“Well, no, sir, not born nephew,” she said, smiling; “he’s a little neighbor boy. His folks live three miles further down the river; but I reckon we all think jest as much of him as if he was our born kin. Won’t you come in, sir?” By this time she had passed under the luxuriant arbor of honeysuckle that shaded the porch, and she threw wide the door. The room was large. It was very tidy. The furniture was of the sort that can be easily transported where railways have to be pieced out with mule trails. But it was hardly the ordinary pioneer cabin. Not because there was a sewing-machine in one corner, for the sewing-machine follows hard on the heels of the plough; perhaps because of the white curtains at the two windows (curtains darned and worn thin by washing, tied back with ribbons faded by the same ministry of neatness), or the square of pretty though cheap carpet on the floor, or the magazines and the bunch of sweet-pease on the table, but most because of the multitude of photographs on the clumsy walls. They were on cards, all of the same size (not more than 8 by 10 inches), protected by glass, and framed in mossy twigs. Some of the pictures were scenes of the country, many of them bits of landscape near the house, all chosen with a marvellous elimination of the usual grotesque freaks of the camera, and with such an unerring eye for subject and for light and shade that the artist’s visions of the flat, commonplace country were not only picturesque but poetic. In the prints also were an extraordinary richness and range of tone. It did not seem possible that mere black and white could give such an effect of brilliancy and depth of color. An artist looking over this obscure photographer’s workmanship might feel a thrill like that which crinkles a flower-lover’s nerves when he sees a mass of azaleas in fresh bloom. Amos was not an artist, but he had a camera at home, and he gave a gulp of admiration. “Well, he _is_ great!” he sighed. “That beats any photographic work I ever saw.” The wife’s eyes were luminous. “Ain’t he!” said she. “It ’most seems wicked for him to be farming when he can do things like that—” “Why does he farm?” “It’s his health. He caynt stand the climate East.” “You are from the South yourself, I take it?” “Yes, sir, Arkansas, though I don’t see how ever you guessed it. I met Mist’ Brown there, down in old Lawrence. I was teaching school then, and went to have my picture taken in his wagon. Went with my father, and he was so pleasant and polite to paw I liked him from the start. He nursed paw during his last sickness. Then we were married and came out here—You’re looking at that picture of little Davy at the well? I like that the best of all the ten; his little dress looks so cute, and he has such a sweet smile; and it’s the only one has his hair smooth. I tell Mist’ Brown I do believe he musses that child’s hair himself—”