“Blorh-hum!” coughed Amazeen, and he proceeded, addressing no one in particular: “When I was a boy, goin’ to school, there was a family named Bragg that lived clust to us, and they had a boy named Ximenus--that was it, Ximenus Bragg. Them Braggs they was poorer--poorer’n Pooduc, but the old man had to have his three dogs, and fin’ly Ximenus was took with a craze for music and nothin’ would do but what he’d got to have a snare drum. And he teased and he coaxed. Old Bragg hadn’t the gumption to plunk his foot right down and say ‘No,’ but he’d whine and argue with the boy and say that with winter a-comin’ on he’d ought to have long-legged boots instead of a drum. Finally Old Bragg told Ximenus that if he would go without the boots and not whine, he could have the drum, and the drum he did get, by gorry. I s’pose that for a couple of days there never was a more tickleder boy. He ratty-tooed and ratty-tummed and long-rolled and biffed and banged and et his meals off’n the head of the thing and kept at it till his ma was so near drove crazy that she chased him out doors with the rollingpin and threatened to bust in the head of that drum if he ever put stick to it ag’in in the house. “There it was, late fall and the snow beginning to fly, and I’ll never forget the sight Ximenus made standin’ out there on the cold door stone on one foot and holding the other foot to the calf of his leg to warm it, and then shifting feet to get the other warm, and drumming away all the time, trying to keep his courage up and make himself believe that he loved music and the drum and was glad he had it instead of them new long-legged boots.” “Beats all about some critters, don’t it?” commented Uncle Buck, after listening to this tale with much interest. “It does that,” returned Amazeen. The Squire had not taken his eyes from the Mayo boy’s face. “Bub,” he said softly, “they meant well--your folks--but--damn ’em for fools. “Are you and the little one hungry?” he asked in a half whisper after a time, careful that the old men did not overhear. “We ain’t suff’rin’ none, Squire, but we don’t have meat vittles nor nothin’ the same’s I had at----” but as the hard lines crinkled ominously around the lawyer’s gray eyes he stopped confusedly. Shielding himself from the scrutiny of Buck and Amazeen behind the youth who still leaned over the table, Squire Phin straightened his leg and cautiously ran his hand into his trousers pocket. After a period of fumbling he slid his hand along the table, slipped a bill into the palm by which the young man was propping himself, squeezed the fingers down over it, and said with a tenderness almost parental: