"A bear?" he reiterated blankly. "Certainly," I said; "undoubtedly a bear--I myself saw it. A large, dark bear." "And whut about this here?" he continued, now beholding for the first time the remaining woodcock, which hung from the limb of a low tree, and pointing toward it. "Is that there a Mound Builder's chicken?" "Assuredly not," I said. "That is a white woodcock. There was also a black woodcock, presumably a mate of this one; but it--it has been disposed of. The pair were slain yesterday with bow and arrow in the adjacent depths of the woodland, which is their customary habitat." You will note that I constantly refrained from mentioning my youthful compatriots. Did I dare reveal that I had companions, and by so doing expose those helpless lads to the unbridled fury of these maniacal beings, filled with the low cunning and insatiable curiosity of the insane? No; a thousand times, no! Rather would I perish first. At all hazards I would protect them--such was my instantaneous determination. "I git you," replied the bearded man, his tone and manner changing abruptly from the truculent and threatening to the soothing. "You was takin' a private lesson in plain and fancy swimmin' on a pink sofa cushion; and that there ancient and honourable milk crock was willed to you by the Mound-buildin' Aztecs; and a big bear come in the night and et up your wild strawberries--which was a great pity, too, seein' they're worth thirty cents a quart right this minute on the New York market; and you killed them two pedigreed Leghorn woodcocks with a bow and arrows in the forest--the forest whutever you jest now called it. Jest whut are you, anyway?" "By profession I am a clergyman," I answered. "And do all the members of your persuasion wear them little sailor suits or is it confined to the preachers only?" he demanded. I gathered that this coarse reference applied to my attire. "This," I told him, "is the uniform or garb of an organisation known as the Young Nuts of America. I am the Chief Nut." "I can't take issue with you here," he said with a raucous laugh. "And now, Chief, jest one thing more: Would you mind tellin' us whut your aim was in holdin' your nose over that there brush fire a bit ago?" "My head has been giving me some trouble," I said. "I was curing myself with the aid of the smoke." "One minute a nut and the next minute a ham," he murmured, half to himself. Dropping his pitchfork, he stretched his hands toward me. "I s'pose," he added, "it ain't no use to ask you when you got out?" In a flash it came to me--I had often read that the victims of a certain form of mania imagined all others to be insane. My plain and straightforward answers to his vague and rambling interrogations had failed of the desired effect. Being themselves mad, they thought me mad. It was a horrifying situation.