he gave a
kind of groan. 'Who's that?' says he. 'It's a boy come over from
Bywood,' says Mrs. Abner, as they call her. 'He's goin' to stop here
over night, Father. Ain't you glad to see him?--Father likes young folks
real well!' she says to me. The old gentleman gave a groan, and sat
down, nursing his big bottle as if it were a baby. 'D'ye ever have the
dyspepsy?' he asked, looking at me. 'No, sir!' said I. 'Never had
anything that I know of, 'cept the measles.' He groaned again, and
poured something out of the bottle into a tumbler. 'You look kinder
'pindlin',' says he, shaking his head. 'I think likely you've got it on
ye 'thout knowin' it. It's sub-tile, dyspepsy is,--dreadful sub-tile.'"

"What did he mean?--subtle?" asked Hilda, laughing.

"I suppose so!" replied the boy. "And then he took his medicine,
groaning all the time and making the worst faces you ever saw. 'I reckon
you'd better take a swallow o' this, my son!' he said. 'It's a
pre-ventitative, as well 's a cure.'"

"Bubble," cried his sister, "you are making this up. Confess, you
monkey!"

"I'm not!" said Bubble, laughing. "It's true, every word of it. I
_couldn't_ make up old Mr. Colt! 'It's a pre-ventitative!' he says, and
reaches out his hand for my tumbler. Then Abner, the young man, spoke
up, and told him he guessed I'd be better without it, and that 't wasn't
meant for young people, and so on. 'What is it, Mr. Colt?' I asked,
seeing that he looked real--I mean very much--disappointed. He
brightened up at once. 'It's Vino's Vegetable Vivifier!' he said. 'It's
the greatest thing out for dyspepsy. How many bottles have I took,
Leory?' 'I believe this is the tenth, Father!' said Mrs. Abner. 'And _I_
don't see as 't 's done you a mite o' good!' she said to herself, but so
't I could hear. 'Thar!' says the old man, nodding at me, as proud as
could be, 'd' ye hear that? Ten bottles I've took, at a dollar a bottle.
Ah! it's great stuff. Ugh!' and he groaned and took a great piece of
mince-pie on his plate. 'Oh, Father!' says the young woman, '_do_ you
think you ought to eat mince-pie, after as sick as you was yesterday?'
He was just as mad as hops! 'Ef I'm to be grutched vittles,' he says, 'I
guess it's time for me to be quittin'. I've eat mince-pie seventy year,
man an' boy, and I guess I ain't goin' to leave off now. I kin go over
to Joel's, if so be folks begrutches me my vittles here.' 'Oh, come,
Father!' says Abner; 'you know Leory didn't mean not