of the day, lookin' for some landmark or sign that would
prove my claim, that dated seventy years back. I recollect we had soused
pigs' feet for supper that night; and I don't think I ever tasted better
in my life. I eat pretty free of them, as I always did of anything I
liked, and we wound up with some of her canned peaches, that she'd got
out to coax me to eat, and cream on 'em 'most as thick as butter: she
had a skimmer with holes into it that she always skimmed the cream with
for our own use. She'd made as good a pot of coffee as I ever tasted.
And when I'd had all I wanted, I felt a good deal better, and I says to
her,--'I'll fret over it no more, Gracie: if it's his'n, let him take it
'ithout more words.'

"She read me a story out of the paper that made us both laugh right
hearty, and then a chapter, as usual, and then we went to bed. And all
come round jest as it did afore. I thought I was roamin' about the farm,
as I had been pretty nigh all day; but things was changed round,
somehow, and the further I went the more mixed up they got, till, jest
as I'd found the pine-tree, I heard Lavina's voice, the same as I'd done
afore,--first far, and then near,--sayin', 'Father;' and the third time
she said it, when it sounded close to, she went on to say, 'He's done
his cuttin', now do you do yours. You cut through twenty more rings, and
you'll find the blaze that marks _your_ survey. And then thank him
kindly for givin' you the idee. The smartest of folks is too smart for
themselves once in a while.' And with that she laughed her own jolly,
hearty laugh; but that was the last she said; and I laid there wonderin'
and thinkin' for a while, and then dropped off to sleep. But it was all
as clear as a bell in my head in the morning, and I had McKellop and old
Peter at the pine-tree by eight o'clock. I'd sharpened my axe good, I
can tell you, and it didn't take me long to cut through twenty more
rings, and there, sure enough, was the blaze; and if ever you see a
blue-lookin' man, that man was McKellop; for as soon as old Peter see
the blaze he recollected hearin' his father tell about the survey; he
recollected it particular because the old man was a good judge of
apple-jack, and he'd said that _my_ father'd gi'n him some of the
best, that day the survey was made, that he'd ever tasted. And Peter
said he reckoned he could find something about it in his father's books
and among some loose papers he had in a box. And, sure enough