, Pharo! Ef ye want to find yerself, ye'd better start on down t'
the south eend o' the Basin, 'n' negotiate around to leeward o'
Leezur's bresh-heap; that's the d'rection yer ball was a-startin' for,
las' time I seen 'er!"

"Poo! poo!" said Captain Pharo, drawing a Sunday "parlor" match
explosively along his boot-leg; "jest hold on thar, Shamgar. Jest hold
on till I git my old chimley here a-goin' ag'in----"

"The meetin' is open and patiently waitin' for remarks," said Brother
Skates, poising himself wearily but ever enduringly on one boot.

After an appreciative silence within, the whisper finally arose once
more: "But he paid her off pretty well."

"Dew tell!"

"She took 'n' hid his pipe one day, and her clo's was hangin' out on
the line--she wears the mos' beautiful, 'labberotest-trimmed clo's you
ever see--so what does he do but go an' git a padlock an' padlocked
them clo's onto the line. 'When you git me my pipe,' says he, 'I'll
unlock your wardrobe,' says he."

"Wal, I never! Ain't them ructions!"

"Did the peddler come around to your house this month?"

"He did so. I bought a pictur' 't was named 'Logan.' It's a fancy
skitch, I guess, 'but I'm goin' to have that pictur', Cap'n Nason Ted,'
says I, 'ef 't takes every egg the hens is ekil to from now t'
deer-stalkin',' says I. It jest completely drored me somehow; it had
sech a feelin' look."

"Did Nason let ye buy it?"

"Yis, he did; but he was dreadful sneakish an' j'ilous. 'It's jest a
fancy skitch,' says he; "'tain't nothin' 't ever slammed around in
shoes,' says he."

"I bought a pair o' black stockings," said the voice of a young matron.
"I remember 'cause I wore 'em the very day that Johnny swallowed six
buttons--and _smut!_--wal----" A picture too dark for the imagination
was relieved by the hum of a discussion now bravely finding voice on
the male side of the house.

"There's some difference in the price of a hoss afore blueberryin' and
after blueberryin', I can tell ye."

"All the difference 'twixt black an' white. Wal, thar's mos' things I
can do without, but when you find me without a hoss you'll find me done
'ith trouble altogether an' stretched out ca'm an' laid on the cooler."

"Skates's raisin' a pretty good colt thar, 'ceptin' 't she's a leetle
twisty in her off hin' leg. What do you consider on her worth, Skates?"

"I refused two hunderd dollars for 'er last week," said Brother Skates,
in a clearly round, secular ton