rk, declaring it time for all honest folks to be abed. "Thar's lots
o' wuck to be did to-morrow, an' the only way to git it did, is to tek
a good holt on the day at the start, an' set it squarely on its laigs."

CHAPTER II.

GETTING TO WORK

"This process of 'setting the day on its legs' is certainly a noisy
one," was Abner's first thought next morning as he awoke in the gray
dawn to find that the place beside him in the big feather bed had
already been vacated by Henry.

Above the clatter made by dogs, chickens and geese in the yard below,
could be heard the stentorian tones of Mason Rogers evoking his black
myrmidons. "Hi, thar, Rube, Tom, Dink, Eph! Wake up, you lazy
varmints!" From the negro quarters came, in answer to each name, "Yes,
suh! Comin', Marstah!" The creaking boards of the back porch, the
slamming of doors, the clatter of cooking utensils, and the admonishing
voice of Mrs. Rogers attested that she, too, was taking "holt on the
day" in earnest.

Dudley slipped into his clothes and hastened down the steep stairway in
search of such toilet accessories as his attic apartment did not
afford. When he reached the porch, the twins provided him with a basin
of water, a "noggin" of lye soap, and a towel; and telling him he would
find the "coarse comb on the chist of drawers in the settin'-room,"
hurried to the poultry-yard, where the chickens were already off their
roosts and clamoring for their morning meal.

His toilet completed, Dudley started for a ramble before breakfast. At
first a faint pink light began to tinge the eastern sky, but presently,
from over the crest of the hills across the road, the sun arose like a
red ball, dispersing the chill gray mist, and the new day, fresh and
radiant and vibrant with the songs of birds, the crowing and cackling
of chickens, and the lowing of cattle, was fully inaugurated.

If the stranger found the scene in front of the house quietly
beautiful, no less interesting was the more homely one to the rear. In
the stable lot Susan and Rache were each stooping beside a long-horned
cow, milking. In another enclosure Eph was struggling to head off a
determined little calf from its mother, a fierce-looking spotted cow
which a negro woman was trying to milk. At the window of the barn loft
could be seen a negro man tossing down hay to the horses; and in a lot
across the way a number of hogs, in answer to Henry's loud "Soo-e-ey,
soo-e-ey!" came clamoring and squealin