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 Another Random Document on
Scribd Without Any Related Topics
 The Home of
“J. Ledyard Symington”

The building of the distinguished name had, however, been continued,

and the legend on the door was now, “J. Ledyard Symington-Symington,
Bart.” The reception days had been effaced. The old man may have
achieved that point in his social aspirations when he “didn’t care to know
anybody who wasn’t anybody.” Like Don Quixote, he may have departed to
battle with hostile windmills, or he may have walked into his estates
“unknown,” to mingle in phantom social functions in ghostly halls and
silent chambers in the Great Beyond.
Perhaps there are no “Tuesdays and Thursdays” there, and calling cards
and stovepipe hats are unnecessary. His blighted hopes, and those that may
have ended in fruition, concern the widely distributed gossips along the
coast no more.
While we may be interested and amused with the petty gossip, the rude
philosophy, the quaint humor, the little antagonisms, and the child-like
foibles of these lonely dwellers in the dune country, the pathos that
overshadows them must touch our hearts.
They have brought their life scars into the desolate sands, where the
twilight has come upon them. The roar of a mighty world goes on beyond
them. Unable to navigate the great currents of life, they have drifted into
stagnant waters.
Happy Cal’s unwelcome guests and his blighted affections—Catfish
John’s rheumatism and his pork that “them fellers” stole—Old Sipes’s lost
“kittle”—Doc Looney’s unappreciative wives—J. Ledyard Symington’s
“humiliations,” and all the other troubles of the old outcasts, will disappear
into the oblivion of the years, with the rest of the affairs and happenings of
this life.
If they have not been ambitious, their rapacity has not destroyed
empires, or deluged the earth with blood. If they have not been learned,
they have not used knowledge to devise means for the destruction of human
life. If they have not been powerful, their greed has not oppressed and
impoverished their fellow-beings.
Let us hope that the storms from the lake, and civilization on the shore,
will deal gently with these poor derelicts, as they peacefully fade away into
the elements from which they came.
 (From the Author’s Etching)
“RESUMING THEIR MIGRATIONS”
 CHAPTER XI

THE BACK COUNTRY

B EHIND the ranges of the sand hills, lie stretches of broken waste
country. It is diversified with patches of woods, tangled thickets,
swamps, little ponds, stagnant pools covered with green microscopic
vegetation, and small areas of productive soil. There are long, low
elevations, covered sparsely with gnarled pines, spruces, poplars, and
sumacs. Tall elms, many willows, and an occasional silvery barked
sycamore, lend variety to the scene.
Here and there, just back of the big hills, are deep secluded tarns, which
have no visible outlets or inlets. One looks cautiously down from the
surrounding edges. In the obscurity of the deep shadows there is tangled
dead vegetation, a few decayed tree-trunks, and an uncanny stillness.
Unseen stagnant water is there, and the mysterious depths seem to be
without life. They are fit abodes for gnomes, and evil spirits may haunt their
silences. There is an instinctive creepy feeling, and an undefined dread in
the atmosphere around them.
 Swamps of tamarack, which are impenetrable, contribute their masses of
deep green to the charm of the landscape. The ravagers of the wet places
hide in them, and the timid, hunted wild life finds refuge in their still
labyrinths. In the winter countless tracks and trails on the snow lead into
them and are lost.
Among the most interesting of the marsh dwellers is the muskrat. This
active little animal is an ever-present element in the life of the sloughs, and
he is the most industrious live thing in the back country. His numerous
families thrive and increase, in spite of vigilant enemies that besiege them.
The larger owls, the foxes, minks, and steel traps are their principal foes.

A MARSH DWELLER

The houses, irregular in shape and size, dot the surfaces of the ponds and
swamps. They are built of lumps of sod and mud, mixed with bulrushes and
heavy grass. They usually contain two rooms, one above the other, and little
tunnels lead out from them, under ground, providing channels of escape in
case of danger, and safe routes of approach to the houses from the burrows
in the higher ground along the banks.
The upper cavity of the little adobe structure is usually lined with moss
and fine grass. Lily roots, freshwater clams, and other food are carried up
into it from under the ice in the winter. In these cosy retreats the little
colonies live during the cold months, oblivious to the cares and dangers of
the outside world.
There is a network of thoroughfares and burrows in the soft earth among
the roots of the willows on the neighboring banks. The devious secret
passages and runways are in constant use during the summer.
The muskrats are great travelers, and roam over the meadows, through
the ravines, up and down the creeks, and around on the sand hills, in search
of food and adventure. They run along the lake shore at night, and their
tracks are found all over the beach. Their well-beaten paths radiate in all
directions from their homes. They are not entirely lovable, but the back
country would be desolate indeed without them.

A SENTINEL IN THE MARSH

The herons stand solemnly, like sentinels, among the thick grasses, and
out in the open places, watching for unwary frogs, minnows, and other
small life with which nature has bountifully peopled the sloughs. The crows
and hawks drop quickly behind clumps of weeds on deadly errands in the
day time, and at night the owls, foxes, and minks haunt the margins of the
wet places. The enemies of the Little Things are legion. Violent death is
their destiny. With the exception of the turtles, they are all eaten by
something larger and more powerful than themselves.
 (From the Author’s Etching)
THEY “DROP INTO
THE PONDS AND MARSHES”

