know that
Si and Shorty'd divide their last crumb with him. Look here, Sambo, if
I give you a cupful o' this broth and a piece o' the meat, will you git
down on your knees and swear you'll take every bit straight to him, and
not take even a smidjin of it for your self?"

"De Lawd be praised and magnified foreber, but I will," said the negro,
dropping on his knees and holding up his hand. "Swar me on a pile o'
Bibles big as a haystack. I'd radder go to hell on my knees backward dan
tech de fust drap ob dat. I's too anxious to hab Cappen McGillicuddy git
well, so I is. What'd become ob dis pore niggeh if he should die?
No, indeedy. Hope I'll drap dead in my tracks if I taste de least wee
morssel."

"I'm goin' to trust you," said the Deacon, stirring up the savory mess,
ladling out a generous cupful, adding a drumstick, and covering the cup
with a piece of paper. "Now, carry it carefully. Every drop's worth its
weight in gold."

The Deacon looked a little regretful at the shrinking of the contents of
the kettle, made by taking out the cupful, and said:

"Mebbe I oughtn't 've done it. The boys need every spoonful. But if it'd
bin themselves, I know they'd have given their Captain more'n I did. He
is twice blessed that giveth, and probably they'll git more somehow on
account o' what I've given away. But I mustn't give any more."

"Say, Mister," said a very feeble voice at his elbow, "can't you give me
a cupful o' that? It smells so good. It smells like home. I smelled it
away over there in the tent, and it seemed to me that if I could get
some of it I'd certainly get well, though they all say they think
there's no hope for me. I crawled out of the tent and come while the
nurse was asleep and wasn't watching. They won't let me get upon my feet
when they're watching me, but I fooled them this time."

As he spoke, he sank down from sheer exhaustion, but still held out his
cup imploringly, while an in tense longing filled his great, blue eyes.

The Deacon looked pityingly at him. His wan face was fair and delicate
as a girl's, and even be fore disease had wasted him he had been very
tall and slender. Now his uniform flapped around his shrunken body and
limbs.

The Deacon could not stand the appeal of those great, plaintive eyes and
that wasted form.

"The Lord blesses the giver," he said, taking the cup from the thin
hand, and proceeding to fill it from the kettle. "It may be that my own
son will have the more from w