"Jud's flume boss now, an' Jess she plays that pianner an' sings like a bird. When we gits down ter Mill Flat I'll show yeh their house. It's a white one up on the side o' the hill, jest across the gulch from the mill. "Wal, yeh had all the grub yeh want, pardner? Say, ain't them green gages sour? They sets yer teeth on aidge all right. An' I couldn't find the boys' sugar-can. If yer full up, I guess we'd better git inter the boat." I took my seat behind Oram and a particularly offensive pipe he had just lighted. Looking down the long, swift-running, threatening flume, I shuddered; for since Oram's recital the native hue of my resolution had been "sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought." I remarked that if he saw any of those Cape Horn curves ahead to let me know and I would get out and walk. "Don't yeh be skeer'd by what I told yeh," said he. "Yeh got a pretty fair-sized head, but yeh ain't quite so top-heavy as Mis' Sneath's big upright. An', besides, the' ain't no more Cape Horn on this flume; they calls that place Pianner P'int now." THE CONTUMACY OF SARAH L. WALKER BY MIRIAM MICHELSON Reprinted from _Munsey's Magazine_ of April, 1904 by permission "THE BOARD will now pass to consideration of the case of Mrs.--Mrs. Walker." The president looked from the report in front of her to the superintendent sitting opposite. The Rev. Alexander McCaleb rose slowly to his feet. "I regret exceedingly," he said, "to have to report this case to the board. I need not say that if it had been possible to convince Mrs. Walker of the error of her ways, no pains or time would have been spared. But I have done all that I could. Mrs. Walker persists. She--ah!--she flouts all authority, and--ah!--sets such an example of rebellious conduct that I fear the discipline of the home may be gravely compromised." The president knitted her pretty, dark brows. Her hair was white, with a soft, youthful whiteness that haloed her head as if it was a joke of old Time's. She was new to her office, and was conscious of a critical atmosphere that subtly underlined the formality of the proceedings--an official formality that made the meeting of the lady managers of this Old People's Home a formidable affair. "I see no record of any case of disciplining heretofore," she said, troubled. "There is no precedent by which the chair can be----" "But there are the by-laws," suggested the superintendent. He reached over to his own desk, and read from a pamphlet that had lain open there: "If any inmate of the home shall persistently and willfully disobey the rules, the superintendent shall report such case to the board of managers. If, after full and complete investigation, and a notice to that effect having been duly served, said inmate shall continue to persist in contumacy, the board is by a majority vote empowered to expel." A little hush fell upon the assemblage at this invocation of its dread powers.