IN early days, Ben Overton kept a little grocery store in the woods, and when James Mitchell quit making whiskey, Ben went to St. Louis and bought a barrel of whiskey and put out the word that he would not sell it in any other way but by the drink, a picayune a drink. The men did not like him very well, they said he was mean. When Ben got home, on the Saturday after, the men gathered there from ten miles around, and now Ben thought he would have a big day. The men had their jugs hid in the bushes, and soon one of my uncle’s and Bill Doyle got into a fight, just out under some trees, then while Ben’s attention was diverted, the men run in at the back door and filled up their jugs, also one for each of the combatants, and when the last jug was full some one hollered: “Part ’em.” They did not hardly leave Ben whiskey enough to “drown his trouble.” The Spelling Match. IN our early boyhood we hardly ever saw a buggy and there were not many farmers who owned a wagon. At one time there was to be a spelling contest between our school and one five miles East and we was bothered to decide how to get the girls there; but a day or two before the time for the spelling, there came a deep snow, and then we knew what to do; we had a very large yoke of oxen, we would hitch them to the big sled and we would have room for all, and when the day came, soon afternoon, we hitched up and started around to gather up our load of boys and girls, and when we got them crowded closely into the sled, we found we had room for all only two, but we knew how to manage that, and I got on the back of old Pete, while cousin Frank got on old Mike and we struck out; but before we got there we had a long hill to go down, and on one side there was a pretty deep ditch washed out and when we started down the hill the steers got to going faster and faster, and when we saw that we were running into that ditch, we hollered “hoa”, and the steers stopped very suddenly, while we “scooted” over their heads into the deep snow; we jumped up as quick as we could, and looked back, the sled was standing up on one side, while the boys and girls were piled up in that ditch three feet deep, but there was no one hurt much, and we brushed the snow off, and got there just at dark. Our boys and girls kept laughing so, that we found it necessary to ask leave to get up and explain what they were laughing about. I told it as funny as I could, and I was in practice then for telling things funny; I also tried to show how old Pete was standing, when I looked around, but I did not have legs enough to show it just right; when I got through, it took a long time to restore order. When we had spelled for a long time and all were “spelled down” on both sides, except our brother Albert on our side and Manda Johnson on their side, and when they had spelled for two hours, and neither one had missed a word, the judges decided to call it a “draw” and dismissed. The Prices.