im.
Although he hath fought for the wrong side to our thinking, bravely
hath he fought, and made his way to a colonelship, worth five thousand
dollars, if ever they pay their wages. Never did I think that he would
earn so much, having never owned gifts of machinery; and concerning the
handling of the dollars, perhaps, will carry my opinion out. But where
was I wandering of a little thing like that?

"It hath pleased the Lord, who doeth all things well, when finally come
to look back upon--the Lord hath seen fit to be down on this young
man for going agin his grandfather. From Californy--a free State, mind
you--he come away to fight for slavery. And how hath he magnified his
office? By shooting the biggest man on that side, the almighty foe of
the Union, the foremost captain of Midian--the general in whom they
trusted. No bullets of ours could touch him; but by his own weapons he
hath fallen. And soon as Ephraim Gundry heard it, he did what you see
done to him."

Uncle Sam having said his say--which must have cost him dearly--withdrew
from the bed where his grandson's body lay shrunken, lax, and grimy. To
be sure that it was Firm, I gave one glance--for Firm had always been
straight, tall, and large--and then, in a miserable mood, I stole to the
Sawyer's side to stand with him. "Am I to blame? Is this my fault? For
even this am I to blame?" I whispered; but he did not heed me, and his
hands were like hard stone.

After a long, hot, heavy time, while I was laboring vainly, the Sawyer
also (through exhaustion of excitement) weary, and afraid to begin again
with new bad news, as beaten people expect to do, the younger surgeon
came up to him, and said, "Will you authorize it?"

"To cut 'un up? To show your museums what a Western lad is? Never. By
the Blue River he shall have a good grave. So help me God, to my own, my
man!"

"You misunderstand me. We have more subjects now than we should want for
fifty years. War knocks the whole of their value on the head. We have
fifty bodies as good as this, and are simply obliged to bury them. What
I mean is, shall we pull the blade out?"

"Can he do any thing with that there blade in him? I have heard of a man
in Kentucky once--"

"Yes, yes; we know all those stories, Colonel--suit the newspapers, not
the journals. This fellow has what must kill him inside; he is worn to
a shadow already. If there it is left, die he must, and quick stick;
inflammation is set up already. If we e