denly
waked from a brown study, and dropped off into another as soon as he had
given the definition.

"Busy, does it? Wall, I guess we ain't no better off now 'n we ever was.
One tree's 'bout 's busy as another, as fur 's I can see."

"Wall, there is kind of a meanin' in it to me, but it'sturrible far
fetched," remarked Jabe Slocum, rather sleepily. "You see, our ellums
and maples 'n' all them trees spends part o' the year in buddin' 'n'
gittin' out their leaves 'n' hangin' em all over the branches; 'n' then,
no sooner air they full grown than they hev to begin colorin' of 'em red
or yeller or brown, 'n' then shakin' 'em off; 'n' this is all extry, you
might say, to their every-day chores o' growin' 'n' cirkerlatin' sap,
'n' spreadin' 'n' thickenin' 'n' shovin' out limbs, 'n' one thing 'n'
'nother; 'n' it stan's to reason that the first 'n' hemlocks 'n' them
California redwoods, that keeps their clo'es on right through the year,
can't be so busy as them that keeps a-dressin' 'n' ondressin' all the
time."

"I guess you're 'bout right," allowed Steve, "but I shouldn't never 'a'
thought of it in the world. What yer takin' out o' that bottle, Jabe? I
thought you was a temperance man."

"I guess he 's like the feller over to Shandagee schoolhouse, that said
he was in favor o' the law, but agin its enforcement!" laughed Pitt
Packard.

"I ain't breakin' no law; this is yarb bitters," Jabe answered, with a
pull at the bottle.

"It's to cirkerlate his blood," said Ob Tarbox; "he's too dog-goned lazy
to cirkerlate it himself."

"I'm takin' it fer what ails me," said Jabe oracularly; "the heart
knoweth its own bitterness, 'n' it 's a wise child that knows its own
complaints 'thout goin' to a doctor."

"Ain't yer scared fer fear it'll start yer growth, Laigs?" asked little
Brad Gibson, looking at Jabe's tremendous length of limb and foot. "Say,
how do yer git them feet o' yourn uphill? Do yer start one ahead, 'n'
side-track the other?"

The tree rang with the laughter evoked by this sally, but the man from
Tennessee never smiled.

Jabe Slocum's imperturbable good humor was not shaken in the very least
by these personal remarks. "If I thought 't was a good growin' medicine,
I'd recommend it to your folks, Brad," he replied cheerfully. "Your
mother says you boys air all so short that when you're diggin' potatoes,
yer can't see her shake the dinner rag 'thout gittin' up 'n' standing
on the potato hills! If I was a siniki