d to folks that give such sudden turns. Don't you
s'pose you could set down and be comfortable somewheres while I be
talkin', instead of twisting and snerling yourself up in my poor vines?

"You'd rather stand where you be; well, then, I'll get on with my story.

"I was coming to Joel. It's more interesting to strangers, that part
about Joel, for he was, as I said before, everything 'Lihu
lacked--bright and gay, handsome and refined. Ay, and he was a manly
looking feller too, and had took lessons in fighting and worked through
a gymnasium course, while 'Lihu knew no better exercises than sawing
wood and pitching hay and such farm work. 'Lihu was clumsy in moving,
but Joel graceful and light; you'd as soon have thought of the old
church tower taking to dancing as of 'Lihu trying his hand at it; but
Joel, of course, he were the finest dancer anyone had ever see'd in our
neighbourhood.

"So it naturally come about that when Kitty wanted to have a gay
time--and what young girl does not like fun sometimes?--she took to Joel
and left 'Lihu to his fierce jealousy out in the cold.

"Joel had nothing to do but philander after Kitty, come vacations, and
there he'd be lounging round the garden, reading poetry to her, when
she'd a minute to set down, and telling her about the doings of gay
society folks in cities.

"Kitty liked it all, why shouldn't she? and the more 'Lihu looked like a
funeral the more she turned her back on him and favoured t'other. You
see, sir, I give it you fair. There was faults all round; and if you
want my candid opinion, that Joel was more to blame than Kitty, for,
being a man of the world, he knew better than she what the end of it all
was bound to be; that the day would come when she would have to make her
choice between them and that to one of them that day would mean a broken
heart, a spoiled life.

"Ah, well! It was hayin' time just twenty years ago, and a spell of
weather just like this, perhaps a mite warmer, but much the same.

"Well, it threatened a thunderstorm, and all hands was pressed into the
fields. Even Kitty was there, with her rake, for, to tell the truth,
she was child enough to love a few hours in the sweet-smelling meadows.
Joel, he was there, he'd took off his store clothes, and was handsomer
than ever in his flannels, and, with his deftness and muscle, was worth
any two hired men in the field.

"He and 'Lihu, who had come over to lend a hand, was nigh to one another
that aft