learnin' you to steal sheep and vote
for Vallandigham. I'd like to put a stone around his neck and feed him
to the catfish."

There was something so strange and earnest about the Deacon's wrath that
it impressed the negro more than any of the most terrible exhibitions
of wrath that he had seen his master make. He cowered down, and began
crying in a maudlin way and begging:

"Pray God, Boss, don't be so hard on a poor nigger."

Si, who had learned something more of the slave nature than his father,
ended the unpleasant scene by giving Abraham Lincoln a sharp slap across
the hips with a piece of clapboard and ordering:

"Pick up that camp-kettle, go to the spring and fill it, and git back
here in short meter."

The blow came to the negro as a welcome relief. It was something that
he could understand. He sprang to his feet, grinned, snatched up the
campkettle, and ran to the spring.

"I must get that man away from here without delay," said the Deacon.
"The influences here are awful. They'll ruin him. He'll lose his soul if
he stays here. I'll start home with him to-morrow."

"He'll do worse'n lose his soul," grumbled Shorty, who had been looking
over the provisions. "He'll lose the top of his woolly head if he brings
another{42} gang o' coons around here to eat us out o' house and home.
I'll be gosh durned if I don't believe they've eat up even all the salt
and soap. There ain't a crumb left of anything. Talk about losin' his
soul. I'd give six bits for something to make him lose his appetite."

"I'll take him home to-morrow," reiterated the Deacon. "I raised over
'leven hundred bushels o' corn last year, 'bout 500 o' wheat, and just
an even ton o' pork. I kin feed him awhile, anyway, but I don't know as
I'd chance two of him."

"What'll you do if you have him and the grasshoppers the same year,
Pap?" inquired Si.

That night the Deacon began his preparations for returning home. He had
gathered up many relics from the battlefield to distribute among
his friends at home and decorate the family mantlepiece. There were
fragments of exploded shells, some canister, a broken bayonet, a smashed
musket, a solid 12-pound shot, and a quart or more of battered bullets
picked up in his walks over the scenes of the heavy fighting.

"Looks as if you were going into the junk business. Pap," commented Si,
as the store was gathered on the floor.

The faithful old striped carpetsack was brought out, and its handles
repaired w