In the fall and early spring the wild ducks and geese drop into the ponds
and marshes, and rest for days at a time, before resuming their migrations.
They come in from over the lake during the storms to find shelter for the
night, and are reluctant to leave the abundant food in these nooks behind the
hills. A flat-bottomed boat among the bulrushes, and a few artificially
arranged thick bunches of brush and long grass, which have been used as
shooting blinds, usually explain why they have not stayed longer.
A few of the ducks remain during the summer, build their nests on
secluded boggy spots, and rear their young; but the minks, snapping turtles,
and other enemies besides man, generally see that few of them live to fly
away in the fall.
Occasionally a small weather-beaten frame house, and a tumble-down
old barn, project their gables into the landscape. Around them is usually a
piece of cleared land that represents years of toil and combat with the
reluctant soil, obstinate stumps, and tough roots.
Nature has begrudgingly yielded a scanty livelihood to the brave and
simple ones who have spent their youth and middle age in wresting away
the barriers which have stood between them and the comforts of life. The
broken-spirited animals that stand still, with lowered heads, in the little
fields and around the barn, are mute testimonies of the years of drudgery
and hardship.
 On approaching the house we encounter a few ducks that splash into the
ditch along the muddy road, and disappear in great trepidation among the
weeds and bulrushes beyond the fence. The loud barking of a mongrel dog
is heard, a lot of chickens scatter, and several children with touseled heads
and frightened faces appear. Behind them a lean-faced woman in a faded
calico dress looks out with a reserved and kindly welcome. The dog is
rebuked sharply, and finally quieted. The scared children hastily retreat into
the house, and peek out through the curtained windows. We explain that we
came to ask for a drink of water. The woman disappears for a moment,
brings a cup, and some rain water in a broken pitcher, with which to prime
the pump in the yard.
This wheezy piece of hardware, after much teasing, and encouragement
from the broken pitcher, finally yields, and one object of the visit is
accomplished. The children begin cautiously to reappear, their curiosity
having got the better of their alarm.
A few commonplace remarks about the weather, a complimentary
reference to a flower bed near the fence, an inquiry as to the ages of the
children, soon establish a friendly footing, and we are asked to sit down on
the bench near the pump and rest awhile.
“Don’t you sometimes feel lonely out here, with no neighbors?” I asked.
“No, indeed,” she replied. “We’ve got all the neighbors we want. Nobody
lives very near here, but there isn’t a day passes that I don’t see somebody
drivin’ by out on the road. I ride to town every two or three weeks, an’ that’s
enough for anybody.”
A man of perhaps forty, but who looks to be fifty, rather tall and spare,
with bent shoulders and shambling step, appears after a few minutes. His
shaved upper lip and long chin whiskers strictly conform to the established
customs of the back country.
It is a land of the chin whiskers, and they are met with everywhere in the
by-paths of civilization. Their picturesque quality is the delight of him who
uses the lead pencil and pen to portray the oddities of his race.
He has come from over near the edge of the timber, where he has been
repairing a decayed rail fence. His greeting is kindly, and we are made to
feel quite at home. Some fresh buttermilk from an old-fashioned churn near
the back door adds to the pleasant hospitality, and the loud cackling of a
proud and energetic rooster, adorned with brilliant plumage, who takes
credit for the warm egg which a dignified old hen has just left in the corner
of the corn crib, lends an air of cheerfulness and animation to the scene. He
has just learned of the achievement, and the glory is his.
Out in the yard is a covered box with a circular hole in its front. A small
chain leads into it, which is attached to the outside by a staple. After a few
minutes the furtive wild eyes of a captive coon peer out fearfully from the
inner darkness of the box. He was extracted from the cosy interior of a
hollow tree, over near the edge of the swamp, during his infancy, and was
the sole survivor of a moonlight attack on his home tree, after the dogs had
located the happy family. The tree was cut down, the little furry things
mangled by savage teeth, and their house made desolate. The little fellow
was carried into a hopeless captivity, where his days and nights are passed
in terror. He is a prisoner and not a pet.
It is mankind that does these things—not the brutes—and yet we cry out
in denunciation when humanity is thus outraged. We chain and cage the
wild things, and shriek for freedom of thought and action. Verily this is a
strange world!
I talked with one of the little girls about the coon. She told me his story
and said they called him “Tip.” My heart went out to him, and I longed to
take him under my coat, carry him into the deep woods, and bid him God
speed. He probably would have bitten me had I attempted it, but in this he
would have been justified from his point of view, for he had never had a
chance in his despoiled life to learn that there could be sympathy in a
human touch. In this poor Tip is not alone in the world.
Time slumbers in the back country. The weekly paper is the only printed
source of news from the outside, and, with the addition of a monthly farm
magazine, with its woman’s department, constitutes the literature of the
home. These periodicals are read by the light of the big kerosene lamp on
the table in the middle of the room, and the facts and opinions found in
them become gospel.
The country village is perhaps a couple of miles farther inland. There is a
water-mill on the little river, and bags of wheat and corn are taken to it to be
ground. The miller—sleepy-eyed and white—comes out and helps to
unload the incoming grain, or deposit the flour or meal in the back part of
the wagon.
 The general store and post-office is on the main road, near the mill. The
proprietor is the oracle of the community, and a fountain of wit and
wisdom. The store is the clearing-house for the news and gossip of the
passing days.
A weather-beaten sign across the front of the building reads, “The
Center of the World.” The owner declares that “this must be so,
fer the edges of it are just the same distance off from the store, no matter
which way ye look.”
There is much unconscious philosophy in the quaintly humorous sign,
for, after all, how little we realize the immensity of the material and
intellectual world that is beyond our own horizon. The homely wit touches
incisively one of the foibles of human kind.
Elihu Baxter Brown, the storekeeper, is well

THE “GENERAL STORE”

along in years. He is tall, somewhat stoop-shouldered, and his eyes look

quizzically out of narrow slits. His heavy gray mustache dominates his face,
the cumbersome ornament suggesting a pair of frayed lambrequins. He lives
in a little old-fashioned house that sets back in a yard next his store. A quiet
gray-haired woman, with a kindly face, sits sewing in the shade near the
back door. They walked to the home of the minister fifteen miles away, to
be married, over fifty years ago. They trudged back in the afternoon and
began their lives together in the humble frame house that now shows the
touch of decay and the scars of winter storms.

