I recall an amusing instance of this "follow-my-leader" motive which occurred many years ago in a way somewhat personal to myself, in southern Kentucky. Engaged in survey work, I was passing along a quiet road when in the distance I heard a thunder of hoofs, and in a moment saw a great drove of mules, the appointed leader of which, a man on a white horse, had fallen to the rear of the column. The creatures, thinking that it was their duty to overtake the missing master, were going on the full run. Heeding the shouts of the troubled herder, I turned my wagon across the road, which, being at that point very narrow, was effectually barricaded by the vehicle. Although the rush was so wild that the brutes nearly overset my "outfit," they were brought to a full stop. Unhappily, on one side of the road and one hundred feet or so from it, there was a comfortably built southern house, with a broad gallery extending along the front; while in the door of the mansion were some women who had been attracted by the tumult. No sooner had the mob of mules been brought to a state of surging quiet, than one of the creatures jumped the picket fence, and started for the open house-door, thinking, perhaps, that he would find some peace of life in what probably seemed to him his accustomed barn. In much less time than it takes to tell it, a hundred or more mules were on the gallery, the floor of which gave way beneath their weight; they quickly broke down the columns which supported the roof, so that the whole structure at once became a heap of wood and mules. The unhappy proprietor of the drove, in his consternation, forgot even to swear--an art which I have never known on any other occasion to pass from a mule-driver; and, sitting on his white horse, he lifted his hands like an oriental in prayer, and said to me meekly, "Did you ever in all your life?" I assured him that I had never, and went my way, leaving him to settle an interesting case of damages with the owner of the mansion.