tion when he told his
master the next day the outcome of Jim's probation.

UNCLE SIMON'S SUNDAYS OUT

Mr. Marston sat upon his wide veranda in the cool of the summer
Sabbath morning. His hat was off, the soft breeze was playing with his
brown hair, and a fragrant cigar was rolled lazily between his lips.
He was taking his ease after the fashion of a true gentleman. But his
eyes roamed widely, and his glance rested now on the blue-green sweep
of the great lawn, again on the bright blades of the growing corn, and
anon on the waving fields of tobacco, and he sighed a sigh of
ineffable content. The breath had hardly died on his lips when the
figure of an old man appeared before him, and, hat in hand, shuffled
up the wide steps of the porch.

It was a funny old figure, stooped and so one-sided that the tail of
the long and shabby coat he wore dragged on the ground. The face was
black and shrewd, and little patches of snow-white hair fringed the
shiny pate.

"Good-morning, Uncle Simon," said Mr. Marston, heartily.

"Mornin' Mas' Gawge. How you come on?"

"I'm first-rate. How are you? How are your rheumatics coming on?"

"Oh, my, dey's mos' nigh well. Dey don' trouble me no mo'!"

"Most nigh well, don't trouble you any more?"

"Dat is none to speak of."

"Why, Uncle Simon, who ever heard tell of a man being cured of his
aches and pains at your age?"

"I ain' so powahful ol', Mas', I ain' so powahful ol'."

"You're not so powerful old! Why, Uncle Simon, what's taken hold of
you? You're eighty if a day."

"Sh--sh, talk dat kin' o' low, Mastah, don' 'spress yo'se'f so loud!"
and the old man looked fearfully around as if he feared some one might
hear the words.

The master fell back in his seat in utter surprise.

"And, why, I should like to know, may I not speak of your age aloud?"

Uncle Simon showed his two or three remaining teeth in a broad grin as
he answered:

"Well, Mastah, I's 'fraid ol' man Time mought hyeah you an' t'ink he
done let me run too long." He chuckled, and his master joined him with
a merry peal of laughter.

"All right, then, Simon," he said, "I'll try not to give away any of
your secrets to old man Time. But isn't your age written down
somewhere?"

"I reckon it's in dat ol' Bible yo' pa gin me."

"Oh, let it alone then, even Time won't find it there."

The old man shifted the weight of his body from one leg to the other
and stood embarrassedly twirling his ancient hat in