poor old “Jedge” is arguing his own plea for mercy before a greater Court. Let us hope that his final appeal may bring forgiveness and peace.

The stone, simple and suggestive, which was erected to his memory, was designed and paid for by his friends. Even Sipes relented and requested Catfish John to put fifty cents in “cash-money” into the contribution box at the store for him.

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