saloon-keeper up to Zoar.

Sez I, "The very man that sold that poor sinner the licker on that
night?"

"Yes," sez Josiah.

"Wall," sez I, "the rope ort to be used on his own neck."

And Josiah Allen acted awfully horrified at my idee, and asked me "if I
wuz as crazy as a loon?"

And sez he, "He has been one of the fiercest ones to head him off that
has been out."

And I sez dryly--dry as a chip, "He wuzn't so fierce to head him off the
night he sold him the whiskey and hard cider." Sez I, "That headin' off
would have amounted to sunthin'."

And agin I sez, "The rope ort to be used on his own neck, if it is on
anybody's, his and Uncle Sam's."

And agin Josiah Allen asked me, "If I wuz as crazy as a dumb loon and a
losin' my faculties--what few of 'em you ever had," sez he.

And I sez, "The two wuz in partnership together, and they got the man to
do the murder." Sez I, "Most all the murders that are done in this
country are done by that firm--the Goverment and the Saloon-keeper. And
when their poor tools, that they have whetted up for bloodshed, swing
out through their open doors and cut and slash and mow down their
ghastly furrows of crime and horrer, who is to blame?"

And Josiah turned over the almanac to the yeller cover and perused it,
so's to show his perfect and utter indifference and contempt for my
words.

Wall, they ketched the man a day or two after, about sundown. He had
been a little ahead of his pursuers, a-dodgin' 'em this way and that
way, jest like a fox a-dodgin' a pack of hounds.

His old rubber boots wuz all wore offen him, his clothes hangin' in rags
and tatters where he had rushed through the woods and swamps, his feet
and hands all froze. Half starved, and almost idiotic with fear and
remorse and the effects of the poisoned licker and doctored cider he had
drinked, he wuz the most pitiful and wretched-lookin' object I ever see
in my hull life.

And it happened he wux took a little over a mile from us, and he wuz
brung right by our door.

There wuz some officers in the party, so they interfered and kep the mob
from hangin' him right up by the neck.

They said they had to hold that saloon-keeper to keep his hands offen
him, and they said that in spite of all he did git the rope round him.

But the officers interfered, and after that they had to hold the
saloon-keeper to keep him from the prisoner.

And I sez, when Josiah was a-praisin' up the saloon-keeper's zeal, and
how the of