"But the prettiest sight I seed, paw, was Fulty and t'other wild boys that runs with him a-setting there so peaceable and civil, a-hemming handkerchers. And the amazingest was Fulty and Darcy a-playing together in the same set, and nary a shoot shot." Uncle Lot turned these things over in his mind as he sat on the porch after supper, gazing up into the virgin forest of the mountain in front. After a while he quoted:-- "'The lips of a strange woman drop honey, and her mouth is smoother than butter; yea, the furrin woman is a norrow pit, and they that are abhorred of the Lord shall fall therein.' "I give you the benefit of Solomon's counsel, Ailsie, afore you went in to see them women; but you tuck your perverse way, and now you have seed for yourself. What made Fulty and his crowd of boys set there so mild and tame, with needles instid of weepons in their hands? What caused Darcy and Fult to forgit their hatred and play together like sucking lambs? Why, nothing naetural or righteous by no means--naught but a devil's device, a bewitchment them furrin women has laid upon 'em. I can relate to you right now what them women is, beyand a doubt. A body knows in reason that five good-lookers like them is bound to have husbands somewhere or 'nother; and my ingrained opinion is that the last of 'em is runaway wives that has tired of their men and their duty, and come off up here to lay their spells on t'other men. Which is as good as proved by what you have told." Aunt Ailsie gasped. "O paw," she said, "if you was to talk to 'em you'd know they wa'n't that kind!" "If I was to talk to 'em," declared Uncle Lot, judicially, "I'd examinate and cross-question 'em tell I got at the pine-blank facts of the case. I'm a fa'r lawyer myself, having sot on so many grand juries, and I wouldn't leave ary stone onturned tell I proved upon 'em what they air!" After this, Aunt Ailsie dared not inform him that she had asked two of the women to take the night with her Monday night. The following day--Sunday--Uncle Lot started off at daylight for a distant "funeral occasion," and she improved the time by giving her house a searching cleaning. She also swept the yard all around, under the big apple trees, until not a speck or a blade of anything was left upon it. Then she walked up the branch half a mile, to her son Lincoln's, and said to his wife:-- "Fetch the young-uns and come down to-morrow early, Rutheny, and help me bake and get ready for company. I axed two of them women on the hill--Virginny and Amy--to take the night with me, and now I'm afeared I won't have things fixed right. And don't name nothing to Lot about their coming."