“Waal, I expec’ Ben hyar mought hev his say-so ’bout’n studyin’ on the Bible, jes’ in the time fur pullin’ fodder,” suggested Eli Strobe. He was the constable of the district, a heavy, thick-set fellow, forty years of age, perhaps, and of medium height. He had a large head and a certain lowering side glance, barely lifting the lids of his slow dark eyes with a sullen, bovine expression. He carried himself in a deliberate pondering manner, and with distinct aggressiveness. He wore his broad black wool hat pulled far over his brow. His boots were drawn to the knee over his blue jeans trousers, and were graced with large spurs. His features were straight and regular, handsome in their way, and his face was characterized by a sort of surly dignity. He stood sturdily in the road, with his hands in his pockets, and looked up from under the brim of his hat at the horseman. Jepson lifted his head loftily. “I’d ruther be in the wilderness with the sperit than with the gleaners in the richest fields o’ the yearth!” Despite a sanctimonious twang imitated from the circuit rider, his voice in speaking betokened his gift in song. It was rich and low, and as smooth as velvet. The constable, at a spiritual disadvantage, recanted with acerbity. “I reckon so! Ennybody else would, too. Ye talk ez ef nobody hedn’t no religion but yerse’f.” “Laws-a-massy!” exclaimed Jepson’s half-brother, Ben Bowles. “Laws-a-massy! whenst Teck gits ter studyin’ ’bout the Bible-folks, I’d jes’ ez lief he’d wander ez work. He talks ter me till them tales hender me mighty nigh ez much ez him. No fodder sca’cely would hev been pulled hyar ter-day ef he hed stayed.” The mention of his work reminded him of it anew. As he stood in the turn-row, he began to tear from the stalwart stalks of the Indian corn, tasseled far higher than his head, the long blue-green and glossy blades, rustling at a touch and shining in the sun. He was in his shirt-sleeves, a gaunt, shambling fellow, with yellow beard and hair, and long, tobacco-stained teeth; he had a docile, acquiescent face and a temporizing blue eye. Few men could contrive to agree with both Jepson and Strobe, but to Ben Bowles no miracle of trimming was impossible. The corn was fine; the heavy ears, swathed in their crisp husks and crested with sun-embrowned silk, hung far from the stalks, about which trumpet vines twined, the blossoms flaunting scarlet. There even peered out now and then the tender blue eyes of morning-glories, still open, a-bloom in the dank shadow. The more prosaic growth of pumpkins was about the roots, and sometimes Bowles caught his awkward feet in the vines, and added a stumble to his shamble.