"Do you mean to insult me, sir?" Sanders retorted, weakly bristling up; and the Major turning from the sideboard, with the odd-shaped bottle and several glasses in his hands, looked at Batts and said: "Don't, Gid." "All right, but I was joking," the old rascal declared. "Wash and I always prank with each other. You can take a joke, can't you, Wash?" "With the best of them," Sanders answered. "Yes, sir, and before the doctors proved to me that I couldn't get well I was joking all the time." He raised his hand and with his long finger nail scratched his chin. "But they showed me that I couldn't get well and if that ain't enough to sadden a man's life I don't know what is." "Now, gentlemen," said the Major, "I want you to help yourselves, and not be afraid, for the glasses are shallow and the bottle is deep." The red bewhiskered man Perdue, who had said nothing, took out his quid of tobacco and with a loud "spat," threw it against the chimney-back. "I'll join you," he said, grinning. "Never saw any liquor too old for me." They stood and touched glasses. Gid walled his eyes like a steer, and with a rub of his breast and an "ah-hah," he nodded at Low. "What do you think of that?" he cried. "Isn't it a miracle?" "Ah, it is very smooth," Low answered, sipping. "Most uncommon I should think." "Smooth," said Gid. "Did you say smooth? It is as silk woven in the loom of a dream. Wash, how does it strike you?" "I think it will help me," Sanders answered. "Help you!" And under his breath Gid added: "Ought to kill you." "What did you say?" Sanders asked. "Said it wouldn't kill you." "Oh, I think not. Really, after a while I might be tempted to go out and eat something. How are you gettin' along, Perdue?" "Shakin' hands with my grandfather in the speret," Perdue declared, and running his fingers through his fiery whiskers he laughed with a hack that cut like the bleat of a sheep. "Jim," said the Major, turning to Taylor, who had not left his seat, "you'd better try a little. It won't hurt you." "No, thank you, Major, I'm afraid of it." "Let him alone," Gid spoke. "One drink of this and he'd carry off the gate, posts and all and leave them on the hill. Don't tempt him." "Gentlemen," said Perdue, "I have always made it a rule never to repeat anything that my children say, for I know how such a thing bores folks, but I will tell you what my son Ab said the other night. His mother was gettin' him ready for bed--just a little more, Major. There, that's a plenty. Mother was gettin' him ready for bed and he looked up----" "I feel the blood of youth mounting from the feet of the past to the head of the present," Gid broke in. "I can jump a ten rail fence, staked and ridered." "And I'm pretty jumpy myself," the Major declared. "But what were you going to say, Perdue?"