gnificent barbarism about them that I liked. They were never vulgar,
never immoral, but rather rough and primitive, with an unconventionality
that spent itself in loud guffaws, slaps on the back, and naps in the
corner. I hurried by the cottage of the misborn Neill boys. It was
empty, and they were grown into fat, lazy farm hands. I saw the home of
the Hickmans, but Albert, with his stooping shoulders, had passed from
the world. Then I came to the Burkes' gate and peered through; the
inclosure looked rough and untrimmed, and yet there were the same fences
around the old farm save to the left, where lay twenty-five other acres.
And lo! the cabin in the hollow had climbed the hill and swollen to a
half-finished six-room cottage.

The Burkes held a hundred acres, but they were still in debt. Indeed,
the gaunt father who toiled night and day would scarcely be happy out of
debt, being so used to it. Some day he must stop, for his massive frame
is showing decline. The mother wore shoes, but the lionlike physique of
other days was broken. The children had grown up. Rob, the image of his
father, was loud and rough with laughter. Birdie, my school baby of
six, had grown to a picture of maiden beauty, tall and tawny. "Edgar
is gone," said the mother, with head half bowed,--"gone to work in
Nashville; he and his father couldn't agree."

Little Doc, the boy born since the time of my school, took me horseback
down the creek next morning toward Farmer Dowell's. The road and the
stream were battling for mastery, and the stream had the better of it.
We splashed and waded, and the merry boy, perched behind me, chattered
and laughed. He showed me where Simon Thompson had bought a bit of
ground and a home; but his daughter Lana, a plump, brown, slow girl, was
not there. She had married a man and a farm twenty miles away. We wound
on down the stream till we came to a gate that I did not recognize, but
the boy insisted that it was "Uncle Bird's." The farm was fat with the
growing crop. In that little valley was a strange stillness as I rode
up; for death and marriage had stolen youth, and left age and childhood
there. We sat and talked that night, after the chores were done. Uncle
Bird was grayer, and his eyes did not see so well, but he was still
jovial. We talked of the acres bought,--one hundred and twenty-five,--of
the new guest chamber added, of Martha's marrying. Then we talked of
death: Fanny and Fred were gone; a shadow hung over th