.

"Great Scott," said Jud, "what we want to do is to keep you folks
from eatin' so much. Lem'me see," he added after a pause, as if still
thinking he'd get to the source of her trouble--"Yistidday was
Sunday--you didn't have to work--now what did you eat for breakfast?"

"Nothin'--oh, I aint got no appetite at all"--whined Miss Samantha.

"Well, what did you eat--I wanter find out what ails you?"

"Well, lem'me see," said Miss Samantha, counting on her fingers--"a
biled mackrel, some fried bacon, two pones of corn bread--kinder
forced it down."

"Ur-huh--" said Jud, thoughtfully--"of course you had to drink, too."

"Yes"--whined Miss Samantha woefully--"two glasses of buttermilk."

Jud elevated his eyebrows "An' for dinner?"

"O, Lor'. Jes' cu'dn't eat nothin' fur dinner," she wailed. "If the
Company'd only get some cherry bark an' whiskey"--

"At dinner," said Mrs Carewe, stroking her chin--"we had some
sour-kraut--she eat right pe'rtly of that--kinder seemed lak a
appetizer to her. She mixed it with biled cabbage an' et right
pe'rtly of it."

"An' some mo' buttermilk--it kinder cools my stomach," whined Miss
Samantha. "An' hog-jowl, an' corn-bread--anything else Maw?"

"A raw onion in vinegar," said her mother--"It's the only thing that
seems to make you want to eat a little. An' reddishes--we had some
new reddishes fur dinner--didn't we, Samanthy?"

"Good Lord," snapped Jud--"reddishes an' buttermilk--no wonder you
needed that weight on your stomach--it's all that kept you from
floatin' in the air. Cyant eat--O good Lord!"

They were silent--Miss Samantha making wry faces with her pain.

"Of course you didn't eat no supper?" he asked.

"No--we don' eat no supper Sunday night," said Mrs. Carewe.

"Didn't eat none at all," asked Jud--"not even a little?"

"Well, 'bout nine o'clock I thought I'd eat a little, to keep me from
gittin' hungry befo' day, so I et a raw onion, an' some black
walnuts, and dried prunes, an'--an'--"

"A few apples we had in the cellar," added her mother, "an' a
huckleberry pie, an' buttermilk--"

Jud jumped up--"Good Lord, I thought you was a fool when you said you
put that stone on her stomach, but now I know you done the right
thing--you might have anchored her by a chain to the bed post, too,
in case the rock didn't hold her down. Now look here," he went on to
Mrs. Carewe, "I'll go to the sto' an' send you a half pound of salts,
a bottle of oil an' turbb'ntine. Give he