“I am very sorry my good neighbors’ sympathy demonstrates itself in that way,” said Mr. Force.
“You can’t help it, though!” triumphantly exclaimed the lady from the diggings, as she gave the off horse a sharp cut that started the whole team in a gallop, and jerked all the party out of their seats and into them again.
“As a magistrate, it is my bounden duty to help it,” returned Mr. Force, as soon as he recovered from the jolt.
“Look here, ole man! You take a fool’s advice and lay low and say nothing when lynch law is going round seeking whom it may devour! For when it has feasted on one wictim it licks its chops and looks round for another, and wouldn’t mind gobbling up a magistrate or two any more than you would so many oysters! Leastways that is how it was at Wild Cats’. And I tell you, our boys out there woudn’t have let a beat like him cumber the face of the earth twenty-four hours after his first performance, if they could have got hold of him. It’s a word and a blow with them, and the blow comes first! Now, for goodness’ sake, do stop talking, ole man! I can’t listen to you and drive down this steep hill at the same time without danger of upsetting! Whoa, Jessie! What y’re ’bout, Jack? Stea—dee!”
And the lady on the box gave her whole attention to taking her team safely down Chincapin Hill and across the bridge over Chincapin Creek.
“Oh! how glad I am to see the dear old woods and the creek and the bridge once more!” said little Elva, fervently.
“‘See!’ Why, you can’t see a mite of it! It is as dark here as the bottom of a shaft at midnight. No moon. And what light the stars might give hid by the meeting of the trees overhead. ‘See,’ indeed! There’s imagination for you!” replied Mrs. Anglesea.
“Well, anyhow I know we are on the dear old bridge, and going over the creek, because I can hear the sound of the wheels on the planks and the gurgle of the water running through the rocks and stones,” deprecatingly replied Elva.
“Why don’t you say ecstatically—
“‘Hail! blest scenes of my childhood!’