I had a prescience that this hill woman knew more than she had told me, but how was I to get it from her after that last speech? It was safe to assume the Tollers were good friends to Granny, and confidences were just as essential to these people as to those more civilized. I determined to employ strategy. Would it hurt my conscience? Bah! For Celeste I would lie, or steal, or kill! "Mrs. Toller," I began, as though I had at that moment made a discovery. "I declare you have a fine, handsome lot of children. All of them yours?" I turned smiling from one group to the other. When my eyes came back to the woman I saw with joy that her features had relaxed, and something resembling a grin played about her bloodless lips. She quit work, and beamed upon her frowzy, tatterdemalion progeny, proud as if each had been a world conqueror instead of a dirt-enameled midgit of ignorance. Ah! the simplicity and the beauty of motherhood! "Ever' chick 'n' chil' 's mine 'n' th' ol' man's." How her voice had changed; a silver thread had crept into it where before iron had rung. "Fo'teen uv 'em, sir, 'n' we've marrit fifteen year come th' fust o' Jinnywary!" "Fine, healthy lot!" I rubbed my chin and took a fresh view of the spindle-shanked, pinched-cheeked, tallow-faced little creatures, salving my conscience as best as I could by bringing to mind that faulty old saw that the end justifies the means. But I knew I was lying, and I wasn't used to it. True this lie would do good. It would give happiness unalloyed to Mrs. Toller, and I felt that I had put in a wedge with which I might prize out the information I coveted. Mrs. Toller relinquished her grasp on the stick, turned her back on the clothes, and folded her arms contentedly. "They _air_ a likely look'n' set o' young-uns, since yo' 're kind 'nough to say so. Co'se it ain't fur me to brag, seein' 's I'm they mammy"--she could hardly speak that sentence because of the pride which tightened her throat--"but they ain't none here-'bout, not ev'n over to Hebrin way, whut's nice 'n' man'erly 'n' _ree_-specb'l, sho!" The peregrinations of the persecuted toad, after describing an irregular semi-circle, had now led him near the spot where I stood. After the patient reptile toiled the three infants; two of the same size and apparently the same age, and one who had but recently reached the crawling period. This one, by the way, was perpetually in the rear of the procession, its single garment hampering its knee action and making any sort of speed out of the question. The frog had become tired of his enforced journey, and was getting harder to move after each diminishing leap. Now it sat with palpitating sides, stubbornly refusing another jump, while the finger of the lead tormentor prodded with dull persistence at its posterior.