of action, wasted no energy in discussion. He
jumped to the ground, pulled out first his overcoat and gripsack,
fortunately unharmed, then the paper parcels of oatmeal and hominy,
sticky and dripping. Swiftly corking the jug, he lifted it out of the
carryall, together with the oilcloth strip, and deftly stood both
against a fence by the roadside. Flint watched him with admiration. He
felt himself supremely helpless in the presence of the direful
calamity. How was he ever to get these bundles into condition to be
put back into the wagon? How cleanse the oilcloth and the fatal jug?

No house was in sight.

Flint stood gloomily gazing down at his boots covered with the oozy
brown fluid. "Jupiter aid us!" he exclaimed; and as if in answer to
his call, "a daughter of the gods, divinely tall," rose on their
sight, coming towards them from over the ridge of the hill. She came
on swiftly, yet without hurry. She walked (a process little understood
by the feminine half of the world, hampered as they are by their stays
and tenpenny heels). This woman neither hobbled, nor waddled, nor
tripped. With the leg swinging out from the hip (no awkward
knee-movement, yet no stride), she swept down the hill as serenely as
though she were indeed a messenger sent by Jupiter to their
assistance. Beside her trotted a large dog who now and again
excursionized in search of tempting adventure, but as constantly
returned to rub his head lovingly against his mistress's skirt, and
lick her hand, as if to assure her that, in spite of his wandering
propensities, his heart remained faithful.

"The hoodoo!" muttered Flint.

"What a pretty girl!" exclaimed Brady.

The object of these widely differing criticisms moved steadily nearer.
She wore a white gown. A basket was on her arm, and her wide-brimmed
straw hat was pulled low over her eyes to shield them from the sun.
She was close upon the scene of accident before she discerned it.
Catching at the same moment a look of annoyance on Flint's face, she
swerved a little, as if with intent to pass by, like the priest and
the Levite, on the other side; then, reassured by Brady's look of
half-comic despair, she set down her basket and paused.

"You have met with an accident, I see," she observed, as casually as
though she had never before heard of any catastrophe in connection
with Flint. "The molasses worked, I suppose. It will, sometimes, if it
is not tightly corked. It was stupid in the grocer not to