The elders of the party stared at one another. The fire roared suddenly as a log broke, burned in twain; the limestone fragments, still crude, went rattling down into the crevices its fall had made. Peter Knowles’s arm, with the free ministerial gesticulation which he was wont to copy, fixed the absurdity upon Ormsby even before he spoke. “Don’t ye know that thar Philistine ain’t got sech speech ez them ez lives in Happy Valley, nor thar clothes, nor thar raisin’, nor thar manners, nor thar ways, nor thar--nuthin’? Don’t you-uns sense that?” “I ’lowed ez much ter him,” replied Ormsby, a trifle browbeaten by the seniority of his interlocutor and the difficulty of the subject. “I up-ed an’ said, ‘Ye ain’t nowise like folks ez live in Happy Valley. Ter look at ye, I’d set it down fur true ez ye hed never been in the shadder o’ Chilhowee all yer days.’” “An’ what did he say, bub?” demanded old man Cobbs gently, after a moment of waiting. “Great Gosh, yes!” exclaimed Peter Knowles explosively. “We-uns ain’t a-waitin’ hyar ter hear you-uns tell yer talk; ennybody could hev said that an’ mo’. What did the man say?” Ormsby turned doubtfully toward the descending sun and the reddening sky. “We-uns war a-huntin’, me an’ that juggler. I seen him yestiddy mornin’. I went down thar ter Mis’ Sims’ an’ happened ter view him. An’ I loant him my brother’s gun. An’ whenst I said that ’bout his looks an’ sech, we war a-huntin’, an’ he ’peared not ter know thar war enny Happy Valley ’way over yander by Chilhowee. An’ I tuk him up high on the mounting whar he could look over fur off an’ see the Rich Woods an’ Happy Valley, an’--an’”--He paused. “An’ what did he say?” inquired Knowles eagerly. Ormsby looked embarrassed. “He jes’ say,” he went on suddenly, as if with an effort, “he jes’ say, ‘Oh, Dr. Johnson!’ an’ bust out a-laffin’. I dunno what the critter meant.” Once more Ormsby turned, swinging his axe in his strong right hand, and glanced absently over the landscape.