“No—oh, no,” answered Sam (for it turned out that so the typical Yankee was called). “No; he gits enough to eat and wear, but he never hez a cent to lay by, and never will.”
“Don’t drink, doos he?” asked Jed, who seemed to belong to a different town from the one wherein the others and Seth abode. His acquaintance with the one under discussion was evidently by no means intimate.
“No; he ain’t got no vices ’t I know of. Jes’ onlucky.”
“It’s s’prisin’ haow tantalizin’ly clus good fortin hez come to him—different times,” said the one who had asked for the tobacco, and whom the others called Silas.
“You’re right, Silas,” assented Sam. “He c’n come nearer to good luck ’thout techin’ it ’an any man I ever see.”
“Don’t seem to worrit him much,” said Jed. “He seems cheerful.”
“Don’t nothin’ worrit him,” Sam continued. “Most easy-goin’ man on the face of the airth. He don’t ask fer sympathy. He takes great doses of bad luck ’s ef ’twas good fer his health.”
“Never fergit,” said Silas, “the time when he bought a fine new milch Jarsey at auction fer five dollars. Why, he hed two offers fer her nex’ day, an’ I know one of ’em was forty dollars—”
“Well, naow I call that purty lucky,” interrupted Jed.
“Wait!” continued Silas, seating himself more comfortably on a trunk. “Seth he wouldn’t sell. Said he never did hev his fill of milk, an’ he was goin’ to keep her. Very nex’ day, b’ George! she choked on a turnip, an’ when he faound her she was cold. Man sympathized with him. ‘Too bad, Seth,’ says he; ‘ye ’r’ aout forty dollars.’ ‘Five’s all I figger it at,’ says Seth. ‘Didn’t keer to sell.’