"Often, but some folks in this country would go through fire--an' even water--for the sake o' somethin, new. I've cal'lated to make a free bath a throw-in' to some o' our customers that I could name, but first I'm goin' to try it on some old chums. I'm goin' to have the grand openin' on Decoration Day, an' try it on all the members of our Grand Army post. The boys'll do anythin' for an old comrade, specially if he's post commander, as I be. There was all sorts in the army, an' sometimes it's seemed to me that the right ones didn't get killed, nor even die afterwards. There's three or four of 'em in this county that makes it a p'int o' gettin' howlin' drunk on Decoration Day, which kind o' musses up the spirit o' the day for the rest of us. They're to have the first baths; I'm goin' to 'gree with 'em that if a bath don't make 'em feel better than a drink, I'll supply the liquor afterwards; but if it does, why, then they're not to touch a drop all day. Black Sam reckons that by bein' spry he can curry 'em down, so to speak, at the rate of a man ev'ry ten minutes, an' there's only seventeen men in the post. I reckon that them that don't drink'll feel just as good after bein' cleaned up, as them that do drink, an' I'm goin' to get 'em to talk it up all day, so's to keep the rummies up to the mark. The tank lumber's all ready; so's the carpenter, an' I reckon I'll write that plumber to-day." Philip told Grace of Caleb's new project, and Grace was astonished and delighted, and then thoughtful and very silent for a few minutes, after which she said:-- "Some of the New York baths have women's days, or women's hours. I wonder if Black Sam couldn't teach the business to his wife?"--a remark which Philip repeated to Caleb, and for days afterward Caleb's hat was poised farther back on his head than usual, and more over one ear. "This enterprise of Caleb's," Grace said to her husband, "has set me wondering anew what Caleb does with his money. He has no family; his expenses are very small, for he is his own housekeeper and pays no rent, and you pay him three hundred dollars a year." "That isn't all his income," Philip replied, "for he gets once in three months a pension check of pleasing size. Still, you would be astonished to know how little cash he draws on account, and how great a quantity of goods is charged to him from month to month. I've been curious enough about it, at times, to trace the items from the ledger back to the day-book, and I learned that his account for groceries, food-stuffs generally, and dry goods is far larger than our own. As for patent medicines, he seems to consume them by the gallon--perhaps with the hope of curing his malaria. I've sometimes been at the point of asking him what he does with all of it; if he weren't so transparently, undoubtedly honest, I should imagine that he was doing a snug little private business on his own account; for, as you know, he pays only original cost price for what he buys."