THE STOREKEEPER

The small trees that they planted around it have grown tall enough
almost to hide the quiet home among their shadows. Little patches of
sunlight that have stolen through the leaves are scattered over the roof on
bright days, like happy hours in solemn lives.
In a sealed glass jar on a “what-not” in a corner of the front room is a
hard queer-looking lump, encrusted with dry mold, a fragment of the
wedding cake of half a century ago, which has been faithfully kept and
cherished through the years. To the world outside it is meaningless; here it
is sacred.
The little things to which sentiment can cling are the anchorages of our
hearts. They keep us from drifting too far away, and they call to us when we
have wandered. The small piece of wedding cake—gray like the heads of
those who reverence it—has helped to prolong the echoes of the chimes of
years ago. It was a rough gnarled hand which carefully put the glass jar
back into its place after it was shown, but it was a tender and beautiful
thought that kept it there.
 The old man is now seventy-six. He says that sometimes he is only about
thirty, and at other times he is over a hundred—it all depends on the
weather and the condition of his rheumatism.
“When I git up in the mornin’,” said he, “I first find out how my
rheumatism is, then I take a look at the weather, an’ figger out what kind of
a day it’s goin’ to be. If it’s goin’ to rain I let ’er rain, an’ if it ain’t, all well
an’ good. Business is pretty slow when it rains, an’ when its ten or fifteen
below in the winter, they ain’t no business at all. When it gits like that I hole
up like a woodchuck, an’ set in the back part o’ the store in my high-chair,
an’ make poetry an’ read. I don’t like to do too much readin’, fer readin’ rots
the mind, an’ I’d rather be waitin’ on people comin’ in. Most gen’rally a lot
o’ the old cods that live ’round ’ere drop in an’ we talk things over.
“This rheumatism o’ mine is a queer thing. I’ll tell ye sumpen
confidential. You prob’ly won’t believe it, an’ I wouldn’t want what I say to
git out ’cause its so improb’le, an’ it might hurt my credit, but I’ve bin
cured o’ my rheumatism twice by carryin’ a petrified potato in my pocket.
An old friend of mine, Catfish John’s got it now, an’ I don’t want to take it
away from ’im as long as it’s helpin’ ’im, but when ’e gits through with it,
I’m goin’ to have it back on the job, an’ you bet I’ll be hoppin’ ’round ’ere
as lively as a cricket. The potato ’ll prob’ly be ’ere next week. I’ve had it fer
ten years, an’ it beats everything I’ve ever tried.”
I asked the old man to allow me to see some of the poetry he had
“made,” and thereby opened up a literary mine. The request touched a
tender chord and I was ushered back to a worn desk of antique pattern in the
rear of the store. He raised the lid and extracted the treasure. A book had
been removed from its binding, and the covers converted into a portfolio.
He gently removed about a hundred sheets of paper of various shapes and
sizes, covered with closely written matter. Some of the spelling would have
shocked the shade of Lindley Murray, and made it glad that he had passed
away, and some of it would have made a champion of spelling reform quite
happy. It was vers libre of the most malignant type. Rhymes were freely
distributed at picturesque random, and while the ideas, rhythm, and meter
were quite lame at times, much of the verse was better than some recently
published imagist poetry, which contains none of these things. Humor and
pathos were intermingled. Sometimes there was much humor where pathos
was intended, and often real pathos lurked among the lighter lines.
 There are many singers who are never heard. Melodies in impenetrable
forests and trills that float on desert air are for those who sing, and not for
those who listen. A happy soul may pour forth impassioned song in
solitude, for the joy of the singing, and a solitary bard may distil his fancy
upon pages that are for him alone.
The verse of Elihu Baxter Brown is its own and only excuse for being. It
has solaced the still hours, and if its creator has been its only reader, he has
been most appreciative.
A touching lay depicts his elation upon the departure of his wife “in a
autobeel” on a long visit to distant relatives, but the joy prevails only during
the first six lines. The remaining thirty are devoted to sorrow and “lonely
misery as I walketh the street,” and end with “when will she be back I
wonder?” He falls into a “reverree” and from under its gentle spell the virile
lines, “The brite moon makes a strong impress on me,” and “I’ve named my
pet hen after thee,” float into the world. With “eyes full of weep” he reflects
that “sometimes she’s cold as all git out,” and further on he wishes that his
“loved one was a pie,” so as to facilitate immediate and affectionate
assimilation.
He bids the world to “go on with its music and kink it another note
higher.” In later lines he naïvely admits that “of all the poets I love myself
the best.” Alas, he has much company! This effusion ends with “Gosh, I
can’t finish this poetry till I pull myself together.”
War, love, spring, and beautiful snow flow through the limping
measures. There are odes to the sun, the rain, and to his old bob-tailed gray
cat, “Tobunkus,” who drowses peacefully on the counter near the scales.
The inspection of the poems led to the exhibition of his box of relics and
curios, which he greatly valued. Among the carefully ticketed and labeled
items, which we spread out on the counter, was a small chip from Libby
Prison, a fragment of stone picked up near the National Capitol, a shark’s
tooth, some Indian arrow-heads, an iron ring from a slave auction pen of
ante-bellum days, a chip from the pilot house of a steamboat that was
wrecked sixty years ago on the Atlantic coast, the dried stump of a cigar
which had been given to him when he visited a Russian man-of-war in
Boston harbor in 1859, and many other odds and ends that were of priceless
value to him.
 I picked up a small, round piece of wood, which he told me was the most
remarkable and interesting relic of the whole lot. “That,” said he, “is a piece
of the first shaving brush I ever shaved with”—a fact fully as important as
most things, seemingly significant at present, will be a century hence. This
wonderful object completed the exhibition, and the collection was carefully
put away.
The interior of the store was rather gloomy, badly ventilated, and was
pervaded with numberless and commingled odors. I could distinguish
kerosene, dead tobacco-smoke, stale vegetables, damp dry-goods, and
smoked herrings, but the rest of the indescribable medley of smells baffled
analysis.
The stock of merchandise was varied, but there was very little of any one
kind, except plug tobacco. Over a case containing several large boxes of
this necessity of life in the back country was a strip of cardboard, on which
was inscribed, “Don’t use the nasty stuff.” Under a wall-lamp was another
placard, “This flue don’t smoke, neither should you.” Other examples of the
proprietor’s wit were scattered along the edges of the shelves, and on the
walls, and helped to impart an individual character to the place. Among
them were, “Don’t be bashful. You can have anything you can pay for.”
“This store is not run by a trust.” “No setting on the counter—this means
you!” “Credit given only on Sundies, when the store is closed.” “Don’t talk
about the war—it makes me sick.”
A large portion of the stock was in cans. Some of them had evidently
been on the shelves for many years. There were cove oysters, sardines, and
tinned meats of various kinds, with badly fly-specked labels. The old man
remarked that “some o’ them air-tights has bin on hand since the early
eighties.”
The humble tin can has been one of the important factors in the progress
of the human race. With the theodolite, the sextant, and the rifle, it has been
carried to the waste places of the earth, and because of it they have
bloomed. Tin cans have lined the trails to unknown lands, and they have
been left at both of the poles. The invader has flung them along his
remorseless path when he has gone to murder quiet distant peoples whose
religion differed from his own, and they have thus been made “instruments
of the Lord’s mercy.” They lie on ghastly battlefields, mingled with
splintered bones, where a civilization, of which we have boasted, has left
them.
They are scattered over the bottom of the sea, float languidly in the
currents of uncharted rivers, and rust on the sands of the deserts. They are
hiding-places for tropical reptiles in tangled morasses, and prowling beasts
sniff at them curiously in deserted camps along the outer rims of the world.
They symbolize the ingenuity of the white man, and in them has reposed
the remains of every kind of fish, reptile, bird and beast that he has used for
food. The aged bull, the scrawny family cow, the venerable rooster, the
faithful superannuated hen, the senile billy goat, and other obsolete
domestic animals, have found a temporary tomb within mysterious walls of
tin, and have helped to feed others than those who canned them. They
enclose fruit and vegetables that could not be sold fresh, and in them they
go to the uttermost parts of the earth.
It was indeed strange destiny that took the sardine, flashing his bright
sides in the blue Mediterranean, and left him immured on a musty shelf in a
store in the back country. If he, with the contents of the cans around him,
could return to life, there would be a motley company.
Perhaps, in quiet midnight hours, wraiths come out of the tins and play
in the moonbeams that filter through the dusty windows. They may all have
been there so long that social caste has been established. The fish, lobsters,
