us about that."

The old gentleman hedged a little. "Oh, that is not much of a story,"
said he.

"Come, Squire, I've heard tell o' that 'ere catamount that you and Zeke
Edwards killed; but I never could get the particulars," said Aunt Olive.
"Jest give us the particulars."

Gramp tried to put us off. "I'm no great hand at stories," he said. "You
must get Hewey Glinds to tell you bear and catamount stories."

"But you promised me, Gramp," Theodora reminded him.

At length, after some further excuses, the Old Squire was induced to
make a beginning, and having begun, told us the following story which I
give in words as nearly like his own as I can now remember.

"It was in the year 1812. I was little more than a boy at that time, and
the country was quite new here. We had a clearing of about fifty acres
and had not yet built our present buildings; and our only neighbors,
nearer than the settlement in the lower part of the township, where the
village now stands, were the Edwardses. Old Jeremy Edwards came here at
about the same time that my father came.

"Eighteen-twelve was the time of our second war with England. Soldiers
for it did not volunteer then; troops had to be raised by draft. Father
and neighbor Edwards were both drafted. I well remember the night they
were summoned. Mother and Mrs. Edwards cried all night. But there was no
help for it. There were no such things as substitutes then. They had to
go the next morning, and leave us to take care of ourselves the best we
could.

"Little Ezekiel Edwards--Thomas's and Kate's grandfather--was just about
my age; and the men being away, everything depended on us. Those were
hard times; we had a great deal to do. We used to change works, as we
called it, so as to be together as much as we could; for it was rather
lonesome, planting and hoeing off in the stumpy, sprouted clearings.
That was a long, anxious summer! We heard from father only once. He was
somewhere near Lake Champlain.

"We were getting things fixed up to pass the winter as well as we could,
when one night, about the first of November, Ezekiel came running over
to ask if we had seen anything of old Brindle, their cow. It had been a
bright, Indian-summer day, and they had turned her out to feed; but she
had not come up as usual, and was nowhere in sight. It was dusk already,
but I took our gun and, starting out together, we searched both
clearings. Brindle was not in the cleared land.

"'We shall hav