“Dunno--used ter be.” The shadows deepened; we must go back to the house. “Is there a dam below here, Buck?” “Yes, thar's a dam about a half-mile down the river.” I was disgusted. No wonder there were no bass in that pool. “Why didn't you tell me that before?” “You never axed me,” said Buck placidly. I began winding in my line. “Ain't no bottom to that pool,” said Buck. Now I never saw any rural community where there was not a bottomless pool, and I suddenly determined to shake one tradition in at least one community. So I took an extra fish-line, tied a stone to it, and climbed into a canoe, Buck watching me, but not asking a word. “Get in, Buck.” Silently he got in and I pushed off--to the centre. “This the deepest part, Buck?” “I reckon so.” I dropped in the stone and the line reeled out some fifty feet and began to coil on the surface of the water. “I guess that's on the bottom, isn't it, Buck?” Buck looked genuinely distressed; but presently he brightened. “Yes,” he said, “ef hit ain't on a turtle's back.” Literally I threw up both hands and back we trailed--fishless. “Reckon you won't need that two-hoss wagon,” said Buck. “No, Buck, I think not.” Buck looked at the Blight and gave himself the pleasure of his first chuckle. A big crackling, cheerful fire awaited us. Through the door I could see, outstretched on a bed in the next room, the limp figure of “pap” in alcoholic sleep. The old mother, big, kind-faced, explained--and there was a heaven of kindness and charity in her drawling voice. “Dad didn' often git that a-way,” she said; “but he'd been out a-huntin' hawgs that mornin' and had met up with some teamsters and gone to a political speakin' and had tuk a dram or two of their mean whiskey, and not havin' nothin' on his stummick, hit had all gone to his head. No, 'pap' didn't git that a-way often, and he'd be all right jes' as soon as he slept it off a while.” The old woman moved about with a cane and the sympathetic Blight merely looked a question at her. “Yes, she'd fell down a year ago--and had sort o' hurt herself--didn't do nothin', though, 'cept break one hip,” she added, in her kind, patient old voice. Did many people stop there? Oh, yes, sometimes fifteen at a time--they “never turned nobody away.” And she had a big family, little Cindy and the two big girls and Buck and Mart--who was out somewhere--and the hired man, and yes--“Thar was another boy, but he was fitified,” said one of the big sisters. “I beg your pardon,” said the wondering Blight, but she knew that phrase wouldn't do, so she added politely: “What did you say?” “Fitified--Tom has fits. He's in a asylum in the settlements.” “Tom come back once an' he was all right,” said the old mother; “but he worried so much over them gals workin' so hard that it plum' throwed him off ag'in, and we had to send him back.”