"Cutting of trees," said the woodman, as he spread his large horny-knuckled hand upon the supper table, "and handling of logs, will make any man's paw broad, and mine wa'n't small at first." "Ha! ha! ha!" ejaculated the sergeant, "you ha'n't forgot Dick Rowley over here on Congaree, Wat,--Walloping Dick, as they nicknamed him--and the scrimmage you had with him when he sot to laughing at you because they accused you for being light-fingered, and your letting him see that you had a heavy hand, by giving him the full weight of it upon his ear that almost drove him through the window of the bar-room at the Cross Roads? You ha'n't forgot that--and his drawing his knife on you?" "To be sure I ha'n't. That fellow was about as superfluous a piece of wicked flesh as I say--as a man would meet on a summer's day journey. But for all that, Horse Shoe, he wa'n't going to supererogate me, without getting as good as he sent. When I come across one of your merry fellows that's for playing cantraps on a man, it's my rule to make them pay the piper; and that's a pretty good rule, Horse Shoe, all the world through. But come, here is supper; draw up, Mr. Butler." Mary Musgrove having completed the arrangement of the board whilst this conversation was in progress, the family now sat down to their repast. It was observable, during the meal, that Mary was very attentive in the discharge of the offices of the table, and especially when they were required by Butler. There was a modest and natural courtesy in her demeanor that attracted the notice of our soldier, and enhanced the kindly impression which the artless girl had made upon him; and it was, accordingly, with a feeling composed, in one degree, of curiosity to learn more of her character, and, in another, of that sort of tenderness which an open-hearted man is apt to entertain towards an ingenuous and pretty female, that he took occasion after supper, when Mary had seated herself on the threshold of the porch, to fall into conversation with her. "You do not live here, I think I have gathered, but are only on a visit?" was the remark addressed to the maiden. "No, sir; it is thirty good long miles by the shortest road, from this to my father's house. Mistress Adair is my mother's sister, and that makes her my aunt, you know, sir." "And your father's name?" "Allen Musgrove. He has a mill, sir, on the Ennoree." "You are the miller's daughter, then. Well, that's a pretty title. I suppose they call you so?" "The men sometimes call me," replied Mary, rising to her feet, and leaning carelessly against one of the upright timbers that supported the porch, "the miller's pretty daughter, but the women call me plain Mary Musgrove." "Faith, my dear, the men come nearer to the truth than the women." "They say not," replied the maiden, "I have heard, and sometimes I have read in good books--at least, they called them good books--that you mustn't believe the men." "And why should you not?"