eir
ugliness alive or dead, and, though I've never seen no appearances of
any kind, as I may say, I can believe jist as easy that some of 'em come
back for mischief as that others come back for good."

There was a few minutes' constrained silence after this remark. Mr.
Dickey's first wife had been what is popularly known as "a Tartar," and
there was a generally current rumor that as the last shovelful of earth
was patted down on her grave he had been heard to murmur, "Thanks be to
praise, she's quiet at last." The idea of her reappearance in her wonted
haunts was indeed a dismaying one, especially as Mr. Dickey had recently
married again, and, if the gossips knew anything about it, was repeating
much of his former painful experience. The silence, which was becoming
embarrassing, was finally broken by the schoolmaster.

"Had you any more experiences of the kind you have just related, Uncle
Jabez?" he asked, in tones of such deep respect and lively interest that
Uncle Jabez responded, with gratifying promptness,--

"Plenty, plenty, though perhaps them two that I've just told you was the
most strikin'. But it always seemed to me, after that first time, that
Lavina was on hand when anything went wrong or was likely to go wrong;
and ef I was to tell you all the scrapes she's kep' me out of and pulled
me out of, I should keep you settin' here all night. There was one
more," he continued, "that struck me a good deal at the time. It was
about money, like the fust one, in a different sort of way. It was
durin' those days when specie was so skurce and high that it was quite a
circumstance to get a piece of hard money. There come along a peddler in
a smart red wagon, with all sorts of women's trash packed into it, and
Gracie took it into her head to want some of his things. It happened to
be her birthday that day, and, as she didn't often pester me about
clothes, I told her to choose out what she wanted, up to five dollars'
worth, and, if the feller could change me a twenty-dollar note, I'd pay
for it. He jumped at it, sayin' he didn't count it any trouble at all to
give change, the way some storekeepers did, and that he always kep' a
lot on hand to oblige his customers. I will say for him that it seemed
to me he give Gracie an amazin' big five dollars' worth, and when he
come to make the change he handed out a ten-dollar gold piece, or what I
then took to be such, as easy as if he'd found it growin' on a bush, and
said nothin'