A larger number than usual of possible customers and evident idlers were gathered at Billy West's country store on the Tuesday morning following Court Day, discussing the latest news. The building was a small one-room frame, set in an angle made by the Willis Mill dirt lane and the New Pike, an ideal spot for an exchange of news, often bordering on gossip, and a convenient halfway resting place for those homeward bound, or else on their way to mill or town. The proprietor's small stock of merchandise consisted of a heterogeneous collection, well suited to the needs of the locality, and ranging in variety from knitting needles, for the industrious matron at her fireside in the long winter evenings, to plow-shares, which her sturdy spouse might grasp when the soil demanded tilling in the spring. The varied mixture of farming implements, groceries and clothing presented the appearance of having been deposited by some friendly passing whirlwind, for the owner was of far too sociable a nature to devote much time to "stock-keeping." When an article was wanted, it generally had to be hunted for, unless it chanced to fall under the immediate range of vision of salesman or customer, while the crowded shelves and counters presented a bewildering array of tinware, glassware, patent medicines, clocks, trimmed hats, churns, gaudy neckwear, cheap clothing, mock jewelry, hair-oils and colored perfumes put up in glass bottles of seductive shapes, along with sundry articles great and small necessary to the needs and adornment of the people of the surrounding country. It was not for lack of time that Billy allowed his stock to fall into this chaotic confusion, for he had much leisure on his hands, but, as I have before remarked, he was of a sociable nature, and usually spent his spare moments tilted back in a well-worn chair under a locust tree, if the weather was warm, indulging in neighborhood news, or else was engaged in an exhaustive argument with his circle of solons as to how the government should be properly run. If the season necessitated shelter, the usual coterie removed its sittings to the rear of the store, while during the rigorous winter months checker-playing afforded amusement, the board being of white pine, home-made, in alternate inked squares, and the checkers of black and white horn buttons supplied from the general stock. On the morning I have mentioned, the air was yet cool from a frosty night, but the sun shone brightly, giving promise of speedy warmth, as the day advanced, and the little company chose the sunlight, being sheltered from the breeze by the front of the building, which faced the east. Moses Hunn, an old stager, was descanting on the previous night's raid, having first borrowed a chew of long-green tobacco from his nearest neighbor. Moses was an inveterate chewer and had been relying on his friends for tobacco for the last twenty years. "Yes, sir, they say them night-riders fit like wild cats."