cove oysters and clams, being sea people, probably hold aloof. This they
may well do, as they are on the upper shelves.
The elderly domestic animals may have a dignified stratum of their own,
in which the affairs of the old families can be discussed, while those who
were feathered in life possibly form another pale group that devotes itself
entirely to questions of personal adornment.
Behind the red labels on the lower shelves are the devilled ham and the
pig’s feet. The goblins from these may hold high carnival in the silvery light
—the frolics of the indigestibles—and their antics may last until the gray of
the morning comes.
Nameless elfs may appear in the little throng. They are from the soups,
and have so many component parts that they know not what they are.
Naturally they may precede the others, but if they are in the ghostly circle,
they are not of it.
 Probably the specters from the canned hash are at the lower end of the
scale.
I suggested to the old man that all these things might be happening while
he slumbered, but he declared that I was mistaken. “There’s never bin any
doin’s like that goin’ on ’round the store,” said he.
Figuratively, it might be said that many of us obtain most of our
intellectual food from cans. The diet may be varied occasionally by fresh
nutrients, but too often we rely upon products bearing established trade-
marks for our mental sustenance. The rows of labels, honored by time and
dimmed by dust, stand like tiers of skulls, with their eyeless caverns gravely
still—mute symbols of the eternal hours—as if staring in dull mockery out
of a vanished past. Living currents flow around us unheeded. We absorb
predigested thought to repletion, and neglect vibrant mental forces, that
through disuse become depleted, instead of enriching them with the study
of the green and growing things that have not been put in cans.
“About ev’ry third year,” said the old man, “business gits worse’n ever,
an’ that’s when a hoss trader named Than Gandy comes ’round. He lives
some’rs in the eastern part o’ the state, an’ after ’e’s bin through ’ere ’e
waits long enough fer most of ’em to fergit ’im before ’e comes agin. He
starts out from where ’e lives with a sulky, an’ a crow bait hoss, an’ about
five dollars. He spends a couple o’ months on ’is travels among the little
places away from the railroads, an’ when ’e gits through with ’is trip, ’e has
a string o’ seven er eight hosses, an’ four er five little wagons an’ buggies,
an’ a lot o’ harnesses an’ whips an’ calves an’ sheep, an’ a big wad o’
money. He’s got all them things to boot in trades ’e keeps makin’. He beats
ev’rybody ’e runs up ag’inst, an’ when ’e quits ’round ’ere nobody’s got any
money left to buy things with. They don’t know what’s happened to ’em till
’e’s away off. When ’e stops at the store, he gen’rally trades me sumpen fer
what ’e wants.
“Once Jedge Blossom traded hosses with ’im when ’e was piped, an’
gave ’im ten dollars to boot. He got a bum animal shifted on ’im, an’ when
’e sobered up, ’e sent Gandy a bill fer fifteen dollars fer legal advice, an’ the
advice was not to come into this part o’ the country any more.”
The old man told me that he was born in a small town in Massachusetts.
“I was named after the preacher of our church. He was a great man an’
’is eloquence was wonderful. His name was the Reverend Elihu Baxter, an’
’e used to go up into the pulpit, an’ lean ’is stummick ’way out over it, an’
say, ‘Now you listen to me’!—an’ that’s the way ’e drawed ’em to ’im.
When ’e’d first begin, the church ’ud be so still that you could hear the flies
buzz, an’ ’is voice would sound all hollow, like ’e was talkin’ into a big
dish-pan. We don’t have no more preachers like ’im now days, an’ people
don’t go to church no more like they did then. We don’t have no more old-
fashioned Sundays. There’s too many newspapers, an’ what they have to
say takes the place o’ what we used to hear in the pulpit. What the preachers
say now days ain’t interestin’ any more. People rest an’ play on Sunday
now, instid o’ bein’ solemn an’ sad an’ settin’ ’round an’ listenin’ over an’
over to somebody tellin’ about them three fellers that was in the fiery
furnace.”
He felt deeply his responsibility as a representative of the national
government. The post-office department, with its rows of glass-fronted mail
boxes, numbered from 1 to 40, was located at the right of the store entrance.
The mail bag was brought daily from the railroad station, five miles away,
by a fat-faced young man in blue overalls and a hickory shirt. His elbows
flopped madly up and down as his horse galloped along the highway with
the precious burden across the pommel. He made another trip at night with
the out-going mail, and when the hoof-beats were heard on the road, there
would be many glances at the clocks in the houses along his route, and the
fact approvingly noted, that “Bill’s on time to-night, all right.”
There are many people in the world who win lasting laurels by being “on
time.” Some do it quietly, and others by flopping their arms violently, to the
accompaniment of resonant hoof-beats, as “Bill” does, but being “on time”
is essential to success in life. “Bill” may have no other argument to present
for his eventual redemption than the fact that he was always “on time,” but
it cannot fail to be powerful and convincing.
“I would like this postmaster business,” said the old man, “if it wasn’t
fer all the books I have to write in an’ the blanks I have to fill out. It keeps
people comin’ in, but sometimes I have to set up pretty near all night writin’
out things fer the gov’ament. I don’t keep no books fer the store, fer I never
sell nothin’ ’cept fer cash, or fer sumpen that’s brought in, an’ I keep my
expense account in my hat. If the sheriff ever comes ’round ’ere to close me
up, ’e won’t find no books to go by. I spend all the money that gits in the
drawer, an’ if what’s in the store should burn up, I’d be ahead ’cause I’ve
got insurance, an’ I’d git it all at once; so I guess I’m all right. I ain’t got
much to show fer my life, ’cept a grin, but that’s sumpen. Some day I’ll
have all the poetry I’ve made printed into a volume that’ll be put on sale,
an’ I’ll have a reg’lar income an’ I won’t have to work no more.
“I’m keepin’ a first class place here. There’s a lot o’ this new-fangled
stuff that I’ve stopped carryin’. People always buy it out when they come
in, an’ I have to keep gittin’ more all the time. If I don’t have them things
they ask fer, they’ll prob’ly buy sumpen that’s already on hand. I can’t
please ev’rybody all the time, or I’d be worked to death. I don’t keep no
likker, but anybody can git most anything else here that’ll make ’em smell
like a man, an’ I don’t sell no cigarettes. A feller come in ’ere with one
once, an’ when ’e went out ’e left ’is punk on the edge of a pile o’ paper.
After a while some o’ the bunch out in front noticed some fire, an’ it pretty
near burnt up the store, an’ besides they smell like a burnt offering, an’ I
don’t like ’em.”
I asked him if he ever went over to the lake.
“Not fer about fifteen years. We all drove over there fer a bath, an’ I took
a bad cold an’ I haven’t bin there since. This talk o’ washin’ all the time is
nonsence. Jedge Blossom’s got a big tin bath tub up to his place, that’s
painted green, an’ ’e gits in it an’ sloshes ’round ev’ry Saturday night when
’e’s home, but when Monday mornin’ comes ’e don’t look no better’n
anybody else.”
During one afternoon that I spent with him in the rear of the store, he
showed me some of the literature which he had taken down from the stock
on one of the upper shelves, and had been reading during the winter. The
pile consisted of old-fashioned dime novels of years ago, with their
multicolored illustrated paper covers. Among the titles, and on the blood-
curdling, well-thumbed pages, I found names that were once familiar and
much beloved. “Lantern-Jawed Bob,” “Snake Eye,” “Deadwood Dick,”
“Iron Hand,” “Navajo Bill,” “Shadow Bill,” “The Forest Avenger,” “Eagle-
Eyed Zeke,” “The War Tiger of the Modocs,” “The Mountain Demon,” and
many other forgotten heroes of boyhood days, “advanced coolly and
stealthily” out of the mists of the dim past, and once more they scalped,
robbed, trailed, circumvented bloodthirsty pursuers, had hair-breadth
escapes, mocked death, rescued peerless maidens from savage redskins in
the wilderness, and finally married them, as of yore.
 The romance in the pile was irretrievably bad, but it recalled happy
memories. It was not surprising that the old man was impressed with the
idea that “too much readin’ rots the mind,” when spring came, and he had
finished the stack.
Around the big stove, on chilly days, the owners of the chin whiskers
congregate, with cob pipes and juicy plug. They contribute liberally to the
square boxes filled with sawdust that serve as cuspidors. In this solemn
circle the great political problems of the nation are considered and solved.
The gossip of the township is exchanged, and the personal frailties of
absent ones discussed. The local Munchausen tells wondrous tales of his
cow, that stands out in the river and is milked by hungry fish that wait
among the lilies, and of hailstorms he has seen that have demolished
brickyards.
A projected barn, the sale of a horse or cow, the repairs on a wagon, the
prospects of frost or rain, the crops, the price of hogs, the tariff, the trusts,
the rascality of the railroads, and many other subjects, are mingled with the
gossip of the neighborhood. These matters are all deeply pondered over.
They talk about their rheumatism, the “cricks” in their backs, their coughs,
their aches and pains, and the foolish vagaries of the “women folks.” They
buy patent medicines, and they bathe only when they get caught in the rain.

