any messages left for me. Look sharp, now! You know your failing!"

They found Judge Straight in his office. He was seated by the rear
window, and had fallen into a gentle doze--the air of Patesville was
conducive to slumber. A visitor from some bustling city might have
rubbed his eyes, on any but a market-day, and imagined the whole town
asleep--that the people were somnambulists and did not know it. The
judge, an old hand, roused himself so skillfully, at the sound of
approaching footsteps, that his visitors could not guess but that he
had been wide awake. He shook hands with the doctor, and acknowledged
the introduction to Tryon with a rare old-fashioned courtesy, which the
young man thought a very charming survival of the manners of a past and
happier age.

"No," replied the judge, in answer to a question by Dr. Green, "I never
met his mother; I was a generation ahead of her. I was at school with
her father, however, fifty years ago--fifty years ago! No doubt that
seems to you a long time, young gentleman?"

"It is a long time, sir," replied Tryon. "I must live more than twice
as long as I have in order to cover it."

"A long time, and a troubled time," sighed the judge. "I could wish
that I might see this unhappy land at peace with itself before I die.
Things are in a sad tangle; I can't see the way out. But the worst
enemy has been slain, in spite of us. We are well rid of slavery."

"But the negro we still have with us," remarked the doctor, "for here
comes my man Dave. What is it, Dave?" he asked sharply, as the negro
stuck his head in at the door.

"Doctuh Green," he said, "I fuhgot ter tell you, suh, dat dat young
'oman wuz at de office agin jes' befo' you come in, an' said fer you to
go right down an' see her mammy ez soon ez you could."

"Ah, yes, and you've just remembered it! I'm afraid you're entirely
too forgetful for a doctor's office. You forgot about old Mrs.
Latimer, the other day, and when I got there she had almost choked to
death. Now get back to the office, and remember, the next time you
forget anything, I'll hire another boy; remember that! That boy's
head," he remarked to his companions, after Dave had gone, "reminds me
of nothing so much as a dried gourd, with a handful of cowpeas rattling
around it, in lieu of gray matter. An old woman out in Redbank got a
fishbone in her throat, the other day, and nearly choked to death
before I got there. A white woman, sir, came v