“They poured out five barl’s uv the best whisky—’cordin’ to what’s said uv it—that ever went to town on ’lection day. They say jist one drink ’ould run a man wil’ enough fur the ’sylum, an’ one drap ’ould make a rabbit pick a qua’rl with a bull-dog, ef he had to spit in his face to do it.
“It’s all sech ez that has ruint the country—stark-nater’ly wiped business out’n Montvale. The dirty, low-flunged, lazy good-fur-nothin’ imps uv the devil, prowlin’ aroun’, ’stroyin’ what other people’s sweat has earnt!
“But still they wuzn’t satisfied! Then they went up above the mill—’stillery, as they called it—, an’ drawed the’r Winchesters an’ Smith & Westerns, an’ farred bullets all through the ruff, an’ poked the door ez full o’ holes ez a sifter. They jest blowed the whole thing bodyaciously all to flugens an’ flinderations, with the’r guns an’ pistols.
“An’ that’s how the mill come to be shot down,” she added, as her parting guest once more lifted the gate aside.
“Good day, Madam,” he said, as he lifted it back.
“Wush ye well,” she answered. “Ef ye’re ever hyer agin, come to see us—I reckin we kin stand ye, an’ Bill Ed won’t know nothin’ about it tell he’s up an’ out. He may be gone by that time any way, fur he’s speenied to Feder’l Court up at Louisville purty soon, fur a witness ’gin the government, to swar Sam Ben an’ tother ’shiners out’n trouble.”
“Yes,” said the traveler to himself, “when I put up again at ‘the finest hotel,’ Bill Ed will be gone—to Federal Court, or some lower or higher tribunal.”
INDEFINITELY POSTPONED.
By Eva Williams Malone.