, "tended beater" and Moss measured and
"stricted" the grain as it came from the separator;--and it was hinted
about among the farmers, that "Moss would bear watching."

We were kept very busy during those two days; Halse, I remember, was
first set to "shake down" the wheat off a high scaffold, for Dennett to
feed into the beater; while Addison and I got away the straw. I deemed
it great fun at first, to see the horses travel up the lags of the
horse-power incline, and hear the machine in action; but I soon found
that it was suffocatingly dusty work; our nostrils and throats as well
as our hair and clothing were much choked and loaded with dust.

We had been at work an hour or two, when suddenly an unusual snapping
noise issued from the beater; and Dennett abruptly stopped the machine.
After examining the teeth, he looked up where Halse stood on the
scaffold, shaking down, and said, "Look here, young man, I want you to
be more careful what you shake down here; we don't want to thrash
clubs!"

"I didn't shake down clubs," said Halse.

"A pretty big stick went through anyway," remarked Dennett. "I haven't
said you did it a-purpose. But I asked you to be more careful."

They went on again, for half or three-quarters of an hour, when there
was another odd noise, and Dennett again stopped and looked up sharply
at Halse. "Can't you see clubs as big as that?" said he. "Why, that's an
old tooth out of a loafer rake. You must mind what you are about."

Halse pretended that he had seen nothing in the grain; and the machine
was started again; but Addison and I could see Halse at times from the
place where we were at work, and noticed that he looked mischievous.
Addison shook his head at him, vehemently.

Nothing further happened that forenoon; but we had not been at work for
more than an hour, after dinner, when a shrill _thrip_ resounded from
the beater, followed by a jingling noise, and one of the short iron
teeth from it flew into the roof of the barn. Again Dennett stopped the
machine, hastily.

"What kind of a feller do you call yerself!" he exclaimed, looking very
hard up at Halse. "You threw that stone into the beater, you know you
did."

"I didn't!" protested Halse. "You can't prove I did, either."

"I'd tan your jacket for ye, ef you was my boy," muttered Dennett,
wrathfully. He and Moss got wrenches from their tool-box and replaced
the broken tooth with a new one. The Old Squire, who had been looking to
the g