"And a pistol in both hands!" added Killis.
"Boys," I said, "is it possible you can be willing to spend the holy season of Christmas in drinking and shooting?"
"Only way I ever heared of anybody spending it," said Philip; "everybody does it. If there's ary boy here," he added, "that haint been drunk, or tried to, every Christmas he can ricollect, hold up your hand!"
Not a hand moved, till suddenly, as if by an afterthought, Killis's went up. "I weren't last Christmas," he said; "when paw got shot and lay a-dying, he told me never to drink another drap, and I haint toch it sence."
"Mighty hard on you," remarked Joab; "I never pass a Christmas without being drunk,—paw he gen'ally fills me'n Iry up till we can't see single, and then makes us walk a crack in the floor, for fun."
"I allus used to swill all I could hold, from New Christmas to Old Christmas," said Killis.
"I drink all I want and then ride around on Blant's nag and shoot off my rifle," said Nucky.
"When I were a five-year-old," contributed Geordie, "my uncles give me a pint of liquor, and then put a cocked pistol in my hand and p'inted it at Absalom, and told me to shoot. I fired away,—good thing I weren't sober, I'd a-kilt him sure!"
"The neighbors up the branch they invites us to their house and treats us a-Christmas," said Hen; "but Keats he haint half a man,—I can drink twict as much as him!"
"Self-brag is half-scandal," exclaimed Keats, angrily; "it's because I've had white swelling and typhoid I can't drink as much as you, you sorry little scald-pate!"