"Hold on, Amos," put in the Judge warningly, "that's outlawed. Talking about being bald and the war reminds me of the night Walters and I---- By the way, where is Walters to-night?" "Sick," put in the Colonel, straightening up exultantly. "I waxed him three straight games last night. You won't see him again till spring. Skunked him once, and beat him twice." "Oh, git out." "Hear the old seed twitter!" "Did you ever notice, gentlemen, how lying and baldness go together?" queried Foster, reflectively. "No! Do they?" "Invariably. I've known many colossal liars, and they were all as bald as apples." The Colonel was getting nervous, and was so slow that even Gordon (who could sit and stare at the board a full half hour without moving) began to be impatient. "Come, Colonel, marshal your forces a little more promptly. If you're going at me _echelon_, sound y'r bugle; I'm ready." "Don't worry," answered the Colonel, in his calmest nasal. "I'll accommodate you with all the fight you want." "Did it ever occur to you," began the Judge again, addressing the crowd generally, as he moved back to the stove and lit another cigar, "did it ever occur to you that it is a little singular a man should get bald on the _top_ of his head first? Curious fact. So accustomed to it we no longer wonder at it. Now see the Colonel there. Quite a growth of hair on his clapboarding, as it were, but devilish thin on his roof." Here the Colonel looked up and tried to say something, but the Judge went on imperturbably: "Now, I take it that it's strictly providential that a man gets bald on top of his head first, because, if he _must_ get bald, it is best to get bald where it can be covered up." "By jinks, that's a fact!" said Foster, in high admiration of the Judge's ratiocination. Steve was specially pleased, and, drawing a neck-yoke from a barrel standing near, pounded the floor vigorously. "Talking about being bald," put in Foster, "reminds me of a scheme of mine, which is to send no one out to fight Indians but bald men. Think how powerless they'd be in"---- The talk now drifted off to Indians, politics and religion, edged round to the war, when the grave Judge began telling Ridings and Robie just how "Kilpatrick charged along the Granny White Turnpike," and, on a sheet of wrapping-paper, was showing where Major John Dilrigg fell. "I was on his left, about thirty yards, when I saw him throw up his hand"---- Foster in a low voice was telling something to the Professor and two or three others, which made them whoop with uncontrollable merriment, when the roaring voice of big Sam Walters was heard outside, and a moment later he rolled into the room, filling it with his noise. Lottridge, the watchmaker, and Erlberg, the German baker, came in with him. "_Hello_, hello, _hello_! All here, are yeh?" "All here waiting for you--and the turnkey," said Foster.