The major pulled himself up, half sobered as if by a dash of cold water. "And what has Cabarreux to make him fit for her?" he demanded shrilly. "Neither money nor brains. No one of the name ever had energy to earn salt to his bread. Cabarreux? Bah-h! Boyer is a man! Why, gentlemen, if Peter Marmaduke Boyer were to appear in Sevier, it would be like the coming of the eagle among the magpies." "Sam, you're drunk," said Byloe. "What d'ye know about the man?" "Know Boyer?" He laughed. The major had a peculiar laugh, which always put the crowd about the pump in a good-humor--a shrill, pleasant cackle of exultation. "Why, the whole country knows Boyer. But, if you must know it, he was a personal friend of mine. He had a great intellect--a gi-gantic intellect," sweeping the horizon with his arm. "He represented one of the great Western States in the Senate, Mr. Byloe: ten years ago he was known through the length and breadth of the Union as North Carolina's favorite son. To have asked who was Peter M. Boyer then would have argued yourself unknown." "Sam's right," said the squire, nodding. "Now, that you speak of it, I remember him perfectly well. He had a great reputation as a politician. The Raleigh _Herald_ used to publish his speeches _in extenso_. Queer he took no part in the war!" The major chuckled again, delighted: "He did, sir! he did! Beauregard had no braver officer. To see that man lead his command into the teeth of the Yankees was a spectacle nobody who saw it can ever forget." The little man stood up as he talked, gesticulating fiercely as if in the presence of the foe, his linen coat flapping about his legs, his white hat set jauntily on one side. "Ha! those were pleasant days, squire," wiping his forehead in a glow of triumph. "They brought men up to their proper level! Boyer was never promoted, though. He was too modest to push himself, and war was hardly the right groove for him, after all." "So this great man was a personal friend of yours, Sam?" asked Byloe with another wink and shrug at the crowd. The major nodded: "Yes. I wasn't always a drunken loafer in Sevier, nor Ike Byloe's companion," he said quietly. There was a laugh of applause. The little man, with all his vaporing, his windy boasts, his general utter worthlessness, had at bottom a grain of something genuine which keen Ike Byloe lacked. "What sort of looking man was this Boyer, Sam?" asked the doctor. "I confess I have a curiosity about the jedge's heir." "Oh, a fine-looking fellow--every inch a man," said the major carelessly. "Voice orotund, magnetic. Easy manners. Good figure;" and he walked up and down complacently, slapping his own shrunk shank. There had been a well-shaped leg inside of the ragged linen trousers once, and the conscious merit which infused every atom of his lean little body still culminated in his strut.