per-grass."

I drove to town next morning, on some business, and did not return until
noon; and after dinner I had to visit a neighbor, and did not get back
until supper-time. I was smoking a cigar on the back piazza in the early
evening, when I saw a familiar figure carrying a bucket of water to the
barn. I called my wife.

"My dear," I said severely, "what is that rascal doing here? I thought
I discharged him yesterday for good and all."

"Oh, yes," she answered, "I forgot to tell you. He was hanging round the
place all the morning, and looking so down in the mouth, that I told him
that if he would try to do better, we would give him one more chance. He
seems so grateful, and so really in earnest in his promises of
amendment, that I'm sure you'll not regret taking him back."

I was seriously enough annoyed to let my cigar go out. I did not share
my wife's rose-colored hopes in regard to Tom; but as I did not wish the
servants to think there was any conflict of authority in the household,
I let the boy stay.

THE CONJURER'S REVENGE

Sunday was sometimes a rather dull day at our place. In the morning,
when the weather was pleasant, my wife and I would drive to town, a
distance of about five miles, to attend the church of our choice. The
afternoons we spent at home, for the most part, occupying ourselves with
the newspapers and magazines, and the contents of a fairly good library.
We had a piano in the house, on which my wife played with skill and
feeling. I possessed a passable baritone voice, and could accompany
myself indifferently well when my wife was not by to assist me. When
these resources failed us, we were apt to find it a little dull.

One Sunday afternoon in early spring,--the balmy spring of North
Carolina, when the air is in that ideal balance between heat and cold
where one wishes it could always remain,--my wife and I were seated on
the front piazza, she wearily but conscientiously ploughing through a
missionary report, while I followed the impossible career of the blonde
heroine of a rudimentary novel. I had thrown the book aside in disgust,
when I saw Julius coming through the yard, under the spreading elms,
which were already in full leaf. He wore his Sunday clothes, and
advanced with a dignity of movement quite different from his week-day
slouch.

"Have a seat, Julius," I said, pointing to an empty rocking-chair.

"No, thanky, boss, I'll des set here on de top step."

"Oh, no, Uncle