THE PESSIMISTS
 A slatternly looking woman comes in, buys some calico, thread, two
yards of ribbon, and some hooks and eyes. When she departs some one
remarks, “Wonder wot she’s goin’ to make now!” From that the
conversation drifts to “the feller that left ’er about two years ago.” The
proprietors of the chin whiskers all knew “when ’e fust come ’round, ’e
wasn’t any good,” and the sage prophecies of by-gone days are now fully
verified. The demerits of a certain horse, which he had once sold to one of
the prophets, are again recounted, and the general opinion is that after the
delinquent “got through with the lawsuit ’e was mixed up in, ’e went out
west som’ers with the money ’is lawyer didn’t git. Anyhow, ’e was no
good.” Nobody is “any good.”
When the time comes to “git home to supper,” the dilapidated vehicles
begin to crawl out into the fading light and disappear. They carry the
pessimists and the few necessaries which they have bought at the store—
some molasses, sugar, tea and coffee, possibly a new shovel, some nails,
and always a plentiful supply of plug tobacco, a great deal of which is
filtered into the soil of the back country. Some eggs, butter, vegetables, and
other produce of the little farm has been left in payment.

THEY “CRAWL OUT INTO

THE FADING LIGHT”
 After the tired horses are unhitched and fed, the exciting gossip is retold
at the supper table. A few chores are done, an hour or so is spent around the
big lamp, and another eventful day has closed. A week may pass before
another trip is made to the sleepy village.
Those who are gone are under the tall grasses and wild flowers on the
hill near the woods, beyond the little weather-beaten country church. The
iron bell has tolled for them as they were laid away, and now that it is all
over, it is the same with them as if they had been monarchs or millionaires.
A touching, if crude, epitaph can be deciphered on one of the gray mossy
stones through the crumbling fence. After the name and the final date are
the lines,

“Shed not for me the bitter tears

Nor fill the heart with vain regrets.
’Tis but the casket that lies here,
The gems that filled them sparkles yet.”

and lower, under a pair of clasped hands, “We will meet again,” and it may
be that a mighty truth is on the stone.

The “Jedge”.
 CHAPTER XII

JUDGE CASSIUS BLOSSOM

T HE road leading from the lake, through the sand hills, and the low
stretches of the back country, over to the sleepy village, is broken—and
badly broken—by numerous sections of corduroy reinforcements,
which have been laid in the marshy places, across small creeks and
quagmires. The portion of the road near the lake is seldom traveled.
Occasionally, during the hot weather, a wagon-load of people will come
over from the sleepy village, and from the little farms along the road, and
go into the lake to get cool. They will then spend the rest of the day
sweltering on the hot sand to get warm, and return at night.
Beyond the marsh, perhaps half way to the village, is the residence and
office of Judge Cassius Blossom, the local Dogberry, the repository of the
conflicting interests, and final arbiter in most of the petty dissensions of the
sparsely settled country in which he lives.
 OLD SETTLERS IN THE BACK COUNTRY

