Yes, though it wuz one on his side instid of mine, justice makes me say he seemed to be a good feller, and smart as a whip, too. And he seemed to feel real friendly and cousinly towards us, though I had never laid eyes on him more than once or twice before. Josiah had known him when they wuz boys. He had lived in Vermont, and had been educated high, been through college, and preachin’ schools of the best kind, and had sot out in life as a minister, but bein’ broke up with quinsy, and havin’ a desire to be in some Christian work, he took to colporterin’, and had been down in the Southern States to work amongst the freedmen for years. He went not long after the war closed. I guess he hated to give up preachin’, for I believe my soul that he wanted to do good, and bein’ so awful smart it wuz a cross, I know—and once in a while he would kind o’ forget himself, and fall into a sort o’ preachin’, eloquent style of talkin’, even when he wuz conversin’ on such subjects as butter, and hens, and farmin’, and such. But I know he did it entirely onbeknown to himself. And to the table—the blessin’ he asked wuz as likely a one as I ever see run at anybody’s table, but it wuz middlin’ lengthy, as long about as a small-sized sermon. Josiah squirmed—I see he did, he squirmed hard, though he is a good Christian man. He wuz afraid the cream biscuit would be spilte by the delay; they are his favorites, and though I am fur from bein’ the one that ought to speak of it, my biscuit are called delicious. And though I hate to say it, hate to show any onwillingness to be blessed to any length by so good a man and so smart a one—yet I must say them biscuit wuzn’t the biscuit they would have been had the blessin’ been more briefer, and they had been eat earlier. Howsomever, they wuz pretty good ones after all, and Cousin John Richard partook of five right along one after the other, and seemed to enjoy the fifth one jest as well as he did the earlier editions. They wuzn’t very large, but light, and tender. Wall, after supper, he and my pardner sot down in the settin’-room, while I wuz a washin’ up the dishes, and a settin’ the sponge for my griddle-cakes for breakfast. And I hearn ’em a talkin’ about Uncle Noah, and Uncle Darius, and Cousin Melinda, and Sophronia Ann, and Aunt Marrier and her children—and lots more that I had never hearn of, or had forgot if I had. They seemed to be a takin’ solid comfort, though I see that Cousin John Richard every time he got a chance would kinder preach on ’em. If there wuz a death amongst ’em that they talked over, John Richard would, I see, instinctively and onbeknown to himself preach a little funeral sermon on ’em, a first-rate one, too, though flowery, and draw quite a lot of morals. Wall, I thought to myself, they are a takin’ sights of comfort together, and I am glad on it. I dearly love to see my pardner happy.