Thinks I to myself: “Mebby, he is a-enjoyin’ poor health.” And then, thinks I: “Mebby, he is a-backslidin’, or mebby, he is backslid.”
And one day, I says to him, says I:
“Josiah Allen, what is the matter with you? You don’t act like the same man you did, several weeks ago. I am goin’ to steep you up some catnip, and thorough-wort, and see if that won’t make you feel better; and some boneset.”
“I don’t want none of your boneset and catnip,” says he, impatient-like.
“Wall, then,” says I, in still more anxious tones, “if it ’taint yur health that is a-sufferin’, is it yur morals? Do you feel totterin’, Josiah? Tell yur pardner.”
“My morals feel all right.”
Says I, anxiously: “if yur hain’t enjoyin’ poor health, Josiah, and yur morals feel firm, why is there such a change in yur mean?” says I. “Yur mean don’t seem no more like the mean it used to be, than if it belonged to another man.”
But, instead of answering my affectionate arguments, he jumped up, and started for the barn.
And, oh! how feerfully, feerfully cross he wus, for the next several days. Finally, to the breakfast-table, one mornin’, I says to him, in tones that would be replied to:
“Josiah Allen, you are a-carryin’ sunthin’ on yur mind.” And says I, firmly: “Yur mind hain’t strong enough to carry it. You must and shall let yur pardner help you!”