The “Jedge” was a faithful member of the solemn conclaves of the wise
ones with the chin whiskers at the general store in the sleepy village, where
he often reversed the decisions of the supreme court. His chair in the
charmed circle around the big old-fashioned stove, and among the sawdust
cuspidors, in winter, and out on the platform under the awning in summer,
was looked upon as the resting-place of about as much legal wisdom, and
about as much bad whisky, as one man could comfortably carry around. His
dissertations were always anxiously listened to and absorbed by his
auditors, each according to his capacity. His opinions and observations were
variously interpreted to the home firesides around through the country at
night, according to the intellectual limitations of the narrator.
“The Jedge says that they’s some cases that’s agin the common law, an’
they’s some cases that’s agin the stattoot law, but about this ’ere case he was
talkin’ about, ’e said ’e’d ’ave to look up sumpen. He told about a case
where some feller ’ad sued another feller fer some money that was owin’ to
’im, but ’e’d lost the notes, but ’e was goin’ to git a judgment agin this feller
all the same, an’ make a levy on ’im. You bet I’m goin’ to be thar when this
case comes up in court an’ see wot’s doin’. The Jedge is sharper’n a tack,
an’ you bet them fellers over to the county seat ain’t goin’ to put nothin’
over on’ im, if ’e’s sober. He’ll make points on all of ’em, but if ’e goes
over thar an’ sets ’round Fogarty’s place boozin’, ’e’ll lose out.”
In talking with Sipes, one afternoon, about some of the roads in the back
country, he suggested that we take a walk over to the Judge’s house and see
him. “The Jedge has got a map that’s got all them things on it. The ol’ feller
deals in law, an’ land, an’ fire insurance, an’ everythin’ else.”
After Sipes had carefully shut the door of his shanty, and secured it with
an old iron padlock, we started on our journey. He said that he generally
locked the place up when he went away, as “there was sometimes some
fellers snoopin’ ’round that might swipe sumpen, an’ the Jedge told me
oncet that if anybody ever busted open the lock, it would show bulgarious
intent, an’ they’d git sent up fer it if they ever got caught, but if they went in
when the place wasn’t locked, it was trespass on the case, or sumpen like
that.”
We trudged along through the deep sand for half a mile or so, and then
turned through an opening in the dunes where the road came in. Our walk
led through the broken wet country for about a mile before we came to
more solid ground. On the way across the marshy strip the old man pointed
out familiar spots where he had “lambasted pretty near a whole flock o’
ducks at one shot.” In another place he had once spent nearly an hour in
“sneakin’ up on a bunch o’ wooden decoys that some feller had out, an’
when I shot into ’em you’d a thought a ton o’ lead ’ad struck a lumber pile.
The feller yelled when I fired. He was back in some weeds, an’ I guess ’e
was afraid there was goin’ to be sumpen doin’ on ’im with the other bar’l if
’e didn’t yell.”
A tamarack swamp, about half a mile away, was a favorite haunt for
rabbits in the winter. He often went over there on the ice after there had
been a light fall of snow.
“Them little beasts are pretty foxy, but I just go over there an’ set still,
an’ when one of ’em comes hoppin’ ’round out in the open, I shoot the
fillin’ out of ’im. I’ve got as many as twenty there in one day.
“When we git over to the Jedge’s house, don’t you go ag’inst none o’
that whisky that ’e’s got in a big black bottle in the under part of ’is desk.
He calls the bottle ‘Black Betty,’ an’ it’s ter’ble stuff. It kicks pretty near as
hard as my ol’ scatter gun, an’ ’e has to keep a glass stopper in the bottle. A
common cork would be et up. A man that laps up whisky like that has to
have a sheet-iron stummick, an’ I guess the Jedge’s got one all right, fer ’e’s
bin hittin’ it fer years.
“He fills the bottle up out of a big demijohn, that ’e gits loaded up from a
partic’lar bar’l at Fogarty’s place over to the county seat when ’e goes to
court, an’ lots o’ times when ’e don’t go to court. The bar’l replenishes the
demijohn, the demijohn replenishes Black Betty, an’ Black Betty
replenishes the Jedge, an’ after that the Jedge has to replenish Fogarty—so
it all works ’round natural—an’ the Jedge keeps a skinful all the time.
“A white man could drink the grog we used to have on the ship an’ still
see, but the Jedge’s dope would make a hole in a pine board, an’ you pass it
by.”
This I solemnly promised to do.
“I notice that them fellers that take up stiddy boozin’ have to ’tend to it
all the time. When ol’ Jedge Blossom finds out that them law cases that ’e’s
always talkin’ about interferes with ’is boozin’, ’e’ll quit monkeyin’ with
’em. It must a bin a sweet country that ’e bloomed in. Pretty near every time
I go to see ’im, ’e ain’t home. They say ’e’s off ’tendin’ to some important
cases before the master in chancery. Them cases is prob’ly mostly before
Black Betty, fer I notice ’e always comes home from ’em stewed, an’
sometimes ’is horse comes home alone an’ ’e comes later. He takes drinks
lots o’ times when ’e don’t need ’em. He just drops ’em in to hear ’em
spatter.
 “They’ll find ’im in a catamose condition some day when ’e’s over to the
county seat, that ’e won’t come out of, an’ when it’s all over they can
dispose of ’is remains by just pourin’ ’im back into Fogarty’s bar’l. All
that’ll be left of ’im’ll be ’is thirst, an’ they’d better put wot’ll be left of ’is
fire insurance business in with ’im, fer ’e’ll need some.”
The old man’s entertaining review of the frailties of the “Jedge,” and of
alcoholic humanity in general, continued until we arrived at our destination.
The small frame house, which was once white, but now a dingy gray,
was adorned with faded green blinds. It stood about fifty feet back from the
road. Some mournful evergreens stood in painful regularity in the front
yard. The fence was somewhat dilapidated, and on it was a weather-beaten
sign:
Cassius Blossom, J.P.,
Attorney and Counsellor at Law,
Notary Public,
Fire Insurance, Real Estate.
A gravel walk, fringed with white shells, led from the rickety gate to the
rather ecclesiastical-looking front door. Sipes remarked in passing that
“them white shells was to help the Jedge steer ’is course on dark nights,
when ’e was three sheets in the wind, an’ beatin’ up aginst it.”
There was a brown bell-handle near the door, and when it was pulled we
could hear a prolonged, hoarse tinkling somewhere off in the rear of the
house. We soon heard footsteps, and a forbidding-looking female opened
the door. She was quite tall and angular. A few faded freckles around the
nose—a mass of frowsy red hair, liberally streaked with gray—a general
untidiness—and a glint in her yellowish-brown eyes, as she peered out at us
over her brass-rimmed spectacles, produced impressions that were anything
but assuring.
On being admitted to the house, we were ushered into the “library,”
which also evidently served as a dining-room and office. A round table
stood in the middle of the room, covered with a soiled red and white fringed
table cloth. A hair-cloth sofa, with some broken springs and bits of excelsior
protruding from underneath, occupied one side of the apartment, and there
were several chairs of the same repellant material. A narrow roll-top
combination desk and bookcase, freely splotched with ink-stains, stood near
the window. Behind the dusty glass doors of the bookcase were a few well-
worn books, bound in sheepskin. The first volume of Blackstone’s
Commentaries, a copy of Parsons on Contracts, two or three volumes of
court reports, and the Revised Statutes of the state, completed the
assemblage of legal lore.
The pictures on the walls consisted of some stiff-looking crayon portraits
in gloomy frames, evidently copied from old photographs—all of which
were very bad—another somber frame containing a fly-specked steel
engraving of the justices of the U. S. Supreme Court, and still another, out
of which the stern and noble face of Daniel Webster looked into the room.
His immeasurable services to his country did not prevent him from leaving
a malign influence behind him. His unfortunate example convinces many
budding statesmen and promising lawyers that the human intellect is not
soluble in alcohol, and they are lulled into the belief that the brilliancy of
