'Practicin',' said Tip soberly, as he turned slowly, his face damp and red with exertion.
'Fer what?' Uncle Eb enquired.
'Fer the 'sylum, I guess,' he answered, with a faint smile.
'Ye don' need no more practice,' Uncle Eb answered. 'Looks t' me as though ye was purty well prepared.'
To me there was a touch of pathos in this show of the deeper things in Tip's nature that had been kindled to eruption by my spouting. He would not come in to dinner that day, probably from an unfounded fear that we would make fun of his flight—a thing we should have been far from doing once we understood him.
It was a bitter day of one of the coldest winters we had ever known. A shrieking wind came over the hills, driving a scud of snow before it The stock in the stables, we all came in, soon after dinner, and sat comfortably by the fire with cider, checkers and old sledge. The dismal roar of the trees and the wind-wail in the chimney served only to increase our pleasure. It was growing dusk when mother, peering through the sheath of frost on a window pane, uttered an exclamation of surprise.
'Why! who is this at the door?' said she. 'Why! It's a man in a cutter.' Father was near the door and he swung it open quickly. There stood a horse and cutter, a man sitting in it, heavily muffled. The horse was shivering and the man sat motionless.
'Hello!' said David Brower in a loud voice.
He got no answer and ran bareheaded to the sleigh.
'Come, quick, Holden,' he called, 'it's Doctor Bigsby.'