will be a scandal ter the jay-bird. I won't hev so much lef' ez the
horn of a muley cow!"

And with this extreme statement he whirled his horse and rode on at
the head of the cavalcade in dignified silence. He was not a dweller
in the immediate vicinity, but hailed from the Cove,--a man of
substance and a large cattle-owner, pasturing his herds, duly branded,
on a tract of unfenced wilderness, his mountain lands, where they
roamed in the safe solitudes of those deep seclusions during the
summer, and were rounded up, well fattened, and driven home at the
approach of winter. He was the typical man of convictions, one who
entertains a serious belief that he possesses a governing conscience
instead of an abiding delight in his own way. He had a keen eye, with
an upward glance from under the brim of his big wool hat, and he
looked alert to descry any encroachment on his vested rights to
prescribe opinion. The jury of view were destined to find it a
doubtful boon that the road law interposed no insurmountable obstacle
to prevent their hearing thus informally the views of those
interested.

Persimmon Sneed's deep feeling on the subject had been evinced by his
dispensing with the customary salutations, and one of the jury of
view, with a mollifying intention, observed that they would use their
best judgment to promote the interests of all parties.

"Ai-yi!" said Persimmon Sneed, ruefully shaking his head. "But s'pose
ye hev got mighty pore jedgmint? Ye'll be like mos' folks I know, ef
ye hev. I'd ruther use my own best jedgmint, a sight."

At which another of the jury suavely remarked that they would seek to
be impartial.

"That's jes' what I kem along fur," exclaimed Persimmon Sneed
triumphantly,--"ter show ye edzac'ly whar the bull's eye be. Thar
ain't no use fur this road, an' ye air bound ter see it ef ye ain't
nowise one-sided and partial."

The jury relapsed into silence and rode steadily on.

The true raw material of contradiction lay in three younger men among
the spectators, contumacious, vehement, and, albeit opposed to the
road, much inclined to spoke the wheel of old Persimmon Sneed, however
that wheel might revolve.

"I got caught on a jury in a criminal case with him wunst," Silas
Boyd, a heavy, thick-set, tall young fellow with a belligerent eye and
a portentously square jaw, said _sotto voce_ to his next comrade. "I
hev sarved on a jury with him,--locked up fur a week 'thout no
verdic'. He ain't got