“Oh, shet up,” Bassett urged on this occasion, being a prosaic man of this world, with a discerning eye for the foibles of others, and appreciating in some sort vast rifts between these spiritual arrogations and actual possessions. “Ye talk like ez ef ye an’ the Lord war partners!” “Ef I hed it all ter do over agin, I reckon I wouldn’t ride that race,” pursued the moralist speculatively, “knowin’ what I know now, an’ how it all turned out, kase I never wanted ter hurt nobody, much less Eli Strobe. But ef I knowed no more ’n I done then, I’d ride it agin. Tell me it’s agin the law fur me an’ Jube ter race our critters ’long the road, an’ yit it ain’t agin the law ter race yer critters on a reg’lar race-track, kase it puts suthin’ inter the State’s pocket! Thar ain’t no jestice in that law, an’ I won’t abide by it. Naw, folkses, wrong is wrong everywhar, an’ money can’t make it right. No use payin’ the State fur a license ter do wrong.” There were few vaticinations now concerning the result of the disaster; the doctor had come and had shaken his head, the precise significance of which was variously interpreted, the majesty and solemnity of the gesture alone being open to no sort of question. The prophets imitated his caution, and reserved their opinion. Eli mought die, they said, and then agin he moughtn’t. And thus they were prepared for whatever might betide. The doctor had added to the ostensible purpose of his existence the fact of furnishing a new theme to the idle gossips who sat upon the fences, and hung about the store and the forge; he, and his big spectacles, and his bald head, and his old-fashioned buggy—a new and a wonderful vehicle in the estimation of Broomsedge—were canvassed afresh, and those who were fortunate enough to have had some necessity for his services in past times, then considered unfortunate enough, renewed their experiences in their account of the methods of his practice, the repetition of hoarded bits of his conversation, and the comparison of views as to his professional capacity. By the majority he was held to be “ekal ter raisin’ the dead,” but Mrs. Strobe did not coincide in that flattering opinion. “Marcelly,” said the sharp little dame, “that thar old bald-headed buzzard,—an’ he looks percisely like one in them slick black store-clothes,—he knows jes’ ez much ’bout doctorin’ ez Watch thar, ef that.”