his mind was not dimmed by his indulgences. They emulate his weakness,
as well as his strength, and console themselves in their cups with the
greatness of Webster.
The “Jedge” sat at the desk, without his coat, writing, his back toward
us. His shirt-sleeves, and his wide stand-up collar, were not clean. Evidently
he was very busy and must not be disturbed just yet. With a solemn wink of
his solitary eye, and an expressive gesture, Sipes attracted my attention to a
faint wreath of softly ascending smoke issuing from a cob pipe, which was
lying on a window-sill on the opposite side of the room, which suggested
that the important business at the desk may have commenced when the bell
rang.
Evidently the “Jedge” appreciated the tactical advantage which
preoccupation always establishes when business callers come. The visitor,
in being compelled to await the disposal of more weighty matters, is duly
humbled and impressed with the fact that, at least so far as time is
concerned, he is a suppliant and not a dictator.
Dissimulation is an universal practice of man and woman kind. A
pessimistic student of the complexities of the human comedy might, with
much justice, conclude that at least half of the people on the globe—and
especially of those who are super-civilized—pretend, to a greater or less
degree, to be something that they are not, and the other half pretend not to
be something that they are.
 Further thought upon this subject was interrupted by the “Jedge.” The
cane-seated swivel chair turned with a loud squeak, and we were before the
disciple of Blackstone & Bacchus—that famous firm whose dissolution the
shade of Webster will never permit.
He was a spare, red-faced man, of perhaps sixty-five, with white hair and
tobacco-stained whiskers. His prominent nose appeared to be a little
swollen and wore a deep blush. With a learned frown he looked out of his
deep-set and bloodshot eyes, over the tops of his spectacles. His voice was
deep and hoarse.
“Good morning, gentlemen. What can I do for you?”
It was afternoon, but, as the uncharitable Sipes suggested later, “the
Jedge prob’ly hadn’t got home last night yet, or mebbe ’e’d just got up.”
“You will have to excuse me for keeping you waiting, but I’ve just been
preparing the final papers in a very important case that I’ve got to file in
court by Saturday. I’ve had to work on them steadily for the past few days,
as there are some very complicated questions of law involved, and I’ve had
to look up a lot of decisions. I am now entirely at your service.”
After being formally introduced by my friend Sipes, I explained the
object of the visit. The “Jedge” was very cordial. He arose from his chair,
walked impressively, and with much dignity, across the room, resumed his
cob pipe, which was still alive, and raised the lid of an old leather-covered
trunk, bound with brass nails. After a long search he produced the desired
map and spread it out on the table.
“Before we take up this matter of the roads, I think, gentlemen, that we
had better have a little refreshment.”
We both politely declined his invitation and expressed a preference for
some cold water. He seemed disappointed, and, with a surprised and curious
glance at Sipes, returned to the desk, opened one of the lower doors, and
gently lifted “Black Betty” out of the gloom.
“I haven’t been feeling very well for several days, and I’ve had some
pains in my back. If you’ll excuse me for drinking alone, I’ll just take a
little bracer.” Sipes’ solitary eye again closed expressively, as the “Jedge”
removed the stopper, grasped the big bottle firmly around the neck, and
tilted it among his whiskers with a motion that no tyro could ever hope to
imitate.
 The answering gurgle indicated that the “bracer” was “going home,” and
that, to say the least, it was not homeopathic. After the restoration of “Black
Betty” to her hiding-place, the “Jedge” resumed the conversation, without
referring to the cold water which we had suggested. Possibly the mention of
it had affected him unpleasantly.
He explained the map in detail, and told of several changes that would
have to be made in a new one. This led to long accounts, punctuated with
more winks by Sipes, of petty litigation, in which he had taken a prominent
part, as a result of which a lot of land had been condemned and some new
roads established. Had it not been for him, the highways would have been
“entirely inadequate, and in very poor condition.”
In summing up his public services he said that he had lived in that part of
the state for about thirty years. His advice was now being generally
followed, and the country was beginning to pick up. He had several small
farms for sale which he would like to show me, if I thought of locating
around there; in fact, there was nothing anywhere in that part of the country
that was not for sale.
I told him that my interest in the subject was entirely of an artistic
character.
“Well, if that’s the case, I can show you a lot of fine scenes, and if you’ll
come over some day and get into a buggy with me, I’ll drive you over to the
county seat when I go to court.”
He seemed much flattered when I asked him to allow me to make a
sketch of him. After it was finished, he examined it critically, to the intense
amusement of Sipes. He thought the nose was a little too big, and the hair
was “too much mussed up.” He also thought that the drawing made him
look a little older than he was, and that the eye was not quite natural, “but
of course I can’t see the side of my face, and it may be all right.
“As you are interested in art, you’ll enjoy looking at my pictures.”
He then showed me the array on the walls, of which he was very proud.
The crayon portrait of his first wife, with the cheeks tinted pink and the ear-
rings gilded, he thought “was a fine piece of work.” A man had come along,
about ten years ago, and had made three “genuine crayon portraits” for ten
dollars. The “Jedge” supposed that “now days they would be worth a great
deal more than that.” The other two “genuine crayon portraits” represented
his father and mother, an antiquated couple in the Sunday dress of pioneer
days, who looked severely out of their heavy frames. The man had taken the
old daguerreotypes away to be copied, and when the completed goods were
delivered, he claimed that “the frames alone were worth as much as the
pictures.” In this he was quite right.
The “Jedge” wanted to show me an album containing pictures of the rest
of his relatives, but fortunately he was unable to find it. In searching for it,
however, he ran across a box containing a collection of Indian arrow heads,
flint implements, and spears, which were of absorbing interest. He had
found some of them himself, and numerous friends, knowing of his hobby,
had furnished him with many of these valuable relics of the red man, whose
white brothers came with guns and strong waters and appropriated his
heritage.
He soon began to show signs of more pains in his back. With an
apologetic reference to them, and with more sly winks from Sipes, “Black
Betty” was again produced, and her fiery fluid again solaced the arid
esophagus of the “Jedge.”
The contents of the bottle were evidently getting dangerously low. He
excused himself for a minute, and took it into the next room, where he
refilled it from the big demijohn that stood in the corner. Sipes indulged in
many amusing grimaces as the sounds from the other room indicated that
“Black Betty’s” condition had again become normal.
After we had talked a little while longer, Sipes related to the “Jedge” the
story of the tangled set lines, over which he and “Happy Cal” had got into
trouble years ago, and wanted to know “what the law was.”
After listening carefully to all of the facts, the “Jedge” cleared his throat
slightly and delivered his opinion.
This preliminary slight clearing of the throat implies deliberation, and
often adds impressiveness to a forthcoming utterance. Sipes remarked later,
that “nobody never lived that was as wise as the Jedge looked when ’e
hemmed a little an’ got on ’is legal frown.”
“It seems from the facts before us, that the mass of property under
consideration was discovered on the shore, about half-way between the
homes of the two claimants, neither of whom, as a matter of fact, possessed
original title to it. The position of the mass when found brings up several
difficult questions of law, involving facts which are malum in se. A portion
