her cords one degree too tight, and that in the night something
had snapped; she had a new force to deal with.

"John"--there was alarm in her voice--he had the door half open--"are
you so cruel and foolish as to take last evening's words literally?"

"That's all gay, mother; 'tain't the parson I'm going after, it's the
surveyor."

He shut the door on the last word and went away whistling. Not that he
was merry; as his horse started he set his teeth, smote in the spurs,
and cleared the paling fence at a bound.

The surveyors were Champion and Shotwell. John worked with them. To his
own surprise he was the life of the party. Some nights they camped. They
sang jolly songs together; but often Shotwell would say:

"O Champion, I'll hush if you will; we're scaring the wolves. Now, if
you had such a voice as John's--Go on, March, sing 'Queen o' my Soul.'"

John would sing; Shotwell would lie back on the pine-needles with his
eyes shut, and each time the singer reached the refrain, "Mary, Mary,
queen of my soul," the impassioned listener would fetch a whoop and cry,
"That's her!" although everybody had known that for years the only "her"
who had queened it over Shotwell's soul was John's own Fannie Halliday.

"Now, March, sing, 'Thou wert the first, thou aht the layst,' an' th'ow
yo' whole soul into it like you did last night!"

"John," said Champion once, after March had sung this lament, "You're a
plumb fraud. If you wa'n't you couldn't sing that thing an' then turn
round and sing, 'They laughed, ha-ha! and they quaffed, ha-ha!'"

"Let's have it!" cried Shotwell. "Paass tin cups once mo',
gen'le_men_!"--tink--tink--

"March," said Champion, "if you'll excuse the personality, what's
changed you so?"

John laughed and said he didn't think he was changed, but if he was he
reckoned it was evolution. Which did not satisfy Shotwell, who had
"quaffed, ha-ha!" till he was argumentative.

"Don't you 'scuse personal'ty 't all, March. I know wha's change' you.
'Tain't no 'sperience. You ain't been converted. You're gettin' _ripe_!
'S all is about it. Wha' changes green persimmons? 's nature; 'tain't
'sperience."

"Well, I'd like to know if sunshine an' frost ain't experiences,"
retorted Champion.

"Some experiences," laughed John, "are mighty hot sunshine, and some are
mighty hard frosts." To which the two old soldiers assented with more
than one sentimental sigh as the three rolled themselves in their
blankets and clo