damaged a thing, an' could 'a' done it without bein' seed.

"Then I made her as mad as Old Nick by a little mistake of mine.
While I was hitchin' up the wagon Old Bay bit a whoppin' big gap
out'n my straw hat, and it was so comical-lookin' that Ma told me
not to wear it. That was easy enough to say, but I didn't want to
go bareheaded, so I begun to look about the house for some'n to put
on, and hid away amongst Het's knickknacks I found a hat that used
to belong to Dick. It was jest my size, and so I put it on an'
thought no more about it till we was all settin' in church. It was
on my lap, and all at once I seed Hettie lift up her veil an'
squint at it; then she heaved a big groan and snatched it and put
it out o' sight. She'd have blessed me out on the spot, I reckon,
if the singers hadn't set in. I was a sight goin' home without a
thing on my head, but she wouldn't listen to reason, an' kept it
stuffed all in a wad under her arm. She said I had no feelin' or I
wouldn't have done sech an outrageous thing.

"The preacher was all right, but he'd bit off more than he could
chaw. It seems from report that he went around Chester to find out
statements that he could work in about Dick that would sound nice
and suitable; but for some reason or other--maybe because everybody
was so excited, and maybe because they was naturally backward
before sech a shinin' light--but, as I say, he run short on
information. When he come to that part of his talk he looked
actually teased. He floundered about considerable, an' drunk a lot
o' water, but he done the best he could. He said Dick was a devoted
husband and father, and got red when he corrected the last part,
and said a Divine Providence had seed fit to take 'im away purty
early in the game, and that the poor fellow hadn't really had a
chance to show what was in him. Looked like he was determined to
say some'n nice about Dick, so he gave a few backhanded licks at
the Republican party and the nigger-lovers of the North, an' wound
up by sayin' that the late lamented had been a stanch Democrat an'
worked at the poles as hard to overthrow graftin' and Yankee
oppression as any man in the fair Southland. He got through
somehow, but, betwixt me 'n you, Alf, I don't think Hettie thought
she got her full money's worth, f