of it was on the surface of the water, a portion of it was submerged, and still
another portion was on dry land. According to maritime law, that portion on
the surface was flotsam, and that portion which was submerged was jetsam.
The laws affecting flotsam and jetsam would prevail as to these two
portions, but as to the portion which rested on dry land, I am inclined to
think that the lex loci would apply.”
Whereupon, the bewildered Sipes asked, “Who done this?”
Disregarding the interruption, the “Jedge” again slightly cleared his
throat and continued:
“A priori, I am of opinion that prima facie evidence of ownership rests
with possession, and that the onus probandi must necessarily be ex
adverso.” The “Jedge” then stated that the opinion would cost half a dollar.
Sipes was speechless, but paid the fee.
The “Jedge” had charged “Happy Cal” a dollar one night, years ago, for
an opinion in the same case. He had advised Cal “not to disturb the status
quo.” The dazed client paid the money and disappeared into the darkness.
He probably stopped at Sipes’s place, where the untangled lines were
stretched out to dry, and cut them up, on his way home, thus disposing of
the “status quo” entirely.
It was to the credit of the “Jedge” that he never took any more than his
clients had, and they could always come back when they had more.
We finally thanked the “Jedge” for his courtesy, and bade him good-bye.
On the way back I reimbursed Sipes in the matter of the half-dollar
which he had paid for the opinion, as it had really been worth more to me
than it was to him. After we had left the house, the old man’s comments on
the visit were earnest and caustic.
“Wot d’ye think o’ the gall o’ that old cuss chargin’ me half a dollar fer
all that noise ’e made about them lines? I don’t know that feller Losey ’e
spoke of. He was never ’round ’ere at all, an’ ’e never ’ad nothin’ to do with
them lines, an’ that melon in the sea, that ’e told about, was all bunk. There
was nothin’ like that near that bunch o’ stuff. I don’t know what ever
become o’ Cal. He may be now in spotless robes, fer all I know, but I know
’e cut up them lines just the same. There was about two miles of ’em, when
they was fixed up an’ stretched out, an’ they was worth some money, an’ as
long as the feller that ’ad ’em out in the lake didn’t come along to claim
’em, they was mine. Cal never ’ad no bus’ness with ’em, an’ I don’t need to
mosey over an’ pay that old tank fifty cents to find it out, neither. Cash us
Blossom is a good name fer him, all right. He’s everythin’ I said ’e was on
the way over, an’ more, too. He’s got some fresh money now, an’ I’ll bet the
demijohn’ll be trundled over to the county seat the first thing in the
mornin’. He can buy a lot o’ the kind o’ Whisky ’e drinks fer half a dollar.
“He lays ’is demijohn on the side, underneath, when ’e starts out, but
when ’e drives home it’s always standin’ up in the back o’ the buggy, so
nothin’ ’ll spill, an’ that’s more’n the Jedge could do. When I see ’im drivin’
on the road, I can always tell, by where the demijohn is, whether ’e’s got a
cargo or travelin’ light. That heap big Injun dignity that ’e’s always puttin’
on when ’e makes them spiels o’ his, gives me tired feelin’s. You can’t mix
up dignity with whisky without spoilin’ both of ’em. If ’e ever comes over
to my place, you can turn me into snakes if I don’t charge ’im a half a dollar
fer the first question ’e asks. I’ll bet ’e won’t come though, fer I’m too near
the water. I wish I could sic old Doc Looney on ’im some time. He
wouldn’t stay afloat long after the Doc got to ’im.”
I asked Sipes if the forbidding-looking female who came to the door was
the Judge’s wife.
“Not on yer life,” he replied. “If ’e had a wife, she’d kill ’im. That ol’
cactus is ’is housekeeper. She’s a distant relative o’ some kind, an’ she’s just
waitin’ fer Black Betty to finish ’im up so’s she’ll git the house.”
We arrived at Sipes’s place about dusk. I had left my boat on the beach,
and, as the old man helped me push it into the water, he indulged in final
anathemas against the “Jedge.” He shook his fist in his direction and said
that “when we go over there ag’in we’d better leave our money in the
shanty.”
I happened to stop at the store in the sleepy village one hot day during
the following summer. The “Jedge” was just getting into his buggy, but
stopped and greeted me cordially. I intended leaving for home that evening,
and he kindly offered to take me to the railroad station, about five miles
away. I gladly accepted his offer, although he did not appear to be in a very
good condition to drive a horse.
On the way across the country he recited his public services, discussed
the details of his “important cases,” and unfolded his dreams of the future
of the county.
We arrived at the station just in time to enable me to jump quickly out of
the buggy and catch the train that was pulling out. I paused on the rear
platform to call out a good-bye to the “Jedge,” but he had tried to make too
short a turn on the narrow road, and the buggy was lying on its side, much
twisted up. The horse had stopped and was looking inquiringly back from
between the broken thills. The “Jedge,” who was partially under the wreck,
but evidently unhurt, waved a cheerful farewell at me as the train passed the
water tank, and in the distance I could see that he was getting safely out of
the scrape.
The station agent and a few villagers, who had come to the depot to see
that the train arrived and departed properly, were going to his assistance.
From about two miles away I saw the black buggy top slowly resume its
normal position and begin to move on the road. The “Jedge” was probably
by this time much in need of “refreshment,” and, as he was now on the way
to the county seat, relief was not very far off. Undoubtedly his friend
Fogarty would fully and deeply sympathize with him in his troubles as long
as his cash lasted.
He was one of the pathetic failures whom we meet daily in the walks of
life. Naturally gifted, and fairly well educated, he had started bravely out on
his road of destiny, with noble ambitions and alluring hopes. In the early
part of the journey he had lifted a fatal chalice to his lips, and the way
became dark. He drifted from the highway that might have led to fame and
fortune to the still by-path in which we found him. Because he was not
strong, he fell—as countless others have fallen before him.
The shadow of “Black Betty” has fallen over a chair in the sleepy village
that is now empty, and it may be that the poor old “Jedge” is arguing his
own plea for mercy before a greater Court. Let us hope that his final appeal
may bring forgiveness and peace.
The stone, simple and suggestive, which was erected to his memory, was
designed and paid for by his friends. Even Sipes relented and requested
Catfish John to put fifty cents in “cash-money” into the contribution box at
the store for him.
“AMONG BIG WET STRETCHES OF
HIGH GRASS AND BULRUSHES”
 CHAPTER XIII

THE WINDING RIVER

T O enjoy a river we must adjust ourselves to its moods, for a river has
many moods. It moves swiftly and light-heartedly over the shallows, as
we do, and it has its solemn, quiet moments in the shadows of the steep
banks, where the current is deep and still. It begins, like our lives,
somewhere far away, and twists and turns, flows in long swerves, meets
many rocks, ripples over pebbly places, smiles among many riffles, frowns
under stormy skies, meditates in quiet nooks, and then goes on.
As it becomes older it broadens and becomes stronger. It begins to make
a larger path of its own in the world, which it follows with varying fortunes,
until its waters have gone beyond it.
The Winding River begins miles away and steals down through the back
country. It curves and runs through devious channels and makes wide
detours, before it finally flows out through the sand hills into the great lake.
Along its tranquil course there are many things to be studied and learned,
and many new thoughts and sensations to grow out of them. We must go
down the river, and not against its current, to know its strange spirit, and to
love it. There is always a feeling of closer companionship when we are
traveling in the same direction.
It is best to go alone, in a small boat, carrying a few feet of rope attached
to a heavy stone, so that the boat may be anchored in any desirable spot.
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