Jim Cadwalader and his wife sat on the lawn, if the patch of brown grass to the side of their little house could be termed a lawn, and awaited the close of the day. Three huge elms, motionless in the still sunshine and, like all motionless things, adding to the stillness, afforded a canopy against the burning rays of the sun. What mattered it that the cool shaded air was infested with mosquitoes and house-flies or that the coarse grass was uneven and unkempt, from the low mounds which ran all over it or, from the profusion of leaves which had here and there fluttered down from the great trees. For it must be confessed that neither Jim nor his wife had found the time for the proper care of the premises, or if perchance, they had found the time the inclination itself had been wanting. "Sumthins got t' turn up in sum way 'r other b'fore long. I ain't seen the sight o' work here in nigh two year." "Guess you won't see it fur a while," responded the wife, from her straight-backed chair, her arms folded, her body erect. "Like as not a man 'd starve t' death in these here times, with nuthin' t' do." Jim sat with his elbows resting upon his yellow buckskin breeches, his rough stubby fingers interlocked, his small fiery eyes piercing the distance beyond the fields. "If this business o' war was through with, things 'd git right agin." "But it ain't goin' t' be over, let me tell you that." They became silent. Sad as was their plight, it was no sadder than the plight of many of their class. The horrors of a protracted war had visited with equal severity the dwelling places of the rich and the poor. It was not a question of the provision of the sinews of war; tax had been enacted of all classes alike. But it did seem as if the angel of poverty had tarried the longer at the doorposts of the less opulent and had, in proportion to their indigence, inflicted the greater suffering and privation. Figuratively speaking, this was the state of affairs with Jim's house.