One afternoon a boy was plowing corn in a field not far from the river. He was apparently about sixteen years old. Under the sunburn on his face there could be seen the soft color of sadness. He was tall and well formed, and his eyes, when he looked up to tell the time of day by the sun, showed, by their wide-open earnestness--if there be anything in such surmises--that his nature was deep and his disposition frank. He had reached the end of the row, near a rail fence along whose zig-zag way there ran a road half overgrown with briers, and, after turning his horse about, was fanning himself with his broad-brim straw hat, when someone called out: "Halloa, young man!" The plowboy looked around and saw a man standing on the road-side, with his arms resting on the top rail of the fence. The man was of uncommon height, and his hair and bushy beard were of such fiery red as they caught a sunbeam that came down through the wavering boughs of an oak, that the boy, bursting into a laugh, cried out: "Ef you ain't on fire, I never seed er bresh heap a burnin'." "Well," the man replied, with a smile of good nature, "I'm not exactly burning, but I am pretty warm. Drive your horse up there in the shade, and come over and sit down awhile. You look as if you are tired, and besides, I feel disposed to talk to someone." "I am tired," the boy rejoined, "but ef my uncle wuz ter ketch me er settin' erroun', he mout norate it about that I'm lazy. "The fresh-stirred soil shows that you have plowed many furrows to day. If your uncle should circulate such a report," he added, with another good-natured smile, "I will go with you about the neighborhood, and assist you in correcting it. Come, for I know that in talking with me, you would not be ill-spending your time." "Then I reckon you air a school-teacher." "No, I am nothing--nothing but an everyday sort of wayward man." "B'l'eve I'll jine you wunst jest fur luck." He drove his horse into a fence-corner, where the tall alder bushes cast an inviting shadow, and joined the man, who had sat down with his back against a tree. "What is your name?" the man asked. "John Lucas. What's yo'n?" "Sam Potter." "You air a mighty big man, Mr. Potter, an' I reckon you'd be a powerful fine han' ter break a yoke uv steers. Peers ter me like ef I wuz ez strong ez you air, I'd go roun' the country an' grab er-holt uv cattle, an' hold em' jest fur the fun uv seein' 'em kick." He laughed boisterously, and then, when his many shouts had ceased, Potter saw the soft color of sadness, under the sunburn on his face. "Just now you spoke of your uncle," said Potter; "do you live with him?" "Yes, sir. My daddy an' mammy wuz drownded a long time ergo, in the river up yander at the fo'd. Did you come that er way?" "Yes." "Did you see er tall rock stickin' up outen the groun'?" "I think I did." "Wall, I put that rock thar when I got big ernuff. It's ther tombstone." "Are they buried there?"