Si produced a piece of board, which had been painted white, and evidently done duty as part of the door of a house in Murfreesboro', looked at it critically, and then selected a piece of charcoal from the fire, and sat down with an air of studious purpose. "What are you up to now, Si?" asked Shorty curiously.
"Why," explained Si, "I've noticed, whenever we've bin in any big place, that all the fine houses have signs or numbers, or something else onto 'em, to name 'em. I've bin thinkin' o' something for our house. How does 'Hoosier's Rest' strike you for a name?"
"Splendid," said Shorty. "Couldn't be better."
"And," continued Si, "I've got this board to make a sign to nail up over the door. Do you know how to spell Hoosier, Shorty?"
"Blest if I do," answered Shorty. "It wasn't in our book. At least, we never got to it, if it was. You see our spellin'-school broke up just as we got to 'incompatible.' The teacher got too fond o' Nancy Billings, that I was castin' sheep's eyes at myself. He got to givin' her easy words, to keep her at the head o' the class, and pickin' hard ones for me, to send me to the foot, where I'd be fur away from her. I wouldn't stand it always, so me an' him had it out one night before all the scholars; I got away with him, and he left the country, and busted up the school."
"Hoosier," repeated Si to himself. "I never saw it spelled. But there must be some way to spell it. Let me see: 'W-h-o spells who.'"
"That's so," assented Shorty.
"I-s spells 'is,'" continued Si. "Who-is that's right so far. H-e-r-e spells 'here.' 'Who-is-here?' That seems almost right, don't it, Shorty?"
"It certainly does," replied Shorty, scratching his head to accelerate his mental action. "Or it might be, Si, w-h-o, who; i-s, is; and y-e-r, yer. You know some ignorant folks say yer for you. And they say the name came from the people who first settled in Injianny sayin' 'Who's yer?' to any new comer."
"I believe you're right, Shorty," said Si, bending over the board with the charcoal to begin the work. "We'll make it that way, anyway."