ely added. "Even if they don't, we
have mules enough."

"But how they moan! It makes me cringe to hear them."

"Twenty miles more," said Thurstane. "Only six hours at the longest. Only
half a day."

"It takes less than half a day for a woman to die," muttered the nearly
desperate Aunt Maria.

"Yes, when she sets about it," returned the officer. "But we haven't set
about it, Mrs. Stanley. And we are not going to."

The weary lady had no response ready for words of cheer; she leaned
heavily over the pommel of her saddle and rode on in silence.

"Ain't the same man she was," slyly observed Phineas Glover with a twist
of his queer physiognomy.

Thurstane, though not fond of Mrs. Stanley, would not now laugh at her
expense, and took no notice of the sarcasm. Glover, fearful lest he had
offended, doubled the gravity of his expression and tacked over to a fresh
subject.

"Shouldn't know whether to feel proud 'f myself or not, 'f I'd made this
country, Capm. Depends on what 'twas meant for. If 'twas meant to live in,
it's the poorest outfit I ever did see. If 'twas meant to scare folks,
it's jest up to the mark. 'Nuff to frighten a crow into fits. Capm, it
fairly seems more than airthly; puts me in mind 'f things in the Pilgrim's
Progress--only worse. Sh'd say it was like five thousin' Valleys 'f the
Shadow 'f Death tangled together. Tell ye, believe Christian 'd 'a' backed
out 'f he'd had to travel through here. Think Mr. Coronado 's all right in
his top hamper, Capm? Do, hey? Wal, then I'm all wrong; guess I'm 's
crazy's a bedbug. Wouldn't 'a'ketched me steerin' this course of my own
free will 'n' foreknowledge. Jest look at the land now. Don't it look like
the bottomless pit blowed up 'n' gone to smash? Tell ye, 'f the Old Boy
himself sh'd ride up alongside, shouldn't be a mite s'prised to see him.
Sh'd reckon he had a much bigger right to be s'prised to ketch me here."

After some further riding, shaking his sandy head, staring about him and
whistling, he broke out again.

"Tell ye, Capm, this beats my imagination. Used to think I c'd yarn it
pooty consid'able. But never can tell this. Never can do no manner 'f
jestice to it. Look a there now. There's a nateral bridge, or 'n unnateral
one. There's a hole blowed through a forty foot rock 's clean 's though
'twas done with Satan's own field-piece, sech 's Milton tells about. An'
there's a steeple higher 'n our big one in Fair Haven. An' there's a
church, 'n' a hay