try experiments with it before we got the hang of its feed, and peek
through the barn doors dretful curious at it to see how it wuz a-actin',
and how its food wuz agreein' with it.

"We shouldn't dast to ride it to water, or holler at it, as if it wuz a
calf; and if it should happen to break loose, Heaven knows what we
should do with it!

"And I spoze every fence would be full of neighbors a-standin' safe on
their own solid premises, a-hollerin' out to us what to do, and every
one on 'em mad as hens if we didn't foller their directions.

"Some on 'em hollerin' to us to mount up on it and ride it back into the
barn, when they knew that it would tear us to pieces if we went nigh it
when it wuz mad. And some on 'em orderin' us to git rid of it. And how
could we dispose of a ragin' rinosterhorse at a minute's notice? And
some on 'em a-yellin' at us to kill it. How could we kill it, when the
creeter didn't belong to us?

"And some on 'em, not realizin' that our rinosterhorse boardin' wuz new
business to us, and we wuz liable to make mistakes, standin' up on the
ruff of their own barns, safe and sound, a-readin' the Bible to us and
warnin' us, and we tuggin' away and swettin' with this wild creeter on
our hands, and tryin' to do the best we could with it.

"And then, right on top of this, Jonesville might serve a injunction
onto us, that we had no right to let such a dangerous creeter into the
precincts of Jonesville; and then we, feelin' kinder sorry, mebby, that
we had ondertook the job, tried to git rid on't; and the rinosterhorse
owner serves another injunction on us, makin' us keep it, sayin' that
he'd paid its board in advance, and that he wouldn't take it back.

"And there we would be, all wore out with our job, and not pleasin'
nobody, nor nothin', but makin' the hull caboodle mad as hens at us; and
we a-not meanin' any hurt, none of the time, a-meanin' well towards
Jonesville and rinosterhorses. Wouldn't we be in a situation to be
pitied, Arvilly?"

"Yes," sez she, "it is jest so as I tell you; Cephus sez that he won't
wait a minute longer than September."

I see how it wuz--she hadn't hearn a word of my remarkable eloquence.
Like all the rest, she had vivid idees about Sunday closin'; but come to
the p'int, her own affairs wuz of the most consequence. She forgot all
about the struggles of the Directors in their efforts to do what wuz
right and best, in thoughts of Cephus.

But I considered it human nater,