No, not a single word did I hear from a Jonesvillian, male or female. And not one word from my pardner, though his excitement wuz so extreme that that night, jest about dusk, he rushed out thinkin' that he had got the murderer, and throwed the rope round Deacon Sypher, who had come over to borrow an auger. And once in a similer way he ketched Old Bobbet, his excitement and zeal wuz so rampant and intense. [Illustration: He rushed out and throwed the rope around Deacon Sypher.] Them old men wuz mad as hens, and cause enough they had, though they forgive him when they see what a state he wuz in, and they jest about as bad themselves. But not a word from them, nor from any one did I hear durin' the hull time the excitement rained--and oh! how it did rain--about the cause of the crime. Not one man waded in and dived down into the deep undercurrent of causes, that strange deep that underlays all human actions. And once durin' the last day's hunt for the murderer, who wuz hidin' round somewhere--it wuz spozed in the woods--I see as I looked out of my kitchen winder, at a party headed for our swamp, one man fur more ferocious actin' than any I had seen; he wuz a-hollerin' wilder, and he carried a fur longer rope. And I asked my companion who that man wuz that acted madder and fur more fiercer than any of the rest and more anxious to git holt of the escapin' man, so he could be hung up to once to the highest tree that could be found. I hearn him say that right out of my own kitchen winder--I hearn him say-- "We won't wait for no law; if we only ketch him we will hang him up so high that the buzzards can't git him." And then he yelled out savage and fierce and started off on a run for the swamp, the rest of the men applaudin' him up high, and follerin' on after him. And Josiah told me that wuz the saloon-keeper up to Zoar. Sez I, "The very man that sold that poor sinner the licker on that night?" "Yes," sez Josiah. "Wall," sez I, "the rope ort to be used on his own neck." And Josiah Allen acted awfully horrified at my idee, and asked me "if I wuz as crazy as a loon?" And sez he, "He has been one of the fiercest ones to head him off that has been out." And I sez dryly--dry as a chip, "He wuzn't so fierce to head him off the night he sold him the whiskey and hard cider." Sez I, "That headin' off would have amounted to sunthin'." And agin I sez, "The rope ort to be used on his own neck, if it is on anybody's, his and Uncle Sam's." And agin Josiah Allen asked me, "If I wuz as crazy as a dumb loon and a losin' my faculties--what few of 'em you ever had," sez he.