“An’ ye jes’ stood up thar, Lethe Sayles, ez bold-faced ez a biscuit-block, an’ lifted up yer outdacious voice afore all them men? Waal, sir! Waal! I dunno what the wimmen air a-comin’ ter!” “I war obligated ter tell sech ez I knowed,” Alethea contended against this assumption of superior delicacy. “I never felt no more bold-faced than in tellin’ ’speriunce ’fore the brethren at camp.” “Oh, child!” cried Mrs. Marvin. “It’s the spirit o’ grace movin’ at camp, but at court it’s the nimbleness o’ the devil.” Alethea argued no further, for conversation was impeded by the succeeding operations of gathering the crop. Marvin was leading the team of the great wagon from one to another of the heaps of corn. The huge creaking wheels crushed the ranks of stalks that fell in confusion on either side; the white canvas cover had been removed from the hoops, in order to facilitate the throwing of the corn into the wagon. Through the wreaths of smoke appeared the long ears of a pair of mules. Sam Marvin had apparently found his new home in a thirstier locality than his old, for he was evidently thriving. The pair of mules might have been considered a sorry team in point of appearance: their sides were rubbed bare with the friction of the trace-chains; they were both unkempt, and one was very tall and the other small, but they were stalwart and sure-footed and fleet, and a wonderful acquisition in lieu of the yoke of slow oxen she remembered. The continuous thud, as the ears of corn were thrown into the wagon, enabled Marvin to affect not to hear Alethea’s reiteration as to Tad’s fate. “I wisht ye’d tell me suthin’ ’bout’n Tad,” she said piteously. “I wisht I knew ye hedn’t hurt him, nor—nor”—